Not Understanding LED Tape?

[ALToronto]

Wow, I was beginning to think that I had written something inappropriate. Instead, it's pretty obvious that Amateur_expert is far too sensitive to participate in a discussion forum where people might - heaven forbid! - disagree with his/her statements and (horrors!) point out errors in the comments.

Kg5, I hope you're not considering fluorescent lights. It's outdated, inferior technology that will die a quick death in the next 5 years. With LED fixtures becoming the same price as fluorescents, while giving better quality light for half the energy (for the same lumens output), it should be a no-brainer. Buy directly from China, it's not the scary experience that A_e makes it out to be.

[kg5]

Thank You So Much For Your Comment ALToronto.

It is hard enough trying understand grow lights as a very new person to it all but the.......

I have been a member of 3 other forums for more years than I would like to admit but I got a personal email one time from a new forum member berating me to the max because I spelt "paid" as "payed" . Like get a life!

Really felt very down about starting a thread that went.....

......Back to where I am at! Now my benchmark is grow lights for an aquarium as my example.

Trying to figure out how to tell what any given grow light system power usage is.

I have a light hood that will fit 2 x t5's so I am going to try them out but looking at aquarium grow lights on line I have come across a blue? t5 light or maybe it is to balance the light spectrum.

I am going to try some LED's as well but am trying to keep away from the UFO colours for my niegbours. The red & blue led lights look like headache material for me.

[SilverShaded]

Originally Posted by naoki

Is giant motorized mirrors attached near the roof (of the main house) a possibility? The angles of each mirror moves with the sun movement, and reflect into the shade house. Initial cost may be high, but the maintenance cost could be lower. If you are going to use artificial light for such a big area, you need to pay a lot of electricity. Since you are in warm region, it seems to be more economical to use the natural light source.

Alternatively, can you use light diffusing material as the roof? I don't know much about this topic, but here is a related topic:
Diffused light - Slippertalk Orchid Forum- The best slipper orchid forum for paph, phrag and other lady slipper orchid discussion!

If you want artificial light, isn't HPS better for this kind of application? Efficiency of HPS (in terms of photosynthesis) is similar to the top-end LEDs and higher than low-end LEDs. Here is the data:
PLOS ONE: Economic Analysis of Greenhouse Lighting: Light Emitting Diodes vs. High Intensity Discharge Fixtures

---------- Post added at 03:12 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:06 PM ----------



Which corn bulbs are you using, SilverShaded?

Currently using two, one is a branded one from the UK with built in cooling fan and is a daylight colour, 2yrs gaurantee. The other is a really cheap chinese sourced one, warm white, passive cooling, supposedly cree leds.

They fitted straight into my old envirolite reflectors with E40 fittings so thats part of the reason i wanted to try them.

So dropped from 450w for cfl to 90w led in total (although i have yet to measure it, LED ratings from china are usually erroneous). Payback is around 6 months compared to cfl.

Ill wait and see which colour rating gives the best growth, growing high light loving plants with them, Nepenthes ampullaria and some pyrophytic indochinese nepenthe species.

It takes good lighting to get decent colours on them, so far results are encouraging.

---------- Post added at 03:24 AM ---------- Previous post was at 03:08 AM ----------

Originally Posted by kg5

Thank You So Much For Your Comment ALToronto.

It is hard enough trying understand grow lights as a very new person to it all but the.......

I have been a member of 3 other forums for more years than I would like to admit but I got a personal email one time from a new forum member berating me to the max because I spelt "paid" as "payed" . Like get a life!

Really felt very down about starting a thread that went.....

......Back to where I am at! Now my benchmark is grow lights for an aquarium as my example.

Trying to figure out how to tell what any given grow light system power usage is.

I have a light hood that will fit 2 x t5's so I am going to try them out but looking at aquarium grow lights on line I have come across a blue? t5 light or maybe it is to balance the light spectrum.

I am going to try some LED's as well but am trying to keep away from the UFO colours for my niegbours. The red & blue led lights look like headache material for me.

I know several people who use waterproof T8 flourescent fittings, normal daylight bulbs. They have the advantage of being very cheap to buy, reasonably efficient, very simple to fit and come in a variety of lengths. Fish tank versions tend to be massively overpriced.

There are LED T8s as well, which i have used. They are a bit expensive at present but will probably get cheaper. One option would be just go for T8s and retrofit later, in a few years, with LED versions.

Flourescent bulbs of all types lose efficiency relatively quickly in use and bulb replacement costs should be considered. T8 tubes are dirt cheap.

Blue aquarium lights are to replicate moonlight or just basically make blue fish stand out. Aquarium lights for plant growth tend to be warm white or have a god mix of red/blue and look slightly purpleish. All overpriced in my opinion.

[ALToronto]

I am certainly not advocating UFO colours. If you look at the spectra of warm white LEDs (3000K +/-) and cool white LEDs (6000-7000K), you will find that they will combine to give a nearly full spectrum similar to natural light. Both have a peak in the blue range, which you need anyway.

If you combine warm and cool 50-50, you will have a nice colour of white light and good growth.

For aquarium lighting, look for colour temperatures above 8000K, up to 12,000. It's still considered white light, but with strong blue tones. I completely agree with SilverShaded, don't look for specialty lights - it's just an excuse to rip you off.

For power usage, you will have to measure it. There is a great device called Kill-a-watt that you plug into your power outlet, and plug your fixture into it. It will tell you the voltage, current and wattage that your fixture draws. It's about $50 in Canada, can't be much different in Australia.

My homemade LED fixture with Chinese LEDs and driver is using power within 1% of the label capacity.

[kg5]

Great info! Thank You! To both of you.

Power usage is good to hear about.

The info on LED's is a big help.

Staying away from aquarium specifically but using there info in a broader search.

Now that eBay has 6 months returns it has been made just for us people buying electrical goods from China.

I have a large aquarium hooded light with 2 x fluorescent lights and have some flasks coming so will use this light for the orchids maturity in the flasks.

With the info given I can now venture into the LED lights with a bit of confidence. Will buy a bit to try before spending too much on any system.

I am now thinking different lights for different plants is going to come into play.

Really appreciate the time you people have spent trying to bring me up to oil on grow lights. It is so nice to share the journey! Thank You!