Disappointed. Need some good unbiased advice

I got two cobs from that guy who advertises on this site. They are used in a3x3. They work pretty well.
 
Sleepy T said:
I’ve emailed them and asked for a refund. Hopefully they don’t give me the run around. Just never had a warm and fuzzy about this light. Back to the drawing board. Everyone is still tight lipped on opinions for an alternative. Thoughts on the Mars FC-E 4800? Or would the FC-E 3000 make more sense for a 4x4ish space, Is there much difference between the FC and FC-E models other than the type of diodes?
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I suggest a chat with our in-house rep' for HLG right here, Les @HLG ....whether you buy from them or not, he'll have quality advice to offer! :smoking:
 
Sleepy T said:
Already contacted Kind, Blue. Took some pics and submitted the paperwork. They seem to be willing to work with me thus far. Just not sure if I wanna try to back out now while I can? Not a good first impression on the light itself. Customer service seems fine… so far.
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I heartily recommend that you get a refund and find another brand.

My rationale - I just finished my second grow. First grow was in 2017 and it never got to harvest. I"archived" my tent until early this year. My grow setup was from SuperCloset. I bought a 2 x 4 Gorilla tent, a 35 gallons res, and a Kind XL 600 grow light. I paid a good chunk of change for the setup but it came bundled up on a palette and it had paper and video instructions that allowed me to grow weed. I paid for their expertise and god some good components. The "in the tent" stuff was run of the mill but the tent was good, the res is going to last forever, and the light is crap.

Huh, the light is crap?

I read what I could read back in 2017 to try to make the right buying decision but there's a far more info available now than there was then. I've spent a lot of quality time reading up on growing cannabis including time learning about LED's. My company writes business software and I'm a data person by nature so I contacted Kind and asked them to send me a PAR map (it's really a PPFD map). When I got it, I contacted them to ensure that they had sent the right document to me.

Yes, it's the right document and they sent me the PAR map that I've attached. That's the Kind XL 600 Series 1 PAR map and that's a 4 year old light so you've got to figure it's a 5 year old design. That's ancient in the technology world so the Kind went back in the box and the box went in the trash.

I got the PAR map for the Kind XL 600 Series 2 light and have attached that, as well. I don't know that there's another light of any repute that has such a poor PAR map. It's just horrid. Though there's no scale to the diagram but that's a 2 x 4 map and, as you can see, PPFD collapses once you leave the very center of the map.

Obviously, I didn't buy that light. I researched what was available on the market and put my $$ into a Mars Hydro SP3000. It's cheap, it's got a decent spectrum (though blue-heavy), it was in stock (!), and it puts out a lot of light with a decent map. Bonus points for it being waterproof and for the fact that you can dismount the driver. All in all, good value. Dunno what the price is today but I've seen it as low as $319 for US delivery.

Looking at the FC-E 4800 vs the Kind - there's no competition.
 

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The difference is the fc uses Samsung diodes and you can't move the bars. The fce uses bridgelux but more diodes and you can move the bars. Based on the par maps and price id go with the fce seems like a great deal and had I not purchased my hlg 650 I would've got the fce equivalent.
 
Theres usually a coupon code field when your checking out...
 
When I purchased the fc direct from mars it came out to a few dollars more for the fc than the fce because they had a different shipping rate. So you got to check.
 
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