LED Grow Light Forum

Just received my SolarStorm 400W light kit as part of the Grower Feedback Program and am kicking off my journal with the first entry here. I have a medical card in Colorado and listed myself as my own caregiver which means I am able to grow up to 6 plants for myself. I started growing last spring with an outdoor setup with 6 plants from clones (3 sativa and 3 indica). Not too bad for my first attempt with very little experience or oversite of the plants. Just put them in 5 gallon buckets with cages and an automated drip line and let them pretty much grow wild. Plants did really well with very little attention and were bushy and around 6 feet producing about 2.5 pounds total. While the grow was pretty easy there were a few issues that prompted me to investigate an indoor grow using LED lighting:
1) The grow went from April through October and since we get a lot of sunlight hours here in Colorado by the time the plants were in full flower we were starting to get below freezing with snow so I had to move my plants into the garage for the last 2 weeks.
2) I live in a residential community and while the plants weren't really visible over the fence where I had them you could really smell them from a good distance.
3) While my plants did well and produced the season was 6 months and I wanted to shorten the time from veg to flower
4) I wanted to be able to grow over the winter if needed

I have a small 8x6 space in my basement that the former owner had used as a darkroom for photography that I thought would be perfect for a small closet grow. I did a lot of research on indoor growing and since I didn't want to have to worry about setting up a ton of HVAC I pretty much settled on LED right away. My goal was to use a 40"x40" tent for 4 plants which put me in the range of a 400W LED for optimal coverage so I started comparing the manufacturers for price/performance/ratings. Since there is a ton of marketing type information floating around out there it was hard to get past the hype and get to some independent testing results. Based on reviews and some tests I found I narrowed my list of vendors down to HydroGrowLED, BlackDog LED, Sunshine Systems and DormGrow. Since California Lightworks never really showed up on my Google searches I didn't even know about them until stumbling on a comparison review of the SolarFlare 200W on Growershouse.com. From the comparison results the California Lightworks LED blew the others out of the water so I looked them up online and did some more research which resulted in them being added my short list as a strong competitor. After learning about the Growers Feedback Program I applied and was accepted which really sealed the deal for me as it showed that California Lightworks was willing to put some skin in the game to prove their lights were the best. I also liked the fact that the lights are designed and manufactured here in the US. That alone doesn't mean they are better than any others but if given the chance I'll always put a US job ahead of anything overseas.

After signing up for the program they shipped out my light and it got here in only a couple of days. Unfortunately one of the UVB lights was broken when it arrived but one email to their customer support address and I had a new one shipped out to me the same day no questions asked. You can tell that California Lightworks puts a lot of thought into all aspects of their products because even the box the light came in was slick (all matte black). The first thing I noticed was how solid and heavy the light was. It has what looks to be a powder coated metal case and it weighs almost 20 pounds. Since I already had my 4 clones potted up and waiting outside and my grow tent all set up in my room I hung the light and plugged it in without delay. I am running in Veg right now on a 22 on and 2 off timer. My plants are in 7 gallon containers and the light is hung about 18 inches above the plants. Here are some shots of the setup:





So far I've been up and running for 5 days. Plants seem to be doing good with lots of new growth. Two things I've noticed about the light that are worth noting:

1) Even running for 22 hours a day the lights produce no noticeable heat in the grow tent so I don't even need fans and can just leave the vent ports open to let the room air circulate. You can put your hand on the glass underneath and they are not even warm to the touch.
2) Even though there are two cooling fans on the light ballast they make almost no noise. While this doesn't matter much in my case since the room is in my basement it could be important depending on where you are running your setup.

I plan on vegging until the plants are around 3 feet so I will keep updating on the progress as they grow and get to the important flower phase where we will really put the light to the test.

Peace

Welcome to the forums!
(I'm going to move this journal to the CLW GFP section soon)

I wanted to touch on a couple of points since you're kind of new to growing and especially indoors.
1) 40"x40" is too big for a SS400w if you want top-shelf results. 2'x3' or less is closer to what I'd call "optimal."
2) You shouldn't let your plants get very big before switching to 12/12 for the flowering cycle; LED lights don't penetrate as well as the Sun or large HID lights. 3 feet is about two feet too tall.
3) Keep an eye on the grow room temps, that heat builds up even if it takes a while in your larger tent.

I'm glad to hear that they are running quiet, they used to be pretty loud so maybe they upgraded their fans.

Let us know if you have questions...


SME

Greetz!! I think i'll take the same challenge!! Good luck, may the schwartz be with u!

Sorry it's been a few weeks since my original post. I had an issue with my plants resulting from a water drainage problem (lack of) and so I had to apply some emergency care to save them all. Ended up having to re-plant all of them in new pots/soil and baby them with foliar feeding of nutrients to keep them alive. After that brief scare the plants have rebounded nicely and are once again thriving in their environment. Call it dumb luck but even though my grow room might seem a bit too big for the light, the combination of a tight central plant placement and the mylar reflective seems to be doing the job as they are bushing out nicely and are now growing vigorously and looking really healthy. As suggested I will not let them get to 3 feet but will give them a little more time to fully recover from their experience and are at full health before I switch to flowering in probably another couple of weeks. For my next grow I plan on switching over to a recycling Deep Water Culture setup which would allow me to accelerate the growth and keep the plants smaller but still get good yields. I'll update again once I start the flowering cycle which is where the rubber will meet the road on the lights.

Peace

If you had updated weekly people could have followed your emergency care and watched the progress.