ok to start i grow i little bit of every thing out doors looking in to moving indoors for winter production.
i need the basics of LED lighting.

what light wave lengths do i need to cover?

what lumens/intensity do i need per sq/ft?

is the canopy penetration problem i have read about caused by low watts?

Welcome to the forums!

You can't grow a little bit of everything indoors, corn, for example, would be bad idea so you might need to be more specific. You'll need mostly red and blue but plants use other spectra too.

That depends on what you want to grow too. Algae, wheatgrass, small herbs and leafy greens will need less than taller plants like tomatoes, peppers, cannabis, okra, etc.

Yes and no. The lower the power on each diode the less penetration. 1w is less than 3w which is less than 5w. However, there is a slight gain for throwing large numbers of diodes in a light too, just not enough to make major differences. The biggest thing is the diode power and lens angle to a degree.

the main things i want grow indoors are tomatoes, peppers, and cannabis. but i would hate to be limited ... corn would be cool i have 12ft ceilings.

i see 3,5 and 7 spectrum light available i don't know if i need 7 because California light works seems to be considered one of the best on the market for cannabis. but i would like versatility. i would say most of the plants i would like to grow are about 5 to 8 feet tall.

evilone983 wrote:the main things i want grow indoors are tomatoes, peppers, and cannabis. but i would hate to be limited ... corn would be cool i have 12ft ceilings.

i see 3,5 and 7 spectrum light available i don't know if i need 7 because California light works seems to be considered one of the best on the market for cannabis. but i would like versatility. i would say most of the plants i would like to grow are about 5 to 8 feet tall.

Tomatoes, peppers and cannabis are all doable with LED lighting; corn, not so much.

Yeah, actually I've seen them range from 1 to 14 (I think) spectra and nobody knows, for sure exactly what's best. We do know that CLW lights can grow all of those...except the corn, of course, but you don't want them to get more than 3-4 feet tall due to penetration issues. You wouldn't even let them get over 5-6' tall with 1000w HPS lights.