Today I’m posting, questioning who is leading the LED light technology & why?
Ive nailed it down to three LED lights current winning the race and they are;
Gavita 1700e HLG 650R Fluence SPYDR 2i
From my research I am led to believe,
The SPYDR 2i has now been overtaken by performance & price by the other two fixtures, so I don’t understand why are they still charging more then the others…
The Gavita 1700e offer a 5 year warranty & expected to last 100, 000 hour running time & have a more even spread of light & supposedly cooling & are listed as waterproof over the HLG 650R, which are expected to last 50, 000 hours & only have a warranty of 3 years although the HLG 650R are a few hundred dollars cheaper & use power more efficient I am considering the Gavita 1700e to be a more solid choice for the price right now.
One thing I have noticed that the spectrums are all slightly different, I am wondering which is proven to have a more efficient spectrum.
Please I would love to hear all feedback, id love to know your choice out of the three & why.
Above I have posted a screenshot with a table stating the efficiency of each light, I have kept the URL there & avoiding cropping it for copyright reasons.
It’s my “opinion” that the lumitek zues, mammoth 8-10 bar and ChilLed 6 bar put out more light and some are more efficient than those listed. I believe independent lab studies also indicate this. The best bang for you buck would be the HLG model you mentioned. If you’re looking to buy something premade with a lower cost.
I got to talking with Austin from ChilLed tech and they have some major improvements in the works. I asked “why can I make a cup of coffee from bed and turn on my washer and dryer, but so very few LED’s are smart? Why in 2020 we still use manually adjust light output/input” Without giving me too much info he indicated their new controller in the development stage will be smart with an app and the potential to possibly adjust spectrum. This alone to me would be the price of admission for me. Also made mention that their will be an add on to their current setups for UV (far red and blue).
I was on the fence for a few months hoping some light would drop that would blow me away. I even asked some questions here and had a helpful ILGM admin answer some questions (thanks again). I kept going back and forth between the mammoth folding 8 bar and the chilled tech 6 bar for my 4x4.
They’re all great lights that will take your from seed to smoke and produce better crops. Ultimately I ended up buying the chilled x6 and according to tracking info it should arrive tomorrow. Chilledtech customer service, social media and real world results from other growers videos separated them from all the other companies listed in your screenshot as well as the aforementioned. Anytime I’ve had questions I would get a response really quickly. Spoke with them twice on the phone in calls they made to me. This matters to me…
Hopefully the chilled led gets me to closer to cmh/hps yields in which my current mars hydro leds can’t achieve while using less power. We’ll see…
Thanks for your response @ArmoredGoat
I’ve been tossing up between the the fixtures I’ve listed as I’m looking to invest in two new ones, but now you’ve just exposed me to two other great options!
The research is on.
They’re all great lights. No matter what you chose from that grouping you’re mine and others, they’re more than enough to grow a quality harvest.
I think some folks myself included get carried with the top shelf lights. They’re great, but only really more effective when you’ve got your grows dialed in (temps, humidity, nutes, ect ect) and supplement co2 to take advantage of all that extra light.
All I can recommend is don’t settle. If this is your hobby invest in it. The better tools you have the higher success rate you’ll have.
Or you can just say fk it and dump all the money you intend to spend on a high end LED with a lower operating cost into a MH/HPS 600w and grow heavy harvests with 80-120$ monthly added electric bill.
Something is really leading me towards the Gavita fixtures, their current price seems reasonable for what they’re offering.
Another thing I have been looking into is a complete climate controller to not only completely dial in my climate but to also track it, the ‘Intelliclimate’ seem’s like a really good option, but also i’d love to hear feedback from anyone who has experience with complete climate controllers as to which are good options.
I wanted to use the PLC photo boost steps. But by the time I had the money for them they were sold out with a 6 to 8 week build time. I went with the Samsung f-series double row strips instead. I will instead do two lights with Samsung strips and ditch my mars hydro and do two more lights with PLC strips and see which is better
I’m currently running the HLG 550 rspec’s but feel with a completely dialled in climate with added CO2 I can push the PFFD further,
maybe those PLC strips are the answer.
Although I am quite fixated on the new gavita fixture & the Spydr fixture…
When I was shopping the gavita was still $1700 and not really available. The only thing that the gavita offers that my 650s don’t is the true vertical hanging. But I don’t have the space to make that usable anyways. So my decision was easy. And now… the monetary difference I can say easily paid for my current side lighting
I haven’t really looked into mars much, I’m currently using HLG 550 v2 Rspecs which I valued more over their boards. Personally I like to go for durability & quality.
Their new lights look okay but I’m going to wait till the end of the year & see what new releases rise up.
Funny you say that because I’ve been thinking about doing exactly that with the Fluence SPYDR 2i.
I try to avoid gavita now that they are affiliated with the mothership. Otherwise the spec to cost ratio on them is fairly decent. Therefore others mentioned here more appealing to me.
You know what you’re looking at in terms of ppf, that’s what should be most important.
After doing some research into it I’m totally on board with you here @dbrn32 , I’ve ruled Gavita out because of this… I personally don’t agree with any of motherships practices.
I’d prefer to pay a little bit extra and go with Fluence I think… I’ve never seen a bad review from someone that actually owns one.
I think waiting until the end of the year / start of the year next year is a wise move, to see if there’s any new releases.
Hard to argue with that. There is a reason that fluence is fluence and their fixtures carry the price tag. People that know are more than willing to buy them.
