ISO: LED guide/advice

Your biggest problem with a space like that is going to be temperature control, LEDs run relatively cool but that doesn't mean that they don't generate ANY heat. This heat can quickly build up in an enclosed space. If your area is very well ventilated I would go with an illuminator 90w UFO style 5-band, tri-spectrum from ProSource WorldWide
LED Grow Lights from ProSource Worldwide - LED Grow Lights w/ 5-Band Tri-Spectrum design. Newest technology available.
This is one of the few LED fixtures that cover peak absorption wavelengths for both ChlA & B as well as the carotenoids. It has been well documented in the scientific lit. that exercising the carotenoid yellow pigments greatly influences photosynthetic rate.

Another issue with LEDs is delayed finishing in the ripening process. This is easily remedied by the illuminators greater spectral coverage and the use of high P-K bloom enhancers, i.e. KoolBloom, BudBlood, Shooting Powder, ect. ect. and a good carb supplement to keep your endogenous bacterial population healthy (unsulphured blackstrab molasses).

I currently use a GlowPannel45 from SunShine Systems as I only grow I plant at a time.
The GlowPanel 45 LED Grow Light - led grow lights -Sunshine Systems
This is actually a 28w system employing a constant current power supply to over drive the1/2w diodes.
Heres what the company wrote me about this fixture:
Customer Support wrote:
Thank you for your email. The GlowPanel 45 was originally a 45 watt light.
We were not happy with the efficiency of the power supply (heat loss) so we
redesigned it and the new one (constant current) pulls only 28 watts. There
is absolutely no loss in light output with the new design. It is just much
more efficient. The light output remains the same but the heat dissipation
from the power supply is considerably less. It is a misconception that the
higher the wattage the greater the light output. This is simply not so.
Our customers our thrilled with not only the performance of the light but
it's increased efficiency too.

These LEDs really max out the ChlB absorption peaks but misses the target for ChlA (the main driver in the photosynthetic quotient). Thus these panels MUST be supplemented with a broader spectrum light. CFLs are perfect in this role. You would only need a few low wattage CFLs to keep ChlA, photosystems I & II and the caratinoids sufficiently stimulated and pumping out hydrogens and increasing the efficiency of the ChlB light reaction. I personally go big on this one (2x 26W cool white, 2x 26W warm white, 2x 42W warm white & 2x 26W UVB 10.0). I have these 8 CFLs attached to and hanging from my LED panel. An ocellating tower fan rotates the whole contraption 180 degrees clockwise and then 180 degrees counter clock wise. This provides excellent light coverage and eliminates most of the light penetration issues that put LEDs and CFLs at a disadvantage to HIDs.
[ame="http://s984.photobucket.com/albums/ae330/moochies420/?action=view&current=ledspin.flv"]ledspin.flv video by moochies420 - Photobucket[/ame]
Spin Spin Sugar!
The addition of the UVB bulbs will serve to increase your trichome and THC production and result in some very crystally buds, but the UV should be dosed. Mine are set for 1 hour off 30 minutes on during veg and 30mins off/30mins on during flowering for the duration of the set photoperiod. Also, if you plan on using UV spectral enhancement it is a good idea to wear some good shades or turn them off while working with the plants (it's not good for your eyes).
One great thing about LEDs is that the tiny reflectors inside the diodes produce very uni-directional light that can be focused directly at your plants. CFLs on the other hand vomit their radiative glory all over the room. Sooo, it would behoove you to use reflectors on your CFLs to maximized their usable light output. The best for smaller CFLS (up to 42W) by far are the reflectors found on hanging auto-shop lights. The ones that have a plastic handle, an aluminum reflector and a metal cage around the bulb. They are expensive so I just made several trips to a HomeDepot/Lowes, removed the reflectors and pocketed a couple each time. They work awsome, but if you have more scruples than I then you can easily DIY reflectors from soda cans.
http://forum.grasscity.com/do-yours...-reflector-so-cheap-its-practically-free.html

Also, in such a small space you might want to consider autoflower strains. I have grown many auto strains (some ok, some sucked comparatively, but always got decent smoke). I now stick with three auto strains that rock!
Russian Rocket Fuel (ShortStuff Seeds)
Himalaya Blue Diesel (ShortStuff Seeds)
dope automatic seeds
BigBuddha Automatic (BigBuddha Seeds) <--by far the best IMHO. These are the folks that really worked the original Cheese strain and let me tell you, they know their shit! They are really revolutionizing autos with this new strain. And if your not into autos, their Chiesel strain will blow yer freakin mind! og Cheese crossed with Somas og Diesel, fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck!
cheese cannabis seeds

Feminized BigBuddha Auto Sprouts 1 week in

One of the biggest down side to auto genetics is the inability to clone and thus an expensive pain in the ass when attempting a continuous harvest. Solution: Colloidial silver. I keep a mini bubbler system to grow out a small feminized auto and then does it with self-generated colliodial silver when flowering starts to force it to herm. I then allow it to self pollinate, seed and ripen resulting in more femmed auto seeds than I know what to do with (I throw hand fulls on my neighbors lawns periodically! To bad they mow so often, poor little sprouts cut down in their prime! Every once in a while I will get some weird non-phenotypic genetics popping up but that is few and far between. Colliodial silver generators aren't to expensive and are a good investment if you are working with autos.
Silver Pulser SP5 - The Silver Pulser by SOTA.
or if you are electronically/mechanically inclined you can build your own for super cheap! A bit of web snooping will get you the plans and a trip to radio shack will get you the parts (minus the .9999 silver which can be ordered online). Search this forum for concentrations and dosing.

If you do decided to go the LED route I would recommend some type of hyrdo setup to ensure max growth and yield. I currently run a 3 gallon hybrid system (continuous flow, counter current, DWC, NFT) to save on grow space. Basically a bucket with "grow hole" in the middle, and plastic bowl attached to a PVC root chamber through the grow hole with plumbing fittings. The bottom of the root chamber is a PVC grate through which 2x airline/airstone is passed. The root chamber is nearly completely submerged in the nutrient solution and has several vent holes drilled just above the water line. And extra air pump/stone airates the solution outside of the root chamber as well. A submersible pump also pumps a continuous flow of solution into the bowl which drains into the root chamber. The bowl and root chamber are filled with hydroton and seeds are sprouted directly in the bowl.
So, the mechanics of this systems are as such:

Air is pumped and diffused into to bottom of the root chamber and travels upwards through the hydroton.
Nutrient solution is pumped up and into the bowl, drains down through the grow hole and then through the root chamber exiting the bottom. (This is known as counter current exchange and serves 4 functions.
1.) I keeps the moving nutrient solution in longer contact with the air bubbles.
2.) Provides a great air/water mixture for your roots to enjoy
3.) Allows me to only use a 3 1/2 gal. bucket with 3 gals. of nutrient and still gives me plenty of vertical grow space.
4.) Concentrates juicy organics such as humics at the root zone
On point #4, I originally developed this idea while building a DIY protein skimmer for a marine reef aquarium. These devices work in a similar fashion by concentrating organics in a collection area to be removed (organics, good for plants, bad for coral). Organic molecules tend to be polar while salts are usually iso-electrically covalent, i.e. organics like to embed themselves in the air water interface of bubbles while salts stay fully dissolved in solution. This means that any organic that I add or any salts converted to organics via bacterial process will be more concentrated near the root zone while the salts with remain evenly distributed throughout the solution. Excess organic rich foam is exported as a spewing slurry through the vents in the the root chamber just above the waterline.

This brings us to the beauty of this system. The submerged hydroton in the root camber and bowl not only provided an excellent source of support, unlimited space for rhizomal expansion, nutrients, water and oxygen it also provided the ultimate environment for colonization of beneficial bacteria. These little buggers (i.e. nitrosomonas and nitrobacter) will oxidize salt fertilizers and ultimately lead to more highly labile organics for you plant to use. Also, a small addition for a endo mycorrhizal fungal product can help your plants to uptake the more complex organics produced.
MycoGrow Hydro from FungiPerfect is an excellent choice and contains 4 endo species.
Fungi Perfecti: MycoGrow™ mycorrhizal products
Ectos aren't of much use in hydro applications but if you are a soil nut, go for it.

A few pointers on DWC:
Only use R/O water
Keep your nutes around 75 degrees and 5.5pH
Make sure there is no light leak into yer bucket

So I guess thats the long of it and prolly more than I needed to say. When it comes down to it, LEDs have their benefits and limitation, but by taking a wholistic approach to horticulture those limitations can be easily worked around with a little bit of experience and research.
The fat dense crystal coated reeking goodness I pull out of this little setup has rivaled the most expensive organic dank that I have ever bought and my friends that I share with will defo agree.

Hope this helps put you on the path!
PGrowSoul

 

Yea, been meaning to write a tek for this new type of setup for a while now, its really does run plants like a champ. guess it all kinda fell outta me when I started to respond to your post! As far as the rep, pshhhhh, rep don't mean shit on here! I think alot of folks open two accounts and rep them selves up. I have seen people with massive reps say some of the stupidest things!

 

isn't there something on this forum about posting the same question in THREE DIFFERENT THREADS.

I would hope so...

do not buy a light with orange LED
do not buy a light with IR LED

DO buy a light with 660nm red
DO buy a light 450nm blue leds

if you're going more than dual band, make sure it doesn't have IR or WHITE or ORANGE - its a waste.

420nm, 450nm, 630nm and 660nm is the right around the ideal mix for a quad band light with 50% being 660nm.

I'm talking only about those ebay lights because thats probably the best you'll find on there.

 

a 120W Quad band LED will work great for you.

 

I'd recommend a sea of green with 8 plants under 160-200 watts of LED, as previously mentioned you want mostly peak red photosynthetic response, with some (very little) blue in there too.


Ventilation will be a must, and you could run 90-120 watts and do fine, but I think youll cap out the yield per square foot of your space with closer to 200 watts of LED.

 

I have a box that's roughly the same size as that! How ironic well contrary to all of the other LED users, I believe making your own LED panel is the way to go. In nearly ALL of the LED units on the market, they're using 1w diodes. Some are even using 2 and 3w diodes, but I think in order for LEDs to be effective you need the 5w diodes. They just produce more light for your money, and if you tighten up the optics you'll get much more intense light too. Of course you lose a little efficiency but for the cost of a much much more potent light. Let's say most of the LED panels have a viewing degree angle of 90 degrees. If you hang one of those lights at 3 ft it will cover roughly 6 FEET in diameter. Obviously you're only working with 2 square feet to begin with.

What does this mean? This means that more than half of your light is going to be reflected off of the walls of your container. We know from CFLs and HPS bulbs that reflected light isn't as intense as light directly from the source. We also know from flashlights, that the more focused your light is, it's more intense in the middle of the circle. Obviously it doesn't cover as much space in width, but with a small space like this, that's exactly what you want!

Now let's say we tighten up the optics to 25 degrees. At 3 feet that creates a beam diameter of 1.33 ft. That's about half of your square footage so I would say that's perfect. If you got a bunch of these little buggers and mounted them to a durable aluminum heat sink you could get MUCH more intense light since it's focused into a tighter beam, ya feel?

With LEDs it's not about how many watts you use, it's about how you get that light to the plant. From what I've researched, and I'll go into it a lot more in depth if wanted, you want tight optics for a micro grow. That way all of the light being put out is being used at the PLANT LEVEL, not being reflected off the wall. This results in an increase in par/lux/any light measurement. You're plants will be much more happy from the intense light and you won't be using even a 3rd of the 'juice'.

Used this website to find the beam angle diameter.
And my inspiration for this came from this website.

I can also show you which LEDs I will be using along with heat sink, power supply, adhesive, and the LEDs used. It's really rather simply once you grasp the basic concept of LEDs. And here's the kicker, you'll spend about as much as it costs to buy one of those commercial fixtures. It will put out MORE usable light and will be cheaper on electricity.

*edit* I also want to point out that I agree with the above posters, IR, orange, and UV-A are completely wasted spectrums. IR does funny things to the leaves, orange has a tendency to create hermies, and UV-A does absolutely nothing for the plant. You want those 4 bands dtp5150 pointed out

And to quote something that also demonstrates the point I'm trying to make:

That's why I think instead of buying the commercial fixtures you BUILD YOUR OWN. Just my $0.02 though. If anyone wants more information I'll be happy to provide it.