LED Grow Lights: What Do You Want To Know?

[HydroGrowLED]

You said the coverage of the lamp with 60 degrees is about half of the lamp with the 120 degrees LEDs. I could be wrong but isn't one-fourth off the coverage. What does this mean for the amount of lamps needed? So what if the 60 degrees isn't the optimal spread of beam?

If you take a 90W UFO and make 1 with a 120 degree Lens, and the other with a 60 degree lens, the unit with the 60 degree lens will occupy about half the space of the 120 degree. LED's emit the majority of their light downward, even if the angle is wider, so the bright area under the 120 degree is going to also be about twice as large as the bright area under the 60 degree. I have a picture showing a 90W unit at 120 degree next to a 120W unit at 60 degree, to give you a decent example of what I'm talking about, though not exactly:

The intensity of the 60 degree is necessary for penetration, which allows you to carry out full flowering with large, dense colas.

 

[HydroGrowLED]

You also say that you're using infrared and white light. I thought white light was a combination of every color light (so every wavelenght, 5400K?). Why should you use wavelenghts that don't corresponds with the optimum wavelengths?

And why should you use infra-red light? I read some other information that you should combine led and HID. First you use the ledlight shine but because of the little heat generated by the ledlight you need to use HID for heating the canopy. This is a sequence you keep repeating. Is this why you use the infrared light, and what do you think about the information I read.

I designed our LED's to be the replacement for HPS or MH, not to need them in order to function properly. Plants require heat in order to grow, but that's not the primary reason we use Infra-red. Our units generate just enough heat on their own, to keep your ambient room temp betwen 70-90 degrees depending on room size. Infra-red aids in cell regeneration and repair. Stimulating your plants with this kind of light helps keep the plant healthier and growing faster.

The use of white light is to provide the plants with the "supplemental" light they use in small quantities outside of the blue/red range. The white we use has a small peak at 450nm, with a large peak at approximately 630nm red. Since white LED's have the highest luminous efficacy (IE more lumens per watt), and since our white emits primarily red, we're actually delivering red to the plants at a high lumen value, vs a simple 630nm LED. The white fills in the entire red spectrum between both peaks, and much of what it emits is actually usable. White makes up a small portion of the overall light in our units, so anything that is unused makes up an even smaller percentage. In our testing, we found that units using white did better than units made of only red/blue mixtures.

 

[HydroGrowLED]

This is my last question (for today)
In the absorbtion graph on your website you can see the relative absorbtion at different wavelenghts. You can also see that the peaks in the red spectrum are alot higher than the ones in the blue spectrum. Why dont only use the red peaks? In which percentage are these wavelenghts distributed, are they evenly distributed to the height of the peek.
You can see that the red peak of chlorophyll-a is about 3 times as high as the blue peak of chlorophyll-a. Does this mean that the amount of leds who have the right wavelenght for the red peak is 3 times greater than the amount of leds with the right wavelenght for the blue peak. So if you have 3 leds for the red peak than you take 1 led for the blue peak, is this right?

I'm going to guess this is the chart you are referring to:

The red peaks are actually lower than the blue peaks, so your question confuses me a bit. That graph shows the plant's absorption curve and the % of light the plant is able to convert at each peak. If you want the real numbers, here they are:

chlorophyll a: 439nm(63%) 667nm(43%)
chlorophyll b: 469nm(80%) 642nm(20%)

So what this tells you is that our plants absorb blue light most easily. They have a more difficult time converting red light into energy (only 43% at best), which is the main reason you need a higher percentage of red light to blue, in order to achieve the same level of photosynthesis across the varying peaks. Hope this helps to answer the question?

 

[wjohan]

Thank you for answering the questions, the answers are very well explained. I think you are indeed 'the expert' of growing with LED light. This give me a good impression of led light growing, I think I'm sold.
Thanx

 

[HydroGrowLED]

Just glad I can help spread some knowledge

 

[ice420]

I'm growing with the 3rd generation ufo (80% deep red 20% blue spectrum)
In soil (20% perlite 10% chicken shit 70% premixed soil wich I have no info on)
69 plants in 3gallon pots in a 60square feet area divided into 5 and a half squares. 6 Ufo's (1 per 10 square feet)
Using GHE flora series at recommended dosage.
Strain unknown
Wasn't able to transpot until 2-3 weeks into flowering (don't ask why) they were, to say the least, very root bound for a few weeks.
Temp is from 23-25. Humidity at 60%.
Good ventilation (6x the room in one hour).

they are in week 5 in flowering.
They were in veg for 4 weeks from seed.

In veg I used T-5 blue spectrum bulbs (16 of them) and there was a little bit of overcrowding due to I had about 200 to start with (140 made it 1/2 male)

I'm not sure as what degree their output but compare to the pic I would say 120 degrees. But the lamps are 90w

They look healthy but not big. I'm not growing in Scrog or sog.
Is there anything else you need to know to estimate how much yield I'll have?

Kind regards

 

[HydroGrowLED]

Honestly I don't have a clue when it comes to other MFR's and their lights. I haven't seen any promising results yet from a 90W UFO of any type, but then again I haven't seen all tests either. Viewing angle and proper spectrum make the biggest difference on how the lights will equate in terms of yield. With a 120 degree spread, and without all 4 spectral peak outputs, I don't expect a high yield, but you shouldn't do too badly either (900W LED after all). Anyhow, I also don't grow dirt, and each strain varies on how much it produces, so there is almost no way for me to predict results of any kind. I know that customers using my 126W and 63W units have reported up to 2g per watt on high yielding strains.

 

[Hydroguy]

Hi HGL

I made the mistake of jumping into the LED dream a bit to early and purchase one of those 90W UFO from China. At the moment i have it combined with a 250 HPs in my flower tent, it kinda of centre and focusing on one palnt from this i can see buds are def smaller than the one being hit full on by the HPS light,,, so my question i hear you say,, are these UFO lights good for veg,, have you tried using any of them for veg. don't like paying for soemthing and dicarding it,, but you know lesson learnt and all that,,,


Cheers
Hydroguy

 

[HydroGrowLED]

I've heard of plants in veg being more tolerable of LED lights of many varying spectrum from just red/blue to tri-band, quad-band, five-band, etc... and having decent growth rate underneath them. Varying models have varying results obviously, for example: a customer on another forum is currently doing our 126W vs the ProSource 180W Jumbo UFO. He has the same clones under both lights, and our light is at 6", theirs was at 8" at half power (90W). Their light began curling the leaves and harming the plant, while the ones under our light were just fine. He raised their light to 15" and turned it on full power, and now the plants are perking back up. In the meanwhile, the plants under our light have flourished being so close to the unit.

So I can't speak for every LED out there, but in most occasions that I've heard of, most models tend to do fairly well in the veg department. My original UFO just collects dust these days... Like the ProSource light, if I got it too close to the plants, it killed em. Don't know exactly why, but I do know the two similarities between their current lights and my first model test unit: they both used 120 degree LED's, and they both used orange. Stay away from orange lol!

 

[Hydroguy]

Thanks for the quick response (you are very early riser!!!)

I'll give it a go in veg a snd see what happens, changing around my light system after next grow and hope to get 2 of your 126w for a tent of 90 by 90 and 120 cm in height, I only flower 4 plants at a time (so this should be more than enough i reckon???)

Thanks again for the info and from what i have read pioneering the next generation of lighting!!

 

[ocnugs]

This might sound stupid but since these dont get as hot could you have one or two u.f.o's coming from the top and another one or two from underneath the plants and do you think this would make for a bigger yeild?

 

[Hydroguy]

Hi ocnugs,

As far as i know the underneath part of the leaf can't absorb light (mother nature never counted on the sun coming from the ground up)

some at the sides may give better penetration under canopy though!!!

peace

 

[Crudvapors]

Really?

 

[ocnugs]

mostley what i was thinking the underneath of the buds that have trouble getting light

 

[HydroGrowLED]

This might sound stupid but since these dont get as hot could you have one or two u.f.o's coming from the top and another one or two from underneath the plants and do you think this would make for a bigger yeild?

As long as the light is able to penetrate the leaves in your lower foliage, it should work ok from underneath. Plants don't normally absorb light in this fashion, but penetration is the key. I think side lighting is a better option probably for supplementing the lower areas of your plants.

 

[desertleaf]

I have 3 plants in small grow room with a 90 watt UFO and though I'm no expert, my plants look great and have starting budding out after 4 weeks under 12/12. I'm adding a cfl to bring more light to the lower extremities. Anyone have luck with this? Thank you, Dee

 

[Baja Big Dog]

Hey Hydrogrow, I gotta say, some may consider this thread as SPAM, but let me be the first to say, this is one of the most informative, and useful threads around here, and your attention to responding is fantastic!!

I never gave any thought to LED, but this information is changing my thought process, I just which the fricken prices would come down!!!

Since LED technology is not new, I would assume the costs probably wont be coming down in the near future?

Maybe assembly in Mexico would help? (dont flame me guys!!)

 

[Crudvapors]

Anyone concidering this thread spam needs to be banned...

I figured as long as light pass through photoreceptive cell, it should absorb, from bottom or top. Wasn't sure though. Thanks for the info cammie.

If I were to grow with a 126w penetrator, what should my grow space be? I know they cover a 2x3 at 12". But throughout all of our grows, hgl, you move the light from 6-9" at least, not sure where else you keep them. But it makes since to me that you are actually growing in a less than 2x3 per penetrator. I'm not factoring in the fact the plants won't take up the entire 2x3 from clone.

And don't encourage cammie to outsource, pay me, I'll make lights. Kinda not in Washington though...

 

[HydroGrowLED]

Hey Hydrogrow, I gotta say, some may consider this thread as SPAM, but let me be the first to say, this is one of the most informative, and useful threads around here, and your attention to responding is fantastic!!

I never gave any thought to LED, but this information is changing my thought process, I just which the fricken prices would come down!!!

Since LED technology is not new, I would assume the costs probably wont be coming down in the near future?

Maybe assembly in Mexico would help? (dont flame me guys!!)

Well Baja, I started this thread so that people could have an easy to read informative topic on LED grow lights. I cover most of this information on my website and also in my grow journals, but most people don't want to flip through 30 pages to read it all. I wanted people to have a place where they could ask about this new technology specifically, and receive answers to any of the questions they might have. I don't see this in any way as SPAM, especially when I'm an advertiser on this forum, but everyone is entitled to their own opinions

As far as the costs go, they have come down A LOT in the last two years. While LED's themselves are not a new lighting technology, the level of efficacy that they have currently was not available 3-4 years ago. LED's are constantly being improved upon with new units creating more and more lumens per watt than ever before. These NEW LED's are still expensive to use, as they are the highest quality and highest output. The prices have dropped 1-2 dollars per watt over the last couple years, but there is still more they can come down.

As we currently MFR in China, I don't think Mexico would be any cheaper. What will cause the price of these units to fall in the coming years, will be the sheer volume of people purchasing them. When everyone has finally made the decision that LED lighting tech is here, and that HID is now obsolete, that switch will signal the end of high prices on LED's. MFR's will be selling 100X the LED's that they currently make (Cree, Luxeon, etc...), giving them more flexibility on their pricing, and leading to further development of cheaper manufacturing processes.

 

[HydroGrowLED]

If I were to grow with a 126w penetrator, what should my grow space be? I know they cover a 2x3 at 12". But throughout all of our grows, hgl, you move the light from 6-9" at least, not sure where else you keep them. But it makes since to me that you are actually growing in a less than 2x3 per penetrator. I'm not factoring in the fact the plants won't take up the entire 2x3 from clone.

My grow space right now is 18" x 30" with a single 126W penetrator. It is 12" above most of the plants, and the light spreads a bit beyond my canopy in one direction, as the other 3 are covered in mylar. With this space I have raised and lowered the light on various occasions, and I find it to be a good sized space for a single unit. Most people using small spaces with 1 light, tend to be leaning towards the 20" x 30" space. I'd recommend that if you want to keep your plants within the vast majority of the most intense light being produced by our units.