What's new
  • Please note members who been with us for more than 10 years have been upgraded to "Veteran" status and will receive exclusive benefits. If you wish to find out more about this or support IcMag and get same benefits, check this thread 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"!

Shen Zhen Bava vs smilley

smilley

Well-known member
Veteran
I've been flowering for the last 14 years with an analogue 600 watt hps. 8 years horizontally and the last 6 vertically. It still works great but I've always had venting problems due to a long exhaust run with several elbows and squeezed duct because of a structural beam. I've decided to retire the hps and give quantum boards a try.

I bought a 480 watt set up from Shen Zhen Bava. It consists of 4 qb288's with 561C diodes, Meanwell driver, dimmer and color temp of 3500K. It cost $502CAN including shipping and brokerage which is very cheap compared to locally available units. I'm keeping my fingers crossed it doesn't crap out on me and I make no claims about it's reliability or efficiency. On the surface though, it seems to have the same specs as the HLG 550 v2.

picture.php


picture.php


picture.php
 

smilley

Well-known member
Veteran
This is the room. It's 46 inches x 52 inches but we'll call it 4ft x 4ft.

picture.php


The crop consists of 3 purple kush x blueberry, 3 blueberry and 3 C99's. They're all clones and I'll veg them another 4 days and then flip to 12/12.

picture.php
 

smilley

Well-known member
Veteran
Full power right now. I'm trying to see how much temperature drop I'm getting. It looks like the room temp is running at a constant 20C. That's a 9 degree drop from the 600hps at 60 inches above the floor. If it runs too cold, I'll throttle down the intake air from the attached garage and increase the draw from the house.

I've got the fixture 22 inches above the canopy so hopefully I don't bleach the tops. This is all new to me so any advice is appreciated. I can't afford to screw this up, I shut down for the summer and the next crop won't come off till December.

Buckeye, I'm looking forward to seeing what you can do with the 600's.
 
R

rastafari80

thank you for this thread, I'm so interested in these "hlg clones".

it looks great, btw.

I have to say that 4 HLG QB96 have almost the same price and it has very high efficiency.


btw, I think this quantum board market is gonna "explode"... [the new lm301h diodes are even better than the lm301b and the lm561c ...]
 

smilley

Well-known member
Veteran
Welcome everyone. A special shout out to my best friend primobud, it's been a long time since you've posted to the Mag pal.

Rasta, I'm a newbie to the led world. After my research I chose quantum boards over cobs because I thought they'd provide a more even/uniform blanket of light. I purchased from China because I couldn't afford a domestic unit. I'm still worried, if it craps out I'm sol. I don't have any faith in a Chinese warranty and the shipping costs would make it a write-off. How many watts does the 4 HLG QB96 draw?

Everything I've read says 35W/ft and I'm only running 30 but I think I can squeeze my canopy footprint a little. We'll see how it all plays out.

Yesterday I was working so I dimmed the light about 25% to prevent bleaching. When I got home the room temp was 16C. I turned up the light a bit and damped down my garage intake. Today I got home and the room was 18C so I damped down the garage intake more and turned the light up a bit. I'm shooting for 22C. I may have to eliminate the garage intake completely. I might even have to turn down the exhaust fan. I'm totally amazed at temperature reduction. With the 600hps and the garage intake wide open it'd be 29C.
 
R

rastafari80

Hi @smiley, well, I'm a wannabe led grower but I'm not in hurry for choosing the best fixture.
I thought to buy the same light you did BUT I choosed a cmh for now.



I think these chinese boards has nothing to envy to a HLG one: same driver, same samsung board.
Warranty is useless, I don't think sending back stuff to china is in any way practical or cheap... It's definitely a risk to take.

The HLG QB96, tested by MIGRO on y0utube, is approximately 120w and it's 99$ right now without driver. One is enogh for 2x2 on flowering.
I concur about the 35W/ft, 30 is plenty enough imho BUT I know a lot of people and manufacturer suggest more power [I use a 3x3 tent and I get suggestion about 480watt fixture... Without adding CO2 that light it's just a problem to manage ]
 

SuperBadGrower

Active member
Going to follow this with interest!

I have lights from China (COB, not samsung) and the reputable sellers have good customer service IME.
 

Smokin Joe

Humpin to please
ICMag Donor
Veteran
Full power right now. I'm trying to see how much temperature drop I'm getting. It looks like the room temp is running at a constant 20C. That's a 9 degree drop from the 600hps at 60 inches above the floor. If it runs too cold, I'll throttle down the intake air from the attached garage and increase the draw from the house.

I've got the fixture 22 inches above the canopy so hopefully I don't bleach the tops. This is all new to me so any advice is appreciated. I can't afford to screw this up, I shut down for the summer and the next crop won't come off till December.

Buckeye, I'm looking forward to seeing what you can do with the 600's.
With led you need to run the room 5 to 10 degrees warmer than with hps. You'll probably need to up the feed also
 

smilley

Well-known member
Veteran
With led you need to run the room 5 to 10 degrees warmer than with hps. You'll probably need to up the feed also

Thanks for that Joe, I'm flying blind here. All week long I've been pushing the temps down in the room till I ended up at 22C (canopy temp). The girls aren't happy!! They're droopy, seem to lack vigor and by lights out they're going limp. I was expecting just the opposite.

picture.php


picture.php


picture.php


I fed them yesterday with my regular veg formula so I'll have to supplement with foliar feeding till I can water them again. They do seem to be a lighter green since they've been under the led. I'm going to veg them a few more days and try to dial in the environment better.
 

Buckeyebandit

Active member
Here is 1 of 2 HLG 600 V2 's I have in my 4x8 tent. These are beast. No dimmer hooked up but might need to

Good info smokin Joe. Thanks for posting that up


picture.php
 

Latest posts

Latest posts

Top