Aquired a 400w HPS

Erm.... yup.

 

think its bright, look directly at it then go outside and look at the sun. Not so bright now is it?

 

Is that the picture of it? No reflector? That doesn't look too bright for some reason. Are you putting it under the plants or above them?

 

Were you looking at his sig or something?

HPS is supposed to be way brighter than a CFL, but that thing seems dim, you shouldnt be able to look at it like that.

 

Ya man, get a reflector and put it ABOVE the plants. Thats a good aspect of HPS is that they are cooler than a lot of other lights and they produce a lot more light, so you can put them almost right aboe the plants.

 

I pretty sure the bulb that you are showing is a 400MH conversion bulb, you need a HPS bulb if thats the case for flowering. And you really need to get a reflector. Also, if your not using a filter for your camera then that bulb is about shot or there is something wrong with your ballast.

 

yeah, when you take a picture of the bulb when it is in, the camera will auto ajust it's white settings or something like that, so it won't seem as bright as it really is.

 

You might be destroying your camera's lense...

 

If it's not a new bulb, bear in mind that older ones take a while to work up to their max brightness, the older/more hours they've worked does significantly reduce their potential. Also it might be an idea to check that you're using the correct ballast for your bulb. The daylight CFL's do tend to look more of a blue/white colour which does contrast a fair bit with the orangey glow of an HPS.

 

Wow man, that thing looks really really stretchy, and I think you need to change the position of that light. Have you thought about topping it to make it more bushy?
What is it growing in?

 

Do street lamps use HPS lights? I tried to buy one but they only sell the actual bulbs and not the fittings for some strange reason. I might climb up my street lamp and steal that if they use them

 

Yea, they do use HPS lighting, however, not only is it really hard to get one, its against the law, and those bulbs are often really old and have proly lost thier lumens, and are stuck with bug juice all over em.

Let me know how that works out, lol.