I'm doing the same!! I started mine outside and now I want to move them inside. My question to you is, what wattage are you putting your plants under?? I'm still confused about the whole equivalent thing. Lol I have a few 23watt and 40watt bulbs. Any help??
the equivalent watts is just for marketing purposes mostly. you will want to read kamels cfl guide if you have questions, it explains a lot.
Lmfao!!! I read it TWICE!!! I also read up on lighting and even talked to a electrician. Lol maybe I'm just having a blonde moment or something hell if I know. It's just confusing. Someone says "use a 23watt bulb equivalent to 100watts" and I'm like, I got one but how do I know if it's equal to 100watts?? Lol I just started going by the lumens. I know a plant needs 27k for its flowering process so I just go with that and that's how I decide my lighting. Lol haven't had a problem yet. Soo... But thanks anyways.
@sharp, what they probably meant was you will want 100 actual watts per plant. I have also heard 50w/sq. ft. is good, personally i prefer HID.
@zmasterflash so how do you find out what 100 actual wattage is if the box says, 40watts cfl?? That's the part that confuses me.
however many watts the bulb uses = actual watts. so if it is a 23watt bulb thats 23watts. 23watt bulbs are normally 60 equivlent. You want 100 actual watts so that would be about 5 light bulbs (23 watts x 5 = 115 watts)
Opps didnt mean to be confusing.. If your using 40 watt bulbs (150 watt equal i assume?) u would want 3 bulbs for a total of 120watts.
Lmfao!!! Omg!! That's still confusing as fuck!!! Sorry if you could upload a picture example. I know it's a lot but some people I guess understand better with pictures. Like show the wattage on the bulb and what that means or is equal to or something. That would help tremendously!!!
do u have a brand/model number of your bulb for pictures? dont want to confuse you with different bulbs
Lmao!! Ok gotcha!!! Explain this one. Because these are the bulbs that I have for my flowering process. I used the sun mostly through the veg process so when I bring them in, this is what they'll be under...
That's a 100 watt bulb that burns 23 watts to make the light. The 23 is what you go by. Four of those would give you 92 actual watts of light. If you had four square feet of grow space and wanted at least 50 watts of light per square foot you would need nine of those 23 watt bulbs. That bulb is the correct Kelvin temperature for flowering.
So basically I would need 4 of those light bulbs for one plant. Going by the rule "100watts a plant, 50watts per additional"..
Lmfao!! Gotcha!! So with that understanding comes another question; what if one bulb says it's 2700k??
the 2700k is the color of the light (2700k for flower & 6400k for veg.) in an earlier comment you simply said 27k; that is actually 2700k on the light or box it came in some bulbs have it on the bulb some don't depends on the manufacturer but it is always on the box somewhere
Right which brings me back to my original confusion. All lights are not the same obviously. It's possible to have a 40watt light that also has a 2700k spectrum or whatever the fuck, as well as a 23watt bulb with the same 2700k lol basically what I'm asking is what the hell am I looking for?? Cuz I have multiple 20-23watt lights that are 2700k. Some are dimmable in case you're wondering.
the wattage of the bulb has nothing to do with the spectrum (color of the light) dimmable bulbs are a waste of money for what you are using the lights for (you don't need to dim the lights & a dimmable bulb cost more than a non-dimmable) With cfl bulbs look at it like this you have actual watts used & equivalent watts ;What this means is a 23 watt cfl bulb will light a room the same as a 100 watt incandecent bulb would (but it is only burning 23 watts instead of 100 watts) it is just a marketing tool 13 watt cfl = 60 watt incandecent 23 watt cfl= 100 watt incandecent 42 watt cfl = 200 watt incandecent This is a way of showing you the supposed amount of power you are saving by using cfl bulbs In lighting your area you want to go by Actual Wattage (using cfl bulbs that is the lower number) As for the color (spectrum) of the bulb that is the numbers followed by a (K) on the bulb or package the bulb came in (ie 2700k,3500k,4000k,5500k,6400k) you can get any color (spectrum) in any watt bulb so always look when you buy bulbs to make sure you a 2700K bulb for flower or a 6400K bulb for veg.( in the wattage power that you want ) If you read this & think about it you should see what I mean (I hope this was understandable anyway) Look at the bulb package you have pictured when you read this & it should help in understanding & as us&them said karmels cfl guide should help you also hope this helps I can't think of another way to explain it if not ask again & we will try to come up with something else to help Just read your post again so what you want for FLOWER is 23 watt cfl bulbs in 2700k (non dimmable prefered but if you already have them use them)
Lmfao!! Ok!!! I swear to you as I'm sitting here blowing and reading I swear everything just came together!! Lol I'm looking at the pictures and the explanations. It makes sense and I'm glad you took the time out to explain it. So what could happen if you were like a few watts off or maybe a few watts over?? And say I have 2 plants, how many watts should I be using??