The major reason I switched to LED from discharge lights is the intensity.
Bulbs in a reflector are limited in focus, about 120 degrees is as tight a beam as can be gotten. This limits the lighting severely, the light has to be close to get the photon density but the high infrared levels limit this. Too close cooks the plant and too far does not grow the plant. The focus limitation forces the position and adjustments to remain in a narrow envelope.
LED lights can be focused down to thirty degrees or less, enabling over 2000 umol to hit the plant without cooking it. Too much by an order of magnitude but this gives options not available to bulb and reflector lights.
I ended up using 700-900 umol with LED, way under the maximum. This gives me endless options of where to place the lights and controls the penetration needed by various sized plants.
If desired, the HPS spectrum can be duplicated with LED. Actually, any light can be duplicated with LED, one of the advantages. I grew indoor poppies for two years with LED just to see. Turns out to be cheaper to buy than grow, the energy needed was twice that of marijuana. But duplicating the high altitude mountainside light conditions with LEDs was not difficult, nor is duplicating specific conditions for equatorial sativas or bottomland indicas.
But nature abhors a vacuum, the totality of the garden determines the output, lights are merely one on the variables.
Bulbs in a reflector are limited in focus, about 120 degrees is as tight a beam as can be gotten. This limits the lighting severely, the light has to be close to get the photon density but the high infrared levels limit this. Too close cooks the plant and too far does not grow the plant. The focus limitation forces the position and adjustments to remain in a narrow envelope.
LED lights can be focused down to thirty degrees or less, enabling over 2000 umol to hit the plant without cooking it. Too much by an order of magnitude but this gives options not available to bulb and reflector lights.
I ended up using 700-900 umol with LED, way under the maximum. This gives me endless options of where to place the lights and controls the penetration needed by various sized plants.
If desired, the HPS spectrum can be duplicated with LED. Actually, any light can be duplicated with LED, one of the advantages. I grew indoor poppies for two years with LED just to see. Turns out to be cheaper to buy than grow, the energy needed was twice that of marijuana. But duplicating the high altitude mountainside light conditions with LEDs was not difficult, nor is duplicating specific conditions for equatorial sativas or bottomland indicas.
But nature abhors a vacuum, the totality of the garden determines the output, lights are merely one on the variables.
