Alright today I went out to buy stuff for this micro in going to be starting in a week or so. I bought my grow box soil nutes Mylar a therm and everything else but when it came to the lights it said wattage equivalent which I'm not sure what it means? I bought these two packs thinking they were 100 watt bulbs an 150 watt bulbs in different spectrums but now I'm not so sure so I'll ask you guys are these alright? Any feedback would be highly appreciated thanks!
The equivalent wattage is just comparing CFL lumen output to the old type bulbs. The older type bulbs put out a lot less light for the same wattage, that's why these have equivalents. For marijuana growth, ignore equivalents completely. It'd be useful if some people were using the old bulbs to grow, but nobody is. Basically, we are limited to LEDs, HID, and Cfl. HID puts out more light than a CFL per watt, and I've got no clue on LED. I think LED panels actually are the most efficient, since they run cooler than the magma filled bulbs in HID ballasts. My suggestion is to get a lot more. Run as many as you can fit. CFL bulbs work, but not the greatest. It's like taking a Prius to a drag strip; you'll make it to the end... but your results aren't going to be very good. You just need to know, going into a CFL grow not to really expect a ton of bud. You MAY pull a few grams if you just ran those 2 bulbs. The work to grow almost outweighs the shitty yield.
Your right they are two different spectrums. It's recommended that you use 100w per plant or so and that is using the actual wattage not the equivalent. So for veg use 2-3 of the daylight bulbs and one soft white for one plant.
So how would I find the actual wattage of these? Because if I have to use like 5 then I'd rather just go out and buy a high wattage day an night spectrum bulbs an just use two instead of a buttfuck of them do they even sell like 100w cfls??
Your going to want about 3000 lumens sq/ft. So appx 2 lights, one of each spectrum per sq/ft. And they do make some massive cfls too but they can be kind of spendy.
[quote name='"Jugganate"']Your going to want about 3000 lumens sq/ft. So appx 2 lights, one of each spectrum per sq/ft. And they do make some massive cfls too but they can be kind of spendy.[/quote] Do you know of any convenient store off hand thy carries these massive cfls?
I've never seen them in any place other than like home depot. What's the size of your grow, how many plants?
I would keep the ones you have. I would recommend using two daylight lights for the first few weeks but when it gets bigger you will want to add some more light. Then use the soft white for flowering or mix the daylight with soft white lights for best results.
lowes had the HUGE ones once for $20 i believe. Me and a buddy couldn't believe how big of a cfl it was lol. Might have been 300w equil?
"Marijuana buds for less: 8 ounces's of bud for under 100$" by See More Buds is a very good simplified day to day grow journal in the book. It shows you how someone could get 8 ounces of bud growing one mango plant and two blue dot clones using CFLs. The book is set up in a way where any new grower could follow it with ease. It shows you how the plant develops from day to day. Oh. And you what the light from the side of the CFL. A CFL doesn't give off as much light from the bottom.
add some fluorescent bulbs to it, they only cost about $7 where I live (for a complete 54watt TL 8, produces about 5k lumen available in 2700K and 4000K). These are very cheap, lowcost when running adding some decent light. Is mostly used for veg stage but in combo with CFL's do well. If you can get cheap T5's then by all means purchase these, but TL8 you can buy at any store around and won't cost you much...
LOL yea it's foil. I spent a mere 100 bucks on this setup. Well it's 2 inches away from the little seedling. Also how do I cool this fucker down?
And also. I have 3 bulbs. Ive got 2 6500 23 watt 1450 lumen cfls and a 40watt 2700 2600 lumen cfl. Which combo of these do you guys think would be best for this stage of my little baby? Right now ive got the 2700 and one 6500
The 6500 for now. Always 6500 when growing. 2700 for flowering. Try to get at least 100 watts total per plant. Lose the aluminum foil and just paint the whole inside flat white. The creases in the aluminum foil will cause hot spots. Cool with computer box fans. One blowing in at the bottom. One sucking out at top. 3 inch at least out through 3 inch PVC pipe with a minimum of one 45 degree elbow. Two is better. So when you go to 12/12 no light gets in.