New grow LED 1000w light: need advice on Watts to use per plant

[Jaz]

I would think it could only support one plant.

Ideally yes.

It's all about growing 'area', you can have a few seedlings but once the leaves fill out the area you either add another light or prune out the slower growers to another tent/outdoors.

I found the ppfd charts for the 1000W'er, cough, cough.

I'm guessing these may be 'suggested' heights for flowering, vegetative and seedling, respectively.

For two or more seedlings you'd want an even distribution, perhaps increase it to 60cm height, from that last chart you can go higher to get a more even spread and dial down the dimmer to 50% and see how they go.... and adjust accordingly as they grow.

Here's a rough guide for DLI's

Photone - Grow Light Meter

growlightmeter.com

j

 

[Lyric8778]

Ideally yes.

It's all about growing 'area', you can have a few seedlings but once the leaves fill out the area you either add another light or prune out the slower growers to another tent/outdoors.

I found the ppfd charts for the 1000W'er, cough, cough.

I'm guessing these may be 'suggested' heights for flowering, vegetative and seedling, respectively.

For two or more seedlings you'd want an even distribution, perhaps increase it to 60cm height, from that last chart you can go higher to get a more even spread and dial down the dimmer to 50% and see how they go.... and adjust accordingly as they grow.

Here's a rough guide for DLI's

Photone - Grow Light Meter

growlightmeter.com

j

Update for y'all I bought a much mor powerful set of led lights each are twice as powerful as the one I had and I bought 10 of them

 

[Lyric8778]

This is the only info I have

 

[Jaz]

Cheers,

I guess this is the important bit for the Iropro 2000W LED

You may want to edit your post if that's your name up top of the image you posted, lol or is that a place in Aus.?

j

 

[Buds Buddy]

Need to know what brand/model light it is or the specs? Need to know how many watts the light draws from the plug. Normally light needed is measured in watts per sq. ft., and 25-35 watts per square foot is the range. My guess is the light you have probably draws between 50-120 watts. (Unless of course you have a 1000w true draw light, then I’m jealous as hell!) lol
You can grow any strain, the light should have recommendations for how high to hang it. If not start at about 24 inches above seedlings and then move it accordingly. I’m covering all bases because I’m not positive what your question is.

I always thought it was 35 watts was the minimum & up to 50 watts per sq. ft. max. I'll have to re-read the lighting articles in my old "Come Grow with Me" journal. There's tons of lighting & environment articles I posted in that journal.

 

[Buds Buddy]

Does it even exist?? I don't know if I've seen a LED pulling 1K...my American made light pulls 660...and that's a 5x5 flower footprint at 1250 PPFD hanging 18"

Most I've had is an 800 watt LED Bar Light. There's probably a 1000 watt out there; but I'm sure it's real pricey.

 

[Jaz]

I always thought it was 35 watts was the minimum & up to 50 watts per sq. ft. max.

Watts is a bad indicator, I remember the Frank/Rosenthal bible we all grew up on stating 10 watts per square foot minimum though 20W is recommended .. if you're using the old fluoro tubes.

HID wattage will be different.

Now look at this table for various LED's

The best small grow light for a 2 x 2 or 0.6m x 0.6m grow tent

The SE-1000 and the TS1000 both use the 1000 nomenclature but look at the actual W they draw, 103 and 146 respectively.

Before you think the more watts the better, the TS1000 draws 146W but it has a usable PPF of 286
Now look at the Migro Aray 2 PRO, it draws less at 130W but has a higher usable PPF of 308.

Other variables also come into play, how reflective is your tent, how high is your light from the plant canopy. The wattage is just not that reliable.

PPFD is the best standard to use, measuring it at different parts across your canopy, it eliminates inefficiencies in light design across various brands/models.

PPFD is the amount of light photons that hit a surface (your plant canopy) in one second. It’s measured in units called micromoles (μmols). Simply speaking – it’s the strength of the light that reaches your plants.

Cannabis seedlings require only 200-300 PPFD per second during the first three weeks of life.
You simply need to double the numbers above – 308 PPFD to 616 PPFD during the vegetative phase and 463 PPFD to 925 PPFD during the flowering phase.

If you’re growing autoflowers you should stick to the recommended vegetative phase light intensity of 306-617 PPFD for the whole life of the autoflowering cannabis plant.

From my previous posts above showing PPFD charts, you'll see how it's distributed more evenly the higher the light is, preferable for seedlings, at the same time you may also lower the intensity via the dimmer if required. With even distribution you can try growing multiple seedlings and prune out the weakest, slowest growing as you go.

More reading here:

Understanding Grow Light PAR, PPFD, Wattage and DLI

So how much light do your plants need?

The DLI is when you take those PPFD numbers and add them up over the course of one day.
DLI stands for Daily Light Integral. This is the amount of light fruit, vegetable, and cannabis plants need each day to produce fruit vegetables or marijuana.

Below is a link to a simple DLI calculator, plug in your plant's age in weeks, hours of light, PPFD intensity and it produces your DLI, letting you know if it's adequate.

You can still achieve the same DLI while varying the parameters, the less hours the more PPFD required and likewise if you increase your hours you can lower the PPFD (via dimmer or raising the height of the light from canopy) and still get the same result.

Why is this useful?
Firstly, pumping too much light at your plant is wasting electricity, it can only take so much per day so don't throw away money.

The way I use it:
In winter, I can lower the PPFD and run the light overnight, which keeps the tent a little warmer during the coldest part of the night, saving electricity by not having to use a heater or running the heater at a lower setting.

In summer I can increase PPFD during the night when the temp is coldest and have the lights off during the long day when the outside temp is warm, saving me on air conditioning.

Have a go and see if your DLI result is right for your plant at its stage of life.

Photone - Grow Light Meter

Quite the post but I hope it gives you a better understanding and why you should ditch relying on wattage.

If you don't have a light meter, there are PPFD apps that are decent, otherwise track down some charts from your light manufacturer. Thanks to the work of one individual who ran some tests, you can look up his charts for some popular makes/models here.

PPFD Data

j

 

[Phytoplankton]

I always thought it was 35 watts was the minimum & up to 50 watts per sq. ft. max. I'll have to re-read the lighting articles in my old "Come Grow with Me" journal. There's tons of lighting & environment articles I posted in that journal.

We're both right, it is very dependent on the light source and design specs.

When it comes to the light source, HPS/MH is a higher wattage sq/ft, LED is a lower watts/sq/ft because LED's are a more efficient light source. You do also have to factor in the Umols, cheap LED lights, with a lower Umol, will need more watts per sq/ foot (1 Umol), higher efficiency LED's need less watts (2-3 Umol). A good quality LED with Samsung/Bridgelux/OSRAM chips will perform much better than "no name" or "Top Bin" LED's. Generally about 40-50 watts/ sq ft for HID, and 25-35 for quality LED's. Cheap low Umol LED's could be as high as 40-50 watts. That's why you want to stay away from cheap LED's. With lower efficiency lights you lose the energy savings because you have to use twice as much lighting.

 

[Delps8]

Ideally yes.

It's all about growing 'area', you can have a few seedlings but once the leaves fill out the area you either add another light or prune out the slower growers to another tent/outdoors.

I found the ppfd charts for the 1000W'er, cough, cough.

I'm guessing these may be 'suggested' heights for flowering, vegetative and seedling, respectively.

For two or more seedlings you'd want an even distribution, perhaps increase it to 60cm height, from that last chart you can go higher to get a more even spread and dial down the dimmer to 50% and see how they go.... and adjust accordingly as they grow.

Here's a rough guide for DLI's

Photone - Grow Light Meter

growlightmeter.com

j

The PPFD maps are labelled by height, not growth stage. Those heights and that labeling are commonly used by many manufacturer's. In addition, lacking CO2 enhancement, no strain of cannabis can withstand 1348 µmols. The light saturation point for cannabis is 900± µmols and, even with a well dialed-in environment, I tried to push my last grow to the 940's and got light avoidance in the parts of the plants that were at that level.

All told, my money's on those being the PPFD charts for that light at those heights.

 

[Jaz]

The PPFD maps are labelled by height, not growth stage.

Correct. I should've paid attention to the values, which are on the high side for each stage. I'm not sure why they chose 30, 40 and 46cm heights and those particular ppfd values to promote.
I guess it's a rough guide to gauge how much the ppfd varies with each increment so you can extrapolate which height will achieve your desired ppfd, all the more harder if the dimmer isn't labelled with percentages.

Some manufacturers do make it easier for the customer, providing a height guide and dimmer settings for each stage of growth, as shown in the chart below.

^ A great selling point, this manufacturer knows his customer, provides the right info for those without a light meter and has put thought into the LED selection/arrangement, making it fit for purpose.

j

 

[Delps8]

Cheers,

I guess this is the important bit for the Iropro 2000W LED

You may want to edit your post if that's your name up top of the image you posted, lol or is that a place in Aus.?

j

Examine the values on the chart and you'll see that things don't add up.

The legend indicates a 2' x 2' tent but the scale reads 120 cm on either side. 120cm is about 4' so this is a PPFD map for an 8' x '8 according to their markings.

Another issue is that the grid is broken into 8 squares on either side but, if it's a 2' x 2' tent, that's 8 squares to the foot meaning that each one is 1.5" across. If that's true, you've got about 1.5" of usable light on either side of the center of the light at 30 cm. That's challenging.

If this truly is a PPFD for a 2' x 2' are, you'll need to compensate for that in the way that you grow the plant.

My thinking - go with the light at 30 to 35 cm above canopy and do not top or LST the plant. Instead, leave the apical stem alone and grow a "Christmas tree" plant. That will result you having a cola in the very center of the tent (that's the "apical stem"), where you've got some light. If you top the plant, which removes the apical stem, or if you LST the plant, the plant will grow wider. You'll have vegetation on the periphery but you don't have any usable light much past a 1.5" radius from center.

Those comments are based on the best I can infer from this PPFD chart. Having said that, don't take my word for it because "garbage in equal garbage out". I'd go back to the manufacturer, discuss the values in PPFD chart with them, and ask them for an updated chart.

 

[Delps8]

Correct. I should've paid attention to the values, which are on the high side for each stage. I'm not sure why they chose 30, 40 and 46cm heights and those particular ppfd values to promote.
I guess it's a rough guide to gauge how much the ppfd varies with each increment so you can extrapolate which height will achieve your desired ppfd, all the more harder if the dimmer isn't labelled with percentages.

Some manufacturers do make it easier for the customer, providing a height guide and dimmer settings for each stage of growth, as shown in the chart below.

^ A great selling point, this manufacturer knows his customer, provides the right info for those without a light meter and has put thought into the LED selection/arrangement, making it fit for purpose.

j

The Migro arrays are really nicely done. They're a little blue heavy for my taste but they have excellent uniformity. Based on how they're designed, it's really easy to upgrade from a 2 x 2 to a 2 x 4 just by adding another light.

 

[Jaz]

Examine the values on the chart and you'll see that things don't add up.

The legend indicates a 2' x 2' tent but the scale reads 120 cm on either side. 120cm is about 4' so this is a PPFD map for an 8' x '8 according to their markings.

I'd go back to the manufacturer, discuss the values in PPFD chart with them, and ask them for an updated chart.

I did notice that and also that it looks like a cheap knock-off of another well known brand.
I wouldn't trust those PPFD values either, who knows if any of it is real or pilfered from other websites.

I doubt you'd even be able to get in touch with the manufacturer, the seller probably bought them cheap in bulk, stores them in his garage between boxes of toothbrushes and drill bit sharpeners and doesn't have a clue about the charts, etc.

I'm willing to bet if you have a problem and complain, they'll just ship you another unit, not bothering with return/repair and once the warranty from the first unit runs out you're on your own if that one has a problem.

Iropro don't even have a website.

j

 

[Delps8]

I did notice that and also that it looks like a cheap knock-off of another well known brand.
I wouldn't trust those PPFD values either, who knows if any of it is real or pilfered from other websites.

I doubt you'd even be able to get in touch with the manufacturer, the seller probably bought them cheap in bulk, stores them in his garage between boxes of toothbrushes and drill bit sharpeners and doesn't have a clue about the charts, etc.

I'm willing to bet if you have a problem and complain, they'll just ship you another unit, not bothering with return/repair and once the warranty from the first unit runs out you're on your own if that one has a problem.

Iropro don't even have a website.

j

Well, aren't you just full of good news! ;-)

Sorry to read all of that but lemons and lemonade, right?

Re. the numbers being fudged - "If you're going to put out numbers that are bullshit, don't put out shitty numbers!" I'd wager a small amount that the numbers are valid because if a manufacturer is going to fake numbers, they'd come up with numbers that show better uniformity, right?

If that's the case (the numbers are valid), the OP should be able to do OK as long as he keeps the plant in the right spot.

I did a grow in 2017 that never got to harvest - I had a power outage (SoCal Edison), I screwed up the timer (I was using mechanical timers back then), so it reveged. After that, I gave up and archived my tent. When I unpacked everything early last year, LED's were a whole different world. I contacted Kind and got the PPFD chart for the light (see attached).

As bad as that PPFD map is, people still managed to grow quite a bit a of cannabis with blurples. Below the PPFD map is a picture of the grow. I don't recall the strain I was growing but I was a first time grower using what we consider an underpowered light and those plants are just under 8 weeks from germination.

 

[Jaz]

Re. the numbers being fudged - "If you're going to put out numbers that are bullshit, don't put out shitty numbers!" I'd wager a small amount that the numbers are valid because if a manufacturer is going to fake numbers, they'd come up with numbers that show better uniformity, right?

I'm not saying the numbers are fudged, I'm saying they may not be accurate for that model. As you pointed out, 'tested in a 2x2 grow tent' yet the chart shows the light scatter for a 4 x 4 area; it's a bit suss.

Many people found advertised ppfd charts from even the well known brands were not entirely accurate, so some tested the models comparing the advertised chart against their results, published results on websites, did videos, etc. Manufacturers caught on and cleaned up their act.

A cheap light can still function well enough to grow healthy plants, there is still the human element of adjusting according to how your plant responds, increasing height, dimming intensity, etc. but you get what you pay for.

Most here are prepared to pay that bit extra for a better built more efficient light. A few extra dollars up front saves you down the track with lower electricity bills and perhaps a longer lasting product.

I'm not putting down your blurple light, Kind Led has a website and is continuing R&D, manufacturing the new rack style LED's; they're not a no name brand sold by some random on Amazon.

I was talking about Iropro, here is a question one customer asks, answered by another customer it seems - Seller skipped town already?

Are these 2000w Samsung 218b or alternative brand?
Answer:
I con not confirm either way for certain but as this is not stated in the description and for the price of the product I would be very surprised.
It does state that it has an HLG series driver intimating that it is a MeanWell driver however this is not the case and is a Toxi TX-ETL-240-F??
It may not last as long as lights made with Samsung and MeanWell drivers however I am pleased with the product for my intended use. More higher valued crops users maybe worth investing in a more expensive fixing however. The customer service was very good though and dealt with an issue quickly and satisfactory.

No information on what LED's are used and has different driver than you see in the photo, it's as if the seller copy/pastes his images from different models - that was my point, you're not getting what is being advertised.

I don't blame @Lyric8778, most beginners cut their teeth on the cheaper brands and as they gain experience they choose better lights when they upgrade.

I started out with Gro-Lux fluoro tubes, very basic and was still able to grow without any PPFD charts, I adjusted by eye... and both the technology and research has come a very long way since the 80's.

Lyric8778 since you have both the 1000 and the 2000 model, stick with the 1000 for the seedlings, you could grow four seedlings and as they fill out the tent, shift some to the 2000 tent. Or you could stagger your grows, veg in one, flower in the other, seedlings and clones in the smaller one, etc. Another option is to get a larger tent and put both lights in it. The choice is all yours.

Have fun experimenting and good luck with your grow.

j

 

[Lyric8778]

Well, aren't you just full of good news! ;-)

Sorry to read all of that but lemons and lemonade, right?

Re. the numbers being fudged - "If you're going to put out numbers that are bullshit, don't put out shitty numbers!" I'd wager a small amount that the numbers are valid because if a manufacturer is going to fake numbers, they'd come up with numbers that show better uniformity, right?

If that's the case (the numbers are valid), the OP should be able to do OK as long as he keeps the plant in the right spot.

I did a grow in 2017 that never got to harvest - I had a power outage (SoCal Edison), I screwed up the timer (I was using mechanical timers back then), so it reveged. After that, I gave up and archived my tent. When I unpacked everything early last year, LED's were a whole different world. I contacted Kind and got the PPFD chart for the light (see attached).

As bad as that PPFD map is, people still managed to grow quite a bit a of cannabis with blurples. Below the PPFD map is a picture of the grow. I don't recall the strain I was growing but I was a first time grower using what we consider an underpowered light and those plants are just under 8 weeks from germination.

I have checked ppfd with the meter I bought and so far it seems to be what they have said bit I will keep u up dated on that as it's progress

 

[Lyric8778]

Photo update day 8 from when they sprouted

 

[Delps8]

Cheers, my post is edited to answer your question.

You may want edit out the old post from your comment. I'll delete this when you do so.



j

I went back and finished your post.

I did have the Kind XL 600 last Spring but it went in the trash soon after I got the PPFD map. I've moved on from that and will be using a Growcraft X2 for veg and an X3 for flower for the foreseeable future.

My last grow used a Mars SP 3000 + a Royal LED blue puck in veg, the X3 in flower + a Viper Spectra XS-1500 for a couple of branches that fell out of the front of the tent. That combo yielded a good result (729 grams from 2 plants in a 2' x 4' tent) but the Mars + the puck was ungainly and it didn't give me what I wanted in terms of interstitial space; hence the X2.

The lighting plan for my upcoming grow:

 

[Lyric8778]

Wee picture update for y'all this is just into week to of veg and a few older ones during seedling stage

 

[Mountainman80]

Need advice on what w I should use with a 1000w led all spectrum light
Can set the w my self tho strain is critical x kush need advice on w to use per plant

Keep that light at least 24inchs from. Those seedlings I'd not further away