pr0fesseur

Originally Posted by pr0fesseur

Actinic IS blue... more precisely Actinic is the FAR blue range
The first line in WIKIPEDIA
"Actinic light is either light that affects photographic film,[1] or will facilitate photosynthesis or stimulate light sensitive species"

There are different Actinic bulbs out on the market. And it IS kind of intimidating on which one to buy. But there are some factors we should take into account!!!
First Lets look at Spectrum. without too much explaination ill show you some pictures. the First pic is the "Super Actinic" These bulbs are ALL a DEEP BLUE color and while they look cool really do not have a good PAR value. There are Better Bulbs to Stimulate plant Growth.

The second Picture is the Bulbs that i call 450's(actinic Plus). These bulbs usually have a spike @420nm and an arch @450nm

From here we move onto the "Special" Actinic These vary by as many combinations as there are companies that make them and most DAYLIGHT bulbs follow this model. A large majority of bulbs from 20000K
to 12000K
After 12000K the lights start to produce more yellow..~@549nm and ~@610 More of the light your eyes see as white! "Cool White" then the color trickles down lower and more "warm White" by adding more of these colors and less blue...

I would stay away from the "Special" Actinics like the plague and here's why. By adding these Unnecessary bands of light the bulb is not producing bands of "useful" light when other bulbs produce a large majority in a single agea and greater PAR.
For example
The typical "Bloom" bulb Notice not that much going on, yeah they work.. but look at my Red and my *PURPLE*
By mixing these various bulbs we can more accurately target the plants needs By Providing More "Usable" light i dont waste Money on heating due to inefficiency in the lamp to produce the proper spectrum.. T5 has MASSIVE potential..you can get it REALLY close to the plants and it has GREAT penetration with the "Right" light!





BTW i WILL journal this post if anyone misses it. I


Did everyone miss this but me? I thought i would be amongst MANY users growing like this... :/ turns out its only ME