Building a Home Made LED

[xmobotx]

finding some interesting stuff w lumiled rebel ES leds availabl from future lighting on star pcb

the warm white version is very comparable to cree ww

seems like a better curve and higher lumens

however. neutral cree is still the better choice for nw

still a comparable curve but lower lumens

key; in the upper curve, rebelES ww is the blue line ~going further into the red; the nw rebel is the fainter blue curve in the second image

 

[repuk]

Hi guys!

Today they start their 4th week into flower. Things seems to be rolling smoothly, this is what I found after 4 days without looking at them:

this was 1 week ago for comparison:

I have noticed something interesting: As you know I use NW, CW and WW leds.

The more stretched and developed budsites are exactly under the WW leds. I have been tucking and training them and invariably after some days I found the taller and more "hairy" budsites under them.

They're very close to the LEDs, (less than 6") no signs of bleaching.

 

[GP73LPC]

Hi guys!

Today they start their 4th week into flower. Things seems to be rolling smoothly, this is what I found after 4 days without looking at them:

View Image

this was 1 week ago for comparison:

View Image

I have noticed something interesting: As you know I use NW, CW and WW leds.

The more stretched and developed budsites are exactly under the WW leds. I have been tucking and training them and invariably after some days I found the taller and more "hairy" budsites under them.

They're very close to the LEDs, (less than 6") no signs of bleaching.

looking good

interesting note about the WW leds... thanks


also, i feel your pain. when i was scroggin if i went 3 days without looking at things, it was OUT OF CONTROL!

i found spending 20 mins a night tying down was much better than a couple of hours every 3 nights

 

[DrFever]

repuk did i here this correctly your 4th week in flower ?????? is this from seed ??? just wondering.

 

[tenthirty]

I have noticed something interesting: As you know I use NW, CW and WW leds.

The more stretched and developed budsites are exactly under the WW leds. I have been tucking and training them and invariably after some days I found the taller and more "hairy" budsites under them.

They're very close to the LEDs, (less than 6") no signs of bleaching.

Yup, that is exactly what I am seeing.

Also, the plants under the HML have more bud sites than the plants under the pro-grow system.

more blue= short and bushy
more red=taller
Now this probably only goes for the first 30 days or less of flower or veg.

When the plant goes into full flower mode, the game changes......

I'm think'in that once we are in full flower mode, more red will promote more/better bud growth.

Rives?????

Pics and update coming......

 

[DrFever]

yo Ten can you post some pics of full plant ???

 

[xmobotx]

repuk & 10:30 it would seem your observations continue to make a case for homogeneity?

 

[tenthirty]

OK,

Update time.......

First pic,

Note how the light transitions across the grow. Can we say side by side experiment.

Also note how much taller the closer HML plants are. Hmmmm



Here is another shot from the other direction.
The one closer tall one got moved about a week ago.



Single plant shots



All of the above is at 18 days.


All the below are day 55 under hps.
I have a possible replacement coming, if everything works out.



Obvious things,

The HML plants are bigger! no brainer here. All of them!

On the last run there was one HML and 1/3 of the plants were bigger.

On this run 2/3 of the plants are bigger. All of them!

This run HML is covering 2/3 of the table.

The next steps will be to get the HPS replaced with something more broad spectrum.
And the next HML to bump the pro-grow out will be shifted more blue to cover the far end (away from the HPS) of the first 30 day table.
This is in the hope that we can keep the same vigor, but reduce the stretch some.

Ultimately, what is going to happen, the room will be filled with broad band light that will shift red as we move across the room while maintaining as much of a homogeneous, harmonic rich lighting environment as possible.
So plant placement will determine ratios.
Tuning the light vs playing the plant!

Problems,

I let the girls veg a little too long. (full 14 days after root set)
Too many really good branches to cut off, I really hated to do it, but the sample rate needs to be kept at a certain level,
and every grow needs to be kept as close to the other comparative grows to measure changes from one to the next.

Also, the pro-grow plant still show some chlorosis problems where the HML plants are the picture of health, other than me sog'in the shit out of them.

If I had to characterize the last 8 to 10 runs,
HPS does grow bud, but the spectrum doesn't do the plant any favors.

It's obvious to me that the plant has to struggle with some processes vs HML......
Even against the pro-grows, plant morphology and overall health suffer compared to the full spectrum HML's.

Further more, from the beginning of the HML experiment, each successive grow has yielded a = or>10% increase of the right kind of biomass. wink wink nod nod.

 

[GP73LPC]

your doing some great work here 10:30....

 

[vukman]

Heya bro....Thing I've noticed and I hope you don't mind me putting some thoughts here into your thread. If you do, please let me know and I'll promptly remove them.

After the flower cycle, which I ran on a bit more than the average of blue...blue/white and with that I am referring to my HML, I then reverted to some old/er LEDs which are highly 630 dominant. Within a day I noticed trichomes developing on the 'sugar leaves'.

I now have around 600w of LEDs in the tent and am going to put another ~400w in there as well. I would like to get my HML in there as well and I will if I have the room available.

As you see, I haven't bought into the school of the low wattage 1 watter chips.. Seeing what I have noticed just within a day or two, I don't think I will.

Obviously, you can see that I am more interested in experimenting with my little tent I have here so I can implement what I have learned here on a larger scale when the new place is up and running...

Fully agree with GP...amazing work my friend...keep it up...!!!!!!

 

[tenthirty]

Vuk, all is good. the larger the sample and the more observations the better.
Your observations, lend themselves to "we want to increase red as flower progresses".
Do we get more harvest???
Do we get better quality????? I'll bet yes.

What you mean, 1 watt chips. I run all 5's and 10's.
I'll be damn'd if I'm going to solder 90 or 100 1 watt chips.

The beauty of small, well....it's small.
For me to move my garden in a given direction take $$ and work.

For me the limiting factors in order,

Canopy size, only so many buds are going to fit in a given area. (I'm maxed out with my available space and frankly, the amount of work involved is a bit more than I really want to do.)
Penetration, the lower the initial photon density, the lower the light levels as time and space pass. (dispersion/refraction not to mention Doppler effect/red shift.)
Bang for the buck, best (I know subjective) light spectrum/intensity for the least amount of watts burned.

Just to recap.

It's taken about 3 months and $500.00 + lots of labor to get to the point to be able to come up with a viable testing methodology that fits space, capitol, and engineering constraints.
There was also over a year of research on leds before I even started.

Time to go clean the waterfarm siphon tubes.

Peace, my brother and all best wishes.
and please keep adding to the knowledge base here.

 

[vukman]

Vuk, all is good. the larger the sample and the more observations the better.
Your observations, lend themselves to "we want to increase red as flower progresses".
Do we get more harvest???
Do we get better quality????? I'll bet yes.

What you mean, 1 watt chips. I run all 5's and 10's.
I'll be damn'd if I'm going to solder 90 or 100 1 watt chips.

The beauty of small, well....it's small.
For me to move my garden in a given direction take $$ and work.

For me the limiting factors in order,

Canopy size, only so many buds are going to fit in a given area. (I'm maxed out with my available space and frankly, the amount of work involved is a bit more than I really want to do.)
Penetration, the lower the initial photon density, the lower the light levels as time and space pass. (dispersion/refraction not to mention Doppler effect/red shift.)
Bang for the buck, best (I know subjective) light spectrum/intensity for the least amount of watts burned.

Just to recap.

It's taken about 3 months and $500.00 + lots of labor to get to the point to be able to come up with a viable testing methodology that fits space, capitol, and engineering constraints.
There was also over a year of research on leds before I even started.

Time to go clean the waterfarm siphon tubes.

Peace, my brother and all best wishes.
and please keep adding to the knowledge base here.

Right on brother... Much love and respect....

As for the 1W thing, I wasn't talking about you but rather a school or train of thought out there which some go by. Personally, I'm with you. I'm looking into the 5W chips but would like them in reds and blues as well as opposed to just the whites but if that's what I have to go with, well then, that's what I have to go with.

As everything, money is the limiting factor here for me when it comes to that issue. Hopefully not for too much longer, I get my driver's license back in the new year (Jan 5th to be precise) and I'll be able to get around better which will enable me to 'whore my services' out ..........hehehhe..just kidding but it will make the getting around and making money a lot easier.

I truly hope that this new year coming holds a whole new era in LED technology so that some of these die-hard nay-sayers will finally be convinced that LEDs are here to stay.

I truly feel as though a major drawback in that category was and still is all the false advertising and false claims being made by unscrupulous retailers and wholesalers. Stuff like a 100W LED is equal to a 1000W HID!!!!!!! Pfffffftttt!!!! yeah, no wonder there are so many non-believers..

Once again, thank you my friend and brother...needless to say that there is an open invite to you to post anything you like in any of my threads and actually would be an honour if you do...

 

[jcmjrt]

I truly feel as though a major drawback in that category was and still is all the false advertising and false claims being made by unscrupulous retailers and wholesalers. Stuff like a 100W LED is equal to a 1000W HID!!!!!!! Pfffffftttt!!!! yeah, no wonder there are so many non-believers..

That has been a major turn-off to many as it just doesn't take long to disprove the claims and once burned twice shy.
I think that another problem is that it seems people are trying to replace their single source HID light with a single source LED and that doesn't seem to be the best way for LED. Several smaller sources to cover seems to be much better.
I'm looking forward to getting the parts for my own diy build. Everything has been ordered and I'm waiting patiently (read - chomping at the bit!) for the mail.

 

[tenthirty]

Well, I just finished planting clones and I'll have to say.......
Finally, all the clones are grade A-B. (Mostly A)

That has been a major turn-off to many as it just doesn't take long to disprove the claims and once burned twice shy.

A rhetorical philosophical question.

After spending the last year or so studying the application of leds.
It stands to reason that any commercially produced system would be less than ideal. (I'm being nice)

Right here, you are shown how you can build an effective LED panel for about $2.00 a watt.
This is all done purchasing top quality parts from retail vendors.
If you add in a reasonable profit..........$3-4.00 a watt?????
Chinese leds can cost a penny a piece. XM-L's $6.50++.

The science and engineering that goes into most commercial led panels is minimal at best. (few exceptions)
Few companies have a vested interest in the science.

So knowing these concepts, would any of you ever buy another premade led panel? ( I know "Lumitech")
What about all the newbees. Deer in the headlights.

When I go to a led vendors website, seldom am I pleasantly surprised. Most of the time I get angry over the extremely high prices and the lack of specification and supporting data.

Thus, here we all are.

 

[tenthirty]

Here is an example. https://growgoddess.com/store.php

 

[Socrates]

I put in a few 15W cool white (6500k) screw-in LEDs from Home Depot to supplement my main panel for veg and early flower. Repuk and tenthirty got me thinking it might be worth it to switch them out for some warm white LEDs during the later part of flowering. I found these, which use CREE XP chips. Do you guys think it'd be worth spending the extra money?

Link: http://www.idealledlight.com/products.php?c=indoor&p=par30sw16&s=des

Apologies if this is too off-topic, happy to delete.

 

[tenthirty]

A bit expensive for what it is.....But it is plug and play.
I think Petflora has a place to get this type of bulb for less money.(not cree)

If the 100 bucks is burning a hole in your pocket, do it and let us know how it works.

 

[Socrates]

They are $37 with free shipping elsewhere. I just posted that link because it has the full specs.

 

[tenthirty]

This, makes for a good learning experience.

Think about this.
At $37 a 15w bulb, this comes out to $2.47 a watt.
This is using top name leds.(maybe/probably not top bin)

It's easy enough to compare against any "grow led pimp"
Also as stated before HML costs are less than $2.50 a watt. (Closer to $2.00 a watt)
I think Petflora is paying like $5.00 per Chinese equivalent plugin led bulb.

Draw your own conclusion

 

[xmobotx]

So knowing these concepts, would any of you ever buy another premade led panel?

DIY all the way