Sorry that I haven´t updated this sooner, but I´ve been really busy. Since there hasn´t really been anything to update, this has been left waiting.

The light remains half working, there has been another light giving more light to the plants, so the results are useless.
I haven´t received any new instructions from  Wellthink, nor new leds for the light, so this test has officially failed.

The light seemed really promising. I have a feeling that the new wavelength does stimulate flowering, but the quality of the leds is somewhat questionable. With such a high prize, one would expect these to work.

But this is an experimental model with special leds, and to my understanding these leds are not used in the lights that are sold to public. Overall I still like this light, it´s very robust design because of the alunium cooler, and water resistant. That is always a good when dealing with water, as in hydroponic systems. It looks like one could drop it to the reservoir, and nothing will break, but I wont recommend it! The fact that it´s also totally silent, is also a huge bonus.

I´ll be happy to test more lights, but not during the summer. My plants are all moving outside in a few days, to enjoy the big HID on  the sky! But if you are still serious about testing in the fall, pm me and we will see. Though my opinion is that the best man for the job would be mr. Fatalii himself!

I first posted this to the wrong thread, so I moved it here where it belongs. Sry.

Just after a couple of days after putting it on, another led died on the light. It´s same weird model led, as the one broken before. I don´t know what they really are, they don´t appear to provide much light, they look more like glowing, at least to the human eye. Maybe they should be all replaced with better ones? I´ll be wiser on that hopefully, after I talk with the Welthink folks.

So the experiment faces yet another setback... This is quite frustrating..

The Trinidad Scorpion opened a couple of flower on the second day, but dropped them soon after the light loosed half of it´s power. Buckthorn cuttings are opening leaves, some of them have white spots on the stem, looks like they start rooting. Other plants haven´t reacted in any noticeable way.

I´ll keep this light on the plants at least for a while still, I lowered it some 20cm, to compensate the loss of power. Hopefully I´ll be able to fix it soon, thumbs up! 

My WEX-P150 broke down, after about years use. This is second time this happened with this model, so maybe there is some problems with the quality of the drivers? WEX-C150 and the WEX-Y90 have been working  without problems, so maybe it´s just this model that has problems? Luckily Welthink has been very helpfull replacing the lights for warranty, so my plants haven´t been left to complete darkness.

When I contacted them about the light, I was told that they didn´t have these at stock. I was asked if I would like to test the new WEX-C150W light, with a new spectrum. This is a passively cooled light, totally silent and supposed to be waterproof. As the noise of the cooling fans is the only downside to these older models, the answer was easy!

The new spectrum they made for my light has some 730nm wavelength added. It´s expected to be even better for flowering and fruiting than the  regular ones.



Here is the new light, massive aluminum cooler..

I got the light straight from China, it took couple of weeks to get it thru the customs. They had hard time understanding it was a replacement for warranty. I´ve been waiting police to raid my home ever since..

I replaced the WEX-C150 on my ebb with this new light, and in just three days all the plants were flowering. Unfortunately problems didn´t stop there, after the three days, half of the leds were down.. I suspected another driver malfunction, and the Welthink representative in Amsterdam send me a new driver. I was told that this is the first time one of these new models has broken. The driver was easy to change, basically just bolt on part, but that didn´t help. As I had their approval for opening the light, I measured the connections and leds, and one led had been busted. I was instructed to jump wire the broken one, and now finally the light is ready to use again.

Whilst the new light was under repair, I put the WEX-C150 back on the ebb, and surprisingly Turbo pube and Trinidad Scorpion dropped all their flowers in a couple of days, and Aji benito dropped most of hers. This was weird, because I´ve had good yields with this light before. Nothing else was changed, just the light.

After that, I changed the nutrient solution for flowering, about two weeks ago, but nothing significant has happened. Yesturday I finally switched the lights again, it will be interesting to see what happens..


Here is the old setup with WEX-C150.


And the new WEX-C150W.


Aji Benito.


Turbo pube.


Trinidad Scorpion.


Here are some buckthorn cuttings from Rauma. Only catch from that fishing trip.. Interesting to see, if they root on the fogger.

Plants will be on the ebb until the summer, so there is a little over months time to see how this 730nm light affects the plants. I´ll try to update this thread as something happens, and I´m open to suggestions and questions also!

Ok, I renamed it, now it works. Thanks!

It seems I haven`t updated this for a while..  Would it be about time now? 

Seriously, people keep bugging me about the foggers and LED-lights, how they work and am I satisfied with them. Lazy as I am, it´s likely easier to write here, for everyone to read, rather than individually for all those curious people..  So here, my experiences with these systems:

On the second run, seedlings were put to the fogger system on 27.02.-10. Here are some pictures of how they developed.


This is taken 11.04.-10.


And this is taken 09.05.-10.


Here is Trinidad Bush on 09.05.-10.


And jalapeño Early on the same day.


Hungarian Wax, same day.


And Super Red, still the same day.

Those were the last pics I took, ok, so Im a bit lazy..  But this is how they grew, is that fast enough?


As for the EBB system, I have even fewer pics, but here´s few.


Aji Benito, after being under the 150w led for about 20 days.


Lower parts of the same plant. Notice how dense the foliage is, this light really penetrates deep.


Here is the whole EBB 05.04.-10. The thing to notice here is how the plants avoid the light. It´s not because of heat, the lamp is not hot, but the light is likely too intense. Anyway, if I wont raise the light, plants won´t grow taller, exept the ones who have room to go around it. The UFO-system was used with florescent lights, to keep temperatures down.  After switching to leds, it´s been useless. Temperatures stay at 22-25C without any air circulation.


Here the light is on, 6 days later. I put a florescent light on the roof of the tent, it makes the led light easier for the eyes when working on the plants, pure grow led light is nasty..


Here is one more close up on the Aji Benito. There should be a lot more pods, but my friends kept raiding the plants...


What have I learned from the foggers so far? They are really fast, likely the fastest way to grow plants today. I´m thinking it might be even faster, if one would use one of those reptile foggers for additional foliar feeding? Who´s gonna test that?

The new reservoirs were made from storage boxes made to fit under bed. I cut holes to the cover, cut the top part of netpots and hotglued them to the cover. That provided good staple hold for netpots, so even bigger plants wont fall over. I keep them half full, so it´s 20 liters of solution. Roots will grow into the solution as the plants grow, but that´s fine.

The foggers I bought from sunflower supplies have been running for approximately 6 months, and work ok still. I have washed the outside of the discs with old toothbrush every now and again, spare discs remain unneeded.

I use an air pump and a air stone on the reservoirs, to feed new oxygen to the system. If there is no other benefits, at least the plants will stay ok even if the pump/fogger breaks.

Foggers are hot, and they heat the water too much, at least on my reservoirs, so I have them on a timer, running 15 minutes on, 15 minutes off, 24/7.

If there is too much air in the water, foggers won´t produce fog, so also the air pump needs to be on a timer, mine is running 30 minutes on, 30 minutes off, 24/7. Off course this depends on the pump and reservoir. On this timer I also have a air fan circulating air.

Plants react to different nutrient levels and Ph's really fast, especially the wrong ones.. So this takes more monitoring than the other systems. My EBB´s reservoir is 300 liters,  I can leave it be for 4 months, and no harm done. Not so with the foggers. This might not be the best system for beginners like me! 

IMO, this is good system for pre growing plants for other systems, and even producing yields, not to mention experimenting, because of the fast feedback it gives. The price of the system is affordable, actually I can think of only two downsides to this system. It´s very sensitive for the nutrient solution, and it´s not so good looking..


From the led lights.. The light is nasty...really nasty. Looking at that for few minutes makes you see everything green for a while. But other than that, they work great! And adding a fluorescent light eases the light color problem significantly.

Led light seems to be a bit too much for seedlings, it needs to be kept extremely high on small plants. Even bigger plants wont grow up to it, they keep at least 15-20 cm. distance.

The light penetrates really well. The foliage is extremely dense, but there are still leaves deep in the bushes, and even pods!

No heating issues. I have had both HPS lights and fluorescent tubes, both produced so much heat, that extra air-conditioning was needed.

There has been constant argument about how the led´s perform against hps lights. Apparently it´s about weather a 100w led light is equal to 400w hps? Now shouldn't it be 100w led against a 100w hps or 400w of leds agains 400w hps? So they consume about as much energy? On this comparison, the hps has no change, the leds are way more efficient. It´s just my estimate, but I think that my 150w led is about even with 400w hps on growing foliage and producing pods.

There seems to be a lot of low quality led lights on the market, I think that on the long run it would be cheaper to buy quality lights in the beginning. These last for several years, and during that time, better leds will produce better yields with less energy consumption, compared to the lower quality leds.

The only downside to these lights is the noise of the cooling fans, it can be quite irritating. The fans can be switched to less noisy computer cooling fans, but that might effect the warranty.

So, am I happy with these gizmos? Yes, I am. Especially the combination of both foggers and the EBB fits my needs perfectly, and I see no other lighting for my plants in the future either.

Hopefully this answers most of Your questions, so You can stop bugging me!    (just kidding)

Edit. for some reason, the picture of jalapeño Early wont upload?

Mulla on ollu noita foggereita käytössä noin 6 kuukautta kaiken kaikkiaan. (siis oikeasti käynnissä) http://chilifoorumi.fi/index.php?topic=6944.0. Toimivat vieläkin moitteetta, silloin tällöin olen pyyhkäissyt levyn pinnan puhtaaksi, uusia levyjä ei ole vielä tarvinnut vaihdella.

Noi lämmittää vettä aika voimakkaasti, siitä syystä ne on mulla ajastettuna siten, että ovat vartin päällä, vartin pois, ympäri vuorokauden. Mulla on noissa myös ilmapumppu hapettamassa vettä, eräänlainen foggeri/bubleri systeemi siis. Ilmapumppu tartti kans ajastaa, mikäli vesi on liian hapekasta, ei foggeri enää tee usvaa. En tiedä vaikuttaako tuo paljonkaan kasvu nopeuteen, mutta ei ainakaan kasvit kärsi, vaikka toinen laite menisikin rikki.

Nykyiset astiat on tehty sängynaluslaatikoista, 40l litran astia puolillaan vettä ja 15 kasvia kanteen. Porasin kanteen reiät, ja leikkasin verkkoruukuista yläreunat irti, jotka kuumaliimasin kanteen. Nyt pysyy verkkoruukut hieman tukevammin paikallaan, ennen oli hieman ongelmia isompien kasvien kanssa..

Kasvunopeus on omaa luokkaansa, siemenestä syötäviin chileihin on nopeimmilla lajikkeilla menny 2-2.5 kuukautta 150w ledilampun alla!

Ravinnelioksen kanssa pitää olla tarkkana, ylilannoitus tai väärä Ph saattaa tappaa kasvit vuorokaudessa, kokemusta on.. Reagoivat liuoksen muutoksiin todella nopeasti, ainakin huonompaan suuntaan. 

Tää "usva-kasvatus" lienee tällä hetkellä kaikkein nopein systeemi, ehkä vielä nopeamman sais kun käyttäis tota usvaa lehtiruokintaankin? Ikävin puoli on systeemin ulkonäkö, ei kovin luomua.. Jos pitäis valita vaan yks kasvatus systeemi, ottaisin silti ebbin, vaikka se hitaampi onkin. Kivamman näköinen, ja kasveja voi siirrellä pois ja takas tilanteen mukaan tosi helposti. Esikasvatuksessa foggeri on kuitenkin lyömätön!

Toivottavasti tästä oli hieman apua!

Mulla on joskus ollut natikka, ja se kyllä lämmittää kämppää kiitettävän tehokkaasti, ledit eivät...

Jatketaan uudella viestillä, kun tuo edellinen alkoi temppuilemaan kesken kirjoituksen..

Mitään ratkaisevaa eroa en ole huomannut kasvatus tehoissa valaisinten välillä, ja molemmat tuntuvat tuottavan satoakin yhtälailla. Yllättävän ison alueen nuo valaisevat, ja tuo, kuinka korkealla valaisimia joutuu pitämään, tuli myös yllätyksenä. Pidin noita suosituksia hieman liioiteltuina, mutta pitänevät paikkansa ainakin minimi korkeuden suhteen. Toisen valaisimen 4m. max. etäisyys kuulostaa silti hieman liioitellulta.

Foggerin ja led-valaisimen yhdistelmällä ensimmäiset podit ilmaantuivat tämän vuoden taimiin noin 2 kuukauden jälkeen, lajikkeena Early Jalapeno. 

Toivottavasti tämä selvensi hieman led-valaisimien ominaisuuksia? Ehkäpä muutkin käyttäjät voisivat laittaa tänne hieman kokemuksiaan näistä, nyt kun niitä on jo ehtinyt kertymään.

Mulla on parikin noita ledi valaisimia käytössä. Molemmat on 150w tehoisia, toinen neliömallinen Red 630nm 660nm Blue 460nm ledeillä ja toinen pitkulainen Red 630nm Blue 460nm ledeillä. Neliömallinen valaisee tällä hetkellä 130cm x 90cm aluetta, tämän kevään taimia 80cm korkeudella latvoista, ja pitempi malli on ebbin päällä valaisten 150cm x 90cm aluetta. Se on nostettuna kattoon asti, ja valotehoa on "riittävästi".

Molempien lamppujen alla kasvit tekevät podeja, ja lehvästöt ovat todella tiheitä. Taimet eivät suostu edes kasvamaan puolta metriä lähemmäs valaisinta, vanhoista kasveistakin ainoastaan Starfish kasvaa lähemmäs valaisinta, n. 20cm päähän. Suositus etäisyydet valaisimille ovat 0.5m-1.5m ja pitemmälle 0.5m-4m. Valaisin ei polta kasveja, vaikka sen laskee lähemmäksikin, (eihän se edes oikein lämmitä kättä), mutta kasvit eivät suostu kasvamaan lähemmäs lamppua, vaan koittavat kiertää sen.

Ainoa huono puoli valaisimissa on niiden jäähdytys tuulettimien ääni, jotkut ovat kai vaihtaneet niitäkin hiljaisempiin malleihin? Itse olen ollut erittäin tyytyväinen näihin, kasvit kasvavat ja tuottavat satoa läpi vuoden. Natikkaa en edes harkinnut lämpö ongelmienvuoksi.

Thats beautiful Bolivian Rainbow! How did you manage to keep it alive? All of mine and the ones my friends have had died after one summer. I thought it was impossible to grow them for more that one season!

I meant the led quality, these lights are really bright. Leds being the most costly part of these lights, that is the place you can save by using lower quality components. As for driver malfunction, it can happen for so many reasons, that I don´t think it´s likely to be a quality issue. It´s unfortunate, but it isn´t the first electronic device braking on me after short usage..  I haven´t heard of other lights breaking besides this one, so I don´t think there is a general lack of quality either. 

Koska moni ilmeisesti harkitsee led valaisinten hankintaa, niin kirjoitetaan nyt tällekin puolelle kokemuksistani. Harkitsin pitkään, mistä noita valaisimia kannattaisi hankkia. Lähinnä huonolaatuiset ledit ja mahdolliset ongelmat takuiden kanssa arveluttivat, laitteet kun eivät ole kovin halpoja.

Päädyin tilaamaan kolme led valaisinta Welthinkilta, Amsterdamista reilu kuukausi sitten. Tilaus sujui ongelmitta, palvelu oli erittäin nopeaa. Valaisimet vaikuttivat laadukkailta, ja valotehoakin oli riitävästi. Olen ollut erittäin tyytyväinen valaisimiin, samoin chilit! Kasvit alkoivat tehdä nuppuja muutamassa päivässä, nyt niissä on jo hedelmiä. Lehvästö on muuttunut huomattavasti tiheämmäksi, ja silti lehtiä riittää kasvien alaosiinkin.

Muutama päivä sitten yhdestä valaisimesta hajosi ilmeisesti yksi ohjainpiiri, osa ledeistä ei enää syttynyt. Otin yhteyttä minulle nimettyyn kontakti henkilöön Welthinkin Amsterdamin toimistossa, ja tämä pyysi lähettämään valaisimen heille, lupasi lähettää uuden tilalle heti kun se saapuu. Tuo oli mielestäni ihan kohtuullista, lupasin lähettää valaisimen heti kun löydän tilalle jonkun toisen, jotta kasvit eivät joudu olemaan pimeässä.

Vastaus viesti saapui miltei välittömästi, hän pahoitteli ettei muistanut, että kasvini ovat teltassa. Tarvetta varavalaisimen hankintaan ei ole, hän lähettää uuden valaisimen välittömästi, voin lähettää rikkinäisen takaisin kun uusi on saapunut.

Eli olen erittäin tyytyväinen saamaani palveluun. Käsittääkseni firma on sama, josta Herpiili ja kumppanitkin valaisimensa hankkivat? Mikäli harkitset led valaisimien ostoa, tuolta kannattaa ainakin pyytää tarjous.http://www.welthink.com/led.htm

As some of you might have noticed, I bought led grow lights a couple of months ago. Them being quite expensive, I considered purchasing them for a long time. Mainly two things worried me, the quality of leds, and possible warranty issues.

I ended up ordering tree lights from http://www.welthink.com/led.htm, the WEX-P150i and WEX-C150 for me, and WEX-Y90 (UFO) for a friend. The service I got, was excellent, and extremely fast, If I send them an email on sunday evening, I´d get reply in a couple of hours! That´s something you don't see in Finland...

Now a couple of days ago, after month of usage, at least one driver at the WEX-P150i died. A group of leds didn´t turn on anymore.


So it was time to see how the warranty works with them. I contacted Welthink Amsterdam, the same person who sold me the lamps, and he told me to send the lamp back to them, and they will send me a new one as soon as it arrives. That seemed reasonable, so I agreed, and said that I´ll send next week, I´ll have to find a replacement for it, so the plants won´t die during the process.

I got a fast reply, saying that there is no need for buying a replacement lamp, they just forgot that I had my plants growing in a tent. They send a new lamp right away, and I can send the old one back after the new has arrived. How´s that for service?

So if somebody is considering led grow lights, the Welthinks Amsterdam office is worth of considering. The lights are good quality, and the service is great.

Time for an update. I´ve been lazy, and the plants are still living on the old solutions, the oldes being the one from the first test run, that makes it about seven weeks old now... The solution is quite mild, made from Kemira hydrolannos, EC was around 1.2. The plants seem to grow fast even with this, so I have left it alone.

Here is the oldest set.


And here is the root growth.


All three sets.


The cuttings on the last set are beginning to root. It seems they root better, if you just stick in a net pot, without rockwool.


Overall, the plants seem to enjoy the fog, they grow incredibly fast. So fast that I´m going to have problems where to fit them all, there´s still over two months to go before I can get them outside.. 

I obviously don´t have any experience in these foggers yet, so all I can tell is hear say so far. If there will be need for cleaning the discs, I´ll try something and post the results then.

The disc life is promised to be over 5000 hours of continuous use, and the set comes with a spare disc and a tool for changing it. Spare discs are also available, and cost $9 a piece. There are no instructions on cleaning the disc, I suppose with the teflon coating it shouldn´t need it.

Instructions that Miksa wrote, are for a different fogger, older and more complex model, or rather a system made by Shira Frapa. I don´t think that one is on the market anymore? (http://www.greenair.com/old/fogger.htm). The method described might still work of course!

The link to the Sunflower supplies I posted doesn´t seem to work, so here is another try: http://www.sunflowersupplies.com/

Lighting is solved now, I ended up with a couple of 150w led lights from Welthink. First short test with the fogger has been done, I tryed one for five days when I was producing seedlings for others. I just lifted the fogger on my ebb, it was simple as there was enough space for it. This fogger also has a bubbler, so it´s kind of combination system.



The rest of the seedlings were on a tray, under fluorescent light, fed with the same mild fertilizer solution as the ones on the fogger.



Results were quite promising...



As mentioned earlier, the foggers are build for aeroponic growing, and come as a complete unit, fittings and all. Here is one fogger on the floater.



And same fogger turned on.. The fog is really fine, just like smoke, but there is a lot of it!



Now here is the next setup, already running. There is now one fogger+bubbler system, bubbler is on all the time and the fogger is running 15 minutes, and 15 off. The other fogger is continuously on, thou I might put all foggers behing clock switch later. There will be one more fogger, and one bubbler later, so there will be four units total.



It will be interesting to see how they grow, if I wont kill them with wrong Ph. I have a Hanna digital Ph meter, and it´s giving me hard time. Seems like I should calibrate it before every use...

I ordered some ultrasonic foggers from Sunflower supplies http://www.sunflowersupplies.com/products/AEROMIST-1-HEAD-FOGGER-KIT-WITH-FOGGER%2C-FLOAT-AND--EXTRA-DISC-110V-or-220V-European.html. These are actually build for aeroponic growing, the transducer discs are teflon coated to prevent nutrient build-up. The set was complete, with powersupply, rubber fitting to run the cord to the pot, floater and spare disc. The unit itself has a waterlevel sensor on it, so if the water runs out, it will stop.

The mist these produce is incredibly fine, just like smoke. The nutrients must go right into roots, no wonder they get so incredible results with these. Like on the Finnish forum, 10 weeks from seeds to harvest!

Can´t wait to start testing these. I have some lighting issues to solve first, but I´ll post some pictures once I`ll put the system together.

Mä tilasin Sunflower suppliesilta http://www.sunflowersupplies.com/products/AEROMIST-1-HEAD-FOGGER-KIT-WITH-FOGGER%2C-FLOAT-AND--EXTRA-DISC-110V-or-220V-European.html tuollaisia. Nämä on tarkoitettu nimenomaan aeroponiseen viljelyyn, keraamilevy on teflonpinnoitettu jottei lannoitteet yms. tartu siihen. Täydellisen setin mukana tulee virtalähde, kellutinlautta, läpivientikumi sähköjohdolle ja vara keraamilevy. Levyn luvataan kestävän 5000 tuntia jatkuvaa käyttöä. Lisäksi laitteessa on vedenkorkeuden tunnistin, mikäli vesipinta laskee liian alas, eli vesi loppuu, niin laite pysähtyy.

Liikkeen omistaja Ryan Clout on asiallinen tyyppi, sen kanssa on helppo asioida. Kun kerroin sille Viherpeukun ratsiasta, se lupas ettei kirjoita paketteihin mitään vesiviljelyyn viittaavaa! 

Using a waterpump, You just put the pump in the bucket, and put a hose from the pump to the pot. The water will flow thru the pot into the bucket. You will also likely use a timer to set the pump on and off, and somesort of an dripper at the end of the hose. This would be a drip feed system, quite close to the aeroponic setups.

There are a lot of instructions for various hydroponic systems on the net, and on this site also. Youtube might also be a good place to seek information.

As for the best/most cost-efficient solution... This is a nice hobby...it will eat all Your extra space and money...

I´ve been growing chilies in passive hydro´s this summer. The reason I chose to try them was that I´m so lazy, I figured they require very little maintenance (watering). This has certainly been true, with the amount of rain here this summer, I still haven´t watered them after potting!!! How ever I had to drill holes to the buckets sides, to prevent over watering.

Just as Fatalii told me in another thread (http://chilifoorumi.fi/index.php?topic=6037.0), the key to healty plants in passive hydros seems to be the waterlevel. Unfortunately I drilled the holes to the max water mark, and that is too high, so I still have to manually drain excess water out occasionaly... The pots I made seem to work best with waterlevels between 2cm to 3/4 full, so for next summer I´ll make new holes, so the waterlevel will stay under 3/4 level.

As for bonchi growing, I don´t think hydroponics is a good choise, because it´s soilless, and the decoration of the soil is also a big part of that. These systems use expanded clay, vulcaponic or similar growing medias. I think that using soil in these pots might cause root rot or mold problems? But if You are in a hurry, You can offcourse first grow plants in hydros, and then cut them down and repot them to bonchi pots. For fast growth, I´d go with aeroponic systems, they are also easy to build (http://www.stonerforums.com/lounge/diy-how/10600-how-build-aeroponics-system.html), and the growing rate should be incredible from what I`ve heard!