LEDs which is the best

[dazza]

hey fellow growers. like a lot of people out there I am interested in changing to LED`s but I am sick of all the hype from the manufacturers and suppliers on how they product is the best and the others are crap. Well what I am after today is independent advice from fellow growers on who is using what brand/type and what results they have been achieving. I have a 4ft x 4ft x 7ft 10" grow box and I veg for 18 hours using 400 watt HS and flower for 12 hours on 600 watt HS. All comments/suggestions greatly appreciated. Manufacturers and suppliers piss off I don`t want to fill your pockets with my hard earned cash and get nothing in return, I have asked a lot you guys question and when I request clarification on warranty policies or tech question you don`t even respond. At least you didn`t try and lie. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Kind regards Dazza Dingo from down under.

 

[cannasensei]

Here's the issue, if we say anything but a sponsor we are censored and warned. So even if we knew we couldn't say anything but like advanced led, or a moderator ends up giving a warning.

 

[gardengrow]

Hi Dazza:

Name brands have hype, and many are overpriced. I am Canadian and here it is a bit of a freer society for personal grow use. If you tough the cold of Canada, there are benefits. Your info says you may be from Aussie or NZ, very sweet. Info ways, LED will save you power, about half, but you need lamps with diode/bulb of min 3 watts each. For same results and penetration as 400W and 600W, I would say use LED that can put out 250 to 400 watts each.

Even if they say "made in USA"....all parts come from China. They are the ones that have the factories and technology, it just depends who their makers are.

As for USA, and Canada, we are a couple of years behind on use and testing, not because we aren't as good at it, but because we have an inherent fear that our governments will find out.

The one recommendation: buy from a company that will not let your purchase info ever be tracked.

Love and Happiness to you Lovers and Fighters.

 

[Hosebomber]

Dazza, you really didn't post a question there so I'll try to help you out the best I can. First you should read the post in my sig. It will give you a lot of basic information to form your own opinion. If you are using a good quality LED panel you want at least 560 watts of LEDs to cover that area (if that is the canopy area). Contrary to gardengrow's 2 post, you can not use half of the power of your HPS system with current tech and expect to get the same or better results. It's more like 60 - 70%. If you custom build a panel and have a near perfect spectra ratio for that strain you can hit that 50% mark.

There are only 2 brands that cannot be mentioned on this site. Both are banned for a very good reason. You should never call the cops on a customer or take their money and not provide a product. The site admins request that you don't post direct links to non sponsors or other grow forums but naming them is not an issue. People push Advance LED on this site because they work. There are a number of documented grow journals and they tend to treat their customers well. They aren't the only LED retailer on this site. Again, not all part come from China for all panels but most do. The Chinese are years behind in the R&D field and generally just make copies of the new designs that American companies are producing without matching the internal design and processes. To my current knowledge, there are no manufacturers using the newest generation LEDs in their panels and if you want bleeding edge tech it will be a DIY panel. That requires a lot of research, knowledge and skill on your part.

Your 600 watt HPS is a little under powered to fully cover your 4x4 area completely. I would suggest either 2 400's or a 1000 watt HPS for flowering. Likewise, use an MH light for veg rather than HPS. If the 600 watt ballast you have is a digital ballast, I would use that with a metal halide bulb to veg under for that size of a grow room.

If you have any direct questions about LED lighting, diodes, or lighting in general feel free to ask.

 

[gardengrow]

If you custom build a panel and have a near perfect spectra ratio for that strain you can hit that 50% mark.

Again, not all part come from China for all panels but most do. The Chinese are years behind in the R&D field and generally just make copies of the new designs that American companies are producing without matching the internal design and processes. To my current knowledge, there are no manufacturers using the newest generation LEDs in their panels and if you want bleeding edge tech it will be a DIY panel. That requires a lot of research, knowledge and skill on your part. [END QUOTE]

Hello Dazza:

You can now see what hype and misleading info can be given from Americans. I am Canadian and you are Aussie, which gives us inherent skepticism when we hear "facts" from Americans.

You can see from what Hosebomber wrote: "you can achieve 50% energy utilization if you have a near perfect spectra.

The answer is: there are companies that have achieved that spectra.

For actual facts please read: Light-emitting Diodes at Wikipedia.org

which will tell you:
current modern high output LED's have been invented by OSRAM, a multi-national corporation that is German. OSRAM is now a large branch of SIEMENS corporation, a german company. OSRAM-SYLVANIA corporation now supplies most of the US for all lighting needs (household and commercial). The Americans have almost no Research and Development in the LED field that leads to organic growth LED's. OSRAM has LED factories only in Malaysia and China. Thus any hardware surrounding development, cooling and housing, of these high performance LED's is developed out of the Far East countries.

I love how Americans think they are the center of the universe.

Even the invention of the LED was done by a Brit at Marconi Labs in Britain.

It is interesting how Hosebomber is not allowed to mention name brands, but somehow gets the name "Advance LED's" in his reply to you.

My advice....search for lower cost, complete spectrum light makers. I know of some based out of Europe and Canada. Myself, I am trying to find a company that will deal with me in getting top quality parts for DIY LED's, just depends what costs are: complete units vs. part. I want to expand my garden.

Love and Happiness to all the lovers and fighters.

 

[bcgrowforu]

If by chance or when you do find out where to get the top quality DIY LEDs plz send me some info if you could, I have the cash just would like to get the best.
Again, not all part come from China for all panels but most do. The Chinese are years behind in the R&D field and generally just make copies of the new designs that American companies are producing without matching the internal design and processes. To my current knowledge, there are no manufacturers using the newest generation LEDs in their panels and if you want bleeding edge tech it will be a DIY panel. That requires a lot of research, knowledge and skill on your part. [END QUOTE]

Hello Dazza:

You can now see what hype and misleading info can be given from Americans. I am Canadian and you are Aussie, which gives us inherent skepticism when we hear "facts" from Americans.

You can see from what Hosebomber wrote: "you can achieve 50% energy utilization if you have a near perfect spectra.

The answer is: there are companies that have achieved that spectra.

For actual facts please read: Light-emitting Diodes at Wikipedia.org

which will tell you:
current modern high output LED's have been invented by OSRAM, a multi-national corporation that is German. OSRAM is now a large branch of SIEMENS corporation, a german company. OSRAM-SYLVANIA corporation now supplies most of the US for all lighting needs (household and commercial). The Americans have almost no Research and Development in the LED field that leads to organic growth LED's. OSRAM has LED factories only in Malaysia and China. Thus any hardware surrounding development, cooling and housing, of these high performance LED's is developed out of the Far East countries.

I love how Americans think they are the center of the universe.

Even the invention of the LED was done by a Brit at Marconi Labs in Britain.

It is interesting how Hosebomber is not allowed to mention name brands, but somehow gets the name "Advance LED's" in his reply to you.

My advice....search for lower cost, complete spectrum light makers. I know of some based out of Europe and Canada. Myself, I am trying to find a company that will deal with me in getting top quality parts for DIY LED's, just depends what costs are: complete units vs. part. I want to expand my garden.

Love and Happiness to all the lovers and fighters.[/QUOTE]

 

[gardengrow]

Hey BCGrowForU: I will keep you updated. One company I was talking to was just getting CSA certification (Canadian Standards Association), which if you do your research has higher standards than what the Americans use. They use Underwriters Laboratories. They said they would have something in Canada soon.

Wish them Gods speed for Gods Ganja.

Love and Happiness for all you lovers and fighters

 

[420 Girl]

Here's the issue, if we say anything but a sponsor we are censored and warned. So even if we knew we couldn't say anything but like advanced led, or a moderator ends up giving a warning.

This is untrue. We allow light mentions of non-sponsored products, just no links or excessive promotion.

 

[dazza]

well what is the point of the forum? 420 magazine I would like some answers on this point because I need an unbiased opinion, not what some cashed up sponsor wants to sell me. I am not liking what I am hearing here, if this is true 420 magazine is a waste of time in my opinion no point in asking a question if you can`t get an honest answer.

 

[dazza]

420girl that sounds better. I read the first blog and not happy, hope this is true

 

[dazza]

sorry you didn't understand what I am asking, must be my Aussie accent.The cabinet and lighting figures that I quoted are being used for one girl at a time in the cabinet, the advice that you have giving me is greatly appreciated and I will take it on board but the info I am after is for LED`s. I agree with you on the 50% watt LED will not do the job, I have read a lot of the blogs and I am in the market for a LED light around the 600 watt plus mark. By the way if there is some dodgy dealers out there you need to name them loud and clear for all to know.I have read a lot of blogs but not all, so can you give me a heads up on who the dodgy dealers are NAME THEM! I will ask my question again who out there is growing successfully using LED`s and what type, what brand and how are you using them. I will quote a few brand names that I have look at Advanced(Pro Grow),Magnum plus 2, and Grow stealth(GS600) just to name a few. Any genuine, for real, unbiased information would be greatly appreciated. Dazza Dingo from down under.

 

[Variable]

Dazza. I am on the same road as you but a few months down the line and I'm happy to share my experience so far, as a newbie who is now on his second growth cycle using LED lamps. I was also puzzled by 420's apparent block on mentioning any brands except the ones they recommend. I'm glad to hear this is not the case so long as one is not being a shill for a manufacturer, but simply describing a good product.
I bought my first lamp seven months ago from eBay. It was unbranded and cost £90 and has 47 X three W diodes totalling 141w. But this figure is merely the potential output of the LEDs. To increase their life expectancy they are only run on about 60 percent power and my unit draws 86 watts at the mains (240 volt). This unit is a mixture of red and blue diodes only and gives off a wonderful mauve pink light. On a light meter it measures 9000 lux at half a metre. But this measurement is skewed because the lamp is only producing the red and blue spectra. The light meter expects to see white light and is biased in favour of green at the centre of the spectrum. In the absence of this green light it underestimates what it is seeing so the actual lux rating is probably 10,000 at half a metre – or approximately indirect dappled sunlight. My next unit, also from eBay, is branded Prakasa and was also £90, although it had been nearly £150 when I was first comparing prices. This comes with a mixture of 48x 3w and 5w LEDs in seven bands: dark red, red, orange, yellow, white, blue and UV. This draws 90w at the mains and is considerably brighter to the eye with a much whiter light, and it measures 11,000 lux on the meter. I currently have six UFOs, five of them from Prakasa, in two grow tents, three in each. The veg tent is 120 by 65 by 160 centimetres and the bud tent is 120 by 120 by 200. Three lights in each is possibly overkill and I could get away with two in the small tent, but hey, I've got them so I might as well use them. Heat is absolutely not a problem and the temperature inside the tents gets no higher than room temperature plus eight degrees centigrade. After a first shaky first generation where hopefully I learned most of the worst newbie mistakes I am ever going to make, I am now watching my second generation of three plants coming into riotous bloom and the clones doing nicely in the smaller tent. So far my total expenditure has been about £700 including seeds and electricity and everything else. I only cropped two ounces from my first generation single plant but it was only meant to be a trial run to see if a larger operation would be viable. That run only cost £110 for a lamp and a seed and some mylar, and weed here costs £200 or more an ounce, so do the maths. I immediately upgraded to the current setup.
When I was looking at lamps I used their wattage/price as the standard. The Prakasa 90w units work out at one pound per watt which is the cheapest I have found. Prakasa make larger units up to 500 watts but none of the larger sizes are as cheap per watt as the little UFOs. Plus, if something goes wrong with a unit you only lose a part of your lighting, not all of it in one go. Having said that I had to send one of the Prakasas back because its fans did not work. But although it's Chinese made it came from a British distributor and the seller replaced it within 24 hours. I hope that's been useful. If you have any more questions and I'll do my best to answer. Good luck and have fun.

 

[Hosebomber]

You can now see what hype and misleading info can be given from Americans. I am Canadian and you are Aussie, which gives us inherent skepticism when we hear "facts" from Americans.

You can see from what Hosebomber wrote: "you can achieve 50% energy utilization if you have a near perfect spectra.

The answer is: there are companies that have achieved that spectra.

For actual facts please read: Light-emitting Diodes at Wikipedia.org

which will tell you:
current modern high output LED's have been invented by OSRAM, a multi-national corporation that is German. OSRAM is now a large branch of SIEMENS corporation, a german company. OSRAM-SYLVANIA corporation now supplies most of the US for all lighting needs (household and commercial). The Americans have almost no Research and Development in the LED field that leads to organic growth LED's. OSRAM has LED factories only in Malaysia and China. Thus any hardware surrounding development, cooling and housing, of these high performance LED's is developed out of the Far East countries.

I love how Americans think they are the center of the universe.

Even the invention of the LED was done by a Brit at Marconi Labs in Britain.

It is interesting how Hosebomber is not allowed to mention name brands, but somehow gets the name "Advance LED's" in his reply to you.

Gardengrow, I know your expertise on LEDs comes from Wikipedia, but you have no idea what you are talking about. There is no manufacture out there that has the perfect spectra... if there was all of them would use it.

Sylvania produces house hold and commercial lighting fixtures and most of them are CFL not LED. Yes, Osram does have some good red LEDs but they are nowhere near the market leader in sales or research and development of top end diodes. Cree and Phillips currently hold all of the records. Bridgelux also does a fair amount in the cutting edge market. So while there is one EU country that does R&D of quality diodes, the majority of breakthroughs come from the American firms. Before you start having diarrhea of the mouth, check your facts and come with some small amount of knowledge in the field first.

I used Advance LED as an example. Feel free to look back through some of my older post and see the criticism I have posted about them. There are many grows on this site with that brand and with them against other brands and they do perform well. When people have an issue with their lights they fix them fast and customer service means something to those that produce commercially. If you lose a crop of 2 or 3 personal plants it's not that big of a deal. If you lose a crop of 50-100 plants and that income provides for you and your family it is a big deal.

FYI there are no Canadian LED manufactures. Not a single one, just re-sellers.

As for where to find parts, Mouser, Digikey, Avnet, and the like have wider selections then most places. Steve's, ledgroupbuy, rapidled, and satisled will have smaller variety but do have good prices from time to time.

 

[wyrman]

Hey dazza, I am getting 2- 100 watt led's from advanced lighting and I can hardly wait to see how they do. a little bit expensive but I think it will be worth it in the long run.

 

[dazza]

When you have completed a grow with the two 100 watters please let us all know how it went. I would like to thank you all for the information. I am now in a little bit better shape to make a decision on what to use and purchase. I think for my situation one light of around 600 to 700 watts will do the trick in my grow box. Unfortunately I don`t have the room for a individual veg and a flower box so I do all growing in the one box, apart for a small cabinet for my clones. I have tried growing two girls in the box but I have found that one at a time is the right way to go for me, anymore and then they start to compete against each other, cause problems. With just one girl I have issues with heat in the cabinet so most of the time I have to leave the door open, not very stealthy and that is why I want to use LED`s. Mind you I am yielding about 14 ounce`s a three month cycle so I don`t complain. Anyway fellow growers keep the chat on this subject going as all the information I/we can get on this subject can only be a good thing. I will post my results after I make a call on which light to purchase and have completed a grow using it. Don`t forget to live the dream, Dazza Dingo.

 

[gardengrow]

To Hosebomber:

You mention Philips as being a major LED supplier and innovator: They are a Dutch multinational.

I agree that Cree is a US originated multinational who would be purported as having perhaps the best LED lights. Please read Wikipedia about Cree........here is a quote "In 2005, Cree opened a subsidiary, Cree Asia-Pacific Ltd., at the Hong Kong Science Technology Park to serve as a center of product innovation in Asia and provide customer and technical support, particularly in the area of packaged LED lighting components.[3][4]

In 2007, Cree acquired Cotco Luminant Device Ltd of Hong Kong for $200 million.[5] Cotco is a supplier of high brightness LEDs in China.

In 2009, Cree announced an agreement to purchase a 592,000-square-foot (55,000 m2) facility in Huizhou, Guangdong Province, China.

This means most innovation is done using Hong Kong brain power, and if LED technology is found in their R&D around the world......all that info is used in their big factories in China and Hong Kong.

That means the imported product from Pan-Asia (whether imported into Cananda, US, or Europe) is all the best quality found in Asia, because not only Cree, but Osram, and Philips make them all there.

Who do you then think can send the lowest price, best quality LED's then? High priced American workers in small factories or less expensive labour in the huge factories that have the best facilities to produce these LEDs.

The lamps from China then get the best prices on the best LED's because they are right in their front door.

If a person delves deeper, most China lamps are made in Guangdong province China, where the GIGANTIC CREE factory is located.

Bridegelux is a pidly small US LED maker, not even one 50th the size of Cree. They make OK lamps.........and Yes, Cree makes agruably the better specta for 50% energy usage.

 

[Hosebomber]

Again, you may want to do a little more research into the LED market.

Phillips Lumileds (the LED division of Phillips) R&D is done in San Jose, CA.

Likewise, if you read the press release on Cree purchasing the Chinese manufacturing space and company you will see that they are going to produce there, R&D will still be performed at the Santa Barbra and Triangle Park offices.

The fact remains that nearly all major breakthroughs in high output LEDs comes from the US and everyone else (except Osram) copies their work and footprint so that they can be compatible and maybe get a piece of the action.

As for Bridgelux being "pidly" you may want to recheck your numbers there as well. They aren't that far behind the other large names. They currently rank 14th in overall diode sales. (this includes their licensed production). Why do you think all of these panel sellers claim to have Bridgelux and Epistar LEDs? They are a good quality product at a good price.

 

[gardengrow]

Again, you may want to do a little more research into the LED market.

Phillips Lumileds (the LED division of Phillips) R&D is done in San Jose, CA.

Likewise, if you read the press release on Cree purchasing the Chinese manufacturing space and company you will see that they are going to produce there, R&D will still be performed at the Santa Barbra and Triangle Park offices.

The fact remains that nearly all major breakthroughs in high output LEDs comes from the US and everyone else (except Osram) copies their work and footprint so that they can be compatible and maybe get a piece of the action.

As for Bridgelux being "pidly" you may want to recheck your numbers there as well. They aren't that far behind the other large names. They currently rank 14th in overall diode sales. (this includes their licensed production). Why do you think all of these panel sellers claim to have Bridgelux and Epistar LEDs? They are a good quality product at a good price.

Hosebomber: Funny how you fail to mention that Philips (the Dutch company has it's largest LED factory in China in Chengdu province, like Cree and Osram having their LED factories in China also. None have their factories in the US. That means most quality LED's have to come from China. No matter how much you try to denigrate their production, these companies have their factories there to produce the best LED's, no matter also where the R&D is done.

Cree had revenues last year of nearly a billion dollars (one thousand million) and Bridgelux sales were pidly compared to that at 32 million........one thirtyeth of their size. So, pidly, yes, when something is 3% the size of the other.

ranked number 14 out of 14 means LAST.

get your facts straight. I don't sell or hawk any specific brand. I just point out the hype from bloggers like you.

 

[dazza]

let us know how it turned out, I hope it goes well. Dazza

 

[crystal lady]

Hi all, I'm a physician in the UK who is pro marijuana, but find the science interesting. I have read a fair bit about LED's and based on science and looked at grow rates and looking into info given by gardengrow would have to say their info about LED light makers is accurate. Not being American might be my ability to be impartial, but if research is done in the US, fine, really who cares. For me, where you have the factory and product would be more important, because that then influences the price. Correct?

Gardengrow, please tell me or pm me where these full spectra makers ship to and ship from, and who they are please, or pm me. I would like to test myself from someone that has reasonable prices for units.