FYI...this is not a reply simply to Aqua Man, but a response to many of the questions that have been asked.
Man, everyone here is super jaded. I get it and can't really blame anyone as their is way too much BS out there. There have been a lot of accusations thrown here yet it was before most of you even took the time to see what we put out on our website. As an entrepreneur and a company creating jobs (45 currently) it is a tough balance to serve every type of customer out there and make enough revenue to feed the souls that put their life energy into creating these lights.
1.) These lights were created for the commercial grower. The robust construction and technology we chose to integrate means they can't compete with the DIY style lights. Some home growers want it, others don't. Compared to our competitors: Fluence, Black Dog, Spectrum King, ProGrowTech, etc. we are priced 10-30% less than them. This was a conscious decision to show the market that an American made light can be high quality and bought at a reasonable price. While other companies are trying to make 100% mark-up we are priced at 35-40%, which is the bare minimum for a company to keep it's doors open. It is also ridiculously expensive to get UL certifications in the US and Canada, CE in Europe and get listed on DLC, and commercial companies can't use the DIY lights because of this.
2.) There is no question the more LEDs spread out evenly work the best. Period. Unfortunately this isn't possible for all grow scenarios, especially greenhouse and large single level (high bay) styles of grows. Our current linear lights (Dragon series) have 196 five watt LEDs which is why they are only have an efficiency of 2.15. Our next gen, due out in January, will have 528 five watt LEDs, driven to 600w maximum, meaning they will run at 20% of capacity and have efficiency closer to 2.4. The LED cost alone for 528 five watt LEDs (including the reds) is almost $200. The reason our other line (Raging K) uses optics is the (a) it is part of our brand; (b) it allows larger grows to clean them and work in wet environments where conformal coated non-optic/lensed lights will fail over time and (c) we believe, and have seen proof, that our unique optical emission pattern does penetrate deeper due to more light being on the angle, directly challenging the inverse square law.
3.) We have done everything possible to be super transparent. Since the beginning our website has had PAR maps (real ones, not some X pattern leaving out important data) in both tents and in larger rooms. We even have the light lab reports up there as well.
www.ScynceLED.com
4.) It is true that spectrum tuning, as I already eluded to, is an unknown today. Our lights, like others that are tunable, do mean sacrificing wattage (power) as you take out parts of the spectrum. This is changing though. Our
Raging Kale light was the first light on the market that is full-power spectrum tunable. That means you can push all 250 watts that this fixture has available into the cool or warm channel, sacrificing nothing to tune in your desired spectrum. This feature will be built into all of our lights come Q1 of 2020. We have also patented a way to do this with a single power supply, every other tunable light has a single power supply per color channel. This approach of a single power supply keeps the costs down and the retail prices as low as possible.
5.) The optics on these lights were designed to work in synergy with multiple lights. Comparing them 1-2-1 with other lights yields average results. The real power here is what we call cross-beaming instead of traditional cross-lighting.
6.) We make no claims of 3+ pounds a light or other nonsense. Yes we have partners getting these results but we don't market that way. Everyone I have ever met wants us to give them lights so they can compare them. We have put over $100k into true 3rd party light testing partners and 80% of the time they fail to report back, make multiple changes that don't give true comparison results or simply fall off the face of the earth. I previously listed multiple IG growers that you can reach out to to independently verify the results they have gotten. While I do have test results that we have compiled they wouldn't be trusted so why share them?
You would be hard pressed to find another light manufacturer this open and transparent. The style of attacks many of you have launched will prevent me and other manufacturers from engaging in, what could be anyways, a great venue for open and honest conversations. Might I suggest that we leave the skeletons in the closet, eliminate the rhetoric and give everyone a chance to show their true colors before we stomp on them?
As someone who has been part of and believes in the unique cannabis "community," we all know that in life and this industry in particular it takes a village. Not everyone is out to screw the next person. Businesses need to make money and the good ones can honor their clients at the same time making it a win-win for everyone. While we aren't perfect, that is our highest pursuit.