Need help on making a decision on led grow lights and grow tents

Ok sounds good thank you for the info its been a real help

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Honestly i dont pay an electric bill
but qbs are definately about efficient as it gets. Plus side also need less a/c and fans might not have to be cranked up like they would with hps or even a big t5
So not only does led save money at the wall in light output it saves in combating heat costs too. Since led is minimal heat.

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Hello everyone thank you for all the info got the light checked off my list now i was curios does anyone us fox farm soil i was going to order some but Iā€™ve read a lot of mixed reviews and before i pay $35 a bag i would love to know which one would be best. Iā€™ve been using mirical grow moster control potting soil for my outdoor grow im not impressed with this soil not that good at all

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No. That doesnā€™t apply there is still just as much heat generated from LEDs as a HPS. Granted a HPS will burn your skin off but so would a large passive cooled heatsink so I wouldnā€™t go off that. Either way expect to need some fans whether that be for airflow in your tent or outtake air intake air these are all things ya need to think about especially in summer. In winter I agree LEDs are a lot cooler but thatā€™s due to ambient temperatures being way lower.

For example. My ambient temps right now in my house today are 28.5C now Iā€™m running two active cooled COB LEDs pumping out 100W of energy. So bare in mind these are active cooled. I still struggle with a 5ā€ outtake fan and a humidifier and a fan for airflow in there to keep temps to 30-31C. If I turned the extractor fan off I had no doubt in temps like today Iā€™d be at atleast 33 if not more. Granted Iā€™m in a cupboard not a tent so it holds heat more than a tent but youā€™ll still need good fans lots of air movement.

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Ok hopping threads to bash my input with garbage. Hps or any hid costs more to run. If your leds are getting that hot you got cheap heatsinks.

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Wow so because I give my opinion Iā€™m hopping threads bashing you? :rofl: get a grip mate have an ice pop an chill out.

I own a spectrum king SK402 and have also seen the 600s in action and to say thereā€™s minimal heat says you have no experience with LED. Thatā€™s a sales tactic with the LED market and Iā€™ll quote that off the SK site for you believe me they give out plenty of heat.

I didnā€™t dispute a HPS/HID costs more to run. When I ran my HPS setup it cost me almost double what any LED has this far. And please so enlighten me what difference there is heat wise to a cheap heatsink vs an expensive heatsink because they both HOLD heat they donā€™t dissipate the heat for you. What a joker :+1:

Ok if a heatsink doesnt dissapate heat whats its job? To spread the heat over a larger surface that cools more rapidly like aluminum right?.according to the Dictionary says thats dissapating heat. Idk nothing though just a common sense closet grower.myself
Air cooled reflector hood is only way to keep hps in same ballpark as led far as heat and that hood will cost you more than the light. I know because im running all these lights as im talking it.

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Oh heatsinks attatch to the hot point giving it a way to spread the heat. To not melt the led chips. You never built a light i see. Thats why fans are attatched to cool the heatsink. Even more rapid cooling.

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LED fixtures are generally more efficient in converting electrical power to photons. This means that you get more photons of energy for the equivalent amount of power used by a non-LED fixture. As such, you could utilize a less power hungry LED lamp and still receive the same number of photons as the higher power consumption lamp. This results in less heat generated by the LED lamp. We say ā€œgenerallyā€ because that is usually true but there are many variables to consider such as spectra, overall fixture PS efficiency, etc.
If both an LED fixture and a non-LED fixture consume the same amount of power, the heat created by each lamp would be similar but the LED lamp would likely produce more usable photons. Hence, why some LED manufacturers quote ā€œequivalent wattageā€ while drawing much less power. They play games with this definition which makes for a messy and confusing discussionā€¦

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The QBā€™s are definitely where itā€™s at but if you must buy a light from Amazon the ViparSpectra 600w switchable pulls 200w from the wall and it will produce. I pulled 1/2 lb from one plant under mine, it wonā€™t be the tightest bud but it will be resonious for sure. Iā€™ll vouch for ViparSpectra all day errday. Good luck!

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Haha right yeh my bad wording. They do dissipate some heat but a passive cooled heatsink doesnā€™t get the heat out of your space does it. No it holds heat and allows it to be passively cooled which let me tell ya is just as hot as a HPS bulb you canā€™t touch the heatsink with your hand.

I will also agree with @Northern_Loki on the fact that some chips ran on lower wattage will definitely be cooler than ones ran at full capacity.

And I donā€™t see why youā€™ve struck up such an issue @rooted Iā€™ve ran both LED and HPS with and without cooling hoods so saying Iā€™m running these lights while talking about it whoopie doo Iā€™ve experience on the subject as well. I simply said youā€™re wrong LEDs are cooler but you said it like you wonā€™t need to worry about fans when you really do which is all I was trying to say to @Joey420

LEDs are cooler. But donā€™t exaggerate and say it will lower costs because thereā€™s not as much heat. I ran the same 6ā€ fan on my HPS grow than what I did on my SK LED grow and struggled all the same with temps.

HPS do get hot, but so does a heatsink 3 times the size of a HPS reflector hood thatā€™s radiating heat.

So those are factors to take into account with ANY lights. That said if I see another thread where youā€™re stating your opinion Iā€™ll leave mine out seen as Iā€™m ā€œhopping threads to bash your inputā€ :rofl:

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Comes down to efficiency. Generally speaking LED will outperform HPS when parsed against overall power consumption.

LED is more direct, HID gives better ambient lighting.

As for heat they are about the same. Depends on if youā€™re cooling them. An HPS with a well built cool tube would actually give you lower temps than LED.

But LED is imo the future. Itā€™s more customizable and efficient and can be scaled to meet pretty much any space requirement.

I sold my HPS after trying out LED, the GPW was significantly higher, but that was admittedly mostly due to scaling down my grow size wise, which LED let me perfectly nail the coverage of a smaller space as opposed to a single 1000w HPS bulb trying to cover a large space.

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Just to throw some kerosene on the fire :fire: :fire: :fire:

LEDs lack the IR spectrum that HPS has. This reduces the radiant heat dramatically. You can, generally, run your room a few degrees warmer with LEDs because of this.

That being said, a watt is a watt is a watt. And watts produce heat, period. Since LEDs are getting more efficient than HIDs you can get away with less watts using LEDs, thus a smaller cooling bill.

These differences are rather small on a single light scale, but add up quickly when running 100 lights. :wink:

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I see a lot of conflicting information on which is more efficient discussion when talking hps vs led. Would think a lot more of say a 250 watt circuit is given up as heat in an hps setup than led and more light/watt for the latter. Then there is the cost of replacing the bulbs. CMH on the other hand is something you should also consider. Certainly the lighting suppliers are loading up promoting their own product enough to muddy the water.

Best would be a mixture of lighting perhapsā€¦In a large enough space some combination of CMH and LED would be my preference. And remove the ballasts or drivers from the enclosure to lower the heat load. Big enough production and double ended hps becomes another thing to supplement with. Then again why not provide some of the lighting w/ straight up sunlight?

All in all what is important is ambient temperature and the heat rise due to the light. In a place like Florida you will need to move a lot of air and remove a lot of humidity. Consider well air entrance and exit points so that your air flow takes best advantage. An example- a trailer or bus grow could pull from the shade underneath and should exhaust the hottest air in the room.

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Ok true you still need fans n all. Idk maybe i took things wrong n jumped a bit cause i seem to keep having people contest any input i give. Im no pro. Im Far from a pro. Im sure we are all still learning.
So back on subject here to getting the op their answers. As always never take my or any single input as law. Theres many ways to get to the same goal.

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If youā€™re on a really tight budget and not adept with a soldering iron, ebay has lots of screw in full spectrum bulbs just itchinā€™ to grow some plants.
Even tighter budget?
A lot of the groundbreaking work with off the shelf bulbs was done by blynx over at ic mag.

Thank you everyone we all are still learning everyday you learn something new im soaking all this in everyone on here has been a big help keep the info coming just be nice to each other :wink: just pack a bowl or role a joint and chill lol. P.s what are your thoughts on fox farm soil and witch one is the best way to go??

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Been doing this since 1970, but my head is spinning reading this whole thread!!! Amazing the amount of knowledge there is at our disposal these days. In 1970 it was a FEW books and magazines, that was the knowledge base. Now, we have everything right here, more than you could ask for. Amazing how far we have come.

Not going to throw advise, damn, got a bunch of that already, just realizing how daunting it must be to start fresh in this day and age, and all the options open to you. Pick wiselyā€¦

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Bingo. Thatā€™s why LEDs are cooler. They use less watts than HID. With premium diodes like QBs or SolStrips, they use about 40% less watts to generate the same amount of light over a given area (PPFD). So they generate A LOT LESS heat in practical application. And thus, are cooler.

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Can you post the company from Alibaba? Iā€™ve ordered carts from there and want leds but there are too many options and a lot of fakes. Donā€™t wanna get screwed. Thanks