Do it. Its great. I have a freaking ocean of herb
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Started with LEDs, and even then have issues with heat, so I can’t imagine how HIDs would bake the crap out of my whole situation.
My first “real” lights were a couple of ES180s, which are pretty nice but don’t out perform the hacky DIY quantums I put together with bubble gum and scotch tape (kidding, obviously, I used duct tape not scotch). But seriously though, I’ll never spend that kind of money on lights again after seeing what el cheapos can do.
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Good save with the duct tape. Passes man code.
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I have a 28w LED that I bought for $300 over a decade ago. It was cutting edge at the time but could not compete with HID.
Now I have a 300w newer LED rig and it is awesome.
The only downside of LED as far as I see it is sticker shock. That goes away when you consider that you save X on your electricity every month and X on not having to replace bulbs.
It’s only going to get better when the tech progresses.
All the best
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I swapped from hps to led and will never go back. 840w of led doubled my yield over hps and heat isn’t such an issue anymore
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@Daytripr69 840w doubled your yield over how many watts of HPS exactly?
Havent grown HID since 2015. Did CMH for a bit. I still use CMH in my veg room. CMH with LED was a good combo but my flower room is exclusively LED now for the past 2 years. My flower lights go too high up and its hard to avoid catching a glimpse of the light even wearing hats.
I too worry about eye health. I dont go in my room much lights on even with LED. Just too bright. I do feel safer though. When i got in my CMH room when lights are on I make sure to never looked at the lamp. Lights are below my vision line, but sometimes I have to crouch under them and work on my plants.
I sometimes wonder what the real danger is for a hobbyist spending a half hour per week in the room. Thats like 3 8hr shifts for a cannabis worker every year of exposure. I do believe eye protection is a must for workers. People who spend 2080+ hours a year in a grow room
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I started with 315 CMH and T5 for seedlings. I will use the 315 CMH in veg tent until it dies than replace with led. When I added a tent for flower it has an awesome @Baudelaire solstrip led light that was assembled by @Jellypowered built for me.
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I came over from HPS/CMH/ SUN grown world to LED over the past few years but mostly organic in soil. I have to agree with folks not going back but likely not for the reasons people think. Yes, some adjustments need to made in terms of environmental controls as leaf temperatures can often be lower with LEDs as @Mr.Sparkle was so kind to explain through a thread however I have come to love LEDs. I think it is important to note that you get what you pay for and if you can’t afford a decent HPS/CMH you certainly won’t be able to afford a good LED. What I love about LEDs is that with just over 1000w I am flowering an 8x4 area and barely have to run extraction for the purposes of temperature control but do so for odor control. I have also had buds grow through my lights with minimal burning. At the end of the day if I was not a home-based grower and had 30k watts at my disposal, would I entertain DE 1000w again based on initial cost alone; very likely but until then in terms of stealth, energy efficiency (of your system including HVAC) and ease of use, they will be in my home-based lab arsenal always.
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Yes, you are absolutely right.
Traditional HID fixtures emit radiant light; the intensity is great, and wears on the eyes. Eye protection is a must.
However LED are much more dangerous. The light comes from intense single sources, which combine to create a diffuse light. It is essentially staring into an array of laser pointers. Permanent eye damage can result in a very short time with how intense some of these fixtures are.
Traditional sunglasses do not offer protection in grow rooms or the sun; in fact, they cause your pupil to dilate, making the retina receive more light.
Expensive as they are, from experience with them I can say they are truly worth the investment for any passionate hobbyist, and a mandatory tool for any serious cultivator:
The models they have are numerous, and the lends technology is amazing. Immediate eye relief. An immense improvement over time; the eyes can heal and catch up with the daily stress.
When working in grow rooms, dim all LED fixtures to lowest possible setting which allows adequate vision for safe work.
With HID, wear protective long sleeves and head protection as well as eye protection; cover all skin. A hoodie works well. Take frequent breaks to restore natural vision while working under 1000w SE fixtures; a few minutes every half hour at least. DE fixtures should be dimmed to 600w.
Another three great aspects of risk with HID lighting, be it CMH or HPS:
- Burns
- EMF Radiation from ballasts
- Burst light bulbs (heavy metal vapors)
If a bulb bursts near you, stop breathing–get away before you inhale. Do not work by a bank of ballasts, or install a bank of ballasts near an employee rest area or frequently used passage way.
As an employer, a great gift to welcome new employees onto the team after proving their chops, is a pair of Method Sevens. Anyone who profits through employees who are exposed to such dangerous conditions routinely, owes it to the crew to provide horticultural grade eye protection.
Regarding the original topic:
I’ve seen a lot of old school SE 1000w medical growers still holding onto their fixtures because it is simple and affordable; the bulbs are very inexpensive. For the most part, the investment cost of the viable replacement fixtures is what dissuades them. Not much thought of electrical savings over time is considered; a $30 bulb once every 6-9 months versus a $900 fixture, is as simple as it gets for some.
But for the new generation of beginner growers starting on LEDs, what a great time to get into growing. Especially if you just started after the two-decade long blurple wives tale was finally dispelled. Cheap blue/red low-wattage LEDs have been pushed since the late 90s and early 2000s. Good riddance; what a way to rob beauty from the plant it was.
The majority of these newer high efficiency diode arrangements is often a lack of UV. A bunch more manufacturers are including UV diodes. But for the highest quality herb, I still think CMH is the way to go. LEDs are a strong workhorse, converting watts into usable photons. A real meat and potatoes. But CMH is a real full spectrum. Not the sun of course–but as close as a fixture in this price range can get.
CMH 315w are what I recommend for new growers, especially in cooler climates which may need heat supplementation throughout winter months. Conversely, in warmer climates I would encourage an LED with large surface area heat sinks and a removable driver which can be kept outside the cultivation space.
If I am growing for the best smoke: I’ll use CMH.
If I’m vegging: I’ll use LED.
If I’m supplementing light in my small greenhouse: LED (waterproof)
If I’m starting up a small to moderate scale business to crop flower with concern for ROI, I’d design the garden to leverage a number of 630w CMHs on light rails to supplement spectrum, and for my workhorse lights depending on budget:
-narrow bar over-driven LED fixtures with low purchase points
-1000w DE used HPS
-1000w SE used HPS
But the goal would be to replace all the HPS bulbs asap, and rely on a mix of warm/cool diodes to drive the garden for the most part, with spectrum supplemented by CMH.
Speaking of employee risks:
In the rose industry, employees suit up in UV protection and walk through the aisles of roses with a cart covered in UV lights; dozens of them. The UV inhibits any fungal growth such as powdery mildew, without any residues which cause blemishes. As well, this exposure improves flower color and vigor in the rose crop.
So maybe we can drive the garden entirely on your modern-day classic warm/cool/far red trio–and just have our buddy Larry walk through the garden with the UV radiation cart once a day.
But yeah, whenever someone asks me what light to buy, if I think they just want to keep things simple, I just say, “This LED fixture.” and link them the most appropriate for their scale and intentions.
Also, for living soils systems, the diversity in spectrum translates to diversity in microbial life and terpene complexity. For a 5x5 with a 4x4 grassroots bed, I sometimes discuss a 1000w DE CMH, to be run dimmed to 600w for the most part.
Myself, in my twenties I worked under all 600w and 1000w SE HPS and 400w and 600w MH lamps. I spent a few years in orchards/vineyards outdoors, and then a few summers in hemp and greenhouse production. I tried to avoid working under 1000w DE HPS as much as I could.
Here at home, through the winter, I just use a bunch of cheap 2x4 fixtures @ around 2.5 umol/j. I have some bulb and ballast technology fixtures I don’t use; the 315cmh, 1000w se hps, 8bulb T5 collect dust. I cringe at turning on 435w 8-bulb t5s to veg for example, when any 200w LED surpasses it in intensity and penetration.
But I do each spring turn on a 315 and move an Afghani mother under it. She provides a few clones for the back yard, and I like to think they come out a bit hardier.
Where LEDs become very interesting to me is in flexible growing applications. Soon we’ll have AI which monitors our cultivation spaces with myriad sensors, and flying nanobot-LEDs will fly over the precise chloroplast which needs supplemental light, to illuminate it to precisely the photosynthetic efficiency correlated with localized VPD in all tiers of all canopies. An artificial hive mind will perceive the crop in three dimensions and optimize its every cells performance through physical and radiative and hormonal influencing means.
The Executive Wagu beef lifestyle.
“At my farm, every stomata is cleaned by nanobots like window washers on a high rise. At my farm, every chloroplast is illuminated by nanobot spotlights on strobe. At my farm, every seed is individually massaged by nanobots as it develops within the calyx. At my farm, every trichome is harvested by nanobot butlers on a silver dish, and served directly to the vape coil installed in my throat.”
-Dr. Zinko
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1000w hps heat generator. I’m sure it’s a combination of things lower heat more light. My plants don’t grow vertically unless I have the lights a mile above then
I’m still on my first flowering cycle with the LEDs. I don’t think I’m getting the same penetration I was getting with the 315 CMH. But we’ll see how the finished product stacks up. Won’t be a big deal for me cause I only grow for myself and my son. I just flipped one of my tents to flower yesterday and will use the CMH to flower this run. I have an LED flowering in my other tent.
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Kind of funny, as of yesterday, for the first time in 20 years, I unplugged my last HPS bulb, a 1k digital.
I started here on Over Grow, learning to repurpose security lights, from local sources. First was a 150 hps, then later that year a 70 mh was added to it, in a NGB stealth box.
I could not afford store bought items back then.
Learned to put together floro’s to fit my stealth boxes.
About 7 years ago, I bought a California Lighthouse that was returned to a local shop, as it could not keep up with their hps lit grow show. We haggled a bit, he lit it up, and I knew that it would be golden.
Once I found it’s sweet spot, and the huge reduction in electric consumption…AND I can gave my indoor AC the boot during summer, THAT sealed the deal for me.
Now, after some much needed work is completed in a few months, I’m tossing all my tents, hps/mh/cmh/T-5’s all gone for good.
I hope my next 20 years with LED (old guy dream) will be as fun as the last 20 was with magnetic ballasts.
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So youre saying LED lights are worse for your eyes?
Damn…i always thought that because theres no UV you would be safe. I thought the UV is what hurts your eyes.
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my 115 watt quantum boards SF and Dimgogo make about 20 degrees less then my 370 watt cmh’s, My experience so far is only the less intense leds save heat,if i could crank up my qb’s to 370 watts pretty sure they would be hotter then the cmh
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I made the switch in 2015 and never even considered looking back. Nowadays, you can hit exact peaks with discrete emitters and cover a damn good portion of the photosynthetic absorption spectra without wasting too much energy with high CRI whites, so I don’t see a reason to ever buy another MH or HPS lamp again.
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Has anyone tried induction lighting from iGrow?
Yesterday a video was uploaded with Kevin Jodrey’s operation using iGrow induction lighting in the background:
Seems like a decent light. At 120,000 hours they claim 90% of original output for their bulbs. Runs cooler, spectrum looks decent.
And then there is The Sun on Demand, a plasma lighting technology with over 220 unique spectrum bulbs, each tuned to specific geographic regions:
https://www.thesunondemand.com/
For example, you can purchase one of their bulbs which produces a spectrum identical to the light received by Durban, South Africa. So you can import some bee pollen from Durban and grow your Durban Poison genetics like they’d be grown back home.
Then there’s LEPs by Gavita, which are another type of plasma lighting technology:
https://gavita.com/horti/products/plasma-fixtures/pro-270e-lep-sup-grow/
I’d love to see and smoke the side by side flower produced from light emitting diodes, ceramic metal halides, high pressure sodiums, induction lighting, and each plasma lighting technology.
-Dr. Zinko
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I’ve heard of the tech, but not that company. How cool!
Infrared can burn your retinas as well, always be careful with invisible light since it doesn’t have the warning factor of… well being visable.
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They are rather secretive about what exactly is driving that plasma bulb (Sun on Demand). At one point ‘waveguide’ was mentioned… Telling me it is probably being pumped by a magnatron. That also explains the double Faraday cage!
Cheers
G
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