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Its time to build a Cephalotus grow space, would love input!

  • #41
RSS - where did you get the racking from in the end??? just stumbled across this an it looks so good the end product!!!

I ended up with http://www.buyplantlights.com/sunlighter-plant-stand-sl44.html, overall it will do its job just fine and seems sturdy enough so far. If I had been able to play around with an assembled one before purchasing I would have went a different route. There is not enough cross supports for my liking and I don't like the way the trays rest on the supports.
 
  • #42
how have you supported the heat sink lighting to the cart???
 
  • #45
Thanks for that, that's what I needed to see great stuff!!!

Looks like I'm on my way to doing something....
 
  • #46
With the positive results so far I figured I needed a larger test subject so I did some searching and found someone in need of more light.

DSC_0785 by randallsimpson, on Flickr

In just under 10 days here is the GG and HG. The Cephs with a lot of moss in the pots are not coloring up as well, likely due to the light being blocked by the moss.

DSC_0786 by randallsimpson, on Flickr

My favorite so far, so I have to post another photo. - 3 days from the last photo - Gets a little darker each day.

DSC_0787 by randallsimpson, on Flickr
 
  • #47
Those v hangers from a hydroponic shop or a wall mart
 
  • #48
Those v hangers from a hydroponic shop or a wall mart

They are from one of the online lighting supply places, they are the V hangers from the Sun Blaze mounting kits. If you look around you can find them for sale by themselves.
 
  • #49
That last pic does really show great coloring for such a short time
 
  • #50
Cheers RSS looking around at the type of stuff we have to compare here in the uk.

An I love the way it's coloured up awesome, it's a work in progress an I think I will be looking to start mine in January
 
  • #51
amazing thread randell. the next setup i build will defiently have leds as the lighting. your instructions took the fear out of the whole processes. thanks for the details.
 
  • #53
Great results for only 4 days. Those LEDs made that plant blush in to time at all. I'm a believer. Can't argue with results. Thanks for keeping the angles the same in the photos.
 
  • #54
Your fast colouration might come at a cost of slower growth. I'm starting to suspect that the warm white LEDs might be better for growing than the cool white. Maybe this can be attributed to warm white LEDs having more output in the red spectrum and less in the blue. Blue helps with colouration, but is required in less quantities than red for growth purposes. You have a mix which includes warm whites as well as cool and neutral so I will be interested to see your results.
 
  • #55
So if a person were to build a led setup purely for maximum plant growth, aesthetics aside, what exactly would that layout be? I'm assuming it would be just the red and blue spectrums. which wavelengths would be ideal and at what ratios?
 
  • #56
So if a person were to build a led setup purely for maximum plant growth, aesthetics aside, what exactly would that layout be? I'm assuming it would be just the red and blue spectrums. which wavelengths would be ideal and at what ratios?

I spent many hours reading trying to figure this out and a lot of the information seemed to contradict itself. You want reds spiking in the 660nm range and blues spiking in the 430nm range with white to fill in the rest of the spectrum. If you look at the red/blue LED charts they are ONLY red or blue there is no filler and they are in a very small range. The blues for instance would have NO output starting around the 550nm range.

When you start digging into the technical #'s for the LEDs you get a lot of useless information like Luminous flux, why is this useless? Its a measurement of visible light so if you look at the RED LEDs its .720 while the warm white LED with the same power is 93.9....130X brighter to the human eye, but which LED is actually producing more light, visible to the human eye or not? I was not able to find that information but as I've said before I only understand about 1/3 of what I'm reading with this stuff.

The general recommendation is more red than blue with some whites, but this doesn't agree with my reading. Reds are used by plants for fruit/flower production while blues are for plant mass/vegetative growth. Are most people growing indoors looking for flowers/fruits or am I missing something?
 
  • #57
In experiments on certain species of plants blue light has been shown to inhibit internode elongation.

Personally I think if I was to build a LED lamp for the sole purpose of growth then I would use 660nm red LEDs with some white LEDs for supplementary plant PAR. The white LEDs would provide some blue light, indeed cool white LEDs are typically high in the blue spectrum and lower in the red.

If I were to go for all white LEDs, then I would choose warm white with a higher ratio of output in the red spectrum compared to the blue.

NASA experiments are often quoted, sometimes with the ratio of 4 red:1 blue stated, but from recollection they actually used red LED combined with fluorescent tubes to provide the blue and other wavelengths - blue LEDs were not readily available or efficient at the time. They were experimenting on food crops, not flowers, and found that using just red LEDs resulted in leggy plants.

Source: http://www.nasa.gov/centers/kennedy/home/plant_growth.html
 
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  • #58
Well with Black Friday and everyone thinking they need to lower there prices on things, I have ordered the remaining LEDs for the bottom 2 shelves I went ahead and added 2 moonlight kits so the bottom 2 shelves with have extra red/blue LEDs when compaired to the top 2 bars. I might go with all reds on one shelf and all blues on the other just to see the difference over a year.

I was also able to pick up 4 PC fans for $6 - $6 rebate, so after a month I'll get my money back :-D.

I just checked there website on a fluke and they were 20% off, so if your planning a project you might want to check with whatever source your planning on using and see if they have a good deal today!

Back to the fun stuff!

Here are the two that have colored up the most so far pulled under normal kitchen light so the LED light colors will not affect the exposure. Emu on the left and German Giant on the right. 20 days under the lights.

DSC_0826 by randallsimpson, on Flickr

Well on its way.

DSC_0830 by randallsimpson, on Flickr
 
  • #59
Its been a little over 30 days so I figured an update was in order. I have attached the PC fans but have not yet wired them up, I'm waiting on the power adapter to arrive in the mail. We got a bit of hail and it built up to a nice sheet of ice that shut down the city for about 3 days:0o: So the USPS did not deliver or try to deliver mail for 2 days!

Anyway here are the "test" Cephs along with some new friends that have been showing up. I've included both the old and new photos for easier comparison.

DSC_0769 by randallsimpson, on Flickr

DSC_0850 by randallsimpson, on Flickr

DSC_0770 by randallsimpson, on Flickr

DSC_0851 by randallsimpson, on Flickr
 
  • #60
I was using my camera as a magnifying glass to check on the health of a few of the babies so I figured I'd post them here.

DSC_0891 by randallsimpson, on Flickr

Here is the main reason I wanted to magnify some of them, the old green leaves that tanned are now drying out and dieing but the new growth coming in is nice and glossy.

DSC_0890 by randallsimpson, on Flickr

DSC_0889 by randallsimpson, on Flickr
 
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