I have or installed a bunch of volt meters on my various stuff.Mowers,motor cycles,cars,trucks.etc.I find they will show me the state of battery charge in volts,rather than the system charging rate. For that ,I install ampmeters as well.to monitor charging rate.tbk

Unfortunately, lots of Sheriff Deputies have little knowledge. I dug up that plant and exhibited it at the county fair (Cincinnati). I showed a couple of people, who are law enforcement officials a leaf and they were aghast that I was growing "pot." It was the Tainug 2 variety - the Everglades 41 looks nothing at all like pot. I was surprised that during the fair, no one questioned the plant and, acting innocently, one evening said something to a deputy that it appeared someone had a pot plant on display. He said he wouldn't know a pot plant if he saw one. The next night, as the fair was closing, three deputies were headed to the area. I am the official photographer for the fair so I asked them what they were checking out - they said a pot plant. Two of them thought it was but one guy knew it wasn't - wrong cluster of the leaves. He was a cool guy - he also likes super hot peppers and I took him some. UGF, I don't have any plants except for a couple of bananas under LEDs, at least not until a few moments ago. I took the tomato that was under the CFL and put it under a 54 watt LED that, alas, has half the lights not working. My experiences with them so far, and it is limited to 14-watt red, blue and red/blue panels and the one 54-watt panel that use to work fine, is that they are great for seedlings and even mid-size plants but not powerful enough to set and develop fruit. That's why I am anxious to find out more - and hopefully get a good deal so I can afford to experiment with the 120-watt panel. Mike

I agree with the flourescents over HID/HPS... way to much heat from the big lamps... and wasted light. I get best results from running a mix of LED and Flourescents. I have my LED lights running down the middle and a flouresent tube on the side. Plants will grow LED Red/Blue mix only... done it. They seem to do better with just a bit of flouresent to fill out the light spectrum. I run a fan not for cooling but it circulates the CO2 and dries the soil top which prevents mold. My grow box is lined with cheapy mirrors to put as much of the light to the plants as possible. LEDs need adjustable height! They are cool enough to touch the plants so I keep them an inch above the plant tops. All about getting the light to the plant. I'm a tightwad so wasting even light goes against my blood... "waste not want not". Mostly I grow exotic hot peppers. Much of my outdoor garden gets sprouted in the grow box... Michigan didn't even get warm plantable weather until June this year... farmers are crying. While late in the outdoor garden I have peppers already and tomatoes any day now.

Watts still means nothing in general as far as lumens go. Watts was first used as a referance because all incandescent bulbs used the same filament. "It used to be" A 100 watt bulb always put out about 1700 lumens. All 100watt bulbs were the same,all 50watt bulbs were the same,each burned X amount of watts and put out X amount of Lumens per watt. "I have 1 watt LEDs that put out 25Lumens and other 1 watt LEDs that put out up to 160LM.Both run on 1.9-3.5volts at .350 miliamps. " If I'm using Red LEDs that use .350MA each and my power supply is 12 volts X amps I can run several different LEDs with different Lumen outputs and use the same amount of watts. Example: Blue 1watt star LED - runs on .350ma at 3 volts each. Each puts out 106lm. Thats 4 LEDs in the string(12 volts) , putting out 424lm per string. using 12volts ,at .350ma total= 4.2watts(12v X .350ma). Red 1watt Star LED - uses .350ma at 2 volts each. Each puts out 25lm. Thats 6 LEDs in the string , putting out 150lm using 12volts , .350ma total= 4.2watts.(12vX.350ma.) So which panel would be brighter,the 4.1 watt one or the 4.1watt one? Watts only tells how fast your meter spins.And can tell you how efficient your LEDs are IF you know the ma,voltage and Lumens your LEDs are in the first place. which you don't with store baught panels. I've never seen all 3 stats advertised. Most say 225,1 watt LEDs are 225 watts.They aren't necessarily.Depends how they are wired. You can say 225,100Lm LEDs are 22,500Lm. total. You can't go by a panels total watts to determin how bright it is. It depends on how efficient of an LED you are using in your panel. Since most grow panels are at least a couple different LEDs that use different volts and ma per LED that probably put out different lumens per watt,it makes watts as a measure of possible lumens even less accurate. Only way you could use watts to compare different panels would be if ALL LEDs used the same voltage and MA to put out the same Lumens in that panel.Which,unless you made the panel,you don't know. Then to make things even more mixed up you can throw in that LEDs are Mini spotlights. The wider the beam angle the less Lumens per sq. Foot,Sq.In. etc. you get from the farther away the LEDs are to the meter,plant or whatever. With some LEDs the angle can change with heat and the power you are running them at... In general Red LEDs are less lumens per watt compared to Blue or white. But an older LED of any color could be less efficient than another of any color thats newer/newer tech.. You can say the same panels are 660watts if you ran them on a 55amp , 12 volt supply too if you really wanted to get creative. LOL LEDs only take what they need. But a 12volt,55amp. supply will use 660 watts if you run 1 string or a bunch off it. Assuming my math is right... I don't see what you are talking about with- "Lumens are definitely useless when measuring LED panels since it is biased to the green which plants just reflect and don't use." Lumens is the measure of ALL VISIBLE light. Has nothing to do with color. If you can see it,it can be measured in Lumens. Check your Funk and Wagnell... Lux is Lumens per sq. Metre. I do find that a lot of light meters have a problem with some shades/wavelengths of high red and low blue. My cameras filter freaks out all the time when I try and get pics of my LEDs when they are on. Once again I dissagree with you. 1 watt LEDs aren't neccesarily less efficient than 3 watt LEDs. I use mostly 1 watt LEDs because for the price and lumens per watt the strings burn added up are cheeper and brighter per $ in general. I have 3 watt,60Lm Leds that run on .750ma,3.2-4volts. I have 1 watt,160lm LEDs that run on .350ma,3-3.4volts. You can't generalise about all LEDs being the same by using watts as a measure. It depends on the specific LED you are using at the time. Voltage,MA. and total lumens have to be considered for each individual panels efficiency. There are too many variations of LED power requirements per Lumen out there. As posted above,most of my stuff burns 48watts and puts out between 2100 and 13600Lumens.Depends on the mix of LEDs I used at the time. So using 90 watts as a rule of thumb doesn't work if you are using the LEDs I use now. There are brighter ones out there(more expensive)that use the same voltage and MA mine do. My 3yr old LEDs are less efficient than the ones I just baught and cost less too. For my use , lighting individual shelves,I don't need them in higher lumens than i have now. In general,if I remember right,plants need a minimum 2000lm of light from a flouro to grow ,in between 5000k and 6500k. Less lumens of LED,plant specific light.Less useless wavelengths are being produced per Lumen. I think you have some stuff mixed up,don't understand,I'm not trying to hassle you. I do enjoy discussing LEDs as growlights for peppers. There is a ton of miss information out there advertised by snake oil salesmen that confuses things about lEDs in real life. Lots of stuff posted by people who never built or used LEDs or baught an LED panel that was junk and post ALL leds are useless for growing plants under in general. Lots of people also miss use their growlight then say that it was junk. Tried putting it a mile away or too close to the sprouts and can't figure out why it didn't work. Too close matters sometimes. LEDs are spotlights. Close can = 2LEDs on the plant. A little farther away means 6 LEDs+ on the same area,the beams overlap.They have a sweet spot. Changes with the angle of the LEDs beam. I just got off a 14hr work shift...time for watching the inside of my eyelids.