CFL during Veg. HPS during Flowering

Mabbin247

Member
I need help, I have a 150watt HPS light and was wondering if I should use HPS during Veg and Flowering or 3 or 4 42watt CFL's(200 watt equiv.) and switch to HPS during flowering?????

Any responses= +REP
 

FoolBloom

Active Member
Personally I would just go with the hps all the way. Hid lights just have more umph, but you can do either.
 

Brick Top

New Member
If that is what you have to work with, without making any major changes that is, I would use both the CFL's’ the HPS together for vegging and possibly with some bulb alteration I would continue to use the CFL’s during flower.

HPS will work from start to finish, just as a MH will work from start to finish … but neither works great from start to finish. As I am sure you know during different phases of growth certain Kelvin range light rays are most needed. Others are useful to some degree/amount or another but certain ones are most needed and giving them to your plants will give you better results.

Your HPS is low wattage so unless you are working with a very small space, something you might have mentioned but thanks to Neville’s Haze I already forgot it, you cannot rightly expect all that much out of it. Supplemental lighting from it during veg and from the CFL’s, with some bulb swapping, will make a definite difference, in a positive way.

It is not like unless there is some situation that cannot be overcome, for whatever reason, that someone has to go straight CFL or HID at any one time during a grow, or from start to finish for that fact.

While I detest CFL’s, when working with lower wattage HID lighting CFL’s will supplement the HID lighting and supplement it enough to make it worth doing. What they add in light might not be major but if used correctly what they will add will be worth the cost and effort. They can be positioned easily and at different levels and they can be aimed/targeted at areas of plants that due to low light conditions of a low wattage HID light, the additional light from the CFL’s can turn those non-productive or under-productive area of plants into decent producing areas.

Small but firm buds are better than popcorn and firm medium sized buds instead of small firm buds are a real blessing … and firm big buds … well they speak for themselves. Depending on overall setup and grower skill each of those steps up might be the result of mixing and matching lighting when you use a two type of light system.

Again not being a CFL lover by any means and where from your fairly basic description of your setup you do not appear to be under CFL’ed, for when it comes to vegging one improvement that is never a bad one to consider when using CFL’s is, if you are not already using them, purchase ‘Y’ sockets so where you only had one CLF you can then have two CFL’s.

It doubles your lighting, well it will if you use the same wattage bulbs. If you go up or down in wattage for some it might not double your lighting and it might more than double your lighting, it is up to you, but it would also allow you to mix the Kelvin range up a bit if you want or need to, like if being used as supplemental lighting during flower or to increase the level/amount of blue light in veg to help keep tighter nodal spacing that will be lost if you went straight/total HPS.

Depending on pot size and grow area size and shape at times when using ‘Y’ sockets it works out that you can run a double row, or just a longer row if the grow area shape is more beneficial to that sort of layout, and you can end up with one CLF directly over the top of each plant in each row,or if a single row you can have one CLF just to the side of each plant shining down on the top and sides more equally.

Add some sort of reflective hood or reflectors, if not already in use with the CFL’s, and you will get a lot more out of them. Anything from the various different sized work-light reflectors that can be purchased inexpensively to forming a hood from wide flashing made from aluminum roof flashing formed into a rudimentary reflective hood to inexpensive batwing reflective hoods to a high quality dimpled aluminum reflective hood would each be a step up and while each would give a varying degree of improvement each and every step up that can be made is worth making if there is now no upper reflective material/surface being used with the CFL’s.

Maybe you should considering using more of your lighting, or even increasing it slightly, and using each type of what you have in conjunction with the other rather than thinking along the lines of either or, or when should I consider to mix and match.

Unless it would cause some problem that could not be overcome, for whatever reason, major or minor, I would say use all that you have at your disposal and if you can upgrade at least a little more, or maybe just fine tune what you already have a bit …. use them both together.

That’s my advice.
 

smallclosetgrowr

Well-Known Member
i would use both the hps and cfls for veg and flowering , but if u can only go with 1 type of lights i would go hps all the way ...unless you are Veggin for along time then i would %100 stay with the cfls then hps flowering. your CFLS are 6500k yeah ?
 

tdiddy

Well-Known Member
Yeah, it will not hurt anything to use both the whole time, but you may be losing if you only use one or the other. Go both and youll be good
 

Mabbin247

Member
i would use both the hps and cfls for veg and flowering , but if u can only go with 1 type of lights i would go hps all the way ...unless you are Veggin for along time then i would %100 stay with the cfls then hps flowering. your CFLS are 6500k yeah ?
yes they are 6500k
 
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