Noobie looking for advice on LED for small tent

[dookleto]

Hi there

I am looking to upgrade my light (300w CFL mixed spectrum) to a mars hydro LED. Mars seem the best choice as I am on a budget, and their prices seem amazing, and they are well reviewed all around.

currently I am growing 4 auto flowers in a 80x80x160 cm small tent.

the lights I am currently looking at are:

150W @ £86.99 :

300W @ £77.89 :

400W @ £153.99:

all of them are from marshydro's ebay store so Im confident they are not fake or anything like that.

A few questions:

is 300 or 400W overkill for such a small tent? at 160cm high (light probably hanging at 140cm i would guess) will it be too strong if the plants stretch and get too close to the light?

Why is the 300W so cheap? it seems like a bit of a bargain. I would prefer a square panel for my square tent, but it seems almost too good to be true

being a small area heat can build up (im running one 4" extractor fan currently) It seems to handle the cfl fine, but im not sure how hot these LED units run.


I am leaning more towards the 300W for the cost it seems like a nice purchase, but I dont want to get a light thats too strong for such a small tent.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated thanks

 

[ibaba]

300w should be fine for you in my opinion, not gonna be too hot

 

[Mars Hydro]

Hello dookleto, those are our ebay stores, you can order from there.
One 300w led can replace your 300w cfl for sure, and if you order the 400w light, that will give you great results.
the old models are on sale, therefore the price is low now. we only have like 0% profit from this models.

 

[NateToke]

Go with the 400W. You'll thank me later. That extra power will only help.

 

[dookleto]

the 400w uses 5w diodes though? I read that these get very hot, im not sure my current setup can handle it, particularly with summer coming.

I am leaning towards the 300W right now.

 

[arellanobrian]

I would agree that the extra wattage would only help but if you feel the temps would get over 85 then I would def not do it. My mars raises the temps in my room by 15 degrees Fahrenheit when I no had be ventilation and only about 5-7 when I left the door open in my tent and had a fan blowing air in but whatever your choice im sure you'll love your mars lights

 

[dookleto]

If anyone is interested I picked up the 300W old model, and am very happy so far. delivery was super fast and was packaged well, and the unit was undamaged and all LEDs were working. I could have tried a more powerful model, but in the small space it seemed fine for me. The price was so good for this unit I figured I can just do a few autoflower runs and if I am not happy I can upgrade to something stronger.

So far after a few hours my tent temperature has evened out at 80F (room is about 70F), and seems to vary only 1 degree from the top and bottom. I was surprised by this, I thought the temp would be much warmer at the top, but it seems this is not the case. It will be interesting to see what the temps are like when the summer really hits. The light itself does not seem too bright to the naked eye, compared to the very white light from my CFL. However I have nothing to compare it to (other LED lights etc) so I am sure it is fine.

Only complaint I have is that it is a bit noisy, but only slightly louder that I would expect, about the same as a PC with cheap noisy fans inside (as they are exactly this, its not surprising). If you use the room for something else, it may be a little annoying. I may look into replacing the fans at some point for some rubber dampened ones. Also the packaging could be a bit more discreet. It clearly said on the side of the box what it was, and I would prefer a little more stealth.

So thanks to mars for the incredibly cheap price, and also rushing the hangers to me super fast <3

 

[Mars Hydro]

hello

 

[LordDoge]

hello

Any chance of some stealth shipping?