Indoor LED's or CFL's?

[snowryderguy]

I purchased two 200w CFL Blue and Red spectrum bulbs for around £55 including post and packaging. I was wondering if my plants would grow better if i bought a LED light instead of using my 200w CFL's?

I seen a few on Ebay going at good prices which have 225 LED's per board. Im only currently growing 4 snowryders in a confined space (H = 60cm, L = 100cm, D = 45cm)

Im only using one of my CFL lights atm as heat is a big issue as i cannot have noise of fans under any circumstanced. I have a few PC fans for air circulation thats about it.

I was thinking if it would be more worth while if I was to use LED lights as they may produce more and better light than one 200w CFL at the moment inside my grow box. I cant relocate my plants as its a very dodgey area and there prying eyes everywhere!

Cheers

 

[The Squid]

Hey pal. Sorry for your problems. As far as LED's; there are only a handful that we know and have evidence of working well for cannabis. They are still slightly new in this field and many look like what you want and say it's the same but it's just not. Try checking out Blackstar LED's. Muddy uses those he's the man. Good luck man.

 

[TokinNuggs]

I only have a little 100W, 2W diode, 6-band UFO LED from Blackstar now, haven't had it long enough to see the results (a few days) but the heat is definitely lower than CFL's, and the fan, at least on this model/UFO models, are not an issue (no louder than a pc fan if that). Right now I've decided to use it on one plant during flowering only (small footprint).

I do know you'll want to stick with 3W-5W models and 6-band lights - there are a lot of factors involved, including cost, not sure how big your grow is, but those CFL's should do the job w/no problem regardless. They are definitely hotter than LED's though, which is why I really like my UFO Led in my PC case and box - heat's a huge issue with just 3 23W CFL's and pc fans.

I'll let others more experienced with them answer here, but just my experience so far - there's plenty of posts about them here and elsewhere with some searching - I am quite happy with my Blackstar model (well-built too), and their service was outstanding.

 

[auto-p]

I seen a few on Ebay going at good prices which have 225 LED's per board. Im only currently growing 4 snowryders in a confined space (H = 60cm, L = 100cm, D = 45cm)

Im only using one of my CFL lights atm as heat is a big issue as i cannot have noise of fans under any circumstanced. I have a few PC fans for air circulation thats about it.

Cheers

I've been growing corals for years using T5 MH and LED setups. So my experience is a little bit different than for cannibis .. But this much I know through experience:

Avoid those type of fixtures. No power, just a bunch of low efficiency LEDs. What you want is an LED fixture with 2W or 3.5W LEDs -- and not the junky Chinese through-hole or 1w LEDs. Osram & Cree are the LED chip brands that have the power and efficiency to work for growing. Anything else and you will be better off using CFL or T5. Osram and Cree are both approaching 50% efficiency with their chips. Those cheap Ebay fixtures use chips with approx 25% efficiency.

It's tough to beat cfl for cost today-- and a good cfl bulb is about 40% efficient. Not bad at all.

LEDs give the ability to waste even less power, because the spectrum is tight- CFL is fairly wideband. CFL spectrums are also tailored for human eyes- not for chlorophyll absorption.

A good LED panel, with good brand and quality LEDs will outperform CFL watt for watt. But those fixtures are REALLY expensive. Cheap LEDs will not perform nearly as well as CFL or T5, and still cost more than either CFL or T5.

A fixture manufacturer should state what brand LED chips are in the fixture. Again, look for Osram and/or Cree.

 

[snowryderguy]

Yer I noticed a LED board going for around £35 but there was one that looked exactly the same going for about £185. I think im going to stick to my CFL's as ive managed to change the grow box, instead of it lying down like a normal cupboard ive put it on its side so it has an extra 2ft in height. I think that should do the trick perfectly. Im not planning on placing the cuboard on its side for quite some time. If the plants get too big I will have to resort to putting it on its side so I can get the extra height. Ive bought a little carbon extractor fan today so im gonna install that tonight and hopefully that should do the trick. I just hope there's no vibrations or noise.