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Super expensive LED's vs cheaper LED's?

exploziv

pure dynamite
Administrator
Veteran
Hahahha... I like the guys that think those cheap entry level lights that say 1000 or 1000w really have anything close to that in power!
 

exploziv

pure dynamite
Administrator
Veteran
I'm a new grower.
we have used another company 1000w led grow light and it works so great. Especially its low cost.
And this is their details specification:
https://www.amazon.com/Ismile-Spectrum-Thermometer-Greenhouse-Hydroponic/dp/B087LY1DSS/ref=sr_1_35?crid=HCCR92L40B25& dchild=1&keywords=1000w+led+gr ow+light&qid=1635324740&s=lawn-garden&sprefix=1000w+led+%2Cla wngarden%2C1945&sr=1-35

Hello, man! Any pics of that grow? Sure seems odd to come in here and throw a link at us in the first post!
 

Mars Hydro Led

Grow on Earth Grow with Mars
Vendor
I'm a new grower.
we have used another company 1000w led grow light and it works so great. Especially its low cost.
And this is their details specification:
https://www.amazon.com/Ismile-Spectrum-Thermometer-Greenhouse-Hydroponic/dp/B087LY1DSS/ref=sr_1_35?crid=HCCR92L40B25& dchild=1&keywords=1000w+led+gr ow+light&qid=1635324740&s=lawn-garden&sprefix=1000w+led+%2Cla wngarden%2C1945&sr=1-35

that is the oldest led tech. check our TS600 or TS1000. ;)
 

gizmo666

Active member
Oops, I guess I was kinda hoping Mars hydro was going to talk me into theirs. Not much feedback here anyway.?Feel free to delete my posts.

Not much feed back????
Well if you looked at the diary's you'll probably see all of Mars products in use.....
As for what to buy its all in the research
Yes there are cheaper lights out there
But can you really see how they work????
Is there a forum where you can converse with the makers
No
Didn't think so
I started with what I could afford which was the ts1000 coming from a 400w hps I was not disappointed it performed way better amazing considering the ts1000 is only 150w
I grew two excellent grows with it then moved on to the best I could afford again this time to an Fce3000 and thankfully great communication once again with Mars before purchase
You won't get that with cheaper lights
Research what your looking for first

Just my 2c
 

Dr.Young

K+ vibes
Veteran
Its simple.. When LEDs started becoming popular, and seen by the mass public.... There was a lot of the Red/Blue chips being used because of the portion of people that believed spectrum was the most important part of plant growth. Creating a huge wave of people believing that you could custom tailor a spectrum to create weed with higher terps, higher thc, etc .
There was tons of business men & women that decided they could buy these special spectrum LED from china for cheap $100 for example, and put their brand sticker on it and sell it for $500-1000. People bought them so more people did similar businesses/fixtures.... Some did research and got custom layouts of chips to create a sales pitch that they did some research efforts... Some had large expensive companies that had to pay employees, some didnt..

The main flaw with the initial lights sold was that most of them had small fixtures, or long narrow rectangle fixtures that covered square spaces poorly. Giving low PPFD in the corner of a tent, but very adequet directly under the light.... Now the fixtures perfectly cover the common square canopy so that every sqft has direct overhead light source, and matching PPFD intensity from center to edge.

Having a even perfectly spread footprint no intense/weakspots is most important.. Achieving your DLI with the least watts used, and problematic heat created.. All of this allows perfection in growing....
With LED you have so little heat to deal with it dramatically relieves the electrical stress you have to manage with powerful AC/Dehumidifier/Humidifier/Fans.... Dramatically less air movement, noise, heat, and electricity to deal with.... Without the wasteful levels of IR you had leaf temperatures 10*F higher than the room also which created almost every issue/solution known to indoor growing. Creating tons of room for error, and a market for more cures/tricks/solutions that are all based on something that could be avoided by using proper lighting technology.

Mars LED simply put have the least expensive LED company using current top tier designs, and technology. The LM301b fixtures at prices so close to the cost of DIY that considering the warranty, and customer service. Its easy, and respectable to recommend them to anyone who will not, or cannot DIY their canopy's lighting.

I remember telling Marshydro to implement the lm301b fixtures a couple years ago, and I took a break from researching. Within a couple months I started researching again, and they had already released a lm3031b fixture... So MarsHydro definitely have a crew that stays respectably current with technology, and/or pays attention to what customers say. I am super proud to recommend MarsHydro, and get newer growers to start with the best of the best today, or teach older growers a way to perform better than possible using HID. Its awesome. VPD, DLI, LED..... Learning how to grow has become so much easier, and scientific than ever before which is how it should be, and I love it.
 

mojave green

rockin in the free world
Veteran
Not much feed back????
Well if you looked at the diary's you'll probably see all of Mars products in use.....
As for what to buy its all in the research
Yes there are cheaper lights out there
But can you really see how they work????
Is there a forum where you can converse with the makers
No
Didn't think so
I started with what I could afford which was the ts1000 coming from a 400w hps I was not disappointed it performed way better amazing considering the ts1000 is only 150w
I grew two excellent grows with it then moved on to the best I could afford again this time to an Fce3000 and thankfully great communication once again with Mars before purchase
You won't get that with cheaper lights
Research what your looking for first

Just my 2c
I bought 2 of em.:biggrin:
 
Mars Hydro, are you planning any higher wattage models like Photontek and Medic Grow is making?

What are your thoughts on higher PPFD LED lights? Some dude on insta growing in 1700ppfd or some crazy amount, hitting wild numbers. Then the Mike Howard, Fohse grow at that Nevada dispo running 1350-1500ppfd hitting like 7 lbs a light.

Medic Grow has a 1000w model, ez8 I think, that throws a ton of light. Photontek has a 1000w model that throws a ton of light plus some more, for 1000$ more a light, with way more red and less blue in the spectrum. It also spreads the light quite a bit better.

Are you guys going to get into the 1000w and up market with the LEDs?
 

Mars Hydro Led

Grow on Earth Grow with Mars
Vendor
Mars Hydro, are you planning any higher wattage models like Photontek and Medic Grow is making?

What are your thoughts on higher PPFD LED lights? Some dude on insta growing in 1700ppfd or some crazy amount, hitting wild numbers. Then the Mike Howard, Fohse grow at that Nevada dispo running 1350-1500ppfd hitting like 7 lbs a light.

Medic Grow has a 1000w model, ez8 I think, that throws a ton of light. Photontek has a 1000w model that throws a ton of light plus some more, for 1000$ more a light, with way more red and less blue in the spectrum. It also spreads the light quite a bit better.

Are you guys going to get into the 1000w and up market with the LEDs?

The 800W is the most powerful light we have for now. The 1000W will be on schedule soon.
When people use more than 1000W PPFD light, they usually use the light with CO2. The concentration of CO2 usually is kept from 1200-1500PPM. Most of other suppliers still use the even diode layout. As we know, the central par will be very high but the side par would go down sharply. We use uneven diode layout to let PPFD more uniform so that each plant in a valid coverage could grow well.

Another advantage of our strip light is that we used more chips. More chips means less heat, higher efficiency, longer lifespan, slower light decay. For example, for FC6500, we used 2688 pcs samsung chips. Most of other suppliers use less than 2000pcs chips for 650W light.

FC6500: https://www.mars-hydro.com/buy-fc-6...ercial-led-grow-light-mars-hydro-for-sale-514

So when you check the light, not only check the chip type and highest PPFD. Also need to check the chip quantity and PPFD uniformity.
 

BABY Z

Active member
Io sono nuovo ragazzi coi led ma posso dirvi codesto....coktivo da anni con hps e in agosto specialmente non ho mai non tribolato con 1500w di hps....calore umidità inesistente ecc....ora ho accesi 2 led 1 lumi 720w e FCE m.hydro 6500 730w + UV 45 supplementari....ben mai avuti parametri cosi OK 2 led dimmerati 250w e 1m di h ...una favola....vi mostro i 11g dalla emersione.....fatti.....fatti
 

Dankdude

A figment of your imagination
Moderator
Mentor
I currently have the SP3000 in a Marshydro 2x4 tent. So far so good. The only real complaint I have is about the hanger design. For such a well designed light, you would think they would have put a little more thought into the hanger design. I recently had a mishap with it where I bumped the tent and the light fell onto my plants.
Needless to say, I wasn't happy. One (out of 5 plants) got the crap burned out of it and it's not recovering very well. This may be a little food for thought. Remember you design a good light, pay more attention to details like hangers. The ones that come with the light are substandard in my opinion.
 

exploziv

pure dynamite
Administrator
Veteran
Were the hangers clipped on the frame steel or on the aluminium fins? That light is a bit tricky to set up for hanging, but after I figured out where to place those hangers seemed pretty solid on mine. But yeah, the fact yours fell shows the design could have been made better or easier to install right, for sure.
 

Ca++

Well-known member
Perhaps a new prospective is needed, when choosing lights.

We need to look at our space first, and decide how much light we need. Then we can find lights that provide that. We can expect cheap lights to use more electricity than more expensive ones.

That's about it really. Almost anything else can be seen as just fanciful buyer desires, or sales nonsense. You can expect some 3000K whites, with some 660s added. That's firmly in the rhelms of reality. Beyond that and doubt starts creeping in.

Mainly, price=efficiency. Where no matter what happens, you know how much light you need. Then must find the light that does that. Saving money at purchase, but costing in power consumption. Or pay more for the light, to get lower power bills. Also in that equation, you can consider the extra power use of the cheaper light, is just heating. If your lighting can be achieve by either a 400w 3umol/w light, or a 600w 2umol/w light, then then we must weigh up that heat. The 600w light, is as bright as the 400w light, and adds a 200w heater into the mix. The purchase price of a 2umol/w light is a lot lower than a 3umol/w light, but you have to run that 200w extra, which is just heat. In Iceland you may welcome the idea, but if that 200w needs 70w of aircon to shift it, the running cost is getting out of hand. 270w than the 400w light that could of done it.

This sort of power consumption math isn't for everyone. Running costs are really an important separation between lighting choices though.


As a working method, we need to know how many square meters our grow is. Then decide how bright, and multiply that by the number of meters.
As an example, a 1.2 x 1.2 tent is 1.44 square meters of floor space. If you want 650ppfd, than 650 x 1.44 = 936umol needed from your light. To put down 650 per meter. Expect losses though.
A upper tier light, that doesn't quite break your nuts, will likely offer 2.5umol/w so you need at least 400w, with 480 looking better. 600w would be gold standard.
Some Amazon lights won't be half that bright. Meaning the 600w won't even be enough. We must forget watts, and think first about how much light we need. Then see what lights can provide it. The more you spend, the lower you expect the power consumption to be. Unless it just costs more because it's got alexa built in. Be sure you buy what you need. Decent hangers is a topic we see quite often.
 

BABY Z

Active member
10giorni dimmerati entrambi a 250w ad un 1m di altezza dalle chiome,e per esser alle porte di agosto come dicevo con 2/3hps da 600 era imppssibile😉
 

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Rgd

Well-known member
Veteran
I made a bunch of 600w led lights from strips and panels i had made 10 years ago
They are 561’s they still do what leds do
The way to compete (jk)
With new tech can be as
smple as moving my light 2”closer
I recently hooked up a few 1kw hps with
Ushio bulbs
They work well but i find the leds are no slouch
 

Mars Hydro Led

Grow on Earth Grow with Mars
Vendor
I currently have the SP3000 in a Marshydro 2x4 tent. So far so good. The only real complaint I have is about the hanger design. For such a well designed light, you would think they would have put a little more thought into the hanger design. I recently had a mishap with it where I bumped the tent and the light fell onto my plants.
Needless to say, I wasn't happy. One (out of 5 plants) got the crap burned out of it and it's not recovering very well. This may be a little food for thought. Remember you design a good light, pay more attention to details like hangers. The ones that come with the light are substandard in my opinion.
We are very sorry, we have upgraded the hang method for greater safety and stability. And SP3000 grow light is equipped with a removable driver to avoid safety issues and added upgraded hooks on both sides for better hanging.

355861387_705111381626450_3190642705832376780_n.jpg
 

Dankdude

A figment of your imagination
Moderator
Mentor
We are very sorry, we have upgraded the hang method for greater safety and stability. And SP3000 grow light is equipped with a removable driver to avoid safety issues and added upgraded hooks on both sides for better hanging.

View attachment 18866945
I will be taking advantage of removing the driver and hanging it outside of my tent. By this time next year I plan on adding another tent and using my current tent as a veg tent. I'm currently in a 2x4 and will be upgrading to a 4x4 for flower.
Now I have to figure out which light I want to use in it.
 
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