LED Wattage

[Iblex]

Hi!
In my understanding the wattage stated on LED lights usually not what it says.
I mean, power consuption inside some leds, like the old Ufos and heat do eat wattage aswell.
And in some cases the info is different depending on the manufacturer.

My question is: What is the actual wattage on these lamps and how do you know?

Ima post 2 different examples.

First one states 100w ish output.
https://todogrowled.com/en/luminari...assic.html#/43-objetivo-ciclo_completo_3500_k

Second states 150w (and in this case i know it is not what you get)
https://ebay.to/3hN4KYW

The second option might be an extreme example tho

But yeah, how do you know what you get?

 

[f-e]

The 150 might be close, but the numbers are a bit fudged. It's using a fan too. I'm not feeling confident about it.
I can't load the other page.

 

[exploziv]

Mars hydro is always within 10% of advertised nominal power.

 

[Iblex]

Mars hydro is always within 10% of advertised nominal power.

Yeah, ive heard alot of good reviews about Mars Hydro.

 

[Iblex]

Thing is, i got a 138w Ufo grow led from a friend who bought it, never used it. But i can not find any info about it (just a china imported copy i guess)
The only thing it states on a small label on top is 138w. Feels like it is hard to trust and i do not want to try it out just to realize it is pure garbage xD

 

[f-e]

138w might be real. Everything should have a power consumption label, to get approval. It's like electrical goods 101. 138w seems too exact to be anything else. It's not very representative of light output though. 120w might make it to the LEDs. However what the LEDs do with it is still questionable. Typical cheap whites in mass produced gear tend to offer 100 lumens per watt. So it's perhaps a 12,000 lumen light. Having Lumen efficiency comparable to T5 flo's. On the other hand, the decent LEDs that absolutely won't be fitted, could make it a 30,000 lumen light. The gap between good and bad LED's is huge, and not represented by wattage.

 

[Iblex]

138w might be real. Everything should have a power consumption label, to get approval. It's like electrical goods 101. 138w seems too exact to be anything else. It's not very representative of light output though. 120w might make it to the LEDs. However what the LEDs do with it is still questionable. Typical cheap whites in mass produced gear tend to offer 100 lumens per watt. So it's perhaps a 12,000 lumen light. Having Lumen efficiency comparable to T5 flo's. On the other hand, the decent LEDs that absolutely won't be fitted, could make it a 30,000 lumen light. The gap between good and bad LED's is huge, and not represented by wattage.

Seems like they counted the leds in this one. 46*3W. This is def one of the cheap ones
Guess ill buy this one when the time is right. https://bit.ly/3hKcLO9

 

[f-e]

TGL link finally loaded. Looks like a nice light. I didn't check the price but is a meanwell driver with cree 3590 LED. Running ~95w at the LED it will probably beat the 150w unit. A quick search has the 3590 at 125-190lm/w depending. It's a 130w chip on a reasonable lump of metal. I reckon 160lm/w like most decent cobs is likely.

 

[Mars Hydro Led]

Yeah, ive heard alot of good reviews about Mars Hydro.

The wattage is also influenced by voltage. Higher voltage output, the power will be a little less.

 

[Three Berries]

You should get a power meter. They are only $20 or so and can keep track of the electricity used for your grow. You can see the exact wattage they draw.

I have one of these. it won't lose the data when power drops out too which is nice.

https://www.gardnerbender.com/-/media/inRiver/PM3100_HR.jpg?mw=410&mh=270&modified=20180406201732

 

[Three Berries]

Well I found out my nute deficiencies issues are really too much light. Had a seedling that has been struggling for two weeks and one day of less light an it doubled in size and was all frosty. Currently have it in the window for a couple hours and it's loving it with a LUX reading of +800k! No where near what I was running the LEDs at.
My 3x3x5 tent worked great with two 65w on the last grow and I went to 1 100w and if started to cause the issues quickly.

Really wish there was a good way to mount hanging LEDs nearly flush with the top of the tent.

 

[Christy Mann]

Looking at the wattage is not always sufficient as different grow lights have their lumen output range. For example, the 400 watt LED grow light has around 40,000 to 60,000 lumens while metal halide grow light has just 10,000 to 20,000 lumens. We will need to look at the lumens.

Thanks for your explanation. I didn't recognize there is another parameter aside from wattage. But what color, or spectrum should we choose? As it seems the grow rate of plant is affected by the wavelength of the lights. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7917910/

 

[LostTribe]

you really do not have any need to purchase a wattage meter. I would expect he'd be more in need of info regarding using it. Its not a big light probably max 2x2 ft square feet and I'd say max 4 ft height of tent or other area would be ideal. 4 1 gallon pots a fan and timer and youre good to go.

 

[f-e]

Oh. I quite like a watt meter myself. A light meter is more use, but only if you know how it's calibrated. The watt meter is good if you also know the lights efficiency. Allowing you to quite accurately calculate the light output.
I'm sure with a light that can't really over do the flowering requirements, that halving that for veg won't be hard. When you literally don't have a clue though, so are religiously following the work of others, you really could do with the same measuring devices they have.

Advances in LED's have left us on a bit of a plateau. Almost everything we are likely to want, sits between 2.4 and 2.9 PPF/W (umol/j). It doesn't take a lot to establish where in that range your light falls, then use power consumption as a comparison between peoples settings. It does seem we are looking at cobs here though. They didn't make it much past 2 ppf/w. So trying to get that 600+ on a meter canopy, needs 300w at least.

 

[Creeperpark]

Just get enough light to grow weed, you got to start somewhere. Get the most watts you can and start there. There's a lot of hype out there and its easy to get confused. If you have a high wattage LED you can keep high above the plants and grow bigger buds. If you have a low-wattage LED you can keep it close to the plants and grow decent bud. Either way, you can add more light or reduce to less light what every you need. You just have to work with it and make it work.

 

[Creeperpark]

I use a combo mix of lights. LED, HPS, and T8 fluorescent for a 5x6 and 8ft high area. Not all at once, I add light as the plants fill up the room. I get a year's worth of weed for two people. This combo uses much less electricity than two 400 watt hps or one 1000 watt hps. The plant growth is super.

 

[9DRAGONS]

Just get enough light to grow weed, you got to start somewhere. Get the most watts you can and start there. There's a lot of hype out there and its easy to get confused. If you have a high wattage LED you can keep high above the plants and grow bigger buds. If you have a low-wattage LED you can keep it close to the plants and grow decent bud. Either way, you can add more light or reduce to less light what every you need. You just have to work with it and make it work.

When you starting out you don't need a lot of power as plant needs to establish its self in the grow medium, also you don't over water, if the leaf temp to high plus 30c as plant will close stomata basically the plant can't breath. If low temp in grow area it can stunt growth also and reduce up take of food

To high temp low rh% the plant closes down as it trying to survive.

To high temp and high rh% plant gets suffocated can't breath, also with this you will introduce mold into the grow area, I try to think is that makes sense, I hope its a little help to your problem. Good luck wish you success, any questions you can pm me happy to try and help.

 

[Creeperpark]

When you starting out you don't need a lot of power as plant needs to establish its self in the grow medium, also you don't over water, if the leaf temp to high plus 30c as plant will close stomata basically the plant can't breath. If low temp in grow area it can stunt growth also and reduce up take of food

To high temp low rh% the plant closes down as it trying to survive.

To high temp and high rh% plant gets suffocated can't breath, also with this you will introduce mold into the grow area, I try to think is that makes sense, I hope its a little help to your problem. Good luck wish you success, any questions you can pm me happy to try and help.

Good info #9 thanks for the tips. I start out with only one LED and keep adding lights until the room is full of weed. The only way I can run a system with this light combo is by running it in the Winter at night. The plants grow faster than outdoor plants flowering on a 12 12 cycle.

 

[Creeperpark]

I start out with T8 fluorescent and when the plants go into 1-gallon containers I add a LED and keep adding until the room is full of weed./Here some photos of last grow using a 2 LED one 400 HPS combo.