There use to be some forum members that were heavy in making their own high end growlights. You can buy all kinds of parts to make your own. Maybe it’s not worth it with all the new stuff available. Mostly all Chinese makes it very hard to weed out the good stuff. There are about 3000 different models available at Amazon, crazy!!. Is all cheap stuff junk? I just send back a grow light that’s absolutely junk. How I got sucker in buying one, still don’t know. You can those 5 stars ratings where the sun don’t…….!
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No AAP I don’t want those lights shoved into my back yard.
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unfortunately, there is alot of misinformation / deception/ hype with led grow lights. ive used the mid-priced viparspectra for 4 years now and had good results. i have 2 1000w equivalent ones and they grow everything ive put under them well. they havent shown much loss in light intensity over time either . the cheap king led was the 1st one i bought and by the 2nd year had weakened quite a bit. i use it for seedlings now. you could buy high end and get junk or low end and get junk. i try and research the components list of a light im interested in. still no guarantee its been put together well but at least you know it has good components in it. my hats off to you guys that make your own and are knowledgeable about what are the best components to put in your lights. i had a bad run in with electricity as a kid and don’t like to fiddle with electric appliances.
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IMO I think the components used will speak volumes about how well a given light system will likely perform - it’s literally the LED’s that emit the light and the driver that powers them, the housing is just there to hold all the “guts” together in a nice form factor. I’ve noticed a lot of cheaper-constructed LED lights will have to use computer fans built into the housing just to keep the electronics on the inside from having heat issues - that would be the light’s drivers, switches, etc. Often times these types of grow lights have 2 “banks” of LED diodes, some a “cooler” or more blue color, and some a more red/purple color to supposedly simulate the shifting of light wavelength as the seasons change. In my experience, these lights fail more often than other form factors of light systems. I’ve had 3 different brands of this style, and each has had issues with one bank of LED’s failing over time, or some LED’s burning out (sometimes after surprisingly little use)
Some of the higher end or better constructed/designed LED light systems in my opinion, are essentially two metal wafers with the LED’s embedded, and the LED driver sits on top of the unit (also making it easy to replace and keeping the heat from the driver away from the diodes) - these are my preference because they are quieter, use less power due to not having a bank of fans running, and they don’t allow nearly the dust, debris, spray/water etc. to get inside the unit that the other style of LED lights has an issue with. If anyone’s ever replaced a bathroom/shower exhaust fan, the combination of dust and moist air is just heck on electronic and mechanical part life over time
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my older viparspectra is with the fans. my newer one is like the spider you posted. it also has all white light instead of the older blurple colored ones. grew under both last year and didnt see any appreciable differences but im betting the newer one will last alot longer as it has more quality parts. was the same price as the spider also. it uses about half the electricity as the older one .
Thanks guys, my plan is just to get my peppers/tomatoes seeds started, so which I do have a lot of, just a head start. Have some peppers growing already, hope they survive without a grow light. Right now they are growing under a led shop light. I would trust members here a lot more than Amazon.
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@steveb4, some of the cheaper grow lights use Samsung leds. Grow lights in the $30.00 range with Samsung led’s, really!.
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