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"!

LED help!

D

Dnzl

New member
Hey all,
Need some advise on how to use led dimmable lights. Have used hps for years and switched to led about a year ago. Have ing good results with lights that I have but need to know how to use the dimmer at different times of the cycle. Seedling, veg, flower etc. so far it’s been blasting away at 100 percent and I think I could do better with the life cycle to get better harvest! If you have any thoughts or if you need more info about system let me know.
Thanks DNZL
 
Mitsuharu

Mitsuharu

White Window
Veteran
Dnzl said:
need to know how to use the dimmer at different times of the cycle. Seedling, veg, flower etc. so far it’s been blasting away at 100 percent and I think I could do better with the life cycle to get better harvest!
Click to expand...
How many watts do you have!? ;) Depending how many seedlings you have/how big you grow space/surface is... i would say you don't need more than 40w for the first week. Than you can go higher the bigger the plants get. Start your plants in small containers so you need not much space and so on not much light.

Btw, this is the reason why i don't like growing automatic strains indoor. Because of their limited veg time you have to start them in the final containers and so you need more light from the beginnig to reach every plant in the grow space.
 
D

Dnzl

New member
I have a 5x5 tent with 5 k1000 lights. Do to state laws we have a 5 plant max law. Was running them from seed but going back to mother clone setup. Ez cloner then to solo cups and finally 3 gallon bags. So I have 1 mother and 4 plants.
Will the lower setting make the plants stretch, I could use another 1 and a half foot in height. Plants tend to stay short and would like to use the whole tent not just the bottom half.
Thanks DNZL
 
D

Dnzl

New member
Yellow, I use FF ocean/forest soil so no need for nutrients for a good 4-5 weeks.
Spectrum is probably messed up!

Mits the lights are Aglex K1000 led lights. Yes china crap from amazon, I have a legitimate reason. Hps grow for life wanted to see if led can work or not. So I spent $300 on 5 lights just to see if they were viable before I bet the house on them! The lights are doing good except certain strains do not do well under led! Others didn’t see a difference in quality of smoke, just quantity of harvest. Ran same strains under hps, so that’s what I used as a reference.

Thanks Dnzl
 
DARKSIDER

DARKSIDER

Official Seed Tester
Moderator
ICMag Donor
Veteran
Dnzl said:
Hey all,
Need some advise on how to use led dimmable lights. Have used hps for years and switched to led about a year ago. Have ing good results with lights that I have but need to know how to use the dimmer at different times of the cycle. Seedling, veg, flower etc. so far it’s been blasting away at 100 percent and I think I could do better with the life cycle to get better harvest! If you have any thoughts or if you need more info about system let me know.
Thanks DNZL
Click to expand...
Put some photos up will help you better in the long run :good:
 
Ca++

Ca++

Well-known member
I don't know how much space there is, so I can't say how much light is needed.

Typically 150ppfd would root a cut, or get a seed up for the first 2 weeks. Then we could look at 250 if used 24/7 or about 300 18/6. Then 500 in bloom.

You can veg on much lower levels, as just living takes little light. However, the plants grown won't yield great. They are not preparing big frames that will meet high demand.

This 250/300/500 is actually all about the same, looking at the plants daily light intake. The 250 might seem more than 300, but plants still sleep with the lights on.


A known $10 light meter will give you a lux number that can be converted to ppfd. Every meter is different, hence a known meter is needed. The resulting reading might be a few percent different to a ppfd meter, but it doesn't matter at all. For example, I'm talking 500ppfd in bloom. A solid commercial amount of light. One that can be achieved with minimal lighting, yet still produce well. You might however, feel 650ppfd a better target, or even decide to run so much light it's giving diminishing returns, such as 900ppfd. The only persons grow to compare with, is your own last one, with your strains. So a super accurate meter isn't really needed. We have meter comparison threads somewhere. I forget the titles though, and I'm gagging for a brew.
 
D

Dnzl

New member
CA++
Thanks for the info good stuff. I use a 5x5 tent with 5 aglex k1000 led/with uv and ir. 256 leds full spectrum lights. Yep as you guessed china lights. Not gonna spend the money on beast lights til I see if led is worthy.
Gonna order a light meter and see where I am at.

Thanks DNZL
 
Ca++

Ca++

Well-known member

ppfd v lux readings. Help Me..

I managed to get this together It's a chart of different light types, and how a lux meter would read at different ppfd levels. I would very much like to put a ppfd and lux meter together under some leds to add to this information. Ideally, under Samsung LM301 led's at 3k, as they seem by far...
www.icmag.com
That tread finds a 15 notes meter to be a good choice. While using any lux meter to measure ppdf will require some maths, the cheapest of meters tested, requires the easiest of sums.

The more costly meters company website will usually offer some maths for different light sources. Just like a lux to ppfd conversion needs math, for different light sources. Each meter having it's own maths to do. Which really does pose the question, what are you getting for your money, in terms of accuracy. When the result needs correcting anyway.


I guess if I had the 500 notes meter, I might be a bit bias towards it. Most are within 10% anyway. Instead, I'm happy with the 15 notes meter. I have to multiply by 3 if I want ppfd, but it's not every day I'm using it. It suits my budget better. Though I do like toys..



Edit: I see your light is 100w, so you have 500w over 2sq/m. 250w a meter of the very best lighting, wouldn't be impressive. I don't imagine you will be impressed at the end of this grow. Looking at the use of that 500w, in terms of generating UV and IR, and par light being a mixed bag... I reckon you need a couple more lights, just to scrape it.

Edit2: If you have a 600 to stick in the middle, you could use just 4 of these, one in each corner.
 
Last edited:
ILSID

ILSID

Member
Dnzl said:
Hey all,
Need some advise on how to use led dimmable lights. Have used hps for years and switched to led about a year ago. Have ing good results with lights that I have but need to know how to use the dimmer at different times of the cycle. Seedling, veg, flower etc. so far it’s been blasting away at 100 percent and I think I could do better with the life cycle to get better harvest! If you have any thoughts or if you need more info about system let me know.
Thanks DNZL
Click to expand...
I’ve been using LED’s for several years now. The only time i’m not running 100% is during the first week of a seedling or clones life. I’ll run em at 75-80 and back them off to like 20-24”. besides that i run 100%, 10-16” from the tops of the plant. Like you, i also used Hps/mh for years. i was pleasantly surprised how well these led’s work. Plus, little heat and pocket change added to the electric bill. you can go wrong w them. hope this helps.
 
trixP

trixP

Active member
If you can only get un 1 light get a controller !! You can dim watt per watt

You’ll also benefit of safety auto shut off for fire say also have a sunrise and set mode

Get a par meter you can dim and raise lower your light to get maximum efficiency and par for stages of growth ;)
 
Hillbilly69

Hillbilly69

Well-known member
CA++ hit the nail on the head, go based on ppfd, are you able to search the light specs for your LED? Most companies publish a total ppfd/m2 for their lights at different heights. Aim to hit the ideal light intensities for each growth phase. I tend to like a little more light, so I go based on 150-200 ppfd for clones or seedlings, 300-400 early veg, 500-600 late veg, 600-800 for flowering.
 
Ca++

Ca++

Well-known member
10 years ago we chirped on about watts, with occasional reference to branding. These days most of us are singing from the PPFD song book. We have to. Since LED the watts alone mean less each day. First it was burple, with maybe 30 lumens per watt. Cheap white is about 100 lumens per watt. The best white we are likely to use, 220+ lumens per watt. That is a ridiculous spread of light you might get, based on the same power consumption. We must forget about watts of power used, and start talking about the amount of light we are creating with that power. Plants are much more interested in the light we provide, than the power bill we receive.

Here I am talking lumens, when even that is loosing meaning. Lumens are for lighting up humans. It's a count of the light we see. Plants react to most of the light we do, but it's not exactly the same. So we use different light meters for plants. While these meters are not exactly the same, they are close enough to have relatable readings. We just need to put a proper light meter, beside a photography meter, once to see the difference. That is the thread I linked to. A few cheap meters we can find, and how each compares under LED lighting of typical vendors.

It's a bit of a hill to climb, but once you can measure how much your plants are getting, you can compare with how much other peoples plants are getting. Measuring the photon density, not power consumption.
 
BuckeyeGreen

BuckeyeGreen

Active member
These links should help. https://www.cocoforcannabis.com/how-much-light-ppf-do-you-need-for-indoor-cannabis/

migrolight.com

Cheap PAR meter hack - Use a Lux meter to measure PAR accurately

I have tested four cheap Lux meters from Amazon to see if they can be used to measure PAR (Photosynthetically Active Radiation) comparing them vs my other par meters. So you can use them to optimise your grow light setup. The measurements are compared to the benchmark quantum sensor for...
migrolight.com migrolight.com

 
Last edited:
D

Dnzl

New member
First off let me apologize for not responding sooner have had some drama go down, so I was forced to make other arrangements for tents.
Thank you for all the great information. Well ordered a lux meter to see where I am at with lighting. I did add another light to tent and have 1 more to add to it so I will have a total of 6 lights in my 5x5 tent.
I have 2 Godfather OG girls that are 20 days in flower and they are going nuts!! With a 9-12 week flower period they should be insane. I topped 1 and let the other go natural. We shall see what the final outcome is in a couple months.
I will post some pictures here soonish gotta get everything set back up and do some trimming so you peeps don't see what kind of slacker I really am.
Later DNZL
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Latest posts

Top