How much should One pay for Chinese quantum boards? What’s the best price? My Answers here!

Botany and Cultivation
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I’ll cut to the chase one should spend roughly 62$ Per ‘288 piece 120 watt lm301b’ model no: 16S18P quantum board (if you order a 6 pack with a 600 watt driver)

Hello, this post is not a call for help but an offer of information! This question is one I asked myself for a long time as an aspiring grower, and have now been pursuing seriously as a serious grower.

I have a friend who purchased over 200 units of the ‘288 pieces 120 watt Lm301b’ model number: 16S18P

With everything included: heat sinks, wago connectors, water proof connectors, a 600 watt hlg driver for every 6 boards (5 boards per driver is max power since each board is 120 watts) and last but not least shipping and taxes/import fees.

Their price came out to roughly $330 Per 6 boards with everything and a 600 watt driver that comes out to near $55 a board; although ordering less than 6 boards would complicate that since they’re paired to a 600 watt driver, but not by very much. I think this is a decent number to work with

I took this deal my friend got and leveraged it into my own deal; not knocking alibaba suppliers hustles, charge what you can and if it sells who am I to ask for a better deal; but to me it’s clear they’re eager to increase supply and able to lower the price;

When I contacted them for an order of only 6 lights + 600 watt driver and all wires included my price came out to roughly $370, now this is before taxes/imports, while my friends was after their order is 30x mine or so. I believe a small order like this could be exempt? Or maybe fly under the radar not sure.

I only used 6 boards in my quote because that is what my friend is working with and I wanted to keep the math consistent I recommend 5 boards per 600 watt driver (cost of $332 per “unit”) so you can max the 120 watts each if you so choose; this will be a higher overall cost if you want to cover the same amount of space with the lights regardless, and I think I’ve heard higher wattage can shorten life spans but I can’t resist going full power.

Feel free to dm me for proof or any additional info!

If anyone’s found a better price or has any advice for me or anyone pertaining this subject please let us know in the thread!

Have a great day ya’ll,

GiGi

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Hello, do you have any pictures of this setup?

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Just confirming you shouldn’t pay more than mentioned. I recently bought a single 240w setup for my ma, and total with shipping was 140. So 70 bucks a board, but that’s only for two. I expected to pay a little more per unit.

So far the thing works like a champ!

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Sway me to the dark (led) side would ya already?

Lol

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I think 70$ after shipping and taxes is pretty fair; my friend who purchased over 200 got it around 55 a piece after shipping and taxes; I got a quote for 6 Pieces and was offered 62 a piece before shipping and taxes.

When I initially contacted them they insisted on 80 a piece and would not budge until I brought up my friends order.

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How much do you pay for your current lights? I think I read somewhere on the forum you switched over to cmh with great results? I won’t pretend to be the end all to lighting I’ve barely experimented with different kinds myself; but through thorough research and others testimonials I think these may be the most cost effective per watt/yield! Would love to hear the stats on your lights; initial cost + watts + grams per watt so we could compare.

Currently I run ipower 1000 watt hps the cheapest get er done lights possible

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No pictures unfortunately although on Alibaba they have pictures of the set ups they sell; I definitely suggest the single 288 piece boards because you can orientate them however you wish. Closer, or farther apart, any pattern etc.

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I forgot to mention in the original post! They also have lm301h which is the newest led diode available for only 2 more dollars per board all other cost are the same; so add $12 to the 6 pack if you wanted lm301h.

Lm301h I believe I heard is 3% more efficient although don’t hold me to that, the h apparently stands for horticulture and they were treated with sulfur to be more water resistant/proof. That’s all spitballed off the top of my head may not be 100% accurate but roughly.

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I used my old big kahuna hoods (new were 175@). Prism ballast 80.00, bulbs 75 00, adapter 12.00.

Sorry, you cant use 1000w and cheap 8n the same sentence. The power, and ac needed to use a 1k light and keep cool is quite a bit of $ to grow. Even at 2000.00lb, you may be able to squeeze 1.5lbs from a 1k light.

I can break it all down to 5.00+/- if you really like.

I’ll need power cost, nutrient cost, what your water/feed cycle is, I wont even count labor.

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How many watts are your ballast? quantum boards may have you beat

600 watts of quantum boards comes out to about 330$

You’re preaching to the choir on cost I run 9 air cooled lights, ac in the summer etc and my bills are ridiculous; although running co2 definitely helps on cooling cost.

I’m looking to upgrade and then expand with quantum boards; i figured I would share the best price I’ve heard of and was able to negotiate for myself!

It sounds like you’re offering me advice I really appreciate that; I’ve been running my set up for over a year, not sure if I misunderstood you but I’m not looking to start one from scratch; though I am always eager to hear about different peoples set ups.

In reference to 1000 watt hps being cheap get er done lights. I really think they are. 4 1000 watt air cooled lights One 500 cfm fan pulling air from outside through the lights and back outside and another on a carbon filter + co2 + ac if it’s summer; no ac in the winter. Few shelves and tubs or alibaba flood tables and box fans. I can throw a room together for like 1500 more or less that’ll cost tops around 700 a month and produce at LEAST 6-7 Lbs of product, very likely more. that’s really rough numbers but puts you at a nice beginners level profit before even taking into account perpetual growing.

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You can not compare watts vs actual pulled watts from the wall for led.

315w cmh

This is the proverbial “wool” that gets pulled over newbs eyes.

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Isn’t that the same for anything though? I know the drivers I use to power my qbs are 94% efficient, advertised anyway. I diy my boards, so I know I’m getting actual meanwell drivers, and they’re pretty reliable for efficiency from my experience.

Not saying I disagree, but there is always going to be some efficiency loss, no matter what lights you use.

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Each 288 piece led quantum board is 120 watts of actual draw out the wall.

At around $260 per 315 watts of cmh

The $330 for 600 watts of actual draw on quantum board seems to be the more cost effective choice.

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Sounds like a great price compared to HLG for pretty much the same thing. Hard to go wrong with five or six with that driver. I’d probably go with four per driver and run em a little harder. That cheap, the boards could be replaced yearly to keep output high.

The HLG 135’s I have are pulling 150 watts at the outlet according to my Kill a Watt; that would be 135 watts at the lights with 90% efficiency. Don’t remember the exact efficiency right now.

I saw a video on youtube comparing light output after 6000 hours of use that make me think running quantum boards cooler would help extend max output. The HLG lost the most output in the test. My thoughts are that there isn’t sufficient cooling to avoid thermal degradation at spec’d output, even with the finned heatsink. Might be worth running a thermal pad between the board and the heatsink, and/or a small fan or two on each heatsink. These mid power LED’s can’t handle heat as well as high power LED’s or COB’s. They shine in their efficiency, and their power comes in numbers. Unfortunately, extra heat comes along with being so densely packed. It would be killer if we could get some extra thick copper boards made up instead of the aluminum ones that QB’s are made of; way better heat transfer properties meaning better cooling. Here’s the video:

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Super interesting video @BigM! And information had no idea you could run them harder. Thanks for that; do you know offhand the yield you’re getting off your quantum boards? Grams per watt?

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They could probably be over driven quite a lot over spec to get more intensity out of them, but you lose lifespan exponentially as you overheat an led. I don’t know as much about the mid power LED’s used in QB’s, but it isn’t uncommon in the flashlight world to overdrive high power LED’s by two or three times spec. Over driving QB’s could help with increasing penetration if you could cool them better, and be alright with replacing the boards yearly. In the long run, you’d probably be better off under driving the QB’s and run more of them. In addition to preserving output and increasing lifespan, efficiency goes up and cost of usage goes down.

Yield looks pretty decent so far, couldn’t give any exact numbers. Honestly hardly ever weigh anything anymore, mostly use mason jars as my main unit of measurement these days :wink: I’ll make sure to get some numbers next time around. Might be a while before they get used for flowering again with the weather warming up.

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I run some qbs and keep em pretty low. I try to only run around 80w tops per board. I run 3 in my 2*4 tent, under driving is def the way to go I think.

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Did a test and after dialing in settings on my second harvest. I got a little over 8oz a plant dried, that does not include any trim, popcorn nugs and nugs I dropped on the floor. I veg the plants for 3.5-4 wks and flowered them for 8-10 wks.

1 x HLG QB288 V2 600W for every 3xplants ratio. Was using HPS 1000w x 3 plants so kept similar ratio.

Growing for patients and family members only so this was acceptable ratio for me. Plus 1 of the plants had a branch broken by my dumbass. I would imagine if I didn’t do that I’d be closer to 10oz a plant dried. Haven’t dialed in my other settings completely reset and rebuild my grow area.

So far the QB haven’t made me miss the HPS fully. I do want add a CMH for UV supplement like @Demontrich is using and see if that will make a difference in the growth. I’ll do that maybe later this year hopefully to test out the difference if any.

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I paid 81 per board including shipping for 2x lm301b 240w mix 3000k+4000k+660nm+UV+IR just this past week. I like that it has an on/off switch for the IR/UV diodes.

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Stop buying Chinese

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