Flouro lights...good or terrible?

ok im using 2 18" flouro plant lights....at first my plants grew quick, now they've slowed down. 20-something days later, they're about the same size as they were at 10 days, i can't really use anything but flouro's right now because of the small space im growing in, so my question is...is it the light or could it be something else, i realized there were nutes in the original soil i had them in so i moved them to composted soil with sterile potting soil, and am using distilled water once a week, and misting every 2 days if the soil gets too dry. i have the lights on 24/0 but the plants wont grow, its killing me! somebody has to have input...I've grown outdoors with hardly any problems, but indoors is a whole new ball park, any feedback would be greatly appreciated-

Storm

hey storm.. can you post some pictures?

no need to mist.

cheers

It doesn't sound like you have enough light to me. You have to remember the bigger the get the more light they'll need to grow. Also, how big is your pot?

maybe get a bunch of cfls instead of the long tubes, the lumens are spread over the whole tube where as a cfl shoots it out closer together and you can fit more than a big tube.

The more light the better.

hey thanks for the input, i had thought of putting cfl's in but im worried about the heat, i try to be cautious with fire hazards and since i have a closet thats about 3' width, 2' depth, and 5' 6" height im trying to avoid anything putting out too much heat.

I'll post some pics up tonight when i get home, so you can see what i'm working with...

also is the once a week watering a good idea? when we grew outdoors they thrived in warm dry soil with natural rain cycles, and once every week and a half sometimes once in 2 weeks we'd water...growing indoors is so much different, i dont want to rot the roots

thanks again,

Storm

check the soil every day but water every other day or maybe every 2 days depending on how quickly your soil dries out. Just let the soil completly dry out and then water. cfls create very little heat and with a relativly small fan you shouldn't see too much of a rise. Someone correct me if Im wrong but Im pretty sure it takes a hell of a lot of cfls to create a legetimate fire hazard. those 23 w ones put out very little heat. the 46w one put out quite a bit more but you need a lot less and they are more effective. A lot of people on this site play around with ms paint and design their grow rooms or cabs, maybe try that out and see how best to fit a bunch of cfls and a fan and hopefully some kind of in/out air circulation.

hey thanks for the info on the cfl's i'll probably try that soon, seeing as i'm now down to one plant....and if this one dies too im just going to rebuild/rethink my area i'm growing in, the pot size is small seeing as the plant is small, about 4"x4" (5" depth) for now, when/if it gets bigger i'll be moving it to a deeper pot...any ideas on that for future ref?

this is the plant....




this is the grow space

I dont understand why people are always trying to grow with cfl's. You will never grow anything truly impressive with CFl's. I bought a 250 watt hps for 91.00 bucks, it puts out 27,000 lumens, your cfl's dont provide 1/5 the lumens. The only time you dont want to go HID is when you are gonna have heat problems cuase these lights do get hot.
Sack up and get a real light. I just dont get it.

sure said:

I dont understand why people are always trying to grow with cfl's. You will never grow anything truly impressive with CFl's. I bought a 250 watt hps for 91.00 bucks, it puts out 27,000 lumens, your cfl's dont provide 1/5 the lumens. The only time you dont want to go HID is when you are gonna have heat problems cuase these lights do get hot.
Sack up and get a real light. I just dont get it.

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because not everybody has the space, in that tiny area that'd fry that little thing fer sure. so if that cabinet is the best available indoors, then HIDs aren't really an option. if he had a whole bedroom to work with and he was still using floros, then yea, wtf. but he's basically growing in a shoe box for now.

check my pics and past posts

hey its YOUR lights, flouresents in general arnt bad but those lights suck , i had the same ones and they killed my plant!!!!!! CFL's rock for your situation, they wont create a fire unless YOU wire them wrong or leave exposed wires to touch...etc... they are a lot safer than HID lights for heat reasons and i find they work great!

appreciate the input,

Ganjageek-i ditched those fluros awhile back, i'm running a 100% cfl setup in the cab now, 2 plants growing steady 83F constant temp with fans...

it has the possibility to hold 8 cfl's however when you have so many in a small area it became obvious the fans couldn't vent all the heat, with 8 bulbs pumping it was at 97F so i cut it back to 6 and its looking great optimal humidity and temps are steady.

JP- was that fluro diagonal across the plant? no burning issues? looks good to me, i have fixtures for a two 3 foot fluro double tubes im waiting to use for the sides, when i pull the shelf out, if you have any idea if it's a good idea let me know.

thanks,
Storm

jprocket69 said:

check my pics and past posts

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looks skiny as a meth addict person LOL

consider venting with an inline duct fan through the ceiling into the attic if your room is on the top floor or out the side if on an outside wall. Ceiling would be best as heat rises. This will take care of both heat and odor then you can burn as many CFL's as you want. You will have to deal with the odor eventually. You can even go to HID lighting in that space with good ventilation. I have a dresser sized space with 150 watt HPS and 4 23 watt T5's for side light with a 6" inline duct fan venting to the outside and heat /odor is not an issue.

Are you still on the same grow? I just noticed that this thread is 4 months old.

edcocks said:

Are you still on the same grow? I just noticed that this thread is 4 months old.

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well that's a good question LOL

nah new grow now i learned some of my old ways were terrible, i only grow really to experiment but now i have two plants that are growing well under cfl's though i've been considering the tubes, the HID would be great but the way this thing is i have no way to properly vent until summer, when i'll be running a "home made" duct thru a window nearby but that will most likely be yet another grow I'll post some pics of what it looks like now though to update....though as i said it's pure experimental, check my gallery to see some of the things i've been doing....btw if you see the pic with sand....sand doesn't work for very long as a top to your soil medium...don't try it lol

Man, to answer you're question, Fluro's will be able to start you're plant (Veg) But you will need to beef up and get a HPS to get those thick dense bud's you're after.