A question of a fellow grower:
I’m currently nearly 3 weeks into the flowering stage of my first indoor grow. I have 2 plants under a 1000w LED light. I decided to go down the LED route since two of my babies got burnt (true to what I always say that sometimes you have to get burned to learn haha) and plus the 600w HPS lamp I was using was draining way too much electricity.
I’m noticing that the plants haven’t grown to the height I experienced with last year’s outdoor grow with the same strain (Purple Haze Fem), which is what a few people online have said about their experience with growing with LEDs. I’m kind of concerned that I may end up with tiny buds and a lower than average yield.
I’ve still got my 600w HPS light so I was wondering if putting this light back on for the plants in the last 4-5 weeks of flowering will be beneficial and increase my yield and potency?
I say add the hps, the led is not enuff. That is prob why ur seeing the difference. Outdoor they had the sun, and cant beat the sun for light but u can try lol
The hps will make a difference is ur buds for sure.
The LED I’ve got is called Kingbo but it’s not the King LED brand. I don’t think I’ll invest in a 3000w King LED light, it’s 3 times more powerful than my Kingbo so will use 3 times more electricity. Despite being energy efficient and only using 200w of power it still drains a lot (contrary to one grower!s claim of growing a whole crop under a similar light and only using $12 of electricity!). By the sounds of it Led’s are good due to being more energy efficient but just don’t have the right intensity to match that of an HPS lamp. I’ll try using the HPS lamp for the last 4-5 weeks and see how my girls get on. Thanks for the advice guys, and if you know of any energy efficient HPS lamps that exist please let me know. Cheers
Use the HPS, your kinbo is some Chinese Amazon special that consumes 182w of actual power but of course they don’t tell you that nor how efficient or what the actual radiation rating or light output is. Typical. I mean it’s a 120$ light right…
LED’s can actually be really great lights but you need to spend the money and know what your buying, the investment up front saves you power cost over time and makes your grow more efficient.
Newer technologies arnt lower priced unless they are “cheap” imitations.
i’m not sure, but the most popular light on this site now is the hlg quantum boards. lots on here use them and love them. there is a diy thread to make your own cheap. @Higher_Self
i’m going with 315 lec myself
If you’re accustomed to running hps there’s a pretty good chance what you’re seeing is different plant response to a light recipe with higher percentage of blue wavelengths. The heavy concentration of far red and ir triggers shading response when using hps lights. Most led fixtures don’t have as much of that in relation to blue wavelengths that keep plants pretty short and squat.
Otherwise the inexpensive led fixtures found on Amazon and places like ebay are about the same as hps in terms of amount of light per watt. So it takes about 600 watts from wall to be competitive with a 600 watt hps light. If you get into fixtures using higher efficiency LEDs they usually crush hps par levels watt for watt.