If youve done your research you'd know that UV-B increases THC production during flowering.. My question is, considering a 26watt CFL (repti-sun/repti-glo) has 10.0 [10% UV-B], is this 2.6w of UV-B? (26w x 10%). If im using 286 x 1w LEDs, is 6% (18 UV LED Bulbs) too much for a 2' x 2' x 3' cab?
That doesnt really have anything to do with what i asked. Too much UV can stress a plant and considering I will have 18w of UV running 12 hours a day (they will be incorporated into 120w panel) will i be using too much? If someone could give me a correct answer to the first question i asked im sure this would help me tremendously. If what i asked is correct, I see people only using 1 or 2 bulbs of 2.6w UV-B whilst using either 250/400/600/1000w bulbs. Thats a low saturation of UV-B in contrast to total output in grow room.
I dont have first hand experience with the LED UVB bulbs, so thats a good question. ill guess though, based on my experiences. Ive used 52w of the 10.0 bulbs for the full photoperiod in flowering, with no reprocussions. ranging from 4-10 inches from the bulbs, depending on which budsite youre counting from lol. thats nearly 5w of UVB (assuming the straight 10%) on constant in the photoperiod. I'd imagine 6w wouldnt be much harder. If you could set them on a separate timer from the other lights, go 4/4/4 off/on/off for a couple weeks, and see how they do. Should be a much milder introduction. This next grow (my journal now) is vegging with the 52w uvb bulbs added to the veg lighting for 6 hours. When I flip to flower, the plan is to gradually increase either the duration of the bulbs (to the full photoperiod), or keep it at 6 hrs (maybe even 4) but double the bulbs, for 104w total. Im leaning towards the latter, as 4 points of UVB production would give a fairly decent spread of the light....nice and even I think youre ok most likely....
haha, I misread you. Youre pulling 18w UVB. I stand by what I said. If you can fashion a 6w panel and a 12w panel, Id veg with the 6w and flower with both. IMO, introducing the plant to a reduced amount negates the 'stress' of the UV light. Im not a big fan of the "stress" argument, fwiw. also, I do run a ceramic metal halide bulb in flower, which throws UV light as well. I dont have the numbers (philips hasnt released the info yet), so I dont know how much, but it IS there. So, im definately closer to 10w minimum I would say. If I do the 4 bulbs in flower, thats 10.4w + the CMH (whatever it is)....thats 15w minimum? maybe 20w?
Thanks for your reply amoril. Ive decided im going to go with 4 UV bulbs per 120w panel. These will be run for the whole 12 hours during flowering. As soon as the lights have arrived and i have setup the rest of the cab properly ill start a journal, probably 2 weeks at most. Happy toking