okay, so here's what's up yo: I've tried to grow in the past, but one outdoor plant got stolen by some mexican's that worked in our backyard. I thought they wouldn't find it, but god knows they did and it was gone the next day Nonetheless, I have saved my bagseed from my schwagg and have about 100 seeds or so stashed away in my freezer ready to be released into healthy mj plants at my will. So I germinated one and put it on the windowsill, it's about 4 days old now and is showing signs of light stretching. SOOOOoo, I DO in fact have a 400 watt hps light that I purchased at a local hydro store, but the simple fact is I don't have the room for it in my small living space and also it overheats like a motherfucker (the main reason i'm not using it) which means it needs a larger space to work in and I need a better ventilation system for the time being. Nonetheless the idea occurred to me to use compact fluorescents since they are the most user friendly grow lights available. So I got four compact fluorescent bulbs (28 watts per light, sunlight type) and will be hooking them up tomorrow in a tall tuperware piece that I will spraypaint matt white. I've already created reflectors for the cfls out of old coke cans and they work better than expected. Now here's the simple and perhaps depressing question to answer: can i get away with something like this? Is it possible to get to flowering with some warm fluorescents after veg? Can I even get through veg, etc. I know that alot of you will say "just get out your hps and use it ya pussy" but the simple fact is I feel it's not the right time to bust out the hps. It's too bulky and also I feel that under my current living conditions it might even be dangerous to use (call me paranoid, i don't care). Anyways, I just wanted some insight and any advice you can offer up to me about this. Is it even worth my time? I think it is and probably will go through it anyway, but nonetheless I'd like to read some comments on this plan. I can, of course, add more cfls as much as my funds allow (which, due to the cheapness of cfls, I am certainly able to add many more) and based off of MrE's cabinet grows on the forums at overgrow.com, I believe it is possible to create a personal stash from 1 or 2 scrog plants once I get a female to clone. So . . . what do you guys think? possible, not possible? Also: as a side note, I'd like to apologize for not having any pics of this one plant I'm growing but both my camera and computer suck, so . . . sorry.
absalutley << i cant spell (stoner) arn't we all , but any way yes you can ive never fully grew my self but i have helped ALOT and the master pat told me some good advice!!
absolutely you can get away with those lights ........ but might i suggest you go buy a couple 4 ft. shop lights and get a 2 pack of cool white and a 2 packs of warm white around $30 if you do it right ... will carry you well into flowering
man, i would get a couple of 4 footers but i don't even have that much room in my closet, which is where i'm doing it . . . If I had that much room I'd probably just figure out a way of creating a better ventilation system for my closet and set up my hps . . . Thanks for the advice though, keep it in mind for laters . . . considering the fact that 4 footers still take up less electricity than my 400 watt hps . . .
why matte white? Gloss is more reflective. I have the inside of my box sprayed gloss white, and it shines like the gates of heaven. If you've been in a dark room, you're gonna need some of those solar eclipse glasses to look at it, because when you crack the side open the brightness is incredible. Not even looking at the bulb - but just the inside of the box imprints your eyes, so you cant see anything directly in front of you very clearly for about 5 minutes.
Hate to be a downer, but I wouldn't expect a good yield from just 4, 28W bulbs. I've flowered a plant with 6 of those guys before and the results were far from spectacular. My recommendation would be to find a way to use the 400W HID you already have, because that's probably one of the best lights you can use.
I'm not saying to have the tubes hanging horizontal man ........ you place them vertically at 4 points and then hang your regular cfl's from the top and then your plant is completely surrounded by light
ah, interesting in concerns to using the 400 hps, i'll consider using it for flowering, considering everything I've heard has been that the yields from an hps will always be higher than a fluoro, but to be honest i'm not looking for more than half an oz or less with this . . . maybe even that's expecting too much but let me know what you guys think.
as long as you take good care of it and do it right i suggest looking into FIM-ing and then flowering w/ the HPS thats not to much different from alot of peoples setups
well since i don't have air conditioning, i suppose the cold weather right now would be able to cool the closet down some . . . i'll definately consider using the hps light now. despite its heating problems, its benefits seem to outweight the cons on this one. Anyways, right now she's up and green (out of her shell) so the lights are working so far for now. I'll make sure to fim and so forth to keep her low to the ground as she grows. Once again, apologies for the lack of pics, but like I said before, my computer and camera kinda suck. Hopefully I'll at least be able to get a good pic of the harvest when it shows. Well, wish me luck guys, your advice has been helpful on this topic and has convinced me of a few things concerning this grow. Wish me luck.
With regards the HPS, if it has a remote ballast move it out of your grow room, you could place it outside the closet in or on top of a night stand. My 400w hps has only a 60cfm bathroom fan for exhaust (3x2x4.5). I cool the hps by hooking up a honeywell fan right at the end of the bulb, the grow room runs hot but doesn't get much hotter than 86f, a bit hot. I planning on getting 1 of those stanley blowers from lowes, the create a ton of air movement and should lower my temps to ambient, i also am installing an active intake witch should help. Honestly, get the venting items, it be well worth it in the end, blower is $40 dollars from lowes, fan $20 dollars, computer fans for intake $15, and you can build a carbon scrubber for under $50. Thats $125 dollars, i started my grow with 4 flouros the improvement of the 400w hps was remarkable, especially when it comes to the speed at witch they grow, they take off under hid. You'll be much more satisfied with using the HPS, and if you make an effort to conserve power at your place you could most likely keep your electricity bill unchanged.
thats funny when i moved from cfl's to MH my growth almost completly stopped ...... i think it was just the plant though ....... its turning out preety good though looking pretty dankish ....... good luck
Well right now they're still only seedlings (like 5 days old now), and they're doing just fine under four 28 watt daylight fluoros (i plan to add more as the project goes on), so I'm gonna stick it out til either it starts to die due to lack of light or she shows preflowers: in either case I will bust out the 400 watt hps light now. But I definately will take your advice on getting an air blower. Previously I attempted to use two 90 cfm computer fans which did a fine job cept the reflector I got with the light doesn't have any area for the fans to be attached to so I just put them right under the light. It was ok but it heated up so much my room got to 90 degrees fareinheit in the winter . . . so I shut down operations cuz most of my plants were dying from heat stress anyway . . . now i'm starting up with fluoros in hopes of finding another way of ventilating the ol closet, which is the only place I've got to do it in at the moment other than trying another outside grow.