I am working on completing a new grow room. It is 9x5.5x8'. My question is regarding the orientation of my two 600w HPS Lights. They are both in 8" cooled reflectors. Traditionally I see most people running them in line with each other, as it makes routing the ducting really easy, as shown below in the first (shitty) illustration. The hoods only have reflective material on two sides, not the sides where the input/output for ventilation are. But which orientation of the hoods would result in the best use of the light. Does it matter much, since the each light would basically be shining over a nearly square 4.5x5.5' space? Here is a picture of the framing used for the floor, to you can get a general idea of the room size.
Maybe tent up some mylar and keep it light tight so you don't waste any? doesn't really answer your question but i couldn't see it being too much of a problem as long as your not wasting light, if your plants start to bend just rotate them every day. This is just what i've read...
to me it has always just made more sense to put them inline. There is a reason why its the 'usual' way... its because it works! The more bends you have in your system the more congested the airflow gets. with the size of your room too it just makes better use of the light to refelect it outwards 3 feet on each side rather than trying to throw it further the other direction. That might have been confusing but in the end i say go with the inline formation.... Less issues and better use of light. Good luck bro!
Thanks for the responses guys. I'm not too worried about airflow being restricted as I'm using a ~750cfm fan to cool the lights. But I guess I'll go with them inline. Since there isn't much left to do with this thread, I'll post up a couple pictures of some bud I just harvested from one of my plants. This is a purple kush from my very first grow over the last few months.