What's new
  • Happy Birthday ICMag! Been 20 years since Gypsy Nirvana created the forum! We are celebrating with a 4/20 Giveaway and by launching a new Patreon tier called "420club". You can read more here.
  • Important notice: ICMag's T.O.U. has been updated. Please review it here. For your convenience, it is also available in the main forum menu, under 'Quick Links"!

Can LED's do a pound or better per harvest?

Can LED's do a pound or better per harvest?

  • No

    Votes: 53 9.1%
  • Yes, 250 watts

    Votes: 40 6.8%
  • Yes, 400 watts

    Votes: 134 22.9%
  • Yes, 600 watts

    Votes: 212 36.2%
  • Yes, 1K and up

    Votes: 146 25.0%

  • Total voters
    585

GP73LPC

Strain Collector/Seed Junkie/Landrace Accumulator/
Veteran
So can LED's give a pound or better at every harvest?

if so, how many watts are needed?

thanks :wave:
 

Herborizer

Active member
Veteran
I don't believe that current LED technology breaks the 1gpw guide. People can do worse than 1gpw, and they can do better. 1gpw is the bar.

Also, we mean REAL watts of the lights. Real and in how much power they draw, less the fans. Not the rated watts.

MH/HPS FTW
 

GP73LPC

Strain Collector/Seed Junkie/Landrace Accumulator/
Veteran
so we have a trend for sure...

seems the consensus thus far is 600 watts of LED's can produce 1 lb+ each harvest.

keep the votes coming in, i'm curious as to the thoughts of the ICMAG community. :tiphat:
 

GP73LPC

Strain Collector/Seed Junkie/Landrace Accumulator/
Veteran
i'd say 600 watts of LED's that are worth anything are $1300 to $3000.
 

GP73LPC

Strain Collector/Seed Junkie/Landrace Accumulator/
Veteran
LED's give you much, much less heat (as compared to hps), much longer life, more energy efficient due to no wasted light spectrum, short tight nodes and according to some, frostier buds...

you have no worries about FLIR, you have no hps heat to dissipate, no bulbs to replace every 1-2 yrs and you have lower temps in your grow room.

i know start-up costs are prohibitive for a lot and that is really the biggest argument against LEDs.

With life expectancy at 10 yrs+, to me the cost of LEDs is worth it. When you consider the price of extra cooling for the grow room and hps light, energy used for additional fans because of the hps, bulb replacement costs, being visible to FLIR (only if running enough watts) and plenty of wasted light spectrum, those costs may in fact add up to or exceed the costs of the LEDs. i guess that really depends on each individual setup and grow room.

anyway, enough rambling from me...

keep the votes coming in. ;)
 

Herborizer

Active member
Veteran
LED's give you much, much less heat (as compared to hps), much longer life, more energy efficient due to no wasted light spectrum, short tight nodes and according to some, frostier buds...

you have no worries about FLIR, you have no hps heat to dissipate, no bulbs to replace every 1-2 yrs and you have lower temps in your grow room.

i know start-up costs are prohibitive for a lot and that is really the biggest argument against LEDs.

With life expectancy at 10 yrs+, to me the cost of LEDs is worth it. When you consider the price of extra cooling for the grow room and hps light, energy used for additional fans because of the hps, bulb replacement costs, being visible to FLIR (only if running enough watts) and plenty of wasted light spectrum, those costs may in fact add up to or exceed the costs of the LEDs. i guess that really depends on each individual setup and grow room.

anyway, enough rambling from me...

keep the votes coming in. ;)

I would bet that 1w of HPS heat = 1w of LED heat in almost every garden LED light setup available. Just because you can touch the LED's, doesn't mean there isn't heat. There is a reason the back of those panels are full of fans.
 

Sgt.Stedenko

Crotchety Cabaholic
Veteran
Candlepowerforums has debunked the LED vs HPS efficiency long ago.
There's not much difference. Both come in around 25-30%. The rest is wasted heat.

If you think a a HID and an equivalent LED dont generate near the same amount of heat, your kidding yourself.

A 600w LED grow will produce about 450 watts of heat.
 

smokefrogg

Active member
Veteran
i am not qualified to answer this question, however i would guess 2 of the lumigrow es 330s could do it, if it's top shelf then that 1 pound harvest would pay for the lamps
 

nappybutbald

Active member
LED grow lights have much higher amount of USE-ABLE light per watt than HPS or MH indoor grow lights and they last longer - up to 10 years in fact. Now I am not saying that a 90W LED grow light can ever match the lumen output of a 400W HID bulb, however, they are equal when it comes to the amount of absorb-able light they emit. Few people that they have experienced less than optimal results from their LED grow lights (and nowhere near what the hype says is possible). Without fail the number one reason for failure is that they bought cheap, discount LED grow lights that were horribly underpowered. The cheap LED grow lights on the market are ridiculously underpowered. On Ebay right now, you can find dozens of LED grow light panels in which each individual LED light is rated at 0.06 Watts. So in a typical 225 LED panel of red and blue, you end up with a total power consumption of about 14 Watts. Sounds great right? Not so fast - you see, these units are good for maybe 1 square foot at a distance of less than 6 inches. Does that describe your growing space? Not likely.

Take a typical growing space of 5x5 feet or 25 square feet . . . if you bought the above light, you would need at least 12 of these units to effectively cover the space. And that is assuming you don't want to grow anything over a few inches tall.

As a rule, you should never buy an LED grow light unless each LED has an output of 1 Watt. In the above example, you would need only one 180W LED grow light to cover 25 square feet for vegetative growth and it would have the power to penetrate a leafy canopy if growing taller plants (in a 3x3).

A good Source for LED LIGHTS good quality is http://www.prosourceworldwide.com/default.asp
 

rives

Inveterate Tinkerer
Mentor
ICMag Donor
Veteran
i am not qualified to answer this question, however i would guess 2 of the lumigrow es 330s could do it, if it's top shelf then that 1 pound harvest would pay for the lamps

I have had no problem achieving 10 oz yields with a single ES330, and it is likely that I could have achieved more with a little more growing area - my screen was quite full at that yield level. The outside measurements of the screen are 30" x 30", with a 3/4" pvc framework, so the net size is roughly 28" x 28".
 

Herborizer

Active member
Veteran
I have had no problem achieving 10 oz yields with a single ES330, and it is likely that I could have achieved more with a little more growing area - my screen was quite full at that yield level. The outside measurements of the screen are 30" x 30", with a 3/4" pvc framework, so the net size is roughly 28" x 28".

That makes sense though. That's about 1gpw correct? Which clearly means you are a great gardener. Though, we are still talking 1gpw.
 

T_B_M

Member
I would bet that 1w of HPS heat = 1w of LED heat in almost every garden LED light setup available. Just because you can touch the LED's, doesn't mean there isn't heat. There is a reason the back of those panels are full of fans.


Its not that they don't radiate heat, they radiate heat only up through the heat sink and away from the plants. So the venting requirements drop a bit since heat isn't being radiated in all directions. Makes cooling your cab fairly trivial, and in winter, might be a problem keeping it warm enough.
 

SOTF420

Humble Human, Freedom Fighter, Cannabis Lover, Bre
ICMag Donor
Veteran
I have pictures of 1 pound grown under 1 Lumigrow ES 330 watt LED light the only thing other than that around the garden canopy was 4 very low wattage 24" T5's (6500k) in the Growlab tent corners just for some added spectrum namely a nice 740 nm spectral bump. I highly recommend T5's around the canopy, you can get the very inexpensive T5 strip lights like sunblaze or sunblaster models they link together as well and produce very little heat and no noise.

Now 2 of the Lumigrow 330 ES lights would absolutely give the average grower a pound harvest I think with any decent strain with 8 plants at a yield of 2 oz's per plant each grown in a 3 gallon (or larger) smartpot. Put 4 plants under each light so they are in the very bright sweet spots under each side because the light consists of two main panels. The quality would be top shelf as LED grows some very potent & frosty herb. :canabis:

You could buy the two lights from them for roughly 2kish if you call for a discount and tell them you saw them on sale last year for $999 each. They sell them for a little bit over that price point now if you buy multiple lights direct from them. They are great lights, very bright and very well made with a 5 year warranty. They grew all my salad toppers so they make great healthy happy seeds if you want to do so also no problem. No limitations with these awesome LED lights, fully tested & SOTF approved :good:

picture.php


picture.php


picture.php


picture.php


picture.php


picture.php


:smoke out:
 
Last edited:

Herborizer

Active member
Veteran
I have pictures of 1 pound grown under 1 Lumigrow ES 330 watt LED light the only thing other than that around the garden canopy was 4 very low wattage 24" T5's (6500k) in the Growlab tent corners just for some added spectrum namely a nice 740 nm spectral bump. I highly recommend T5's around the canopy, you can get the very inexpensive T5 strip lights like sunblaze or sunblaster models they link together as well and produce very little heat and no noise.

Now 2 of the Lumigrow 330 ES lights would absolutely give the average grower a pound harvest I think with any decent strain with 8 plants at a yield of 2 oz's per plant each grown in a 3 gallon (or larger) smartpot. Put 4 plants under each light so they are in the very bright sweet spots under each side because the light consists of two main panels. The quality would be top shelf as LED grows some very potent & frosty herb. :canabis:

You could buy the two lights from them for roughly 2kish if you call for a discount and tell them you saw them on sale last year for $999 each. They sell them for a little bit over that price point now if you buy multiple lights direct from them. They are great lights, very bright and very well made with a 5 year warranty. They grew all my salad toppers so they make great healthy happy seeds if you want to do so also no problem. No limitations with these awesome LED lights, fully tested & SOTF approved :good:

picture.php


picture.php


picture.php


picture.php


picture.php


picture.php


:smoke out:

Those four T5's are 30w each, making 120w. 330w lumigrow+ 120w T5 = 450w. 450w = 450 grams which is about 1 pound.

I hate to say it, but think it's always going to workout like this.
 

SOTF420

Humble Human, Freedom Fighter, Cannabis Lover, Bre
ICMag Donor
Veteran
Not a bad thing really not sure what that proves because not many people can hit a full gram per watt with HID most people are around like .6 or .7 per watt.

Over 1 gram per watt is a great yield imho and keep in mind there are multiple fans running in the Lumigrow light so it's not really 330 watts of light being used. I think there are 58 of the 5 watt LED chips so at a face value of 5 watts each that would = 290 watts of actual LED light.

The T5's are listed as 24 watts each so that = 96 watts and I think I tested them and they did not even use that much to be honest but anyways let's use 100 watts for this conversation.

So call it a fair 390 watts, yield of 448 grams (was actually higher than this) = 1.15 grams per watt and they only flowered for 8 weeks total so we are not talking 10 or 12 week flowering periods here either this was the same amount of time HID would take.

Most important thing is quality was excellent. Much love, & LED's are great by any measure at least the one's I am repping here are that is a fact brother. 1 of them it's possible and with 2 of them you will likely do even better than a pound if you are a decent grower with healthy plants. If you grow Sweet Tooth, they just love LED light and frost up like Christmas under them. :biggrin: :tiphat:
 

Herborizer

Active member
Veteran
For sure you have great gardening skills. led work, at least I trust the Lumigrows do. Though, watt for watt I think they are nearly the same in production and heat. No silver bullets. Just different options for different needs.
 

Latest posts

Latest posts

Top