Luxx 860w LED Pro XR LED Grow Light VS TopoGrow Professional 800W LED Grow Light
Growers often spend hours researching different planting methods and finding the best planting equipment. One of the more difficult devices to study is lighting. There are several different types of lights for growing plants and dozens of different technical specifications to know. This makes it extremely challenging to learn and filter through the hundreds of grow lights on the market today. In this article, I’ll present my picks for the best LED grow lights of 2022.
Do LED Grow Lights Yield More Than HPS?
Many growers find that LED grow lights produce similar yields to HPS grow lights, and with improved efficiency some even argue that LED grow lights surpass HPS yields. When it comes to the better lighting spectrum, however, HPS lights still have the upper hand.
For this reason, HPS grow lights might be the preferable choice for larger grow rooms and LEDs for small, sizeable grow tents.
How Many LED Grow Lights Do I Need?
To figure out the answer to this question, you’ll need to gather a bit of information. First, measure the length and width of your plant canopy to get the square footage.
Caution: Measure the actual canopy rather than the size of the grow room, which could be larger. Flowering plants need on average about 20 to 30 watts of light per square foot, so once you have the square footage, multiply that figure by the needed wattage.
Growing plants in a cabinet under the LED lamp
For example, a plant canopy that measures 6 feet by 5 feet results in 30 square feet. Multiply that by 20 to 30 and the wattage range you will need is 600 to 900 watts.
You’ll then need to choose a number of LED grow lights that individually or together meet that actual wattage.
Luxx 860w LED Pro XR LED Grow Light
Features:
The Luxx LED grow light features two additional 100W LED strips to increase total light output and maintain PPFD uniformity over a larger area, ensuring consistent growth across 5–6 foot tray widths. The strip layout used by the Luxx 860w LED PRO XR allows the luminaire to be placed close to the canopy, maximizing PPFD, while the strip array provides light from multiple locations at different angles to penetrate the canopy. This maximizes light absorption by plant leaves, increasing light effectiveness and reducing wasted photons. The 860w LED Pro XR is the first true 5' wide LED light fixture. It has a 4' x 5' footprint and is designed for growers running 5' wide benches. The 860 has an average PPFD of 865 at 12 inches. ⠀
TopoGrow Professional 800W LED Grow Light
Features:
This TopoGrow LED grow light is made of durable IP65 waterproof aluminum and comes with branded LED chips and drivers. High efficiency of 2.6 umol/J provides strong light output and uniform canopy penetration to maximize yield. PPF of 2080 umol/s maximizes yield with 50% higher average PPFD and 60% higher yield and quality compared to traditional LED lamps. The power consumption is 800W, which is a high-end high-performance commercial plant light. This grow light uses today’s latest high yield LED technology, the maximum yield Spectrum has an enhanced red 660nm LED chip and a warm color 4000K LED chip, it speeds up the flowering and fruiting stages and is ideal for dense buds.
How To Choose A Grow Light
When you are starting your first grow, there are many different factors to consider when looking to buy a grow light. You have to think about the type of light, what crop you are growing and how much light output is needed, the spectrum of light, how big your operation will be, and more.
Types of Lights
The main three types of lights are LED, HID (HPS/MH), and Fluorescent. Each type of grow light has its pros and cons, but when all is said and done, we believe LEDs are the best overall investment for producing high-quality crops for the best cost.
Every plant varies in how much light output it needs to grow. For example, some plants are extremely light-hungry plants and require a much higher light intensity than a vegetable such as a tomato. It is important to keep this in mind when choosing how powerful of a light you choose to get.
Light Spectrum
While getting the necessary light output is very important for your plants, the spectrum of light they receive is also important. Outdoor plants evolved to grow under natural sunlight, which produces every color on the spectrum. Therefore, you want a full-spectrum grow light to best mimic natural sunlight and optimize plant growth.
Within the full spectrum, each wavelength (color) is responsible for a different effect on the plant’s growth. Blue and red light are the most prominent colors since blue drives stockiness in a plant during its vegetative stage, while red light helps plants stretch and bloom in the flowering stage. However, plants also utilize other colors, such as green light for driving photosynthesis and are more effective at penetrating the plant canopy. This is why it is optimal to get a full-spectrum light that uses a combination of all colors for well-rounded growth.
Wattage
It is important to not solely look at wattage when comparing light outputs of different grow light fixtures. Wattage only specifies how much power the light uses, but not how much light output it actually produces for the plants. Efficacy is more important to consider, which is defined as a grow light’s ability to convert power (watts) into light that can be used by crops. Efficacies vary depending on the type of light, which means fixtures with the exact same wattage could have very different light outputs.
Conclusion
Getting the perfect lighting for your plants can be a tricky thing and hopefully, you found this article illuminating. As mentioned at the start, there’s something to be said for innovators who don’t stand for the status quo and continue to find new ways to improve on the original.
