2 Grow Rooms or 1 Veg and 1 Flower?

[XxHammer]

MrB---- thank you for your well written reply. I am actually in the Floor Plan phase right now. By this I mean calculating how much space I need for 12 plants and then locating a place that fits my needs. Sucks I am not yet in a position to buy a house, I am still renting.

I figure to rent a 2 bedroom place. I am going to start with 1 Grow Room. Which will need a solid set of Lights that will run from Veg through Flower. The 2nd room will remain empty for the time being but could become a 2nd Grow Room once I become more experienced.

So, to answer your question. 12 plants probably do 6 hybrid and 6 indica.

I do plan on keeping my 3x3 Tent for maybe Seedlings and/clones

I plan to convert the walk-in closet into a Drying and Curing Room

 

[Mrb53]

Am I understanding this correctly, there were 389 Samsung 301B led's onboard each of the fixtures? Who did you go to in China?

a total of 3112 led's......I have seen the light...
I have a contact but do not want to spread her all over the site..PM me at tcguy2020 at gmail.com - Mike

 

[Anthem]

a total of 3112 led's......I have seen the light...
I have a contact but do not want to spread her all over the site..PM me at tcguy2020 at gmail.com - Mike

I am really not interested in purchasing the lights, I just did not understand the quantity of LED's, now I see my mistake. Secondly, I just do not see the cost savings being worth the effort. I get the Gavita's for 950.00 each. Considering the ease of getting replacements and the warranty I will just stick to either the Gavita's, or the Fluence gear.
I kind of find it ironic that people with a grow or two under belt with a light are now experts at lighting.

 

[Bbonez]

What does that mean? What is a "Burple?"

It means the entire room looks almost purple and if you forget to put on your green filter safety glasses you get a headache and see green for a few hours. Looks like this:

a lot of cheap Amazon lights look like this but for the price of BD you can do much better.

 

[XxHammer]

I called around a few places...

Best deal I found was HLG diablo for 1200$ each.. And maybe ill get a discount if I buy 2.

The other shop had the Gravita 1700e on sale for 1000$ each...

Need to price the KingBrites and see if either of my local shops can order them or stock them...

Grower's Choice seems to be a common brand here as well.... Anyone use a GC light?

 

[FourPlants]

I have a growers choice ROI-E680 but have not put cannabis under it yet as we go legal July 1st. I have a pepper plant under it right now that seems to be loving it.

I paid $850 local and am happy so far. Dimmer does 40 60 80 100. I may add the master controller later on to get all the cool features. Especially if I add a veg tent. We will see how things go.

I wondered why nobody mentions it but I'm new here so I kept quiet for a bit.

 

[Anthem]

I called around a few places...

Best deal I found was HLG diablo for 1200$ each.. And maybe ill get a discount if I buy 2.

The other shop had the Gravita 1700e on sale for 1000$ each...

Need to price the KingBrites and see if either of my local shops can order them or stock them...

Grower's Choice seems to be a common brand here as well.... Anyone use a GC light?

If you are looking at a whole room for growing and pricing stuff out you might want to get an idea of the total cost for equipment before you go to far down the rabbit hole of lights.
I would consider the following needs as well.
#1. Humidification /dehumidification
#2. Cooling / heating
#3. CO2 for a sealed room 2 or 3 20 pound tanks, controller and CO2 meter
#4. Lastly I would consider how I would want to grow. Soil/Coco or hydro

 

[FourPlants]

If you are looking at a whole room for growing and pricing stuff out you might want to get an idea of the total cost for equipment before you go to far down the rabbit hole of lights.
I would consider the following needs as well.
#1. Humidification /dehumidification
#2. Cooling / heating
#3. CO2 for a sealed room 2 or 3 20 pound tanks, controller and CO2 meter
#4. Lastly I would consider how I would want to grow. Soil/Coco or hydro

Yeah, and then increase the cost 150% for all the odds and ends you will forget

 

[Anthem]

I have a growers choice ROI-E680 but have not put cannabis under it yet as we go legal July 1st. I have a pepper plant under it right now that seems to be loving it.

I paid $850 local and am happy so far. Dimmer does 40 60 80 100. I may add the master controller later on to get all the cool features. Especially if I add a veg tent. We will see how things go.

I wondered why nobody mentions it but I'm new here so I kept quiet for a bit.

FWIW I have ran those lights thru a controller, trolmaster to be exact. I had a situation come up where they would not shut off all the way. It happened 2 or 3 times and the last time I tried cycling the light several times and it would still not shut off all the way. I did not find the problem for several weeks because I try to not go into the grow rooms with lights out, but I was home early one day and found that the lights still had a couple of banks of lights still on. The plants had stretched to about 5" from the lights so I had to cut them down and throw them away. When you start adding up costs and the savings for budget lights sometimes it does not make a lot of sense to save 200 to 300 per light IMO.

 

[FourPlants]

FWIW I have ran those lights thru a controller, trolmaster to be exact. I had a situation come up where they would not shut off all the way. It happened 2 or 3 times and the last time I tried cycling the light several times and it would still not shut off all the way. I did not find the problem for several weeks because I try to not go into the grow rooms with lights out, but I was home early one day and found that the lights still had a couple of banks of lights still on. The plants had stretched to about 5" from the lights so I had to cut them down and throw them away. When you start adding up costs and the savings for budget lights sometimes it does not make a lot of sense to save 200 to 300 per light IMO.

Good to know. As I said I new here and to lights in general. I am a pretty techy kind of kind guy though. What do you think makes them cheaper lights? Construction and parts seem up to par to me. Other than a compatibility issue with a third party controller did you notice anything? Just curious and not trying to sidetrack the OPs thread. If they turn out to not work I will ditch them and go a different direction.

 

[XxHammer]

If you are looking at a whole room for growing and pricing stuff out you might want to get an idea of the total cost for equipment before you go to far down the rabbit hole of lights.
I would consider the following needs as well.
#1. Humidification /dehumidification
#2. Cooling / heating
#3. CO2 for a sealed room 2 or 3 20 pound tanks, controller and CO2 meter
#4. Lastly I would consider how I would want to grow. Soil/Coco or hydro

Yep. That was why I started with a 3x3 tent was to get down the basics and figure out what equipment I would need and what works best. This is like my trial run.

I plan to set aside roughly 4k$ for the Grow Room. Well more like 4k$ is going to be close to my max budget

 

[ImpulsiveGrower]

1400$ for the HLG Diablo is out of my budget. Not by much, but out of my budget. I would need at least 2 of them and 2800$ on 2 lights just isnt quite in the cards.

Someone have an alternative to the 1400$ HLG Diablo?

The kingbrite on Alibaba.com is a pretty good budget led. I’ve found others online that use these same LEDs. They even say it’s comparable to spider farmer are far as specs but at a fraction of the cost. For the 240 watt quantum boards they are 130$ but the 60-70$ shipping is the most expensive part but even after all that it’s just over 200$ and it’s 240 watt instead of the 200 that spider farmer and Mars offer. My plants seem to be really loving it and I bought 2 of these and it was 416$ total. I would only be able to buy 1 spider farmer at that price. Google search the model and see for yourself. There’s another good brand on alibaba I don’t remember the name but they all copy eachother anyway. After this purchase I don’t see myself ever going to those other brands when these have all the same quality parts for half the cost. I did add a viparspectra 150watt tho so I’m curious to see how the plants grow under that...

 

[Anthem]

Good to know. As I said I new here and to lights in general. I am a pretty techy kind of kind guy though. What do you think makes them cheaper lights? Construction and parts seem up to par to me. Other than a compatibility issue with a third party controller did you notice anything? Just curious and not trying to sidetrack the OPs thread. If they turn out to not work I will ditch them and go a different direction.

Ok this is going to be a long one.
#1. First off there as a meeting between the light manufacturers and the controller manufacturer that took place before the ROI-680 came to market and it was agreed upon that the control wires to run lights thru a controller would all run on 0 to 10 volts, or at least that was the way it was explained to me from the tech at Trolmaster. So being a third part controller should not play into the mix.
#2. I have ran the following High PPFD LED's Gavita 1650E, 1700E, Fluence Syder 2I and ROI-680's. THEY ALL GROW PLANTS, BUT SOME BETTER THAN OTHERS.
#3. I remember looking at the ROI-680's and the Gavita 1650E, with the naked eye the ROI seemed brighter, which is about the worst way of comparing lights.
I have to date ran the following lights with the following experiences
Mars Hydro reflector Series, loved that light but only used it for veg. It ran without issues for like 18 months. I recently gave it to a widow that started growing her own stuff and it took a crap on her.
Next came the Mars Hydro TS1000s I believe. I got to about 6 months and the first driver took a dump. This was pre flu days and they told me the replacement would have to come from China. I got it in about 4 weeks just as the second light did the same thing. When I inquired about the second light they wanted pictures and the whole ordeal. I was not happy because they knew what the problem was and they just made it as difficult as possible to get the light replaced. The next great idea I had was to look on Amazon and find the light with the best overall reviews. At the time that was Bestva. Well I am at work one day and I get a text the light was delivered. I looked at the picture and I thought something had to be wrong with the picture because the light was so small. Picture was right the light was about 12" x 12". I went ahead and gave it a try until the plants started to stretch for the light and I had to replace that light. Lastly I purchased the ROI-680s because I was told the lights were on par with the Gavita Stuff. IMO they are about 90 percent of the Gavita's. The one point I will make it that Growers Choice did provide a replacement light quickly. As you can see from my experience Chinese LED's have been less that favorable from me. Once I have a grow in flower, trying to get up to the lights and change out a light is extremely difficult and the cost savings to me is not worth the risk.

 

[Anthem]

Yep. That was why I started with a 3x3 tent was to get down the basics and figure out what equipment I would need and what works best. This is like my trial run.

I plan to set aside roughly 4k$ for the Grow Room. Well more like 4k$ is going to be close to my max budget

I would not even consider trying to do a whole 10 x 10 or 10 x 12 room with that budget. It will cost more than that even with budget lights. Not saying you cannot do it, but it will not be ideal and you will end up buying stuff twice or 3 times.

 

[FourPlants]

Ok this is going to be a long one.

Sounds like you have gone through the gauntlets of lights and have a good bit of experience. Based on my experiences of two plus decades in IT... regardless of what standards are agreed upon combability issues can and do happen.

Outside of a quality PAR meter to do side by side comparisons it is all subjective.


I'm glad you have found what works for ya, and at the end of the day that is all that should matter. Growing quality buds

 

[Anthem]

Sounds like you have gone through the gauntlets of lights and have a good bit of experience. Based on my experiences of two plus decades in IT... regardless of what standards are agreed upon combability issues can and do happen.

Outside of a quality PAR meter to do side by side comparisons it is all subjective.


I'm glad you have found what works for ya, and at the end of the day that is all that should matter. Growing quality buds

I was actually talking to a person on this site and it was not a compatibility issue but rather the way the dimming was set up with the light. It was serval months ago but he seemed to have a pretty good idea what was going on.

 

[XxHammer]

I would not even consider trying to do a whole 10 x 10 or 10 x 12 room with that budget. It will cost more than that even with budget lights. Not saying you cannot do it, but it will not be ideal and you will end up buying stuff twice or 3 times.

Really? You couldnt put together a Grow Room for 4,000$?

I will be doing a complete breakdown for the cost of my operation before I start getting stuff so I will know my costs before I go into it

Luckily I have a 400$ Toshiba Portable AC unit for Temp Control. So that is one expense already handled.

I do not want to go over 2500$ for Lights. My "Plan" is 2-3 LED lights appropriate for covering the space I get.

See I am renting an apartment based on what I need to Grow... i am figuring all this out FIRST.. THEN i will apartment shop. That way my next place is ideal for Growing.

 

[XxHammer]

Luckily I live in Arizona where Humidity is not an issue. Ill likely have to run 1-2 humidifiers during Veg but then by the time they Flower they should be good.

 

[FourPlants]

I was actually talking to a person on this site and it was not a compatibility issue but rather the way the dimming was set up with the light. It was serval months ago but he seemed to have a pretty good idea what was going on.

Perhaps, I wouldn't know without the controller, a multimeter, and some time to tinker. Not sure it would be worth the time and effort. Easier to just change the light or the controller at the point. If I had a room full of lights I would think it would be easier and cheaper to change the controller at that point. I honestly being a new grower have not gone super far down the path of controllers so I don't know.

 

[XxHammer]

Is a Controller even necessary if you have Light Timers?

I dont really want to mess with Dimmable lights... I heard it was always best to run lights at 100% anyways.