Growing Plants With LED Lights

In this instructable i shall be demonstrating how to grow small plants under the glorious glow of LED lights. Woop!

Step 1: Introduction

First and foremost...Hullo!!
This is my first instructable (long time reader, first time "actually-post-anythinger", i should be revising for exams, hence i have done this instructable!), any comments and criticism is greatly appreciated.

This instructable will demonstrate how to grow small plants under LED lights.
The idea for this came from an odd source, a friend of my step fathers recently had to run away to a different country because he was caught purchasing large quantities of lights from electrical stores for growing some none-too-legal plants indoors.
I don't condone this in any way, by all accounts the man was an idiot. But it got me thinking about ways to grow plants under artificial lights,after a bit of thinking and a lot of googleing this project was born!

A bit of theory:
Plants look green, therefore they reflect green light, so it probably isn't used in photosynthesis or any of the other interesting things plants do.
So hopefully by using red and blue lights (the colours either side of the spectrum from green) we should be able to keep plants happy and use less energy because where not producing green light which would just get reflected.

(apologies in advance, i cant seem to be able to get the image tag thingys to work, i will try and explain images as best i can.)

Comments

[arnookie]

If you are thinking of building a diy grow light please take note of this.
Each and every led needs to be atleast 1watt each. Anything below that will be useless so don't use old leds out of toys or old boards, they simply will have too little Total lumens versus lumens per watt. You need atleast 10mm LEDs with 1watt per LED to supply enough light to the plant anything lower will not work. A good combination is a pannel made from 75% 1watt red high brightness leds, 20% 1watt blue high brightness leds and 5% 1watt amber high brightness leds. somewhere in the region of 660nm for red and 460nm for blue
There is also no effective difference in penetrative power for horticultural purposes between a 1W LED and a 3W LED. So anything over 1watt is just wasted. This means brightness has very little to do with the benefit you will get once you use 1wat leds. Don't confuse this with a pannel made from say 20 LEDs rated a 10watt as to one with 10 LEDs rated at 10watt. As the 20 watt pannel will use the useless 0.5watt leds verses the 10watt pannel that uses 10x10watt 1watt LEDs that are ideal. This has been tested and proven that 1watt single LEDs have great benefit to plants and anything less is just a waste of time and has no benefit at all to plants. The same applies with going brighter than 1watt has no benefit either.
Hope that may help some of you. Especially if you are growing indoors.
Also LEDs are more efficient than any other form of grow lighting available.
The commercially available LED growlights outperform all other growlamps from HID lamps to including high pressure sodium (HPS) and metal halide (MH) lamps.
So prepare to see other grow lamps become obsolete as LED growlight take over.

Just to clear a point up. If you make a 100watt pannel with 100x1watt leds you will benefit. But if you use 200 0.5watt leds to make a 100watt pannel it will not benefit the plant at all. The same applies if you use say for eg 10x10watt leds to make a 100watt pannel then you are only really getting 10watts overall because the extra 9watt per LED is just wasted as the plant will not benefit. SO using 100x1watt LEDs will benefit the plants by 100watts. 10x10watt LEDs would not because 9Watt of each led is just wasted giving the plant just 10watt of usefull light. Sorry but thats just the way plants absorb light.

[SavoJr]

Sorry, i have to disagree on this:

"10x10watt LEDs would not because 9Watt of each led is just wasted giving the plant just 10watt of usefull light. Sorry but thats just the way plants absorb light."

That claim is just ridiculous.

[jcbeaver7]

i recently bought some 10 mm LED's, and ive been staring at the back of the package trying to find out how many watts they are... I don't know very much about electronics or anything, so how do i find out how many watts they are?

[sargent300ca]

you sir have just tought me alot about leds and growing thank you

[arnookie]

You are very welcome. Hope it helps and hope your plants grow beautifully. :O)

[stonechild]

arnookie,

This information is very interesting. Can you suggest a reference for the power ratings that the LEDs should have? I don't mean to seem as if I'm challenging you. I just want to learn more about this.

I was thinking of trying to build grow lights myself, but it doen't seem worth the trouble after looking at the grow lights available on alibaba.com.

[arnookie]

Yes it would probably be cheaper to buy the grow light ready built. Especially if you are wanting quite a large one. The cost of led bulbs 1 watt and over is still very high, although if you can find Leds cheap then just make sure each led is individually above 1watt. The only benefit of going above 1watt is if you want the lights further away from the plants. Be very carefull regarding pre built grow lights as they are often not made with 1watt Leds. So always check with the seller before buying.
Hope that helps you.

[Lectric Wizard]

Arnookie, How Could the plant know whether the light is coming from from 10 -10W or 100-1W LEDs ? Total lumens is what counts,but there is a limit to how much light the plant can absorb. I agree that the small LEDs are too inefficient to work well,but above .5- 1W it's all the same. ( I work in the electronic lighting industry & have a small farm.)

[RoninVj]

About how long did it take for your seeds to sprout?

[zebratangozebra]

 The idea of using LED's is interesting.
Not sure it makes sense.
Fluorescent lights are more efficient energy wise.
They give off more light per/penny.
The difference is fluorescent lights project in all directions.
While LEDs are directional.
So if light is only needed in one direction LEDs would be more efficient.
But only slightly.
Especially if a reflector is used with fluorescent lights.
Plain fluorescent bulbs work just fine.
Don't need grand lighting to grow great stuff.
Why complicate it. 
The secret is in the seed being grown.
What is wanted is a very vigorous seed.
A plant that grows fast.
Used to be able to buy great seeds from Amsterdam but no more.
Grow lots of different seed until you see "THE ONE".
Can take months before you get a good one.
You will know it when you see it.
Outgrows any other plant at least  2:1 or 3:1.
Monster grower.
Then take cuttings from this mother monster and put them in a 24 hour light cycle mother grow room.
So you need two grow rooms.
Mother room on 24 hours/day.
Flowering room on 12/12,
Lots of soil is not needed.
Can grow great flowering plants in a beer can.
Need water fertilizer mix.
Fit 12x12 flowering plants in a 2x2x4 space.
That's 144 nice buds every 3-4 months or longer.
Depending on the potency desired.
I had some I left in the flower room until they actually turned kinda black before they completely died after 6 months.
Were deadly.
Lots of space is not needed.
Takes about a year to set it up good.
Too much paranoia for me though.
I decided there were easier was to make $.

 

[Derek Vigil]

Dude, do you have a computer that just types your thoughts or something?

[Pink_wolf]

flourescents put out more light in general, but a large amount of light in spectrums that arent used in photosynthesis. So by using red and blue leds in the 660 and 450 spectrums creates just the right lights for what they need. So LEDs = less light Flourescents = less usable light, w 4 w.

[xtank5]

You could make money selling (totally legal) food plants to other students. Seeming as how the grow faster you could make a new crop faster and if you make enough of these and started growing a certain intervals you could in theory have a fresh crop every week and then all your classmates and dorm buddies would be begging you to give them a discount for bing your friends on all your carrots, and chili peppers, and maybe even tomatoes. Yummy tomatoes. :) And since the plants are grown indoors the could be grown organically without pesticides or fertilizers (maybe). I reallly like it! If I could I would give you a +10! Keep up the good work.

[aydonis]

My niece and I have done this. I purchased some organically grown Roma tomatoes more than two years ago. I got the idea to scoop out and save the seeds. I was pleased to find out that these seeds are highly fertile. Every single one has germinated, and they're over two years old and still germinating just fine. I'm getting my last batch off now. The last three springs (including this one I'm working on now) I have been able to give my niece enough baby plants (germinating and growing through youngest stages in my condo windows) for my niece to make a little money for summer. She takes them door to door and sells for $3 / plant. Last year she made 50 -60 dollars, not a bad profit for something that cost me about $5 for the tomatoes and another $10 for topsoil. Tomatoes are also incredibly easy to grow... they don't mind too much water, so I can drown them before I leave on business trips and don't have to worry about them running out of water while I'm away. I've come back to find them wilted and near death before... one healthy dose of water and within a day they were healthy again... except two little guys that dried up and died =(

[harley_rly]

if one were to do that, gibberilic(no idea how to spell) acid and some Miracle Fruit seeds would be a good investment...you could sell miracle berries for a pretty penny

[}{itch]

god knows i could be doing with some more cash right now :) the only problem is with this system on a large scale is it would cost quite alot to set-up, the LED's come in at around 20pence each so to make an array large enough to grow large plants could become rather costly. Also there's the energy consumption to think about (also the environmental cost of producing the energy, when the suns freely available to grow stuff anyway's), regardless i think thats a wicked idea, and organic is always good :) Soon as the next student loan comes through i may investigate building a larger system, maybe with hydrophonics. Thanks for the kind words!

[xtank5]

Search ebay for the leds. I found a 50 pack for about 6 dollars Canadian and the are in Hong Kong, so the shipping might be a little high but who cares? At 13 cents or less than 10 pence apiece I quite frankly don't give a darn.

[xtank5]

I just checked Ebay and i found 50 5mm leds for $4 us at $6 flat rate shipping to Canada. Thats $10 or about 5 Pounds Sterling. That is dirt cheap for me.

[}{itch]

yeah, that's pretty incredible. you'll need to make sure they are of the super bright variety (dimmers ones will probably work, but you'll need more). i'm tempted to have a look on ebay myself now. i've begun the construction of a larger system and i think the best option for large scale would probably be to use 3W luxeon star LED's (you get a bit more bang for ya buck), the only problem is you have to build some kind of constant current source (there's an instructable on it somewhere). but 50 LED's are gonna kick out enough light i should imagine ;)

[m85476585]

I used this Maxim app note to build a constant-current supply for a Luxeon Rebel Star. Just replace the 10kohm resistor with a 7kohm resistor for 700mA.

[astrong0]

What the hell is a twiglet? are they sold in the U.S.?

[ManlyJack]

twiglets are like straight pretzel bits that are dipped in a yeast spread like marmite

[bountycrops]

Great article! Thanks for sharing this wonderful information.

[dwosullivan]

 Might it be that these ones grew better than those on your windowsill as there were warmer due to all the electrics and being in an enclosed space? 
While i'm sure some plants / drugs might be better grown under artificial light i dare say cress can survive without external power supplies!

Interesting as an experiment though!

[balmuge]

through my experimenting ive found a 16-8 light cycle is good to start the plants and then 12 12 to force them to flower

[zebratangozebra]

 For growing give them light 24 hr/day.
Darkness is not needed.
As long as lights are on they continue to grow.
I agree with flowering at 12/12.

[andybuda]

just found a very good and cheep alternative to led.. prolite do a helix design energy efficient bulb in red yellow blue colors sold through cpc at less then £8 there 30 watt... es fitting
http://www.prolite-lamps.co.uk/products/fluorescent_lamps/compact_fluorescents/colour_helix.htm

[el greeno]

Do plants use any of the infra-red or ultra-violet spectrums at all? If so it may be worthwhile putting one or two of these in as well.

[harley_rly]

i know of a certain "none-too-legal plant" that uses THC to protect itself from Ultra-violet light, so suppose your growin this plant chances are you will get more THC if you have a nice lil bunch of Ultra-violet LED's(if there are ultra-violet LEDs)

[andybuda]

blue for veg
red for flower
just white and u`ll b all right
plant will always grow towards the light so you could try horizontal grow tube

an idea i had was solar cell to charge battrie pack conected to photo cell which could switch a relay to turn on battrie pack when go`s dark  "any help of wireing would be helpful"

[knektek]

at the bottom could be a cloth to hold the soil and the plant about 1 inch from the bottom of the tube. that 1' gap would be filled with water and drill a hole at the bottom and fit an electronic air pump there so there is more oxygern and water. so this should provide all of the things to photosynthesise (spelling): h2o, o and light.

[hjenkins]

LEDs are current controlled devices.  They are better driven by a current source than a voltage power supply.  Most supplys allow you to go into  current control mode by used the current limiter control.  Typically set the current at the recommended value for optimum life and longevity.  Now the reason why you would want to do this is to delete the series resistor, its not needed anymore.
And that greatly increases the efficiency.  On the other hand the LED's don't
use much power anyway.  But all the power in the resistor is lost unless you
use it to heat the little greenhouse you grow in.  But I think you'll get enough heat from the LED's that you won't need the heat from the resistor.  One other comment, the Blue LED is probably a different current rating than the other ones.

[Rotten194]

Let there be light! Let there be slightly smaller quantities of blue light! That made my day, lol.

[clivefrog]

just a note for anyone interested. i've built two of these lights using 1 watt and 3 watt leds. they work very well. i'm using computer power supplies for the energy(3 volts for the blue and 5 volts for the red) if you hook them up in series(red) you don't need any resistors, as they run on 2.2 volts +- .5. the blues i ran all in parallel. i believe they ran on 3.3 v +- .5 v. 300 watt power supplies are everywhere for almost free, and all you have to do is isolate the 3 and 5 v feeds(orange and red respectively) i used 40 red to 15 blue, more suitable for flowering but you could easily add more blue and have a switch to turn some off at the right time. i epoxied them all to a big piece of white sheet aluminum i got from a sign shop which not only makes a great reflector, it also keeps them cool. and they where much cheaper than the 600+ dollars they want for a commercial light

[germanudo]

I want say something about the green light. If you got a nice growroom and need to go in that room while the plants are ""sleeping" (dark phase) you can turn on a simple green lightbulb. That won't interrupt the cycle. just make sure that they don't get light from the room , where you come from.

[Rob K]

I live in a college dorm with windows on the north side so I don't get any sunlight in my room. I have a bamboo plant that is sill the same height as when I got it from a year ago. I think this would work to help make it grow a bit taller and make a nice light. Nice Instructable. +1

[germanudo]

Hey, you may forgot to give your Bamboo some food!

[Rob K]

Since you know alot about electroncis could I use my 12v 50w desk light I broke the light socket in.

[}{itch]

thanks for the kind words. On the subject of the desk lamp, that's a bit of a tricky one really, for starters if its a filament type bulb it might be producing AC rather than DC at 12v, which means you'd need to build a rectifier and add a voltage regulator and smoothing capacitors, all quite a bit of hassle really. Also I'd only recommend messing around with mains electricity if your REALLY comfortable with it (i've been electrocuted more times than i care to think about, 300v through your finger will make you be a bit more cautious ;) ) That being said I'm all up for the reusing of broken stuff. I guess if your comfortable with what you are doing, then go for it. Otherwise I'd stay clear, there are other options you can go for, like using an old laptop power supply (I'd heard these are quite useful) or one of those "wall-wart" plug thingys. Anyway's, hope that was some use. and i hope your bamboo does better :)

[Rob K]

It's one of those cheap Halogen adjustable desk lights with a high/low switch.