Quality of weed grown with fluorescent lights?

**Pupu** · 05-12-2010, 09:13 PM

Just one female got in the box being in the eight liter container. There is space for twelve containers, but I will only put twelve plants If they are small clones or seedlings.

Ideally, for flowering, they will be two rows of three plants planted in twelve liter pots, toped and trained with branches of each row pointing towards the laterals of the box.

I have a big disappointing ...twelve of the tubes, two HO & ten HE, are powered by Phillips electronic ballasts, 30$ each, one for every two tubes. My light meter shows 32k-37k lux for the 39W HO and 24k-27k lux for the 21W HE with the meter touching the plastic shield. The other three 21W HE tubes are powered by Chinese ballasts, 1.3$ each, one for each tube ...and my meter in the same position reads 29k-32k lux

I am so curios about dry weight of the buds on the big plant..................

I have to get some serious seeds ..these are bagseed from a schwag with trillions of seeds. I have now a AK47 that was single in a bag of killer weed ..but anyway, here in eastern europe all the weed is "AK47" or "WW".
I really wish some Top 44 seeds ..I've smoked it last year in Holland and was a ton of laugh.

The box draws 360W total.

**growone** · 05-13-2010, 03:41 PM

i can see why you mentioned high cost, that's expensive ballasts
did you order those, or buy local? of course that's water over the dam

**Pupu** · 05-13-2010, 07:40 PM

Ordered on-line from a guy that is stealing them, i think, from his workplace. I paid "only" 110$ for 6 pieces.

**growone** · 05-13-2010, 07:51 PM

that doesn't sound too bad, the $30 price must be the retail price$
i asked because i just bought a 4 tube fluoro electronic ballast, it was a GE
it was around $20, but that's in the USA at a Home Depot
still mulling a scrog, which was my plan, maybe in the near future

**Pupu** · 05-13-2010, 09:33 PM

Indeed you can not compare prices between Europe & US.

1 gallon of gas is 6.5$ here

1Kwh is 0.15$

**xMaYHeM** · 12-23-2012, 08:15 PM

Originally Posted by 10jed

many people believe that the light spectrum from warm (2700K) floros will flower with better resin production. I think most will agree that cool or mixed spectrum floros are as good if not better than anything for veg.

the biggest difference in the use of floros vs HPS is that HPS does a far better job of penetrating the canopy, but with proper techniques you can keep the bulk of your bud sites at an even level and get very good performance from floros! The big advantage to floros is that you can place your plants as close as 3 or 4 inches from the bulbs, so for a lot of people who are working in a small space it is the only option. By proper techniques I mean scrog or lst, and when I say you can keep them 3-4 inches away from the bulbs, I'm saying that you should.

as for the tubes... it depends on what you are talking about here, and how much space you are trying to light. In my flower cab I use CFLs (the curled up floros that screw into a regular socket) and I am very pleased with my results. I currently run 6@ 42 watt CFLs in a 20"x14"x30" space and like I say I am very pleased. Last summer I only had 4 of the 42 watt bulbs and that worked well too. When summer heat comes back I may have to pull the extra 2 out due to heat. Keep in mind that when I say 42 watt I mean 42 and not a "42 watt equivalent". the equivolent rating on the 42's is 200 watt.

Typical "shop lights" (t-8's or t-12's) may or may not produce any smokable bud... I'm going with a maybe and most likely not anything to brag about. The 3 most popular flouro options are T-5 bulbs, PL-L bulbs, or CFLs. The first advantage of the t5's (tubes) and PL-L's (plug in sockets) are that they use an external ballast and you can put that outside of your grow to divert some of the heat... not a lot but some. The other advantage, and probably the biggest one when using them in a cabinet, is that because of their thin tubular design they don't take up much height and distribute light evenly.

Good Luck!

Jed

Hm, so if I were to grow outside, but supplement the light during veg for 3 hours every night with a standard shop light, would it works to prolong veg? I have started my season late and want to still have a long veg time.

**hotrodharley** · 12-23-2012, 08:25 PM

Originally Posted by xMaYHeM

Hm, so if I were to grow outside, but supplement the light during veg for 3 hours every night with a standard shop light, would it works to prolong veg? I have started my season late and want to still have a long veg time.

Depends. If plain T8 low wattage shop lights, probably not much. Are you planning on changing bulbs to grow friendly spectrum/temp? 6500 for veg.

**xMaYHeM** · 12-24-2012, 04:31 AM

Originally Posted by hotrodharley

Depends. If plain T8 low wattage shop lights, probably not much. Are you planning on changing bulbs to grow friendly spectrum/temp? 6500 for veg.

Ideally I want to buy a decent light to pair with this shop light asap. Do you think $40 could cover it? I'm on a pretty tight budget.
I have 4 plants that have just sprouted two days ago, and I'm running them at 18/6 with 14ish hours of sunlight and 4 with this light.
I'm actually not sure what wattage this light is, because I found it in my back shed and it has no labels on it :O
The people that used to live here just left it.
The temperature where I've got them is at about 20 degrees C at nights, owing to the summer weather plus the little heat the my light emits.
Here's how I've got it set up right now! Is that fine?
light.jpg

**ASMALLVOICE** · 12-24-2012, 02:21 PM

I use 2' 4 bulb 6500k T5 lights, and I love them for my Mom/Clone and Veg Cabinets. I can keep 10 seedlings in 1 gallon pots for a while and get very even growth. The plants react quickly to the distance the light is from the plant and you can damn near stretch/squish them to the density you want before you throw them into the world of HIDs
On a side note, they run right at 80*F on the top and make great heaters for cloning trays. My clones are loving the heat. Pic is grow under T5 at a little under 2 weeks from seed pop.
52359.jpg

Peace and Great Grows

Asmallvoice