How To Compare Grow Lights

  • Thread starter jumpincactus
  • Start date
  • Tagged users None
jumpincactus

jumpincactus

Premium Member
Supporter
11,609
438
As a refresher, PAR (Photosynthetically Active Radiation) is a region of the electromagnetic spectrum (400 to 700 nm) that promotes photosynthesis. PPF (Photosynthetic Photon Flux) is a critical metric that tells us how much PAR a light-source emits. PPF does not measure PAR at a specific location (e.g. your crop canopy), but it tells you how many photons within the PAR region are coming out of the light-source every second. PPFD (Photosynthetic Photon Flux Density) measures the amount of photons within the PAR region at a specific location (e.g. the amount of light delivered to your canopy) every second. If you have a PAR meter, it is reporting PPFD (μmol/m2/s) measurements. You must understand the differences in these metrics before you can compare various horticulture lighting systems. Many manufacturers realize this can be a confusing topic, so it is very easy for companies to mislead potential customers with exaggerated marketing claims, misleading information, and by showing a limited set of (or using blatantly wrong) metrics. However, once you understand the differences in these metrics, you will be able to cut through all the ‘marketing’ and ‘hype’ and simply ask manufacturers to provide the data you need to successfully compare lighting fixtures.

In order to explain the correct method for evaluating a horticulture lighting system, let’s first highlight some of the metrics used today that you need to avoid:

  • RULE NUMBER 1: Don’t use electrical watts to compare grow lights
  • RULE NUMBER 2: Don’t use lumens to compare grow lights
  • RULE NUMBER 3: Don’t be fooled by a company that claims to have a magical growth spectrum
  • RULE NUMBER 4: Don’t just look at a single PPFD measurement directly under the fixture
  • RULE NUMBER 5: Don’t focus on the wattage of the LEDs used in the fixture (1W, 3W, 5W, etc.)
In general, if you see a company using any of the above items to promote their horticulture lights, run away and don’t look back. None of these metrics, nor their derivatives, tell you anything about the performance of a horticulture lighting system.

Rule No. 1: Don’t Use Electrical Watts To Compare Grow Lights
Many people use total electrical watts, dollar/watt or watts/square foot to compare horticulture lighting systems, but these metrics are 100% useless and will most likely lead a consumer to make a poor purchase decision. Why? Simple. Electricity doesn’t grow plants. Furthermore, radiometric efficiency (how much light a fixture emits per watt of electricity) can vary by up to 200% amongst the popular LED fixtures on the market today. Hence, since light (not electricity) grows plants, you need to ask how much light a fixture emits. It sounds simple, but 99.9% of horticulture lighting companies do not advertise this metric. Instead, they focus on electrical watts. Why? Because it is very hard to design an efficient lighting system (measured in μmol/J) that delivers high light levels, but it is very easy to build an inefficient lighting system that consumes a lot of electricity. High efficiency LEDs, power supplies and optics cost more than less efficient components, and many manufacturers use lower quality components to increase profit margins

Remember…You are not buying watts. You are buying a system that delivers light to grow your plants, so a quantitative measurement of light output and the efficiency in which the system produces that light is the critical metric you should use to compare the performance of horticulture lighting solutions.

Rule No. 2: Don’t Use Lumens To Compare Grow Lights
This one’s easy to explain. A lumen is a rating of how bright a light appears to the human eye. However, since human vision is not correlated to photosynthetic grow rates, total lumens is a dead metric. As a rule, if someone is trying to promote lumens for a horticulture lighting system, they should not be selling horticulture lighting systems.

Rule No. 3: Don’t Be Fooled By “Magical Growth Spectrums”
Many scientific papers have confirmed that all wavelengths from 400 to 700 nm (the typical PAR range) will grow plants. However, there is a myth that is widely propagated on the Internet that claims plants do not use green light. Many companies promote their magical growth spectrum by publishing the commonly-referenced Chlorophyll A and B absorption spectrum chart. Armed with this chart, they mention that plants are green, so plants reflect green light from the full-spectrum light source. Have you heard this one before? Without going any deeper into this topic, it is important to note that there is no magical spectrum that is going to allow a 50W fixture to replace a 1000W fixture because it only uses the “wavelengths that plants need.” While plants certainly have numerous pigments and photoreceptors across the PAR range, nothing will trump the need for delivering the required levels of light (PPFD) to your plants. Spectrum has a very real effect on plant development, but be cautious of a company that spends too much time talking about their special spectrum (especially if they do not spend equal effort in publishing their delivered PAR measurements). There is a short list of companies who manufacture commercial-grade LED fixtures for the professional horticulture industry, and none of them market the number of LED ‘bands’ in their fixture.

Rule No. 4: Don’t Look At A Single PPFD Measurement
Let’s take a quick look at Rule 4. Unless you are growing a small plant directly under your light, a single PPFD measurement doesn’t tell you much. By clustering the LEDs closely together and using narrow beam optics, it is very easy for a manufacturer to show an extremely high PAR measurement directly under the fixture. However, unless you are only growing one plant in this exact location, you need to know how much PAR is being distributed across the entire canopy. Since most LED lighting systems centralize the LEDs into a small fixture footprint, these systems naturally produce very high PPFD levels directly under the fixture. However, these light levels will drop significantly as you move the PAR sensor just a small distance from the main fixture housing. If you are growing over a 4’ x 4’ area, you need to review the PPFD levels over the entire area to calculate the average light level the lighting system is providing. If you only had a center point measurement you may assume a fixture is extremely powerful. However, you would need multiple measurements across the 4×4 grow area to calculate the average amount of PAR that is provided by the fixture. Light uniformity across the grow area varies greatly from fixture to fixture, and unfortunately, most manufacturers do not publish complete PAR maps. It is easy to produce high PPFD numbers directly under the fixture, but it takes a very powerful and well-designed light to deliver high (and uniform) PPFD values across an entire canopy.

Rule No. 5: Don’t Focus On The Wattage Of The LED’s
Do you use 1W, 3W, 5W or 10W LEDs? We are asked this question on a frequent basis, but the wattage of the LED does not tell you anything meaningful about the lighting system’s performance. Since LED and fixture efficiency varies widely, the wattage of the LED is not a meaningful metric. Remember, the LED wattage is a system input, and growers care about the system output. Hence, the LED wattage doesn’t tell us anything about the system’s ability to deliver light to your plants.

As a simple analogy, the LED inside a lighting system is equivalent to the engine in a car. By itself, the horsepower rating of the engine doesn’t tell you how fast the car will go. Pair a high-horsepower engine with a poorly designed transmission, and the car will not go very fast. Hence, as far as the driver is concerned, the relevant metrics for a car are related to the overall performance (e.g. 0-60 mph time, top speed, miles per gallon). Any reference to a component inside the car is irrelevant to the driver. It is the same situation with lighting systems. The amount of light delivered to your grow area (PPFD), the electrical watt consumption, and the light distribution pattern are the important metrics to focus on, so ask for more information if a manufacturer wants to focus on the type of LED they use.

Note: Since LED quality varies by a very wide margin, it is important to know the brand of LEDs used in the lighting system. There are a handful of world-class LED manufacturers, so make sure you find out what brand of LEDs are used in the lighting system. Assuming the fixture manufacturer has developed a reliable fixture design, higher quality LEDs should last longer if they are not being over-driven to achieve higher light levels.

Again, you are buying light to grow and develop your plants. In our opinion, you want to buy a lighting system that delivers the required amount of light to your plants for the lowest initial cost, while consuming the fewest electrical watts possible. Ask the fixture manufacturer to provide the following pieces on information: PPF, input watts, and PPFD maps for your intended coverage area. With this information, you can calculate: PPF/$, μmol/J, light distribution patterns, and uniformity levels.
 
incogneato

incogneato

7,177
313
As a refresher, PAR (Photosynthetically Active Radiation) is a region of the electromagnetic spectrum (400 to 700 nm) that promotes photosynthesis. PPF (Photosynthetic Photon Flux) is a critical metric that tells us how much PAR a light-source emits. PPF does not measure PAR at a specific location (e.g. your crop canopy), but it tells you how many photons within the PAR region are coming out of the light-source every second. PPFD (Photosynthetic Photon Flux Density) measures the amount of photons within the PAR region at a specific location (e.g. the amount of light delivered to your canopy) every second. If you have a PAR meter, it is reporting PPFD (μmol/m2/s) measurements. You must understand the differences in these metrics before you can compare various horticulture lighting systems. Many manufacturers realize this can be a confusing topic, so it is very easy for companies to mislead potential customers with exaggerated marketing claims, misleading information, and by showing a limited set of (or using blatantly wrong) metrics. However, once you understand the differences in these metrics, you will be able to cut through all the ‘marketing’ and ‘hype’ and simply ask manufacturers to provide the data you need to successfully compare lighting fixtures.

In order to explain the correct method for evaluating a horticulture lighting system, let’s first highlight some of the metrics used today that you need to avoid:

  • RULE NUMBER 1: Don’t use electrical watts to compare grow lights
  • RULE NUMBER 2: Don’t use lumens to compare grow lights
  • RULE NUMBER 3: Don’t be fooled by a company that claims to have a magical growth spectrum
  • RULE NUMBER 4: Don’t just look at a single PPFD measurement directly under the fixture
  • RULE NUMBER 5: Don’t focus on the wattage of the LEDs used in the fixture (1W, 3W, 5W, etc.)
In general, if you see a company using any of the above items to promote their horticulture lights, run away and don’t look back. None of these metrics, nor their derivatives, tell you anything about the performance of a horticulture lighting system.

Rule No. 1: Don’t Use Electrical Watts To Compare Grow Lights
Many people use total electrical watts, dollar/watt or watts/square foot to compare horticulture lighting systems, but these metrics are 100% useless and will most likely lead a consumer to make a poor purchase decision. Why? Simple. Electricity doesn’t grow plants. Furthermore, radiometric efficiency (how much light a fixture emits per watt of electricity) can vary by up to 200% amongst the popular LED fixtures on the market today. Hence, since light (not electricity) grows plants, you need to ask how much light a fixture emits. It sounds simple, but 99.9% of horticulture lighting companies do not advertise this metric. Instead, they focus on electrical watts. Why? Because it is very hard to design an efficient lighting system (measured in μmol/J) that delivers high light levels, but it is very easy to build an inefficient lighting system that consumes a lot of electricity. High efficiency LEDs, power supplies and optics cost more than less efficient components, and many manufacturers use lower quality components to increase profit margins

Remember…You are not buying watts. You are buying a system that delivers light to grow your plants, so a quantitative measurement of light output and the efficiency in which the system produces that light is the critical metric you should use to compare the performance of horticulture lighting solutions.

Rule No. 2: Don’t Use Lumens To Compare Grow Lights
This one’s easy to explain. A lumen is a rating of how bright a light appears to the human eye. However, since human vision is not correlated to photosynthetic grow rates, total lumens is a dead metric. As a rule, if someone is trying to promote lumens for a horticulture lighting system, they should not be selling horticulture lighting systems.

Rule No. 3: Don’t Be Fooled By “Magical Growth Spectrums”
Many scientific papers have confirmed that all wavelengths from 400 to 700 nm (the typical PAR range) will grow plants. However, there is a myth that is widely propagated on the Internet that claims plants do not use green light. Many companies promote their magical growth spectrum by publishing the commonly-referenced Chlorophyll A and B absorption spectrum chart. Armed with this chart, they mention that plants are green, so plants reflect green light from the full-spectrum light source. Have you heard this one before? Without going any deeper into this topic, it is important to note that there is no magical spectrum that is going to allow a 50W fixture to replace a 1000W fixture because it only uses the “wavelengths that plants need.” While plants certainly have numerous pigments and photoreceptors across the PAR range, nothing will trump the need for delivering the required levels of light (PPFD) to your plants. Spectrum has a very real effect on plant development, but be cautious of a company that spends too much time talking about their special spectrum (especially if they do not spend equal effort in publishing their delivered PAR measurements). There is a short list of companies who manufacture commercial-grade LED fixtures for the professional horticulture industry, and none of them market the number of LED ‘bands’ in their fixture.

Rule No. 4: Don’t Look At A Single PPFD Measurement
Let’s take a quick look at Rule 4. Unless you are growing a small plant directly under your light, a single PPFD measurement doesn’t tell you much. By clustering the LEDs closely together and using narrow beam optics, it is very easy for a manufacturer to show an extremely high PAR measurement directly under the fixture. However, unless you are only growing one plant in this exact location, you need to know how much PAR is being distributed across the entire canopy. Since most LED lighting systems centralize the LEDs into a small fixture footprint, these systems naturally produce very high PPFD levels directly under the fixture. However, these light levels will drop significantly as you move the PAR sensor just a small distance from the main fixture housing. If you are growing over a 4’ x 4’ area, you need to review the PPFD levels over the entire area to calculate the average light level the lighting system is providing. If you only had a center point measurement you may assume a fixture is extremely powerful. However, you would need multiple measurements across the 4×4 grow area to calculate the average amount of PAR that is provided by the fixture. Light uniformity across the grow area varies greatly from fixture to fixture, and unfortunately, most manufacturers do not publish complete PAR maps. It is easy to produce high PPFD numbers directly under the fixture, but it takes a very powerful and well-designed light to deliver high (and uniform) PPFD values across an entire canopy.

Rule No. 5: Don’t Focus On The Wattage Of The LED’s
Do you use 1W, 3W, 5W or 10W LEDs? We are asked this question on a frequent basis, but the wattage of the LED does not tell you anything meaningful about the lighting system’s performance. Since LED and fixture efficiency varies widely, the wattage of the LED is not a meaningful metric. Remember, the LED wattage is a system input, and growers care about the system output. Hence, the LED wattage doesn’t tell us anything about the system’s ability to deliver light to your plants.

As a simple analogy, the LED inside a lighting system is equivalent to the engine in a car. By itself, the horsepower rating of the engine doesn’t tell you how fast the car will go. Pair a high-horsepower engine with a poorly designed transmission, and the car will not go very fast. Hence, as far as the driver is concerned, the relevant metrics for a car are related to the overall performance (e.g. 0-60 mph time, top speed, miles per gallon). Any reference to a component inside the car is irrelevant to the driver. It is the same situation with lighting systems. The amount of light delivered to your grow area (PPFD), the electrical watt consumption, and the light distribution pattern are the important metrics to focus on, so ask for more information if a manufacturer wants to focus on the type of LED they use.

Note: Since LED quality varies by a very wide margin, it is important to know the brand of LEDs used in the lighting system. There are a handful of world-class LED manufacturers, so make sure you find out what brand of LEDs are used in the lighting system. Assuming the fixture manufacturer has developed a reliable fixture design, higher quality LEDs should last longer if they are not being over-driven to achieve higher light levels.

Again, you are buying light to grow and develop your plants. In our opinion, you want to buy a lighting system that delivers the required amount of light to your plants for the lowest initial cost, while consuming the fewest electrical watts possible. Ask the fixture manufacturer to provide the following pieces on information: PPF, input watts, and PPFD maps for your intended coverage area. With this information, you can calculate: PPF/$, μmol/J, light distribution patterns, and uniformity levels.
Tons of good info in there. Easy to get caught up in the hype. Especially for us newbies
 
jumpincactus

jumpincactus

Premium Member
Supporter
11,609
438
are you or were you a reefkeeper? I loved the hobby. Getting baked and watching my reef brought years of enjoyment. Sure is a lot of work tho. Nowadays my garden keeps me busy.

Shit man I had my reef so dialed in I used LED moonlights around full moons and could get my corals to ejaculate/spawn. I know sounds gross but it was pretty kool....... I had a mix of soft and stony corals. Had my tank dialed to the tee and my stony corals would grow an inch a month and thats phenomenal when it comes to coral. :)
 
GT21

GT21

I like soup
Supporter
10,114
438
are you or were you a reefkeeper? I loved the hobby. Getting baked and watching my reef brought years of enjoyment. Sure is a lot of work tho. Nowadays my garden keeps me busy.

Shit man I had my reef so dialed in I used LED moonlights around full moons and could get my corals to ejaculate/spawn. I know sounds gross but it was pretty kool....... I had a mix of soft and stony corals. Had my tank dialed to the tee and my stony corals would grow an inch a month and thats phenomenal when it comes to coral. :)
No thats my buddy from another site
 
GT21

GT21

I like soup
Supporter
10,114
438
yea I have played with true actinics and blue actinics with my grows. Personally I never took the time to side by side so am not sure if they really added resin or terps.
They have to be pretty close to the plant.. many keep them to far away for them to see anything.... if you get an actinic bulb close enough to a bud youll see the trichs mature faster by a week or 2... i use uvb bulbs and can tell a difference in flavor and oil production
 
incogneato

incogneato

7,177
313
are you or were you a reefkeeper? I loved the hobby. Getting baked and watching my reef brought years of enjoyment. Sure is a lot of work tho. Nowadays my garden keeps me busy.

Shit man I had my reef so dialed in I used LED moonlights around full moons and could get my corals to ejaculate/spawn. I know sounds gross but it was pretty kool....... I had a mix of soft and stony corals. Had my tank dialed to the tee and my stony corals would grow an inch a month and thats phenomenal when it comes to coral. :)
You got any pics as a reference. Never really seen a coral farm. Hear about em more now that I grow.
 
MIMedGrower

MIMedGrower

17,190
438
They have to be pretty close to the plant.. many keep them to far away for them to see anything.... if you get an actinic bulb close enough to a bud youll see the trichs mature faster by a week or 2... i use uvb bulbs and can tell a difference in flavor and oil production

I have noticed these exact benefits just adding a cmh to hps powered flower room. I think it has to do with the balance of the spectrum. With a 50/50 blue to red spectrum being ideal as learned from the University of Utah grow light testing.

I have since replaced 1 of my 2 600w Hortilux Super hps with their 600w blue metal halide and the plants seemed to green up and look even more vigourous a few days later.

And some deficiencies I was seeing in transition were clearing up before I even fertilized.

This leaf healed and the new growth was perfect before I watered and fertilized her. It basically just reached back up when I put her under the new blue mh. It's the sunlight like spectrum in my opinion.

IMG 4780
 
dan1989

dan1989

1,929
263
As a refresher, PAR (Photosynthetically Active Radiation) is a region of the electromagnetic spectrum (400 to 700 nm) that promotes photosynthesis. PPF (Photosynthetic Photon Flux) is a critical metric that tells us how much PAR a light-source emits. PPF does not measure PAR at a specific location (e.g. your crop canopy), but it tells you how many photons within the PAR region are coming out of the light-source every second. PPFD (Photosynthetic Photon Flux Density) measures the amount of photons within the PAR region at a specific location (e.g. the amount of light delivered to your canopy) every second. If you have a PAR meter, it is reporting PPFD (μmol/m2/s) measurements. You must understand the differences in these metrics before you can compare various horticulture lighting systems. Many manufacturers realize this can be a confusing topic, so it is very easy for companies to mislead potential customers with exaggerated marketing claims, misleading information, and by showing a limited set of (or using blatantly wrong) metrics. However, once you understand the differences in these metrics, you will be able to cut through all the ‘marketing’ and ‘hype’ and simply ask manufacturers to provide the data you need to successfully compare lighting fixtures.

In order to explain the correct method for evaluating a horticulture lighting system, let’s first highlight some of the metrics used today that you need to avoid:

  • RULE NUMBER 1: Don’t use electrical watts to compare grow lights
  • RULE NUMBER 2: Don’t use lumens to compare grow lights
  • RULE NUMBER 3: Don’t be fooled by a company that claims to have a magical growth spectrum
  • RULE NUMBER 4: Don’t just look at a single PPFD measurement directly under the fixture
  • RULE NUMBER 5: Don’t focus on the wattage of the LEDs used in the fixture (1W, 3W, 5W, etc.)
In general, if you see a company using any of the above items to promote their horticulture lights, run away and don’t look back. None of these metrics, nor their derivatives, tell you anything about the performance of a horticulture lighting system.

Rule No. 1: Don’t Use Electrical Watts To Compare Grow Lights
Many people use total electrical watts, dollar/watt or watts/square foot to compare horticulture lighting systems, but these metrics are 100% useless and will most likely lead a consumer to make a poor purchase decision. Why? Simple. Electricity doesn’t grow plants. Furthermore, radiometric efficiency (how much light a fixture emits per watt of electricity) can vary by up to 200% amongst the popular LED fixtures on the market today. Hence, since light (not electricity) grows plants, you need to ask how much light a fixture emits. It sounds simple, but 99.9% of horticulture lighting companies do not advertise this metric. Instead, they focus on electrical watts. Why? Because it is very hard to design an efficient lighting system (measured in μmol/J) that delivers high light levels, but it is very easy to build an inefficient lighting system that consumes a lot of electricity. High efficiency LEDs, power supplies and optics cost more than less efficient components, and many manufacturers use lower quality components to increase profit margins

Remember…You are not buying watts. You are buying a system that delivers light to grow your plants, so a quantitative measurement of light output and the efficiency in which the system produces that light is the critical metric you should use to compare the performance of horticulture lighting solutions.

Rule No. 2: Don’t Use Lumens To Compare Grow Lights
This one’s easy to explain. A lumen is a rating of how bright a light appears to the human eye. However, since human vision is not correlated to photosynthetic grow rates, total lumens is a dead metric. As a rule, if someone is trying to promote lumens for a horticulture lighting system, they should not be selling horticulture lighting systems.

Rule No. 3: Don’t Be Fooled By “Magical Growth Spectrums”
Many scientific papers have confirmed that all wavelengths from 400 to 700 nm (the typical PAR range) will grow plants. However, there is a myth that is widely propagated on the Internet that claims plants do not use green light. Many companies promote their magical growth spectrum by publishing the commonly-referenced Chlorophyll A and B absorption spectrum chart. Armed with this chart, they mention that plants are green, so plants reflect green light from the full-spectrum light source. Have you heard this one before? Without going any deeper into this topic, it is important to note that there is no magical spectrum that is going to allow a 50W fixture to replace a 1000W fixture because it only uses the “wavelengths that plants need.” While plants certainly have numerous pigments and photoreceptors across the PAR range, nothing will trump the need for delivering the required levels of light (PPFD) to your plants. Spectrum has a very real effect on plant development, but be cautious of a company that spends too much time talking about their special spectrum (especially if they do not spend equal effort in publishing their delivered PAR measurements). There is a short list of companies who manufacture commercial-grade LED fixtures for the professional horticulture industry, and none of them market the number of LED ‘bands’ in their fixture.

Rule No. 4: Don’t Look At A Single PPFD Measurement
Let’s take a quick look at Rule 4. Unless you are growing a small plant directly under your light, a single PPFD measurement doesn’t tell you much. By clustering the LEDs closely together and using narrow beam optics, it is very easy for a manufacturer to show an extremely high PAR measurement directly under the fixture. However, unless you are only growing one plant in this exact location, you need to know how much PAR is being distributed across the entire canopy. Since most LED lighting systems centralize the LEDs into a small fixture footprint, these systems naturally produce very high PPFD levels directly under the fixture. However, these light levels will drop significantly as you move the PAR sensor just a small distance from the main fixture housing. If you are growing over a 4’ x 4’ area, you need to review the PPFD levels over the entire area to calculate the average light level the lighting system is providing. If you only had a center point measurement you may assume a fixture is extremely powerful. However, you would need multiple measurements across the 4×4 grow area to calculate the average amount of PAR that is provided by the fixture. Light uniformity across the grow area varies greatly from fixture to fixture, and unfortunately, most manufacturers do not publish complete PAR maps. It is easy to produce high PPFD numbers directly under the fixture, but it takes a very powerful and well-designed light to deliver high (and uniform) PPFD values across an entire canopy.

Rule No. 5: Don’t Focus On The Wattage Of The LED’s
Do you use 1W, 3W, 5W or 10W LEDs? We are asked this question on a frequent basis, but the wattage of the LED does not tell you anything meaningful about the lighting system’s performance. Since LED and fixture efficiency varies widely, the wattage of the LED is not a meaningful metric. Remember, the LED wattage is a system input, and growers care about the system output. Hence, the LED wattage doesn’t tell us anything about the system’s ability to deliver light to your plants.

As a simple analogy, the LED inside a lighting system is equivalent to the engine in a car. By itself, the horsepower rating of the engine doesn’t tell you how fast the car will go. Pair a high-horsepower engine with a poorly designed transmission, and the car will not go very fast. Hence, as far as the driver is concerned, the relevant metrics for a car are related to the overall performance (e.g. 0-60 mph time, top speed, miles per gallon). Any reference to a component inside the car is irrelevant to the driver. It is the same situation with lighting systems. The amount of light delivered to your grow area (PPFD), the electrical watt consumption, and the light distribution pattern are the important metrics to focus on, so ask for more information if a manufacturer wants to focus on the type of LED they use.

Note: Since LED quality varies by a very wide margin, it is important to know the brand of LEDs used in the lighting system. There are a handful of world-class LED manufacturers, so make sure you find out what brand of LEDs are used in the lighting system. Assuming the fixture manufacturer has developed a reliable fixture design, higher quality LEDs should last longer if they are not being over-driven to achieve higher light levels.

Again, you are buying light to grow and develop your plants. In our opinion, you want to buy a lighting system that delivers the required amount of light to your plants for the lowest initial cost, while consuming the fewest electrical watts possible. Ask the fixture manufacturer to provide the following pieces on information: PPF, input watts, and PPFD maps for your intended coverage area. With this information, you can calculate: PPF/$, μmol/J, light distribution patterns, and uniformity levels.

Great solid info man. Came at the perfect time as I'm looking at LED fixtures to replace my current one. Feel like I know what to research now. Thanks!
 
jumpincactus

jumpincactus

Premium Member
Supporter
11,609
438
Leew421

Leew421

1,631
263
Fluence is hands down one of the best commercial LED made. Definitely on the money with light power and par readings solid across the canopy. These lights are made in Austin. Top notch service. Seriously, if you're looking to change it up and get the best start here. The amount of heat put off is way lower than a CMH. My electric went down. I do not work for them but I do use them real world. Top notch.

PPF: 1410 µmol/s
PPFD: (μmol/m2/s): 909 avg | 1022 max | 664 min
https://fluence.science/technology/spydr/
 
3 SPYDRxPlus Both
jumpincactus

jumpincactus

Premium Member
Supporter
11,609
438
Fluence is hands down one of the best commercial LED made. Definitely on the money with light power and par readings solid across the canopy. These lights are made in Austin. Top notch service. Seriously, if you're looking to change it up and get the best start here. The amount of heat put off is way lower than a CMH. My electric went down. I do not work for them but I do use them real world. Top notch.

PPF: 1410 µmol/s
PPFD: (μmol/m2/s): 909 avg | 1022 max | 664 min
https://fluence.science/technology/spydr/
yea agreed. they look like works of art. My next lite will be the spyderxPlus
 
GrowGod

GrowGod

BANNED!
Supporter
8,429
313
Kept a live salt water reef for years!!!! But I quit as it isnt a very sustainable hobby and I got to feeling guilty. :(
Ya I agree there and is pretty expensive. Wish it was easier to breed salt water fish.I raise Lake tanganika African cichlids, lots of diversity. Not as diverse as salt water but tangs are easily bred if you know what your doing.
 

Latest posts

Top Bottom