LED UFO Closet Grow

[northernlightssmokn]

current situation: 3 plants in 5 gal. containers in a medium sized closet.
current lighting: 1 600w hps for ALL stages of growth/flower

Proposed change in situation: 4 plants in 3 1/2 gal. containers
proposed chane in lighting: 3 80w UFO's & 4 15w led bulbs

I already own the UFO's and am rebuilding the closet.

I am looking for feedback BOLTH positive and negative BUT ALL CONSTRUCTIVE!!!

My goals are less heat.
I have tested this and there TRUELY is NO heat build up beyond a few degrees. The 600w hps raises it 16 to 20 deg. This will eliminate the need to exaust out into the cold -20 deg outside and forming an ice clowd. Other pro's are that I can bring in fresh air from the house to the closet and not the rapidly chainging air from the outside (I live in a COLD state) I also want to perfect a simple indoor grow situation apealing to renters that gives personal smoke, not for retail and will not be a fire hazzard by heat, lights or power overload.
Yes, I understand that there will be a longer flower time and smaller yield. those are side effects that can be debugged AFTER the grow environment is studied and perfected.
I would like MP forum members to be part of that. I will be the wallet and you all be the brains. Pictures will acompany an extensive journal and all input will be read and considered. Any one interested in helping???

 

[WeedHopper]

I sent you a PM with a thread that is about an LED Grow.

 

[84VW]

there are a few others on here experimenting with led grows im playing with them now but i dont have a journal on here since my camera is broke and you know everyone loves pictures

i started with cfl's and they put of quite a bit of heat and i was looking for something that produced little to no heat

LEDs were my answer. I'm sure they put of some sort of heat since its a light but what other light after being on 24 hours a day for a week can you put your hand on and hold there for as long as you want and not get burned, and not even feel hot?

that was one other benefit for me, sometimes i get busy and cant check on the plants, and once or twice they've grown right up to and into the light, any other light would've burned my plants

 

[northernlightssmokn]

I got it and have been following it. Thanks. If you wish to post the link here and this link there, that would be great.

Has anyone read the November High Times? Page10 has a small article on LED's and page 104 has a contradicting article by Jorge Cervantez himself with a 3ft by 3ft room, one UFO and a yield of 600 grams. Hmmmm....I dunno about that!! 21 oz's in a 40" by 40" room under ANY lighting???

 

[84VW]

Has anyone read the November High Times? Page10 has a small article on LED's and page 104 has a contradicting article by Jorge Cervantez himself with a 3ft by 3ft room, one UFO and a yield of 600 grams. Hmmmm....I dunno about that!! 21 oz's in a 40" by 40" room under ANY lighting???

i might have to find that and check it out

 

[northernlightssmokn]

Its a good read on UFO's and Jorge is a reputable source...So I woul d love to think!!?? I have seen several of his dvd's.

 

[Mutt]

hxxp://hightimes.com/microsites/led/inside_led.inc.php

I'm still wary of this claim. thats a hell of a claim that LED's could produce 12% more than a 400w.
and high times i think does tend to market a lot....so not sure i trust em completely.
but hey it's all fun as long as your growing
fact is i could not see myself spending 300$ + on one.
I think i could build one cheaper
but alienbait did several style grows using cathodes and leds
hope to see a grow journal tho.

 

[84VW]

very interesting read

 

[northernlightssmokn]

A few thoughts for the record.....

1. If your heat is SO undercontrole, is it wise to further reduce energy by eliminating an oscolating fan in an LED grow?

2. smaller plants from smaller buckets should in theory, benifit more from LED's. Due to the smaller footprint. the light will penitrate deeper into the plant..

3. Less heat stress, Less water consumption...

Any thoughts??

 

[TheEnhancementSmoker]

Oscillating fans help make the stems thick and strong, to hold buds. It's an absolute requirement, in my opinion.

 

[84VW]

so far for me it seems the leds dont penetrate as good as others so i am doing sort of a micro scrog and im not using any fans since the netting will be holding everything up instead of all the weight being on the stem

im still new to all this so who knows if it'll work out the way i see it in my head

 

[blancolighter]

I'm doin a LED grow myself and its goin great. Just put all my girls in flowering under it.

A few points about the LEDs I've found. Don't spend money on LEDs that have less than 3 watts per LED. Any less wont penetrate a canopy and needs to be too close to the plant to be usuable in a multiplant grow enviroment.

You can easily see the breakdown of the LED light as it goes through the plant canopy, so I bet that the best way to grow with them would be with a scrog like 84vw said.

Definately less water consumption. I needed about a third less water when I switched from 600w hps to my 100 watt LED.

Another cool thing I came to find was I can hang my harvested herb right next to the light since it doesnt give off degrading heat or UV rays, so thats nice since I'm space pressed.

 

[northernlightssmokn]

greta idea with the cureing area above the light! I like to top and lower the light...smoke the colas or store them, THAN harvest. So the leds are lowered and there is now no major heat build up. I wonder..Lowryder seems to be the best plant for LED's because of its size. I am planning on dedicating 100watts of led's to each plant. One Ufo on top and one 15w led bulb on bottom facing up. (3 or 4 plants total) This will give each plant its own light source.

 

[Rogue]

I've been playing with LEDs since late last year. :rant:

I've tried the PAR 38 style with the Ultrabright 5mm LEDs, they were even custom made. Not enough juice and the wrong color. :rant:

I have a 7 watt Warm White LED spot. Does really good for one small plant. It puts out 1500 foot candles at 12 inches away from it, in the center of a spot about 12 inches in diameter. The only draw back is that it was $50 plus shipping. :rant:

From those I designed and built my light board that I'm getting ready to re-wire for better performance after a veg run with it. :rant:

From all of that I have learned that Red and Blue LEDs are not enough by themselves to do the job for MJ. Red and Blue LEDs make great grow lights for leaf plants like lettuce and greens. But, you need to supplement them for MJ. I think the way to go is with Warm White LEDs. Their color spectrum is very close to the output of a HPS but with way more blue. :rant:

northernlightssmokn if i was you I would supplement those UFOs with the biggest Warm White LED Floodlights you can find. The combination of the UFOs an WW Floods should give you a really good grow spectrum in my opinion. :rant:

:hubba:

:rofl:

 

[Rogue]

greta idea with the cureing area above the light! I like to top and lower the light...smoke the colas or store them, THAN harvest. So the leds are lowered and there is now no major heat build up. I wonder..Lowryder seems to be the best plant for LED's because of its size. I am planning on dedicating 100watts of led's to each plant. One Ufo on top and one 15w led bulb on bottom facing up. (3 or 4 plants total) This will give each plant its own light source.

Don't worry about underneath the plant just line your floor with Mylar or white plastic and the plants well get plenty of under lighting. You don't want to much anyway not a natural or extremely beneficial thing for a plant to have the sun under it instead of above it..

 

[northernlightssmokn]

I have never heard of Warm white flood lights I guess. Or at least not in that term. Are they 120v? require a ballast?

 

[blancolighter]

I think you're looking ahead to the future rogue! I bet if you sit down and work it out for a sec you could have somethin we'd all buy up...

 

[la9]

It says your goal is less heat so why notget rid of the 600 watt hps ?

After all you stated you will be using

"3 80w UFO's & 4 15w led bulbs"

you also said

"These lights are realy what they say they are, than that will be like having 3 400w hps systems shining down and 1 250w hps shining up through."

with 3 400 watt hps and a 250 watter in there you wouldn't really have a use for that pesky 600 watt HPS would you ? Itis just producing heat and not much else.

Where are you getting the 15 watt LED's from ? What color are they going to be ?

Also you said

"2. smaller plants from smaller buckets should in theory, benifit more from LED's. Due to the smaller footprint. the light will penitrate deeper into the plant..
"

Not sure what you mean be this except maybe the plant will be more anemic looking and the light can reach the soil of the bucket ? Is that what you mean ? he problem will be the fact of the LED's not being bright enough for photsynthesis to occur properly due to light penetration into the leaf itself although the 15 watt LED's will probably be bright enough. The problem is with the UFO's not being bright enough in my opinion.

Are your UFO's still new ? I want to see if you have the same problems I've seen from others as they usually don't make it past 2 grows without failure.

Those are my thoughts, let us know if you have any more questions or goals we can help you out with, the people on this forum ae quite nice and helpful.

 

[northernlightssmokn]

IA9 and 84vw....You two need to chill and go share a bong or something...

IA9 Thank You for the constructive post. First off, If you reread the old thread that turned in to a gripe fest and reread the new post,you should see that this is the controle group. This grow is going to be sized up against the grow with the leds. I did one grow with the 600 only. I am now doing one grow with all the lights and the next grow will be purely LED. That is where I will compile information and build a grow journal. I am compiling information...good and bad..now and will reconstruct the grow closet in a few weeks.
I am very surprised that you do not understand the concept of smaller plants in smaller buckets. Some strains grow just fine in smaller buckets. In this case LED's MAY penitrate better if the plants are smaller through flowering. Kinda like concentrating your energy on 6 colas instead of 3 full plants.

84VW Do you have any thoughts on smaller plants?? This kinda touches an older post of yours about netting.

 

[WeedHopper]

Hey guys, please dont start this "my dads better then your dad crap" here in this forum.We just went through this a few days ago and it got us no where.:hitchair:
1st off, we are all supposed to be Brother and Sister Growers, sharing information with each other, to help each other with our Grows.
Besides you are really making me look bad. I have always said that people that Smoke are way more laid back then this.:holysheep:
Mellowwwwwwwwwww Outtttttttttt.

Lets all sing,,Shall we gather at the river. :ignore: