Latewood's 'little guide' to Lighting...No theory, just info!

[latewood]

I invite you all to comment and add your $.02 worth, or just learn something. :p

This is actually a reply that I made last night on another thread. I thought it might be useful to newer members who are constanly being bombarded with "Grow lamp info" so I am going to post it as a Thread...Perhaps it can be stuck somewhere for reference... :cool:

I am building my own lights , now, and will be posting a step by step tutorial
of 1000 watt ballast and mogul base w/custom chords. Featuring a beautiful brand new Eye Hortilux High pressure sodium bulb!!! :D :D

Here is a straight-up tutorial about lighting, no theory, just info

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

:eek: NO HALOGENS :eek: ...you can get cheap cfl's at wally's 42-45w/150 for 8-9 bucks...

You can go to home depot, now; and get some 100-150w cfl's for 25-35 bucks I believe...home depot also carry 250 and 400 MH lamps now.

Some people say that cfl's don't work, :rolleyes: but if you want to learn to grow, you can definitely grow using these lights. You will just have a smaller yield, than HID's...

JUST FOR THE RECORD: Lights you can use to grow with from weakest to strongest...i.e., what you can use; right through to what, you should use...for the best results...
2/4 foot tube fluoros...for; seedlings/veg

cfl's...(spiral)/(security light-minimum of 42-125watts 8-40 bucks for; seedlings/veg

cfl's...full spectrum/dual spectrum...90-120 watts 70-120 bucks for; seedlings/veg

small HID lamps, this includes MH (metal halide ) and HPS (high pressure sodium)...80-250 watts 15-80 bucks (limited upgrade bulbs available at this size) for; veg/flower

Big HID lamps 400-1000 watts 15-140 bucks (you can get cheap bulbs, but the light spectrum won't be as wide, limiting growth potential)
Good bulbs are fuller in spectrum, have enhanced spectrums, and generally have a higher lumens output... for; veg/flower...

conversion bulbs can be purchased when you only have 1 light and want change MH(veg) to HPS(flower) or vice versa...these are the highest priced bulbs 120-150 bucks...

I know this goes beyond your question, but so many of you little sprouts, just don't get the lighting issue, yet; so I thought I would try to clear it up for you with this simple little guide...remember,the first rule of growing indoors; imho; You cannot be 'chincy' with your lighting, unless you just want a couple of joints to brag about...hope this helps :)

[Mctuffet]

thank y0ou very much sir.

[latewood]

I'll bump this up for the weekend rush...might post pics of each different light, later,
If I get some replies...

[SittinStoney420]

Hey, money isnt a huge issue for me right now im just trying to find something that works,i have a sodium bulb for my flowering closet. Which i know will work fine, but im not sure about my veg lighting i just purchased a 48 in floro tube bulb and i was wondering if that would take my plant through a healthy veg growth. It produces 1400 lumens and i have it in a small space covered in mylar. Thanks for your input man.

[latewood]

Hey, money isnt a huge issue for me right now im just trying to find something that works,i have a sodium bulb for my flowering closet. Which i know will work fine, but im not sure about my veg lighting i just purchased a 48 in floro tube bulb and i was wondering if that would take my plant through a healthy veg growth. It produces 1400 lumens and i have it in a small space covered in mylar. Thanks for your input man.

1400 lumens is not enough...that would work minimally for seedlings or cuttings...imho
Get full spectrum cfl's or.....before I can truly answer this...I need to know;
...how big is your veg area?
...How many plants are you shooting for?

[BILL THICK]

The opportunity to pose a lighting question I have pondered has afforded itself the chance by this thread and your invitation to delve into the exchanging of ideas and sharing of knowledge and discussing lighting so I hope you don't mind me asking your thoughts and opinions on my area of curiosity.......

...... you have a 6' by 12' flowering room with an 8' ceiling and you have 2 1000 watt Hps do you think it would be more beneficial to yield to grow say 12 plants under more intense lighting in say 2/3's of the room using both lights in an area 6' by 8' or grow more plants (say 18 0r 20plants) under less intense lighting by using the whole room 6' by 12' with the same 2 1000k hps covering the larger are but with obviously less lumens than the smaller area with less plants??? Better yeild with large area and more plants or smaller area with less plants??

Hope I am not hacking on your thread Latewood but I think you may be able to shed some light on the subject( lol..... :D shed some light on the subject).You seem to be offering your help to us all and I appreciate that :stoned:

Thanks
Bill

[latewood]

I would advise you to buy light movers and get great intensity all over the 6x12...I also believe that you get good coverage in a 6x6 area w/1000w...
or 6x12 with 2/1000w... :thumbsup: either way, you have to move the plants around or you have to move the lights...to achieve the best results yield...hope this answered you query... and, NO, You are not messing up anything here...I appreciate you participating in the great big discussion on lighting...
I posted this thread because of all the same Q's over and over...what is this? what is that? blah blah blah...By having positive participation; we can address issues of lighting, right here!!! I would have already posted pix of different bulbs, but I have been busy on my step by step...check it out :D http://boards.cannabis.com/showthread.php?t=34253...later

[latewood]

....................................somebody needs this.............................................. ...

[SigmaGenosys]

how many CFL's should i use if i have 5 plants in a bubbler system? I have one 150W on it right now and i figured when i switch to flowering ill put another on it. Or maybe i should have 3 for flowering.... what do you think?

[latewood]

cfl's are great . but you need a few of them in order to get the girls going...I would get at least 4 and buy some ceramic light receptacles and take a board or piece of plywood and cut it the length of your grow...mark where the receptacles go...
then drill a hole for your wires and feed pigtails through hole...screw receptacles to board...wire them all together with romex...make a chord, screw in bulbs and place over plants...you have 600 watts of cfl lighting
...You need one per plant or 2, but the more the better...I am building one of these and will post a stepbystep when I'm done...hope this helps you out, if not let me know.
keep in mind...the more light=more yield...imho

[latewood]

a quick bump for the newbs

[mightymarijuanabuds]

good info here late .. nice thread :thumbsup:

let me just add that CFL's often have 2 ratings on them... the REAL wattage, and the wattage equivalency of a incandescent.... the 150w cfl you get in the store is not a 150w, but a 42w or 45w that puts out as much light as a 150w incandescent... the 125w CFL's (like envirolite) need to be bought at a garden store and require a mogul base, where normal CFL's will go into any normal light socket

also, you didn't cover why incandescent lights suck :D

basically, they produce more heat than light per watt, and that can be difficult to control temps in a closed space... plus they just waste electricity because of that... a CFL puts out way more light with way less electricity, and can be bought in cool (blue) or warm (red) white :twocents:

[HydroDynamics]

Wanted to bump this and add that you can use Highbay lights from Ebay (MH, not HPS as Highbays are rare in HPS), got me a 400W unit for under 50 bucks shipped. Quick trip down to the Hardware store for some sheet metal, chain, s-hooks, and eye-screws and will have myself a 400W MH with reflector for about 60 bucks, just great for the seedling/Veg cabinet/room!! Out with the four 4' flouros after they get a few inches tall and in with the MH!

Learning that you don't have to spend alot, just spend it wisely!!!

[mobay]

thanks for the info lakewood. one question my grow room is 4x6 , can i use a 1000 watt hps. thats 840 sq ft

[BOYZNUS]

[QUOTE=mightymarijuanabuds]good info here late .. nice thread :thumbsup:

let me just add that CFL's often have 2 ratings on them... the REAL wattage, and the wattage equivalency of a incandescent.... the 150w cfl you get in the store is not a 150w, but a 42w or 45w that puts out as much light as a 150w incandescent...

WHY IS REAL AND EQUIVALENT RATING DIFFERANT?? I THOUGHT THE RATINGS WERE,, 100 WATTS OF LIGHT FOR ONLY 45 WATTS OF POWER. LUMENS WERE THE SAME. AM I WRONG?

SORRY LATE FOR INTERUPTING UR THREAD BUD. THNX

[mightymarijuanabuds]

yea thats right.. the lumens (not a very good measure of light.. but anyway) output from the 45w CFL is equal to that of the 150w incandescent... but the incandescent puts out WAY more heat and of course uses about 3x as much power

so to say we have a 150w CFL (do they make those?? i have only seen the 125w envirolights...) means it would have to be equal to 450w of incandescent light.. id like to see one of those LOL

of course we can't alway apply that .. .because i have replaced all the 60w incandscent bulbs in my house with the equally rated cfl, which ended up being 13w.. so now all the bulbs in my house use up about as much as one did before :P

you are right, the amount of light output is the same, just the amount of heat put out and power used are different, but it is important to make light of the difference between real and equivalent ratings so the newb folk don't get too confused the first time they are out buyin lights :D

[BOYZNUS]

[QUOTE=mightymarijuanabuds]
so to say we have a 150w CFL (do they make those?? i have only seen the 125w envirolights...) means it would have to be equal to 450w of incandescent light.. id like to see one of those LOL


THE CFL'S HERE ARE 45/100. SO QUESTION IS,,, DO I HAVE 900W IN MY VEG ROOM, OR 405W? I HAVE 9 x 45/100 CFL'S.

[mightymarijuanabuds]

you have 405w of CFL :thumbsup:

IF you were using incandescents, you would need 900w to equal the amount of light that you have now, which would easily drive tempertures way out of control and fry your plants... even if it were feasible, you would be more than doubling the cost in electricity

heat / electricity / lower light output are the 3 main reasons why incandescent lights suck, and shouldn't ever be used in a grow.

CFL lights can be had in the same and even better spectrums, there is no good reason to use incandescents over CFL.

[BOYZNUS]

AMEN MMB

[latewood]

I meant 150w cfl's, it might be 125w...bigger than you guys are talking about...and no-ones interrupting this thread...that what it is here for.

You are right, 45 watt cfl's = to 150 watt output, lumens wise...
at hompot...they have some 125 w cfl's now...big ass lights...as well as more powerful elongated cfl's...keep in mind, they are not all corkscrew shaped.

[mightymarijuanabuds]

ohyea i think i saw those ... CFL flood lights right?
they still need a mogul socket, but i guess you can buy the whole fixture as one piece and wire it up yourself

ill have to look into that :D

[latewood]

thanks for the info lakewood. one question my grow room is 4x6 , can I use a 1000 watt hps. thats 840 sq ft
.thus getting the benefits of extra light coverage, all around...(I tend to want "bunch" mine close and rotate them 2-3 times daily for good light coverage with only one light) I have 6' light rail now and it allows me more plants and better overall yield per plant.
my flower room is 4x7 and I use 1000w hortilux...

[cactusman23]

I've aquired a magnatek 150w ballast with a capacitor and ignitor, it is wired together with a cord and a medium socket. what could i use to make a remote ballast?

[postmandave]

latewood i know this thread is about lighting but ive been told your th4e man when it comes down to nutes, the thing is there is loads of differant shit around and im looking for one set way to grow i have decided on lst every grow as i like messing with training the plant,so what im looking for is good nute programme i use canna nutes just now and they are fine but there has to be better right, so if you could recomend a couple of your own ideas i will get the nutes you suggest and see what i like , thanks for the time and sorry for hijacking this thread , the postman.

[latewood]

latewood i know this thread is about lighting but ive been told your th4e man when it comes down to nutes, the thing is there is loads of differant shit around and im looking for one set way to grow i have decided on lst every grow as i like messing with training the plant,so what im looking for is good nute programme i use canna nutes just now and they are fine but there has to be better right, so if you could recomend a couple of your own ideas i will get the nutes you suggest and see what i like , thanks for the time and sorry for hijacking this thread , the postman.That's OK...I started this to try and create a dialogue and it started out great, but I don't have tits and I haven't threatened to Kill anybody, so It dropped; LOL. Thanks for bumping it up.

Starting with RO/distilled water...your ph will be much more consistent, if you don't use tap...buy gh or pro ph up/down, you will need it...It is under 20 bucks.

I use 3-part...AN(advanced nutrients) or GH(general hydroponics)
Or...pure blend pro(organic), make sure you get soil or hydro formula, they make each.

1st I add calmag+ to replenish minerals removed by reverse-osmosis process.

I add Liquid karma... you can stop here. LK goes with pure blend pro. this would be a really simple safe 1st time recipe.

Want More?

Botanicare's Line(organic)
pure blend pro
calmag+
liquid karma
sweet
..are what I use if I want to grow organic(my tomato's and peppers)

I finish off rez with hygrozyme and all is good.

In the Advanced Nutrient line...For flower, added to above recipe, consecutively...phase II
I add bud blood...1 week only, for faster stronger flower sets

week 2-5 switch to big bud, high potassium

week 6-7 switch to overdrive, releases the oils/resin

week 8 flush no nutes. use AN final phase or GH Flora kleen.

hope this answers your question.

Liquid Karma contains 1/2 the humic acid rceommended for optimum nutrient uptake. So, I also add 1/2 a dose of humic acid. I use Europonic Fossil Fuel. I will warn you, Straight up; this stuff looks like motor oil...It will stain your roots. somewhat. Not for the timid, rof&lmao
later lw

for future reference you can post in Madman goes aero. I will always answer, disregard crap with stormcooker, he has always attacked me without provocation.

the thread was meant to be a build thread, but since Zandor stuck it, jusrt communicate with me there.
Maybe some-one will start talking about light again.

speaking of lights. I now have 1 cool 48" fluoro tube, great for clones/seedlings
4 45/150 cfl's clones seedlings, satellite vegging
1 250 hps son agromax
1 400 mh sunmaster-warm
1 1000 hps hortilux
2 1000 MH Agrosun gold

really, I am posting this time.:smokin:

[postmandave]

latewood your a diamond geezer my freind i will follow this to the letter thank you very much, and now to lights lol, right i am using 6 x 85watt cool blue flurecent tubes for clones, (why that many as they came for free from a dear relative of mine) anyway i use a 1000 wattmh for veg but the thing is that my ballast is a 1000 watt mh /hps but i have plants in flower so i cant use the mh bulb , my young plants are under the flurecent tubes , questoin is , how long will they be ok under the fluros until they will have to go under the mh, the plants in flower have 2 weeks or so left and the young plants are 3 weeks old , will they be ok or will i have to go and get another 1000 watt mh ballast , thanks for your time geezer, the postman.

[latewood]

latewood your a diamond geezer my freind i will follow this to the letter thank you very much, and now to lights lol, right i am using 6 x 85watt cool blue flurecent tubes for clones, (why that many as they came for free from a dear relative of mine) anyway i use a 1000 wattmh for veg but the thing is that my ballast is a 1000 watt mh /hps but i have plants in flower so i cant use the mh bulb , my young plants are under the flurecent tubes , questoin is , how long will they be ok under the fluros until they will have to go under the mh, the plants in flower have 2 weeks or so left and the young plants are 3 weeks old , will they be ok or will i have to go and get another 1000 watt mh ballast , thanks for your time geezer, the postman.It seems you have a nice fluorotube set-up...I think as long as you keep your 6 x 85w fl...as close as you can get it, so as to prohibit stretching, you could use these fluoros thru entire veg!
Hell, you have almost 500 watts on' em...I wish I had one of those. a couple of Q's
how hot does it get? your 6 x 85? and, you can find a used 1000 watt MH ballast assembly on ebay for about 50 bucks, if you are patient.

[postmandave]

Thank latewood, the clone box is 7ft long, 6ft high. and 4 ft deep, the ballst in the fluro tubes can get quit hot if my exaust fan is stopped, i have inlet vents at bottom of box wi have a oscilating fan on constintley blowing derect to the light , this keeps the temp at 76, but when i stopp the fan rises tramaticaly until i open then it drops to 79 it drops to 7 6when doors
are open, but it works great as when i get the temo so high i omploamate co2 ans it works fer me but i need a flower box with 2x600 watt mh, thanks for your hel, happy growing osirus.

[latewood]

your welcome and thanks for the info on the 6x86's, bro

[latewood]

T bump

[bombdiggity]

hey guys - Im going to start growing this weekend - provided that my seeds arrive, and I have yet to decide on a lighting source.

I am going to be growing in a 3' x 4' closet and I want to spend about $100 or less.. I guess my best choice would be HPS/MH.. and I could just buy the MH bulb now and wait till flowering to buy the HPS.

Any suggestions?

[PharmaCan]

Latewood â?? Thanks for this thread. I understand the different types of lights and their various functions, but Iâ??m confused as to the number of lights needed for a larger (20â?? x 20â?? x 8.5â??) grow room.

Assuming that the room will be used exclusively for either veg or flower at any given time and that the lights will be stationary (i.e. no tracks. Obviously they will be adjustable vertically.) How many HID lights in what kind of configuration would be necessary for optimum crop yield? I guess another way of asking this is what is the optimum effective footprint of a 1000W HID light?

BTW â?? if the plants get too big and bushy, I will supplement with fluorescents in between the rows of plants.

Any advice you can offer is greatly appreciated!

[bongerstonerd00d]

I am not LW, but here is my take on your question. You would need 16 1000 watt HID lights to get 40 watts per sq. ft. To run that many lights you are going to be drawing ~75% of a 200 amp regular service.....lol Each 1000 watt light would cover a 5'x5' footprint. You could grow trees with that kind of lighting. Then adding 216 watt T5's in between plants, wow. DO NOT try to use the microwave when lights are on........LMAO

Drawing 192+ kwh's a day might get someones attention. By the time you add fans, pumps, etc you are going to using 25-30 dollars/day in electricity. Not many households use 900 month in electricity.....lol

If you are not an electrician, I'd get to know one if I were contemplating such a setup, cause you are going to need one. Thats a lotta amps to be dealing with. And, you would need relays or something controlling a lighting setup such as that. You would not want all 16 lights firing off at the same time I would not think.

Please show us pictures if you do this. It would be a killer setup. My peppers, 'maters, cukes, and herbs would be loving life in such a setup. I am envious to say the least.

.5 gram/watt would be ~18 pounds per harvest..........damn. And with a setup like that I would bet you can do much better than .5 gram/watt.

I hope you got deep pockets. I'd bet it would cost 12-15K or more to get a setup like that up and running. Hell, you are going to have 7K+ in lights alone because you are going to want digi ballasts fer sure.

Buy your nutes by the drum.
You will need a "staff" to do the trimming.
Never leave your house, and get a few BFD's (bfd= big fuckin dogs)

Not sure why you would want to veg in that entire space. I'd have a seperate veg area and veg clones under flouro's versus H.I.D. lights. Once you harvest you could toss vegg'd clones in flower room and be on your way to another crop. Not to mention you would save a shitload in electricity by using flouro's to veg with.

Best of luck and keep us posted on the progress. I will be following this thread closely. Will be interesting to see what LW suggests now and if I was even close to suggesting the right equipment.

b0nger

[latewood]

1000watts with efficient reflector is supposed to have a footprint of 8'x8' with that in mind. I would say 9-1000w 3x3. start 4 feet off any wall and space at 8". goodluck.

p.s. heed electrical costs mentioned above.

[PharmaCan]

Bonger and LW - thanks for the advice. Sadly, there's a big discrepancy between the size of the footprints you mentioned. I guess I'll start with the 8'x8' footprint and add more lighting as needed.

As far as the electrical is concerned, I started pulling wire about 35 years ago, so this is a piece of cake. Without bragging, let me say that this will have one of the finest electrical set ups you have ever seen - helll, you'll be able to put a jacuzzi down there so you can sit in comfort and watch your plants grow - well, from an electrical standpoint anyway. LOL

ROFL - Yeah, I could imagine turning on all those puppies at once. 16 lights or 9, wouldn't matter much which. I want to try to find a computer program that will interface with a controller - start everything up in a logical sequence without having to dick around with many various controls.

I'm building a house. The GR goes under the house. Totally self-contained except the intake and exhaust go through the roof of the house above. The house is going to have solar panels, which will off-set a lot of the electrical use. In any event, I live in a Medical Marijuana state so...

The cloning and vegging will actually take place in a seperate room, under flourescents. This didn't seem relevant to my original question, but happy to provide the information.

The budget, yeah... I'm selling my house and building a new one. Have you ever done that before? I have. One day you're standing there with quite a few hundred thousand dollars, just feeling really good about life in general, then 6 months later you're taking out a mortgage because the price of everything went up the moment you started construction. Grrrr Anyway, I'm spending some relatively big bucks on this entire project and the budget & funding are there.

From one standpoint this is just another construction project - Nothing I haven't done before except for the GR. Construction wise, it's a piece of cake. Since the structure is underground, there's not a whole lot of room for changes after the concrete is poured. I have to size some vent pipe and, since the air cooling system for the lights is a big part of my ventilation demand will be those fans, I need to get a good idea of cfm expectations, which requires a ballpark estimate of the number of lights I'm going to need.

What's an efficient number of lights to run on a quality in-line fan, most likely 6" duct? (Just to be clear, the light-cooling system takes in fresh air from outside and exhausts hot air outside. It is completely independent of and isolated from the GR environment.)

Once again, thanks for the great answers!

[latewood]

I cannot answer the...How many inline fans I need...but my guess would be thatb you can't run more than 2-3 max on a fan, and I would even try that. Perhaps Zandor or one of the bigger growers can help you there.

As far as the 8x8 footprint. that is the industry standard, and you can find that info at any national hydro webpage,, under hydrofarm.
100w 8x8
600w 6x6
400w 4x4
250w 2x3feet
common, the same...no debate. fact.

[postmandave]

Latewood nead some help mate.Im helping out a freind he is growing in a space of 12ft x 19ft 11ft high currently he is using 4 x 1000 watt and a 600 watt but his temps are going out the window.hes venting with a RVK/LTI large fan 200mm 8" 750m³ / hour but still the temps going mad after 4 hours lights on the temp starts creeping up over 78 heading upwards of 80s themn he has to turn of the 600 and 1 x 1000 watt until the temps lower. i Know he could add a biger fan but the noise would then becom a problem cuse he is borderline with the noise of the exaust and inlet .He swithched carbon flilters to the new odorsok but that only helped a bit. im thingkin loose some light and get a mover but would be greatfull if you could add some expertise on this:thumbsup: for us. so they can get best use of this space and equipment .Do you think removing the reflectors and hanging the bulbs would be helpfull or detremental to this problems.thatnks in advance davey the postman

[katyowns]

I feel like you're missing a giant part of lighting by not mentioning T5's!

[doco]

I do luv my T5's but I only use them for vegging and mothers. KDspecial does an awesome job with them for flowering too but he's got a seriously green thumb. Normally I don't think they offer the light penetration for flowering anything but short LST'd plants or scrog.

I do gotta say the T5's produce the shortest internodes I have ever seen....I've had a mother under them that was 4 months old and was only 20" tall.

[katyowns]

I do luv my T5's but I only use them for vegging and mothers. KDspecial does an awesome job with them for flowering too but he's got a seriously green thumb. Normally I don't think they offer the light penetration for flowering anything but short LST'd plants or scrog.

I do gotta say the T5's produce the shortest internodes I have ever seen....I've had a mother under them that was 4 months old and was only 20" tall.


I use a 2 bulb HO T5 for my veg and mothers also. I think it's by far the best bang-for-buck and energy consumption value for veg.

[RedEye69]

I just got a 4' 4 bulb T5 HO for the mothers and clones today and damn thats bright for a flouro. I expect them to do very well for veg. from all I read about them. They're in a 2'x5' closet so HID is out of the question and these are perfect. 20,000 lumens, thats as much as a 250 W MH. At 216 W, a little energy savings and ALOT cooler!!! I love them already.:thumbsup::thumbsup:

[alwayssleepdeprived]

LW I was wonderin if you could offer some advice on which way to go

I have a 6' by 10'ish room with a 7' ceiling and I'm not sure if I should go with 600's or 1k

I'm not sure if the 1k will get too hot to work with that low of a ceiling but I wanna make sure I have enough light

I'm looking at the 240v lumatek digital either 600 or 1k

Any advice you could offer to help push me off one side of the fence would be much appreciated ;-)

Pharmacan go with light movers cause if you are trying to create a room that size it will help cut your draw to a more reasonable level but even at that point you better be comin up with some legit reason for drawing even 300 in electricity a month gl and keep us posted with the direction you take