A customised light design - some input needed.

[Prom]

There are no 100% efficient devices.. we would blow to much energy into keeping supra conductive conditions if we want to run a electric system max efficient.

Keep indoor growing simple, the more complicated your setup is, the more issues you have with debugging. Also, just to say it.. if you look for a perfect setup and NOT use a PAR meter ^^ you can't get to the goal anyhow.

The question is, how many watts you want to use to grow. I run 480 watts on a 1.44 square meter area. Most prefer more 600 to 1000 watts on 1 square meter. The more light you put in the more light your plants have to play with.. max they can absorb is about 1000-1200 micromole PAR. Over that you need to add CO2 to get gain in production or just heat up more the environment. 

Problem is the more watts you run the more heat you have to remove again. Goal is to never pass 26 degrees C, over 30 your terpenes burn up and decay high speed. If you want to run things perfect during flower, keep it 20, day and night cycle.

Light is important, I agree very much, but is just ONE component to have in perfect range, if you want perfect weed. 

I use 3000K QBs for Germ, Veg and Flower.  Works... then you need fertilizers... best specific for Cannabis growing and use the fertilizer correctly. Can have the best light in the world.. if you don't feed what the plants need.. will not end well. Doesn't matter if you go Soil or Hydro... or can't make up your mind and go Coco. How you handle the plants will give the result. But.. have to learn the method and swapping means starting over again. 

 

My 5 cents: Great you look into the matter in high detail. But.. don't get lost in the forest of numbers.. the only number counting is if you are happy with your harvest. First learn the ropes and once you learned the plant, check how "perfect" you get your setup to run.  Plants will tell you how they feel.. you just have to observe them and understand what they try to pass on 

[Naughty.Psychonaut]

2 hours ago, koosjr said:

Well, the big problem is I will not be able to change my light cycle to work at night when it is cool...

I simply will not have the power for that. My power is in the day when the sun is shining.

Regardless of that, I would like to see your light design that does not give off any heat.

LEDs, even the best of them is about 50% efficient - unless you can show me products where this is not the case. Shit, I have looked at many data sheets of components and there just ain't that magic one in there.

Sorry, it simply is impossible. A 1W LED will give off about 0.5W of heat minimum and if that LED is inside your room, it is room load.

I am not trying to be wiseguy here. This is just plain and simple realities of engineering. I have never come across a 100% efficient device.

As said, the fact that your hand does not feel the heat, does not mean there is not the same heat. It is just spread over a larger area.

I also see people are struggling to heat up boxes in winter - and yet a simple layer of good bubble wrap sheets around the box will probably more than half the heat one would need to keep it hot. In that case, the light alone will be enough to heat it up.

Running lights on during day is gona be a tough one. indoor growing 101, first thing you learn. big no no to run lights on during day unless you in full controle of environment. good thing you jumped on LED first instead of HID.

Well man, I just don't know what else to tell you. Out of all light style designs the bar style OUT OF ALL OTHER DESIGNS heats up least........ what are you trying to argue? I hope you're not trying to say I am wrong about that?

I am not talking about the heat coming off each single diode itself. the driver itself warms up too even more than the diodes, we haven't even touched on that, but you focussing on the intricate details of a single diode. I am talking about over all heat. you wana keep things as cool as possible, right? so why go with the design that needs external cooling????? PLUS you know heat wears on the stuff..... I really don't understand what it is you not grasping?

If you take that info and go back to your point about each single diode, would it not STILL make more sense to try and get that diode as close to running as cool as possible? 

Grouping diodes together OBVIOUSLY will cause more heat around the diodes itself. spreading them further apart will OBVIOUSLY allow them to run cooler in general.... 

You can see the light I built on my page. and read carefully, I said that I never have issues with heat and constantly in the 25-30°C range. light on or off. because it fluctuates. I also said IF the light has a 3 to 5°C impact on my given temp inside the tent, that doesn't bother me. indicating that the light can give off some heat, not absolutely no heat. It's just minimal, no need for extra cooling in my situation even though a wendy heats up a lot more than inside a house or garage. 

remember we all got temp monitors inside our grow rooms, I watch my temp closely. If there is something you don't understand cause you haven't got experience in it, that's just your level of understanding. It doesn't mean it's not true. If you don't want to understand it cause it challenges how you currently understand things then that's on you

If you know soooooo much about the way heat and electricity works together, you should also know bringing it as close to the least amount of heat coming off the appliance would be best right? (meaning things are running smoothe) And vice versa, running it as hot as possible will be worse, right? So if you have an option to run the thing cooler, why would you argue that and opt for the design that runs hotter and needs external cooling. especially for a guy running on alternative power you should be looking at these things. 

Anyway, I'm not gona try to give you any more pointers  

Goodluck bud

[koosjr]

Quote

If you know soooooo much about the way heat and electricity works together, you should also know bringing it as close to the least amount of heat coming off the appliance would be best right? (meaning things are running smoothe) And vice versa, running it as hot as possible will be worse, right? So if you have an option to run the thing cooler, why would you argue that and opt for the design that runs hotter and needs external cooling.  especially for a guy running on alternative power you should be looking at these things. 

 

What you seems to be unable to grasp is that regardless how cool the fitting runs, it still dissipates the same watts as heat rejection.

If that watts are dropped in your room, then the room gets hot. As simple as that. And it gets the very same hot regardless how cool the surface feels to your hand.

I fully understands why you would want to reverse the light cycle to night time - that is the obvious solution if you have ESKOM power.

If you don't, then it has to be run from batteries. At R 25 000 for a 5.2 kWh Lithuim, of which you would probably need at least 2 then, it can become rather steep.

If this problem can be solved in an elegant wat, then I can assure you it will be to the benefit of many others who will be ever ore plagued by load shedding.

[MrE]

On 5/15/2023 at 6:41 AM, Naughty.Psychonaut said:

Hi bud, hope you well. We got a inhouse LED specialist, if I may say so myself. @MrE have you seen this? 

Hey @Naughty.Psychonaut @koosjrdudes!

Heck yea, super interesting project! Super kean to behold the development!

[Naughty.Psychonaut]

15 hours ago, koosjr said:

 

What you seems to be unable to grasp is that regardless how cool the fitting runs, it still dissipates the same watts as heat rejection.

If that watts are dropped in your room, then the room gets hot. As simple as that. And it gets the very same hot regardless how cool the surface feels to your hand.

I fully understands why you would want to reverse the light cycle to night time - that is the obvious solution if you have ESKOM power.

If you don't, then it has to be run from batteries. At R 25 000 for a 5.2 kWh Lithuim, of which you would probably need at least 2 then, it can become rather steep.

If this problem can be solved in an elegant wat, then I can assure you it will be to the benefit of many others who will be ever ore plagued by load shedding.

Dude, just gona give you a little perspective here real quick - I have 3 different LED grow lights. I have used them all and they all got different heat dissipation. Each light got a different heat coming off the actual light and they each hav impact on the heat in my tent...... and funny enough, the kak lights heat up way more and they heat up the tent way more.... care to explain that to me mr. engineer?

you don't need to worry about if I am grasping what you saying, cause what you saying has very little to nothing to do with what I am trying to explain to you. 

Like I said - forget about the lm/w forget about W forget about all your fancy finer details about each individual light. honestly if you do this test between 2 kak cheap diodes and 2 kak expensive diodes the results will remain the same, cause it's really not the output or the tech behind these diodes I am talking about. It's the layout of the build, the design of the light. have you heard about heatsinks for qb's - why do you think they use heatsinks? have you seen the old tech LEDs with built in fans - care to explain to me WHY those fans are there in the first place, mr.smartboi? I give you a hint - the cooler the appliance runs the better for the appliance itself that's all I am saying. the cooler the thing runs the better and there are ways to build a design that don't heat up as much sparing you on extra fans and sparing the life of your light. How you feel about that isn't gona change the fact. 

perhaps, get your box and your light built and gain some experience here, then maybe you'll get the picture, cause right now you being waaaayy too smart to understand basic stuff and completely missing what I am trying to say to you  

I don't need to have back and forth with you about something I have dealt with a long long time ago, wasnt giving the info to discuss it really, just wanted to help a fellow grower save some money and grow better weed, but yeah can't help those who don't wana be helped hey  kinda perplexed at how hard it is to explain this basic info to an engineer, thought it would be like second nature to you.

[koosjr]

Hey buddy, no need to get excited.

Obviously a kak led will give off more heat than a good one. I never said it would not.

Good LED or KAK LED, a heat sink does not make the heat less. It simply spreads it - and that I have learned prevents foxtailing

The lm/w is a great indication of the efficiency of the light. There is a theoretical maximum that a 100% efficient source can deliver.

Some of us likes to get technical. You have a problem with that?

If you just want to draw on your experience and no more, good for you. Me wants to understand the theory and connect it to practice.

I am quite comfortable with heat transfer. Don't have to prove that to anyone.

I have also designed plenty of electronics by now and I can assure, we to have to deal with the heat from components. You cannot just leave it.

 

Edited May 17, 2023 by koosjr

[LitItGrown]

On 5/14/2023 at 10:32 AM, koosjr said:

HI III_Evan,

 

I am for no forced to work on Lux values as I have no other data on the LEDS in the sheets, so that is the reference I have.

I made a Typo. I wanted 60 000 Lux on 3000K.

But you are now making new suggestions.

I thought that 3000K was almost exclusively needed for flowering stage, but you now say I should start with 3000K and later move over to 5000K.

I assume though that the IR will work all the time.

Do you mean that I should make provision then for 60 000 lux at 5000K?

This sort of means that I will start vegetation stage at a 50% load on the 5000K and eventually add some 3000K.

I will then have to change over to 3000K for flowering - perhaps with some 5000K in there and end of with only 5000K?

If this is the case, then I will have to double up on my 5000K portion.

I did investigate using dedicated 660nm LEDS but they are so low in power output that they will not add anything useful.

Hi, maybe this could help you out; Convert Lux to PPFD - Online Calculator | Waveform Lighting you input your lux value, select the light spectrum and it will give you and estimate

[LitItGrown]

On 5/14/2023 at 2:25 PM, koosjr said:

https://migrolight.com/blogs/grow-light-news/cheap-par-meter-hack-use-a-lux-meter-to-measure-par-accurately
 

Perhaps not a bad ay of doing it initially.

There is a free app in the google play store, PPFD Meter - Grow Light Meter - It gives you the DLi (as well) - It uses your phone's camera sensor, so I would suspect that the better the sensor on the phone the more accurate the app would probably be. You can google Bruce Bugby or search youtube he has 1 particular presentation on light that explains a lot on the subject.

[koosjr]

Jip, those references helps, but the point is I will not know until I have the first prototype on my table. And that is what design is about.

I now need to make the best guess I can based on the best information I can get, order the stuff and see if my expected calculations managed to reflect in practice.

Design is about not having to try 50 times. It is first guess and perhaps try 2 or 3 times.

Edited May 17, 2023 by koosjr

[Prom]

13 hours ago, koosjr said:

Good LED or KAK LED, a heat sink does not make the heat less. It simply spreads it - and that I have learned prevents foxtailing

If you run into foxtailing with LED lights.. you are seriously low on ventilation inside the tent. Some heat sinks on those LEDs and a light air breeze should be enough that the bud can actually touch the light and not get burned.. is hand warm (i have no dimmer on my boards and run 2 x 120w QBs on a 240w driver).

[Naughty.Psychonaut]

On 5/17/2023 at 4:10 AM, koosjr said:

Hey buddy, no need to get excited.

Obviously a kak led will give off more heat than a good one. I never said it would not.

Good LED or KAK LED, a heat sink does not make the heat less. It simply spreads it - and that I have learned prevents foxtailing

The lm/w is a great indication of the efficiency of the light. There is a theoretical maximum that a 100% efficient source can deliver.

Some of us likes to get technical. You have a problem with that?

If you just want to draw on your experience and no more, good for you. Me wants to understand the theory and connect it to practice.

I am quite comfortable with heat transfer. Don't have to prove that to anyone.

I have also designed plenty of electronics by now and I can assure, we to have to deal with the heat from components. You cannot just leave it.

 

That's the whole point!!!! The heat needs to be displaced, like you said - so if you know that then what are you arguing about?????

you know how heat build up and heat dissipation works, right?

if you  group ANYTHING that gives off ANY kinda heat it will build up more heat than when those exact same things spread further apart, bacause the heat is allowed to dissipate more freely instead of building up in one spot - basic knowledge dude. you learn this shit before going to school. the fact that you're an engineer doesn't even come into play here, this is basic preschool knowledge.

the principle is true doesn't matter what lm/w doesn't matter the quality of diode doesn't matter any of the kak you gerting lost on. lm/w may be great indication of efficiency, I clap my hands for you smart man, but sadly ALL diodes, ALL lights, ALL THINGS IN LIFE SUCCUMB TO THIS PRINCIPLE.

I'm gona say it again, try to read carefully here -

ANYTHING THAT GIVES OFF ANY KINDA HEAT WILL HAVE MORE HEAT BUILD UP WHEN THEY'RE GROUPED TOGETHER THAN WHEN THEY ARE SPREAD FURTHER APART.

If you can't understand that there's probably a bigger problem at play here.

I didn't ask you why heat sinks are used, your mind is like a gold fish. You read a word you think you know something about then you don't read the rest or howcome it's so hard for you to understand basic stuff??? You the one that said you don't wana get technical then went and got as technical as you possibly can and then play victim and say sometimes some of you wana get technical and ask if I have a problem with it bro what are you on? It was never even technical to begin with. I pointed to heat sinks and external fans being used, because of the importance of heat displacement and that there are better ways to achieve even better results. You know about the difference in "active cooling" and "passive cooling".

If you know about heat displacement, next thing for you to start learning about is how to achieve best heat displacement. There are better ways and worse ways. You'll learn in due time my friend. Build your light, I'm excited to see how long it takes before you realise I was trying to help you and you just neeeeeeded to protect that ego hey this will cost you in the long run, rather you than me.

[Naughty.Psychonaut]

12 hours ago, Prom said:

If you run into foxtailing with LED lights.. you are seriously low on ventilation inside the tent. Some heat sinks on those LEDs and a light air breeze should be enough that the bud can actually touch the light and not get burned.. is hand warm (i have no dimmer on my boards and run 2 x 120w QBs on a 240w driver).

he's gona be running his lights during the day. heat wouldn't even be only from the lights. why it's so much more important to go with a design that doesn't heat up, don't know why people are so reluctant to accept help  

[Prom]

Is also no reason to overthink things.  You are not going for a moon landing.

Putting thoughts in your light is great. If you go with a grow light from a known manufacturer, you will end with a good harvest, if you know how to handle the rest. (If you never grew Cannabis.. might take more than one run to get it figured out. Winter more easy indoor, lights heat reduces humidity.)

If you just plan to run a 1.2x0.6 tent, light rather easy to handle and you also have less issues with ventilation and heat. Small tents need less side gear as big tents do. If you get a pure 3000k, 3500k, 4000k or 5000k board, will work. If you add IR, will help, UVa.. some say do, others don't advise it, new stuff hehehe. You do what you learn while growing your plants. I think you have more than enough knowledge to start.. will you build the first setup in a perfect way? Most likely not.. nobody i know has done that (including me) ^^ There is always something to tweak and Winter/Summer setups differ like totally new setups (i change my ducting).. feeding changes (summer needs more pure water feedings, except hydro, that needs more active solution cooling).. hehehe there is no perfect setup working all year long.. except you run a fully climatized indoor environment. And that only pays out if you sell in big numbers.. private people blow way to much into cooling during summer, or best shut down Dec-end Feb.

I favor Flower over Veg, reason i went 3000K with IR (660-720nm), no UV. My plants get to size anyhow (worst case they stay a few days longer in the Veg tent, no time limit on Veg), but prefer more red for flower to add the 'umpf' and bud density. 3500-4000 is 'i don't know what i prefer' and 5000k is 'Veg is king, less node spacing' ^^ Flower has a limited time and plants will run out of time.. dying, rot or worse, go into rodelization. If you want to go PERFECT/PERFECT.. you would need dimmers on each kind of diode and change the setup depending on each stage.. i think i would take a pistol and put a funny painting on the wall before going that way  keep it simple 

Would bet that you change your light setup later on ^^ might not be the light temperature and mix with IR and UV (or leave it) but also shape  or cooling.. or simple redirect the in-tent ventilation to your light.. add more ventilation to cool the light better, more tent cycles (tent should get at least 6 full air exchanges per minute, PM prevention). And i missed at least 20 things now ^^.. you can over do it at some stage.

Would just start.. go and find the light fitting your first impulse and grow some weed 

 

Addon: ^^

And when the next generation of diodes gets released.. you start over

Edited May 18, 2023 by Prom
addon

[koosjr]

On 5/18/2023 at 6:24 AM, Naughty.Psychonaut said:

he's gona be running his lights during the day. heat wouldn't even be only from the lights. why it's so much more important to go with a design that doesn't heat up, don't know why people are so reluctant to accept help  

What reluctance to accept help? You have yet to provide any proper data of your lights. I did so I know hat I work with. Rather the devil you know.

I was simply discussing the problem and brain stormed a bit.

Me think you need to go and smoke a joint. You sound way to tense.

But that said, this happened on other forums before. I got into a topic and made a nice thread where the ideas was developed. Got lots of appreciation from some for it and then of exactly the same reaction like yours from those like who apparently feel threatened that some oaks wants to figure out things with developing the theory first.

Same story. Told me how stooopid I am as an engineeeer who cannot understand these basic topics that one apparently learned on school. Simply could not follow the discussion. Told me theory and practice does not meet bla bla bla. Eish. And one should not dare mention the Dunning-Kruger effect because that they like to try and throw that back at you.

You can see that everywhere. Mechanics thinks they know better than the engineer who designed the engine in front of them. That is now the engine and ALL the tooling and technology to built it. So mechanic think just because is able to make it faster, he did better - yet he is unable to design and make the engine for starters. Too stoopid to think that perhaps the engineer could also do what he did, but he did not because there was many other things to consider.

On one forum I documented the remapping of the ECU of my TD5 Land Rover. I started knowing nothing about engine mapping. I documented everything from knowing nothing to the final result and covered the improved measurements during the exercise, in detail.

I ended up with probably on of the most balanced and polished maps ever done anywhere for this vehicle, because I did my research and I can make things work in practice. You can ask anyone who have my engine map on their car today.

It ended up with a super smooth vehicle, nice power, vastly improved shift quality on the auto gearbox, improved traction control in low range, improved engine protection - all of which "experienced" engine tuners (with no engineering degrees mind you), bypass. They just moer the fuel map because that is how they did it all the years. Worst place ever to scratch around in an ECU map. And they have broken maaaany motors with their approach.

A few really bright guys stuck with me there and we could generate some great ideas - and we had to ignore the others who were annoyed when we got good results.

I honestly doubt that you of all can teach me anything about heat exchange and inefficiencies. Sorry Sir. 

I am perfectly aware of the problem of running lights at day. Said that even before you did. But you should know by now why I need to consider it. I only have solar power. No eskom. Can't run a gennie here all the time. If that reason is not ligit enough for you, then why waste time here? It is a damn good reason.

Do you perhaps have clever ideas of how to get through a night other than buying fat batteries? Or running a noisy gennie?

I bet you don't. Neither have I.

Option 1: Look at a major heat source and see if I can do something about that. And the lights, regardless how good they are will dump at least 40% of what ever watts goes into the room, as raw heat if it is not removed by other means. It does not matter how they are put together.

Option 2: Grow Outside. Not for now.

[koosjr]

On 5/18/2023 at 2:10 PM, Prom said:

Putting thoughts in your light is great. If you go with a grow light from a known manufacturer, you will end with a good harvest, if you know how to handle the rest. (If you never grew Cannabis.. might take more than one run to get it figured out. Winter more easy indoor, lights heat reduces humidity.)

If you just plan to run a 1.2x0.6 tent, light rather easy to handle and you also have less issues with ventilation and heat. Small tents need less side gear as big tents do. If you get a pure 3000k, 3500k, 4000k or 5000k board, will work. If you add IR, will help, UVa.. some say do, others don't advise it, new stuff hehehe.

 

You do what you learn while growing your plants. I think you have more than enough knowledge to start.. will you build the first setup in a perfect way? Most likely not.. nobody i know has done that (including me) ^^ There is always something to tweak and Winter/Summer setups differ like totally new setups (i change my ducting).. feeding changes (summer needs more pure water feedings, except hydro, that needs more active solution cooling).. hehehe there is no perfect setup working all year long.. except you run a fully climatized indoor environment. And that only pays out if you sell in big numbers.. private people blow way to much into cooling during summer, or best shut down Dec-end Feb.

I favor Flower over Veg, reason i went 3000K with IR (660-720nm), no UV. My plants get to size anyhow (worst case they stay a few days longer in the Veg tent, no time limit on Veg), but prefer more red for flower to add the 'umpf' and bud density. 3500-4000 is 'i don't know what i prefer' and 5000k is 'Veg is king, less node spacing' ^^ Flower has a limited time and plants will run out of time.. dying, rot or worse, go into rodelization. If you want to go PERFECT/PERFECT.. you would need dimmers on each kind of diode and change the setup depending on each stage.. i think i would take a pistol and put a funny painting on the wall before going that way  keep it simple 

Would bet that you change your light setup later on ^^ might not be the light temperature and mix with IR and UV (or leave it) but also shape  or cooling.. or simple redirect the in-tent ventilation to your light.. add more ventilation to cool the light better, more tent cycles (tent should get at least 6 full air exchanges per minute, PM prevention). And i missed at least 20 things now ^^.. you can over do it at some stage.

Would just start.. go and find the light fitting your first impulse and grow some weed 

 

Addon: ^^

And when the next generation of diodes gets released.. you start over

Many things said here that agree with.

Yes, I not going for a moon landing, but I do want to have a good chance to get the best plants I can in the shortest time.

The climate is obviously important - and there I tried to get some direction on another thread - about if and how one can mitigate the problem of say running above 30 °C for some lenght of time. The suggestion to say that then you avoid growing in the hottest months, is practical at least. Perhaps not always the answer one wants, but practical.

Growing indoors without Eskom is a huge challenge. That is already evident on this forum. The problem for many here is that they have made their setups in a time where load shedding was not such a big problem is. Now it is and it will not get better.

With that in mind, it would be foolish not to put in an effort now to see how one can deal with it. Again. If I do not have much power at night, what should I do? Reduce the power to half the level and hope it works? Sounds like high change for poor results.

Lights is THE major issue to get right. It makes the heat which in winter is good and in summer is bad. It makes the light. 5000K works better for veg and 3000k for flower.

I have 25 years of experience with heat load calculations. This is by far the highest heat load from lights that I ever had to work with and I can tell you, from my perspective this will be an issue regardless of the application not only for a cannabis room.

If I just buy the fist light, good or bad, then I still have no possibility for reconfiguration if I need  to.

With the light I want to design myself here, I very much want the flexibility. So, if I grow plants, it does not go well, I post pics and the problem is perhaps a common one with a solution - like changing the shape of the light, I want to be able to do that on the spot.

If I buy a light with all the dimmer functions etc I am going to pay through my ears for it. A good light is at the very least R 20 per watt or more.

I can build that myself however because I am well fluent with PCB design. For me to put in the circuitry needed to dim the light is not that big a deal. I will rather want to find out that I dont have to use it, than not having it and needed it.

Lets say then I can have it done for R 7 per watt, power supply included and it ends up begin good. That will be a good deal if one wants to expand further.

 

Right. Air changes. 6 air changes per minute is already something to work with. However, that probably does not mean 6 FRESH air changes per minute? Just recirculation I suppose?

 

And then, when the new range of LEDS come, all I need to do is change a component and order a new batch. The rest will be sorted.

[Naughty.Psychonaut]

Holy hahahah so you still don't understand that things that give off heat grouped together build up more heat than when those same things are spread further apart???? You're kidding me right? 

Yeah. I am sooooooo tense man, ooooh you tense me up reeeeeeeaaaall bad man, aaaaahh soo teense!!! hahahah

The fact that I have a QB on a heat sink - which it needs to dissipate the heat - and the bar light that doesn't need a heat sink, cause it runs coolers is more than enough information I need to give you.  

you just gotta stop THINKING you know better and open yourself up to learning from those ahead of you, I'm reaching a long arm out trying to help you still after you giving me shitty attitude, you should thank your stars, but don't worry, as you grow through what you go through the truth will catch up to you.

I never said you HAVE to build it this way, I just say theres a better desing than QB or PCB. If you don't already know this then you stuck in the past and reluctant to move forward, you went on to disagree with me and now I am trying to help you understand something that I have dealt with a really long time ago and you going off a hunch and have no experience in the field. I'm not about to let your emotions tell me I am wrong about something I can measure. 

It's clear you not ready for this big step of accepting information that might help you, sometimes letting go of what we used to know is scary, I get it man. Just get busy, build that light you speak of forget about anything I said, don't let new information stress you out. like mentioned before by a couple of us - you probably gona do a rebuild once the answers reveal themself to you. 

and we're all here to watch and support it all when it happens 

[Naughty.Psychonaut]

Biggest threat is PM due to the fall of the FAE and no air circulation. Not light schedule. 

Natural outdoors RH goes up at night, naturally higher in tent too as they get their air from outside, no power to push air around or exchange the air is a WAY bigger concern than if the lights are on or not. 

This whole thread is a bit backwards.  

You can watch my threads bud, I grow indoors with loadshedding with no gennies no inverters none of that fancy stuff, cause I am one step ahead of the curve.  

there are ways to combat and navigate the high RH, but it's got nothing to do with your lights. and you gotta stop thinking you already know the answer. 

[Prom]

11 hours ago, koosjr said:

Many things said here that agree with.

Yes, I not going for a moon landing, but I do want to have a good chance to get the best plants I can in the shortest time.

The climate is obviously important - and there I tried to get some direction on another thread - about if and how one can mitigate the problem of say running above 30 °C for some lenght of time. The suggestion to say that then you avoid growing in the hottest months, is practical at least. Perhaps not always the answer one wants, but practical.

Growing indoors without Eskom is a huge challenge. That is already evident on this forum. The problem for many here is that they have made their setups in a time where load shedding was not such a big problem is. Now it is and it will not get better.

With that in mind, it would be foolish not to put in an effort now to see how one can deal with it. Again. If I do not have much power at night, what should I do? Reduce the power to half the level and hope it works? Sounds like high change for poor results.

Lights is THE major issue to get right. It makes the heat which in winter is good and in summer is bad. It makes the light. 5000K works better for veg and 3000k for flower.

I have 25 years of experience with heat load calculations. This is by far the highest heat load from lights that I ever had to work with and I can tell you, from my perspective this will be an issue regardless of the application not only for a cannabis room.

If I just buy the fist light, good or bad, then I still have no possibility for reconfiguration if I need  to.

With the light I want to design myself here, I very much want the flexibility. So, if I grow plants, it does not go well, I post pics and the problem is perhaps a common one with a solution - like changing the shape of the light, I want to be able to do that on the spot.

If I buy a light with all the dimmer functions etc I am going to pay through my ears for it. A good light is at the very least R 20 per watt or more.

I can build that myself however because I am well fluent with PCB design. For me to put in the circuitry needed to dim the light is not that big a deal. I will rather want to find out that I dont have to use it, than not having it and needed it.

Lets say then I can have it done for R 7 per watt, power supply included and it ends up begin good. That will be a good deal if one wants to expand further.

 

Right. Air changes. 6 air changes per minute is already something to work with. However, that probably does not mean 6 FRESH air changes per minute? Just recirculation I suppose?

 

And then, when the new range of LEDS come, all I need to do is change a component and order a new batch. The rest will be sorted.

The barrier is 26 degrees  not 30.. over 30 things just turn out as bad as they can get. You have to include active cooling.. hence A/C.. and your cost just doubled. I recommend to shut down indoor growing in Summer, if you do not have a fully isolated room to work with, cooling cost will drive you nuts otherwise. Cooling is less efficient compared to LED diodes.. so the biggest factor of a perfect setup is the cooling.. and if you want to run 'perfect', A/C is imperative... as you will also run it during winter to keep it at 20... if you run a commercial setup. Is a huge difference to produce yourself some weed to smoke or produce top quality material.

What size tents you want to run? I can give you an estimate of your power cost. With the estimate of power consumption you can design the solar setup to bridge your tent(s). You will put a lot more in as the household would need. So once load shedding stops.. you will have a over dimensioned setup. As indicator, a 2.4x2.4 tent will eat about 48-96 kwh a day (no A\C cooling, with A/C double it)... normal house hold uses 10-20 kwh per day, depending if it has a pool and solar geyser. 

A 288 Quantum Board will set you back 25-30$US.. plus cooler and the driver.. cooler and driver you can use on other boards if you change. 4 QBs 100$.. is not the biggest investment for a test run (1.2x1.2 tent). As said, if you want to go perfect, you don't need a Lux meter.. you need a PAR meter (science doesn't guess.. hard facts or is just toying around anyhow). You want perfect weed, you have to stay below 26 degrees at all time, best 20 dead flat... just to get that dialed in, you will spend 1000's of $ till you have the right A\C setup with the control units handling all automatically. If you plan to go nuts.. I would honestly suggest to also go additional CO2 to get maximum harvests from that expensive setup. So you will run 2 cooling circles. One for the plants and one for the lights. I would in this case also go hydro and not soil, makes your life easier feeding wise.. and at least 4 2.4x2.4 tents to make it run even. What means.. you will have high costs learning to grow the plants. Every fuckup will set you back around 50-100k in cost you have to cover next harvest.. you hopefully get.

So if you say.. naa, no A\C.. why bother for the light so much? As said, get a grow light from a known producer. Now you know that your light is a working one.. then learn to grow the plant and get your weed tested. Most growers are shocked to find out.. average potency is 12%... not 20 or 30%... average private grower test results are a lousy 12%  You get 20% from a strain able to produce 30%.. then you can say: OK, i know what I do, now lets build a perfect setup and see if I can reach the 30%. And yes.. people reach that.. so the target is set.. reaching it is a totally different story.. and you will practice for years till you get there.. perfect setup or not, at the end it counts how happy you keep your plants, the setup helps you, but you have to make every decision yourself.. your setup will not prevent mistakes you create 

Is why i said.. don't overthink.. would start with a setup you know works and not a new invented wheel.. also use a known fertilizer brand and proper genetics. You know your tools work, only one to blame for a fuckup is yourself, no excuses. Is like you want to build the perfect F1 race car but never driven a race car in the first place. Light is the engine... not the driver. Best car and a shitty driver will end with bad lap times... hence 12% thc content on average.

Not so easy when a new generation diodes comes out. More efficient.. less draw.. so you add diodes to reach same draw for your driver or you have to add a dimmer.. if your driver can't handle a dimmer.. new drivers for your setup. Then, if you add diodes or not, you have to remeasure your hanging scheme with a PAR meter to have em in the right area again (Proper grow lights give you the hanging distance for each stage). If you would hang em just same as before, you would waste your efficiency gain. So only rule.. never ever buy old diodes for a grow light, that is hyper short minded as the 50$ you save on the diodes will get eaten by Eskom in 1-3 months and after that time your 'awesome' deal delivers less light and uses more electricity... for the next years. Why not shot in your leg just for fun? ^^

 

The interesting part of growing is that in a lot of cases the first run comes out rather nice and the next runs after more as fails, what confuses people. The reluctance of the first run and just follow orders on the fertilizer bottle gets to the right result. Next run people simply start to over-care and things turn sour suddenly. "But i watered more regular"... yup, they never got the dry phase needed.. "But i defoiled much better this time"... no, you defoiled constantly and kept the plant confused. A little change can have nasty results even you don't notice them. That is why i say... use your knowledge and the information you gained in your research and just start. If you never grew indoors, I would start with a smaller size tent.. 1.2x0.6 is a perfect tent to learn the ropes and understand what the plants tell you. You see your plants pray, you know you do things right.  

 

Na, is fresh air exchanges, so the capacity going in and out the tent. I would say you need to shift at least the same capacity inside the tent. I combined my intakes with plant ventilation but you need another 4 40cm desk fans at least in a 2.4x2.4.. beside the 2 150mm inline silent fans going in (if you go cheap on inliner's, you will hear your tent room on the other side of the house during night). With 2 going out, 4 total. Mine sounded like a turbine factory till i exchange the cheapos with TD-500 silent inliner's.. ~15k Rand gone just for the new air exchange in and out the tent. But worth it, you can easy talk in the room now. The desk fans make it about 2 years till you have to get new ones. A grow room is a running project, the bigger, the more gear you run which can fail.

So cost: Power for lights, air circulation, cooling and gear controlling the setup plus heat mat(s) for cloning box(es). Fertilizers (each run has a certain cost), cloning gear/seeds, air purifiers (carbon filters or ozone generator) and all the side gear like UPs and DOWNs, test kit calibration solutions and grow medium (soil, coco, rock wool, clay pebbles,... endless). Beside the toys you need.. Pen for pH, ppm, EC and the quantum flux PAR meter. If you go for quality.. just those 2 tools can easy set you back 12k Rand... and depending how you grow, they are both simply a must. 

Go soil with a biological fertilizer, get your lights from a grow shop (no not anything HID related, they love to sell it as it looks cheap, it isn't) and start growing some weed  18 weeks after you started your journey, you know a lot more about everything in regards to growing indoors. You will not reach perfection till your learned the ropes.. is why I say, don't overthink, just start, you put enough thought into light. 

[koosjr]

Prom, Thanks for an excellent post. The information in there is exactly the kind that I can work with.

Thanks for the offer to help calculate the room consumption. Luckily I can do that to a T. Energy simulations still is some of the primary work I do for my customers, usually just on a MW scale.

So, I am planning a 2.4x2.4 room for one reason only: So that I can in the beginning have walking space inside. Grow space will be no more than 2 m2.

I certainly consider a type of hydronponic or autopot setup. I do like what I see form the Autopot.

The 6 fresh air chages per minute is something I did not expect. That is a SERIOUS amount to cool or heat. For cooling, I just won't have the power for AC, but I do have a bore hole so I can do it geothermally. I have almost 20 meters of water column which gives me a few kilowatts of cooling. With 6 air changes per minute cooled geothermally, I should be able to stay below 26°C, but I will have to have a custom coil made.

Yes, I know the TD-series fans well. We use them all the time. They are certainly some of the better products out there.

So, are the air changed needed 24/7, or only when the lights are on?

 

Edited May 20, 2023 by koosjr

[koosjr]

Just for interest sake, what potency is possible from a well grown outdoors plant?

[Prom]

8 minutes ago, koosjr said:

Prom, Thanks for an excellent post. The information in there is exactly the kind that I can work with.

Thanks for the offer to help calculate the room consumption. Luckily I can do that to a T. Energy simulations still is some of the primary work I do for my customers, usually just on a MW scale.

So, I am planning a 2.4x2.4 room for one reason only: So that I can in the beginning have walking space inside. Grow space will be no more than 2 m2.

I certainly consider a type of hydronponic or autopot setup. I do like what I see form the Autopot.

The 6 fresh air chages per minute is something I did not expect. That is a SERIOUS amount to cool or heat. For cooling, I just won't have the power for AC, but I do have a bore hole so I can do it geothermally. I have almost 20 meters of water column which gives me a few kilowatts of cooling. With 6 air changes per minute cooled geothermally, I should be able to stay below 26°C, but I will have to have a custom coil made.

Yes, I know the TD-series fans well. We use them all the time. They are certainly some of the better products out there.

So, are the air changed needed 24/7, or only when the lights are on?

 

Ventilation in/out never stops.. so is a easy 24/7 calculation. You can reduce the ventilation inside the tent in your Veg tent... not recommended to do that in the flower tent. The Veg tent needs in general less ventilation.. helps to keep humidity high. 

Tent size... a full tent runs best.. so half a 2.4x2.4 will work but your 'side' plants will get less light as if all sections would run. Can also just start with a 2.4x1.2, is the same access if you would work inside a 2.4x2.4 but side reflection just helps. Light is important  Growing indoor is a efficiency game. 

Also, the tent gets the climate from the room it stands in. Bring the room to the needed temperature and sort the tent over the ventilation.

You will notice that as soon as the plants go into night mode, they exhale. Moisture goes up not just by the drop of temperature. Is in general the night times causing PM issues, so ventilation is super important to run all the time. Light phase it removes heat, dark phase it removes moisture. Bad ventilation kills all the fun...

Will be a fun project to see what you can do and what is just to much for a heat pump. Would be cool if you could document it, i like tech shit  and trust me... your setup will look very different once you got all dialed in. 

Right now.. with load shedding.. you will learn the hardest way possible.. keep that in mind too. Just read that Eskom wants to setup load shedding schedules up to Stage 16 now.. that means.. 24 hours dark at 16.. that would kill indoor growing once and for all. And a fun number.. for 2023 we had so far 2 days no load shedding at all. Not sure i prepare for worse or to leave.. leave would suck.. but stage 16 would bring monstrous issues. 

I think I fire up everything and build myself a stash till Eskom goes dark  If they announce it, they know it will happen... would take it serious.

[Prom]

7 minutes ago, koosjr said:

Just for interest sake, what potency is possible from a well grown outdoors plant?

That depends on the strain too. You get indications from the breeder when you buy seeds. Old School weed... GSC, WW, NL,AH,... hover around 18%.. indoor or outdoor. The indoor advantage is the creation of perfect conditions. Rain going down on a mid flower outdoor tree isn't helping. Reached 18.6% on a GSC indoor. The new strains on the market are more in the 25-30% range, some even go over 30... but that is lab condition grown weed... perfect/perfect  

[koosjr]

Well ja. I have load shedding 24/7. Only a solar system to run from.

It will take quite a bit of thinking to make my setup viable, if at all.

Things like fans will have to be selected with the utmost care. Easy peasy to make a wrong selection and double your consumption for the same flow.

That said, I don't think you need 6 fesh air changes per minute at night time to control humidity. What about you can do a lot less on less on that side and only keep the box ventilation on? Jsut enough fresh air to keep humidty down?

Is humidity your only issue at night time? Apart of course from temperature control?

 

[Prom]

Other option is heat to keep humidity low.. but heat costs more as ventilation ^^ I use mirrors during the day time to get light into the tent, worked well but ^^ shattered the big one. Thinking on putting 2 on tri pods to bridge power outs, just for the Veg tent.. mother tent has 2 backup LED lights.. but worse and will not work anymore.. stage 6 is a bit my absolute limit right now.

[Naughty.Psychonaut]

My option - build a light using a design that saves the life span of the diodes and the driver aswell as provides better coverage and penetration for your canopy and because the light runs cooler you may have to put a very very small room heater on a timer for about 4 months of the year. 

You guys - build a light that runs so hot it needs external cooling, taking into consideration that it's being externally cooled which means it's already running hotter (more W to heat less to light output, simple grade 1 stuff) so you already wearing more on the light plus you gotta get and run a AC for the rest of the 8 months of the year, cause you can only run your lights druring the day. 

Must be nice having so much money you don't really have to put that much time into thinking. School fees, especially for indoor growers, can get kak high. Best to at least try and take the right approach from the start.