Best Growlight Currently Available?

[Rocket Soul]

The EMF debate is bougs ? lol why because Rocket Soul said so ?
Grow your plants under microwave light, no problem, but as a led builder you are ignoring facts that don't suit you (ofcourse they don't, it hurts your sells haha)
You led builders found a new way of making money because the hid game is so cheap.
you won't let this cash cow off so easy we know haha, no matter how lame and harmful the product you are selling is.
Money money money

No, because HPS and the Sun also emitt an electromagnetic field. The suns EMF, the heliosphere, stretches out as far as 120x the distance between the sun and earth. And sunlight contains X-ray, micro waves, gamma rays, deep uv and lots of other harmfull stuff. It is only the earths magnetic yield and ozone layer which protects us from that. Infact if you were able to place a plant in space or another without protection it would also fry.
No; the suns "method" for creating light is not the same as HPS; the sun uses fusion which creates photon when two hydrogen atoms fuse under great heat and pressure and a neutron is destroyed and converted to energy, e=mc², all that einsteiny thing. And no, a HPS does not work on the passing of a magnetic field thru a gas, its based on passing a current thru gas. Did you ever see your HPS bulb attract nails or coins to it? Didnt think so. So strike 2 on being wrong. If you have arguments for what your saying other than what you described id happily look at them but for now they all just seems faith based, like flat earth conspiracy.
The plant does not care how light was created, only the light it receives. By your statement I understand you have your whole house lit by HPS, since anything else is dangerous? Come up with something decent for whatever bad results youve had fron leds and lets have a normal rational talk about it.

Lol, as always with Ca++, a lot of words, no facts, haha HIDs don't emitt EMF, check the facts before you replay sounding all smart but you are most definitely NOT.

@Rocket Soul
You are a led salesman, you have no say in this debate, I'm sorry.
But, I'll answer you as you are again wrong and that's surprising coming from someone that build led kits but don't know nothing about them
HIDs don't emitt EMF, sorry.
HIDs use the same principles of the sun when making light (magnetic current passing through gas)
Leds use a chemical reaction between alloys.
Get your facts and science straight, not to offend you but I wouldn't buy anything from you after reading all the mumbo jumbo you write and claim to know.

Again, you can argue all you want, you are biased.
These are the cold hard facts, take it or leave it.

I do not sell leds i develop and buy them in order to improve our midsized grow. We can already get great yields of better quality bud than we got after 7 years with HPS, but since we are in a very competitive market it makes sense to grow the best quality you can get. I have nothing for sale, nor the funding to set up a company, maybe someday in the future but definitely not now. And in any case why would that disqualify me as biased? Its free to speak and reality also has a say: majority of both grows and cup winners are led, and ill happily admit that some of the best weed ive seen was grown under hps+led.

Infact the work i do with leds was somewhat based around what youre describing: with standard shitty leds there is something in the quality that is missing; that volatile smell some people people call volatile sulfur compounds, some call it fuel. And guess what, if you tweak your leds the right way you get it back! Theres nothing about the leds intrinsicly that causes yield loss, only the trend in led lighting manufacturers of today: to allways go for absolute highest efficiency even if hortiscience dont back that up really. You need a balanced led spectrum to do that, taking into account chloro a and b, phytochrome action spectrum and the correctly designed uv supplement. Just cause no (or very few) manufacturers does it right doesnt prove that its impossible or the leds fault.

Your intensity argument is also bogus, it can be measured, both in lux and ppfd: leds are more intense if you use enough watts. Unless youre talking about a secret 10000w hps you have but cannot show cause its a secret....

Developing leds would definitely give me a leg up in the conversation based on experience cause it means you can manipulate the light, target specific genetic expressions cause you have much more control since mono leds are very narrow in their spectrum. Unless you have a secret HPS factory you could just take the L and accept that you got less experience in how different light will affect the plant. But then again if youre producing HPS bulbs youre as biased as me, no?

Also please note my reply: HPS works fine in some environments and can be preferable if you grow mainly in a cold climate. Am i really that biased?

Best Light Quality = 400V HPS
Best Spread Quality = LEDs

Beaten HPS quality ? I doubt that very much sir, you can't beat natural light (sun, hids) with harmful EMF induced light (leds)

I take your doubts as a compliment and a proof that youve not been able to grow a good crop under leds: if youve only been using shitty leds i feel sorry for you missing out but you cant cure an anti-rational mindset.

Yes, theres lots of words here aswell but they are backed up by an argument and not silly ideas based on your beliefs with no proof

 

[aCBD]

asking for the best growlight on the market is like asking what's the best car on the market right now. a lot of people have different views and opinions on it.
personally i agree with the others who said led if the environment/temperatures allow it, hid if you need some extra heat to warm the grow space.
there is a huge learning curve with led and it takes some grows to have it dialed in but with good old hps you just hang it in there and have to take care of less factors.
if i could I'd run hps+led together as many others do, to benefit from both worlds.

 

[Ca++]

Lol, as always with Ca++, a lot of words, no facts, haha HIDs don't emitt EMF, check the facts before you replay sounding all smart but you are most definitely NOT.

You don't actually have a clue what I just said. Because you don't know what you are saying. Wading into a topic you clearly know nothing of, but trying to tell people how it is. So far from understanding, that you can't even see the truth when it's in front of you.
Yes, I probably do look smart, to you. Make some use of it.

Rocket Soul has made a decent reply already, which others should look to. You are on your own against physics in general. Words are not going to change this. You are just talking bollox.

 

[merkaba]

Wait wait wait...let me catch up. I have only used HID lights, and obviously the last many years DE HPS. Local shops have told me the companies making DE bulbs are phasing them out - obviously this could be a sales tactic. I would prefer to us my trusty DE but I thought LED was the way to go? Cooler, better yield (grams per watt), easier to control the environment etc. Not true?

 

[merkaba]

I have grown herb for 30 years, just decided to retire 2 or 3 years ago, then got bored and thought I would play with some of the random seeds I have around.

 

[merkaba]

asking for the best growlight on the market is like asking what's the best car on the market right now. a lot of people have different views and opinions on it.
personally i agree with the others who said led if the environment/temperatures allow it, hid if you need some extra heat to warm the grow space.
there is a huge learning curve with led and it takes some grows to have it dialed in but with good old hps you just hang it in there and have to take care of less factors.
if i could I'd run hps+led together as many others do, to benefit from both worlds.

BMW duh - I am sure there are a few brands that are tested and people like. If you ask best car - you know the general answers. Local shops are pushing Diablo and Gavita. Ran Gavitas for years as DE. As far as environmental changes, its really just supplemental heat if needed correct?

 

[Dime]

I'm still using fluorescent for veg ,halide,hps for flowering, I don't care about electricity cost,I'm familiar with it and get great results. I get a decade out of a ballast and replace bulbs every year at minimal cost. I buy 2 packs at a time. If my ballast does go it's $150.No reason for me to switch at this time. Between outdoor and indoor,how much weed can I possibly smoke?

 

[xtsho]

I'm still using fluorescent for veg ,halide,hps for flowering, I don't care about electricity cost,I'm familiar with it and get great results. I get a decade out of a ballast and replace bulbs every year at minimal cost. I buy 2 packs at a time. If my ballast does go it's $150.No reason for me to switch at this time. Between outdoor and indoor,how much weed can I possibly smoke?

Same here. I have a 100 watt Vivosun LED that I use sometimes for veg but my 4 ft 4 bulb High Output T5 blows it away. Plus the 600 watt HPS in the flower tent in my unheated garage provides needed heat. I don't even need to grow indoors as I can grow enough outdoors to last all year until the next harvest but I like strains that I can't grow outdoors where I'm at as they wouldn't finish. A friend just gave me all of his grow equipment so I have a couple more HID fixtures, bulbs, ballasts, etc... I'll be using it for years.

 

[Rocket Soul]

Wait wait wait...let me catch up. I have only used HID lights, and obviously the last many years DE HPS. Local shops have told me the companies making DE bulbs are phasing them out - obviously this could be a sales tactic. I would prefer to us my trusty DE but I thought LED was the way to go? Cooler, better yield (grams per watt), easier to control the environment etc. Not true?

G/w goes up with leds generally but you may have to get a bit used to the tech and adaptiions until you get real increases per square foot.
Bud size may look smaller, but wait for the weigh in before you decide, a pound of white based led weed looks a lot smaller than a pound of hps weed. It may sound crazy but led weed is denser; more weight per volume. Hps weed contains much more water in the bud, and fluffy led but is something more from the purple lights.
Environment : its trickier than hps tbh. Hps in a temperate climate, where all youd have to do is cool a bit is abit easier. With leds on low watts you may need to heat a fair bit, especially if youre taking air from outside. You will also likely want to have ways of controlling rh. Most people using leds run VPD from 79F as lowest temp. Vpdchart dot com is your friend. Have a look. If you dial in +3-4 degrees in leaf temps you get a very recommended environment for hps. Check it out. If the recommended environment is impossible to keep then you may be better of with hps or cmh or similar. Another thing you can do is mixing leds with cmh or hps. Get something which makes a nice 4x2 spread both with hps and leds and you can mix and match according to time of year.

BMW duh - I am sure there are a few brands that are tested and people like. If you ask best car - you know the general answers. Local shops are pushing Diablo and Gavita. Ran Gavitas for years as DE. As far as environmental changes, its really just supplemental heat if needed correct?

Yeah, mostly. And use a bit higher nutes. Since the led light doesnt drive transpiration as hard: your plants drink less but of a stronger juice. If in coco then keep a bit of calmag handy.
Another way to get that IR back is to add another 10-15% of incandescent light in your grow, but make sure you got it on a dimmer.

There is no 100% better growlight, just more or less adapted to the grower and his environment, and yield and quality expectations. I think the best approach is to go on continuously tinkering, little by little until you get a perfect system. Led means you can build your own light, even around your HPs bulb in the middle. DIY led is a deep rabbithole but i really recommend it, it means you can get exactly what you want and need for your grow

 

[merkaba]

I suppose my intention should be stated...I have a box of random seeds from as far back as the late 80s through 2000s I want to see what comes up. Old DJ Short never released, OG Raskals, Aliens, random OGs from every valley in NorCal, Thais, Mexicans, Africans, etc.etc. Also, I have moved to a legal state and figured I would just buy herb from the shops but it tastes like burnt aspirin so may as well just grow my own. SO...2 things, run some of these crazy heirlooms I have and grow my own. Yield is whatever, I have proven to myself I can get weed to pay bills . I have actually heard from numerous folks that the LED buds are smaller but denser. So I am thinking a 5x5 tent, coco drip (that's how I rocked it for the last 20 years), run a roughly 700watt LED, keep it about 12" off the tops, it will be in a tent in a room, so air won't be freezing but I will keep a heater, humidifier at hand. Sound about right?

 

[aCBD]

I suppose my intention should be stated...I have a box of random seeds from as far back as the late 80s through 2000s I want to see what comes up. Old DJ Short never released, OG Raskals, Aliens, random OGs from every valley in NorCal, Thais, Mexicans, Africans, etc.etc. Also, I have moved to a legal state and figured I would just buy herb from the shops but it tastes like burnt aspirin so may as well just grow my own. SO...2 things, run some of these crazy heirlooms I have and grow my own. Yield is whatever, I have proven to myself I can get weed to pay bills . I have actually heard from numerous folks that the LED buds are smaller but denser. So I am thinking a 5x5 tent, coco drip (that's how I rocked it for the last 20 years), run a roughly 700watt LED, keep it about 12" off the tops, it will be in a tent in a room, so air won't be freezing but I will keep a heater, humidifier at hand. Sound about right?

sounds pretty good! you'll find out the right light intensity and distance to the canopy during one grow

 

[merkaba]

Do leaves curl and crisp or turn white if its too close?

 

[Ca++]

The HID or LED choice, could start with your local weather. If your in a hot place, then the weather has taken care of your heat needs, and you choose LED as it makes the most light, for the power consumed. Likely the best light to, as something like an HPS is pretty monochromic, viewed beside the sun, or LED.

If you will need to add heat, then the decision becomes hazy. If I were in a polytunnel, and it was cold, I would be all over HIDs. A polytunnel is almost outdoor, and the only heater that's working outdoors, is a radiant (ir) one. Not hot air blowers. Spending time around outdoor drinking establishments should show us real examples of this. A patio heater, is radient/IR.

Indoors, where heat is needed, we can use typical space heating, or radiant heating. If it's to be radiant (like the sun) then in the lights is the best place for it. Heat radiating from the lights, can't be drawn away by the extraction, unlike hot air. It's that pub garden thing again. Radiant heat will warm the surface it lands upon. Our plants expect heating this way, and this act, will causes transpiration at the tops, where the buds are needing water and food to be drawn to.
If instead we heat the air, perhaps before it enters the grow, then we don't get the stratospheric heating to a similar extent. We will be heating the whole plant, not just the tops. Maybe this is good, maybe this isn't. However, that hot air will soon leave via the extraction. Some of which, may simply bypass the plants, and be wasted power.

Looking at the HID and LED, we see the HID turning about 25% of the power into light. About 25% into convected heat, and 50% of the power is turned to radient heat. The 600w HID will radiate 300w of heat upon the tops, and perhaps 150w of light. While the 150w of hot air, will likely leave via the extract, directly.
The 600w LED might put 300w of light on the plant. Double the HID. While 300w goes to heating the air around it, that might just leave via the extract. The radiated heat will be negligable. Like my rounding of numbers trying to make this explaination.

The very best solution, may be to use LED, and IR heaters beside them, to produce the bare minimum of heat needed. After a baseline temp of 25c/77f is reached using preheating. If would be a lot of effort though, seeking out that perfect balance of lighting colours, and heat placement, together.

In microgrows, there is a really long thread filled with domestic lamp grows. The ideal light might be better, but it's hard to see why. While it remains little surprise that leading experts, who want to sell us lighting products, are actually saying what we need, is just more. People like Bugbee who will sell you fancy measuring kit, just telling us the light we want, is the more light.

It's a job for a calculator, but spending the extra dime on top end lighting efficiency, should make an electrical bill saving, over the projected 7 years of use, that make the top end light worth paying for. However, for a child that's not seen 20yo yet, they may rather buy a super cheap 2.3umol/w light, and to hell with the electric bill in 7 years, and the fact the lost 1umol just became insta-heat. Which in some scenarios, might not even be useful. While in others, it's more AC.

It's a multifacited balancing act, that could be consuming if we seek perfection. I really could go on and on about conditions leads to extraction rates, that upset other conditions, leading to more kit being employed. Almost seasonally. Our seasons, and the plants.

I can say in the UK, in the hottest weather, the HID users used to often shut down. I might find myself on 50% lighting, on the peak few heatwave days. Now we have LED, I'm not backing off in any weather, and others are not shutting down every summer. Flip that on it's head though for winter. Extraction rates to keep RH down, lead to cool temps that must be answered with heating. For me, out comes the HID to blend with the LED. Along with a small thermosticic heater for a base temp. I'm actually about 24c under the plants, and 30c above. Which seems quite natural, and gets water consumption where I want it. I can't go any cooler though.

 

[merkaba]

So in the UK, you only occasionally have to supplement LED with a HID?

 

[Ca++]

So in the UK, you only occasionally have to supplement LED with a HID?

I have HID provide half my light (in light terms, not power) and do so most months of the year. I extract out the building, so that heat is gone. Many people just use heaters though with their LED, and it's less power lost, if you recirculate the air through a filter, rather than loose all your 30c air, out of the building.
I have done just LED, and it was fine. I just feel the HID is a better heating method. Soon I'm getting back on my 'heat recovery' project, which could see the HID move back into retirement. However, I feel some radiant heat to give a stratospheric temperature gradient, is really quite useful. When I did pure LED, I was soon sticking in incandescent lamps. As have other people who also found their use beneficial. This might be from heat, or extended spectrum, and I can't which. Though clues do point at heat, more than light.


I have enough lighting around, to do it either way. I refuse to pick a single camp though. Lights are a tool, and drive morphology as much as any other mechanism. The HID of any type, gets the water carrying feed to the tops, and we see dominant leads, form big buds in there own space. The LED doesn't promote main heads to gain dominance, and instead all grow tips come up more uniformly, and we get more uniform bud sizes. Not the few big heads, but lots of smaller one's. There is some thought, that the LED crop needs clearing out, to leave fewer heads, and a more 3D landscape. The uniform canopy being a bit 2D, gives less bud sites. The 3D canopy, well, offers another dimension to grow in.

Sorry.. I have drifted.

The best LED is likely a balance of cost and efficiency, not forgetting running costs in that equation.
If that is too cold, then addressing this directly with canopy heating might be the most natural, and cheapest approach. Though you will still have to ensure their warm enough, you don't really need the whole plant around 28c, as you would with just room warming. You can lower the room a few degree's, if you can keep the tops warm, thus driving water movement.

There as so many variables, that not all advice can fit all situations. Some people bypass the meter, and couldn't care less about power use. So will just use a heater, if the LEDs not warming things enough.

 

[Rocket Soul]

So in the UK, you only occasionally have to supplement LED with a HID?

Heating strategy at ours is recirculating air between a few grow spaces, flipfloping 2x 12/12 flowers in opposite timetable and dehueys providing heat and rh reduction when extraction is minimal.
I say fire up your bulb and get yourself some led strips to build around them, alternatively boards in each corner of your 5x5.
For this type of work its quite a bit easier to get familiar with diying rather than finished bought lights. There is a great deal of both us domestic options as well as cheap and cheerful china options that work well.

 

[merkaba]

Yeah, like I mentioned, this is more for my own head stash, sort through several thousands seeds, see if something interesting pops up.

 

[Ca++]

Good luck Merkaba. With that many, you should be spoiled for choice.


If it's a 5x5 then it's not far off mine. I have that HPS 6 in the middle, and a 125w QB in each corner. I should really have a 400 in the middle, and turn up the QB's some more, but it is what it is. A 6(00) should be replaceable with 400w of LED, so I'm putting 200w into that tent that's not lighting it. It's 200w of heat, to motivate water movement. 140w of radiant, and 70w of hot air, ish. I don't feel it's all that wasteful, and if that was a 400, It's really very little indeed. I still have a heater most of the time, so while I'm using that, I'm really not wasting power using HID, at all.

I like the idea of recirculating the air, and drying with de-hu's that add some heat. That is a purposeful solution, but co2 needs thinking about. At least briefly.
I'm actually drawn to propane heaters. Heat and co2, just running the pilot light. I put a 1sqm tent in a room with recirculating extract. Opened the window a couple of inch, and the bedroom door. This led to a hall with kitchen and bathroom, both with extract. So there was air coming in that bedroom window all the time. I then added a candle. CO2 had been dipping below 400ppm when nobody was home, but near 500ppm when people were around. A little odd considering household air wasn't being drawn in that direction, but as cold slipped out out the door, warm air would slip in. The candle in the room, would hit the 1000ppm alarm while the plants were tended. 700ppm usually. This 300ppm gain from one candle might of been just 150ppm with the building vacant, but getting 370ppm up to 600ppm was a real bonus, and showed how much use a single flame was.

I absolutely must keep negative pressure. Not just on the tent, but in the room also. So extract is my easiest option. The heaters pilot light will still be of use though, and heaters are really not that expensive, while buying their gas raises no eyebrows. I have to burn gas to warm the house anyway, so this is co2 use with no additional carbon footprint. I'm pretty much sold on the idea.

 

[Ca++]

Mars have a useful calc, that asks the right questions, to tell you what you are paying per gram produced. It expects a price for the light, that can be zero for later crops. This might give people a better idea of the costs or savings involved

https://www.mars-hydro.com/grow-light-cost-calculator

It's actually two calcs, side by side, on the same page. For making comparisons.

The TS 3000 seems cheap. 250usd for 450w of 2.45umol/w lighting, giving about 1200umol overall. That's going to replace a 600 nicely. Saving a fair bit in replacement lamp costs, over the years. We used to pay that for a 600 set anyway. LED really has pushed HID out of most markets. I'm not sure HID has a decent foothold anywhere now.