Quote Originally Posted by Skeebo
Hmm... I'm wondering if I should start a new thread or just put this here? Here seems to be a good a place as any.

I would like to hear from those who are growing with or assembling LED grows and lights about the following information:

What strength MDC LEDs are you using?
How many volts/amps (or milliamps) does your system require or use?
Water clear or coloured LEDs?
How many LEDs and how do you have them set up?
Ratio of blue to red LEDs (if any)
Any other experiences or experiments that you have done.

That being said, on with my own experiments.

Inspired by this thread and science, two weeks ago I purchaced a handful of 5000mcd red LEDs and a couple 5000mcd blue LEDs. I pulled out some breadboard, resistors and soldering iron. After 2 good reminders on how hot a soldering iron can get I had completed my experimental module.

22 red LEDs and 3 blue LEDs made up my module (I stuck to the 10:1 ratio of red:blue LEDs, as you can see, my math sucks LOL!). Totalling 125000mcd of power. This tiny monster drew an astounding 250ma at 12 volts for a total power consumption of 3 watts.

I had a leftover, unused vegbox which I quickly stripped down and installed my new light. One of my favourite test subjects was then introduced. Cat grass. What a great experimental tool. Cheap. Easy to grow. My cats love it too!

The cat grass was placed in the box and subjected to no other light and within 6 days I had a healthy viable pot of cat grass. The cats approved and chewed away on it. I am impressed. Now onto phase 2, larger light with more LEDs and more experimenting.

While wandering through my local electronics store I stumbled across a dream. I found a 60000mcd water clear red LED. Yes, sixty thousand is correct! Qiuck math (which apparently in my head is not always accurate) shocked me to find out that my entire phase one grow light could be replaced by just over 2 LEDs. I just about fell over.

The downside. These puppies are expensive. $2.25 each with tax. My 100 light set up with the 5000mcd LEDs was going to cost me under $25. 500000mcd. Nine 60000mcd LEDs would give me 540000mcd at $20.25, just for the LEDs.

So now I ponder and design with my money and math.

And now for something completely different:

I would love to see this thread edited. It takes far too long to go through the "You can't grow with LEDs" "LEDs will never compare to HID lighting" to get to the information you need.

Now an exercise in futility.

As consideration to those of us that are experimenting with LEDs and are benifitting from the open exchange of information, is it possible for the narrow or close minded posters to keep their thoughts to themselves and not fill up the tread with crap?

Everyday I walk down the street and see stupid people. I resist the tempatation to tell them that they are stupid. I smile to myself and keep my mouth shut. I'm just asking the non-believers to smile.

When we have something good we will post it.
In all this you never mentioned what (NM)nanometer they are. That makes all the difference in the world. Can't just use red and blue.