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LED Mythbusting, KILL A WATT proof

GP73LPC

Strain Collector/Seed Junkie/Landrace Accumulator/
Veteran
Please share pics of any LED unit you have plugged into a Kill A Watt...


WELTHINK WEX-C150
Advertised: 150
Real: 109

picture.php




LUMIGROW 330
Advertised: 330
Real: 331

picture.php




HYDROGROW 205
Advertised: 205
Real: 176

picture.php




HYDROGROW 345
Advertised: 345
Real: 279

picture.php



whatcha got? :tiphat:
 

zymos

Jammin'!
Veteran
Lots of these units have thermostatically controlled fans, right? So in any given picture, the lamp could potentially pull more watts than is being shown.

Which just points to the difficulty of doing LED comparisons: watts used are not all even generating light.
 

LoSwaga

Member
Correct me if I'm wrong, but is this even a valid comparison? Don't most newer consumer electronics have built-in wattage controllers that only go full out when necessary?
 

GP73LPC

Strain Collector/Seed Junkie/Landrace Accumulator/
Veteran
@zymos,
not sure on the thermostatically controlled fans. the fans on my unit run when the light is on. not saying this is perfect, but it's better than the myths perpetuated by the manufacturers...

@LoSwaga,
i don't know that answer. but this is more realistic than the Advertised Watts...
 

rives

Inveterate Tinkerer
Mentor
ICMag Donor
Veteran
Correct me if I'm wrong, but is this even a valid comparison? Don't most newer consumer electronics have built-in wattage controllers that only go full out when necessary?

If you are referring to something like the power management circuitry in laptops, then the answer is no. How would a light fixture determine when it was appropriate to run at full strength?

Zymos, yes, there are some wattage variations on my Lumigrow ES330 - the above picture was the low point, and I have seem it up to 337 watts.
 

smokefrogg

Active member
Veteran
lumigrow es 165 leds powered off and only fans running uses 8.2 watts of power - some leds are burnt out so this reading is really pointless...
picture.php


here you can see some leds are not working, thus this is all really kind of pointless about me posting lumigrow es 165 info right now but taking pics and whatnot is fun so whatever
picture.php


lumigrow es 165 blue only leds using 40.1 watts of power - some leds are burnt out so this reading is really pointless...
picture.php


sunshine systems glowpanel 45 - advertised at 28 watts, using 24.3 watts of power
picture.php


lumigrow es 165 only red leds using 108 watts of power - some leds are burnt out so this reading is really pointless...
picture.php


lumigrow es 165 full power 140 watts - some leds are burnt out so this reading is really pointless...
picture.php


cheap ebay led panel model 2501 quad using 4.8 watts of power, advertised to use 14 watts of power, note that some leds have died on this, so let's guesstimate about 6 watts total
picture.php

picture.php


haight solid state ppf-400 revision 1.1 using 77.1 watts of power when on full power mode, website states it is a 90 watt led lamp
picture.php


haight solid state ppf-400 revision 1.1 using 26.5 watts of power when on low power mode
picture.php


250 watt hps lamp 2 minutes after being turned on using 170 watts of power
picture.php


250 watt hps lamp 20 minutes after being turned on using 249 watts of power
picture.php


40 watt cfl bulb using 28.5 watts of power
picture.php

picture.php
 

GP73LPC

Strain Collector/Seed Junkie/Landrace Accumulator/
Veteran
wow, thanks for the contribution smokefrogg :tiphat:
 

GP73LPC

Strain Collector/Seed Junkie/Landrace Accumulator/
Veteran
btw smokefrogg, are you gonna send that ES 165 for repair? those have a 5 year warranty, correct?
 

smokefrogg

Active member
Veteran
btw smokefrogg, are you gonna send that ES 165 for repair? those have a 5 year warranty, correct?

yes, i just had to let it finish something up and then shift around some mid flowering plants, i'll probably send it back monday, i'll do this again when i get it back from repair...the es 165 is only a 3 year warranty, it's under 1 year old though so i'm good!
 

GP73LPC

Strain Collector/Seed Junkie/Landrace Accumulator/
Veteran
cool !!!

all the ads i see say 5 years, at least today...
 

GP73LPC

Strain Collector/Seed Junkie/Landrace Accumulator/
Veteran
hmm, some sites say 3 years, some say 5...

the manufacturer says 3...
 

grow101

Member
It would be a weird pattern in this case, but some lights feature LEDs with 740nm (far red - flower induction), which could show up as defective if your camera uses an IR-filter in front of it's chip. If you had visible light from those LEDs in question before, then they are broken of course.
 

GP73LPC

Strain Collector/Seed Junkie/Landrace Accumulator/
Veteran
thanks to T_B_M for these photos...


blackstar 240W on a kill-a-watt, only 133 watts

blackstar240w.jpg



and an 240 watt from Growledhydro, pulling 245...

glh240w.jpg
 

*mr.mike*

Member
It's kind of unfair to measure these things using a kill-o-watt, simply because LEDs run on current, and not watts.

I use some 3 Watt LEDs. Well, 3 Watt at the full 1400 mA they're rated for... I'm only using them at a "longer lasting" 1000mA, and they're doing exactly what I wanted from my design. I'm sure the Watt usage is lower.

There's just more "under the hood" in LED units than what can be easily (or willfully) explained by those selling them. Just look at a UHaul truck... the speedometer goes up to 95, but the speed governor keeps it at 65, max.
 

T_B_M

Member
It's kind of unfair to measure these things using a kill-o-watt, simply because LEDs run on current, and not watts.

I use some 3 Watt LEDs. Well, 3 Watt at the full 1400 mA they're rated for... I'm only using them at a "longer lasting" 1000mA, and they're doing exactly what I wanted from my design. I'm sure the Watt usage is lower.

There's just more "under the hood" in LED units than what can be easily (or willfully) explained by those selling them. Just look at a UHaul truck... the speedometer goes up to 95, but the speed governor keeps it at 65, max.


What are you talking about? You do know (current x voltage = watts) right? The more the current, the higher the watts, and vise versa. Also, current and voltage correlate to one another with the LEDs. IE: More voltage = more current. This is why I posted the Blackstar vs. GLH 240W arrays. People say Blackstar works ok, but they lie and it is not a 240W light. It draws 100W less than they advertise (because they too drive them lower than the max rating because no LEDs can last the 50,000 hrs. at max power rating), pretty pathetic.

So using a Kill-A-Watt is giving you the actual current draw, but at the AC side. There are some losses due to the driver circuitry and also the fans that are being powered. So the actual power of LED output would be LOWER than the Kill-A-Watt reading. Also, I would like to note that input power for LEDs does not equal output power for LEDs. The true way to build a light is to provide the correct PPFD in the terms of micromoles per meter square per second. But you won't see any of these retailers giving you that data because they are not engineers. Youd think they would want to IMPROVE their designs and buy a spectroradiometer.

You get what you pay for, which is why the Blackstar is cheap and the GLH is more expensive. More power = more money. Most would think they are both 240W lights, but in reality the Blackstar did some number magic to make less informed people THINK they are getting the same power out of their light as the more expensive lights at the same wattage rating.
 

SOTF420

Humble Human, Freedom Fighter, Cannabis Lover, Bre
ICMag Donor
Veteran
The Lumigrow ES 165 is a 3 year total warranty.

The bigger ES 330 is a bit overbuilt I think and thus they trust it enough to give it a whopping 5 year warranty, both very good timeframes imo to get alot of dank usage from them! :biggrin:

Never have had any issues at all with my Lumigrow 330's that have been running for like over 2 years now & they are bulletproof, they also use the stated amount of power. :good:

Much love friends :joint:
 

GP73LPC

Strain Collector/Seed Junkie/Landrace Accumulator/
Veteran
member HempyGuy used an Amp Probe and Fluke meter to determine the following:

Procyon 100 - 110 watts
TI SmartLamp ProBloom - 330 watts
 

GP73LPC

Strain Collector/Seed Junkie/Landrace Accumulator/
Veteran
phaeton confirmed an HGL 336 Penetrator Pro @ 462 watts (lights, includes no fans)...
 
S

stratmandu

I applaud you guys for taking the mfrs to task on their wattage claims. There is no standard here, nor is there much of a regulatory watchdog for rating LED fixtures for horti use (other than youse guys), so its good to dig for the truth and it helps us all. If the advertised power is less than the actual draw, this means MARKETING is in play and caveat emptor. If they lie about the power, what other shortcuts have been taken? Any claims such as "equivalent to x HPS" have no definable meaning and as such are marketing as well.

My only comment is to point out the obvious that power draw isn't enough data to make assumptions about the light output of a fixture, or the quality of the light, but its enough to get a rough number, and certainly is useful for comparisons simply because there isn't much difference in the design of these fixtures and they all have about the same "guts", frankly, speaking of power only. So there is statistical correlation between common design's power draw and output, but power draw does not tell you how good the spectrum is or how well the dispersion or penetration, as you all realize. So don't get too hung up on power. We still need to see how good they grow, and the cream will rise to the top.

your humble servant stratmandu; EE, musician, grower, consumer of fine herbs, and, oh yeah LED experimenter-developer.
 

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