HPS Lamp Question..

[Just A Beginner]

Hi everyone..
Starting to set up a grow room, was thinking of 2 1000w HPS lamps to start with, any ideas on how many plants that would cover, or am i better with one Metal Halide & 1 HPS ?
Thanks in advance for all the help :p :thumbsup: :)

[faithless]

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It's quite an advanced set up to just start off with, check this guy out:
http://boards.cannabis.com/showthread.php?t=87140

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[Just A Beginner]

Hey Faithless, thanks for the link, i'm thinking of getting the lamps as i start to basically save myself money in the future, meaning buying one set of lamps only to buy those later on

[BONG0]

1000 watts wil cover alot of space and 2 even more, if ur space isent huge u dont need that much watage it would get very hot unless your space is large anough and well ventalated, get a HPS ballas and 1 HPS bulb and 1 MEtal Halide both of the same wattage you can run your Metal Halide in the same ballast as the HPS of the same wattage.

[Just A Beginner]

Hey Bongo, the room we will be usin is 11' x 12', and i'd say about 9'x9' will have plant growing in it, would the 2 x 1000w lamps still be too much?, i just don't wanna buy too low a wattage only to go out and buy more, as you know they arent that cheap..

[BlueBear]

9x9 would need about 4 to 5 1000w's to get decent coverage with the 50W's per square ft rule of thumb.
Any how, buyying 2 1000w's the lights would be the cheapest part most likely, after hoods, possibly air cooled or cool tubes, substantial inline fan, scrubber, possible AC unit and other misalanious items, nutes and so on you would be thinking that the lights were the cheepest part of the set up.
Adieu

[xcrispi]

hey j.a.b
my spot's exactly the same size as well as the area wanting to be actually grown , 9 x 9 , in a 11 x 12 room . i use 2 -1000w. hps . start to finish and have no problems . i use 6in. cooltubes and a damn good 6in. hurricane fan to draw air from outside the room thru the tubes and back out of the room and don't have any heat issues . 78 deg. n balmy . i only do 8 or less in waterfarms to keep plant count down . i veg for 4-6 wks. depending on strain , i'm mean to em to, l.s.t , top em , pinch em etc... on average we can net 10-17 oz. per girl . it takes a lil longer this way but i find it's alot less work n upkeep to only care for 6-8 girls . but i'm not looking to supply the masses .lol . i'm a med user and only have to do it once a year .
wise move thinking like you are w/ equipment etc... the shits expensive. to start out in a lil cabinet n find out "damn this is easy" and want to expand and have a 250-400 watt light that can only penetrate a foot or 2 at best .you'll end up wanting the 1000's belive me , once you've got the bug look out .

peace

[Just A Beginner]

Thanks bluebear & xcrispi for the input. We've got about 600GBP/1000USD to kick start a growroom, we've priced up other stuff, extraction, ferts, fans etc etc etc, it's just this lightin and the different opinions on ferts that's crackin my head up. And to finish of this cold horrible day, i have just crushed one of my little seedlings trying to take a picture.. gutted :(

[Cyclonite]

I think your best bet is 1 600Watt MH and 1 600 Watt HPS....much less heat than a 1K and correct me if I'm wrong anyone but I believe the 600W HPS bulbs have the most lumen's per watt. If your needs are greater than that then go with the 1ks but you better have a good fan.

[santacruz_organic]

take it from me J.A.B. your going to need alot more money than that for your room. 1000USD will barley cover your light costs. i thought when i start seting up my room "im not going to spend more than $700 on my room since this is my only 2nd indoor grow..." than it was like "no more than $1000" and now im at around $1800+ for everything and have about a $2700 room (i barrowed alot of stuff luckly). if your going to do it first set up your ventilation, light proof, bug proof, reflection, and every thing you will need for your room then buy your lights and add as you go. it sucked for me having to add on to my room and drill holes in my wall when my room was full of plants. one of my plants died due to it. it is very possible to add on as you go but it sucks having to wait from pay check to pay check to get stuff your ging to need imidiately. ~ I would go with 2 1000w switchable ballast and start w/ metal Halide and switch to HPS. then add CO2 or sulfur vaporizer or humidity controllers, ect. and my room which is a little smaller barley fits my 17 plants so i wouldn't have more than 20 if i was you. the amount that you yeild will justify your cost 5 times over and $1800 out of the $2200 of stuff you can reuse. make sure you do it right or you might lose all your yeild; it happened to me last time. thats why i invested months and alot of money to do it right.

[xcrispi]

hey j.a.b
as far as nutes i use gen. hydro. 3 part because they're very forgiving . but i do hydro , to use in soil i think they recomend 1/4 strength .
peace

[MegaOctane12]

1000w lights are a fucking waste of money and I can tell you that catagorically. Well, if you have the luxury of having 4 or 5 of them in unison no their not. But if you have a situation where you can either use one or two 1000's or a combination of lesser wattage lights to make up the desired lumens. Always, always, always use more of the less intense lights. You will generate more light and illuminate a larger area.

[Just A Beginner]

Thanks everyone for your replies, we've 14 seedlings ( now i've squashed 1 !) which we want to grow on , clone from them, n what we sell buy more lights n better fan n extraction, the £600 we have allocated is to basically get us going,we will add on and tweek obviously. l am worried about messin it all up, thats why i'm here pickin everyones brains, would plants grow just as well under the 600w, maybe three of them,and would yield be roughly the same ? We are growin northern lights, hopin to get some lowryder, more to see how they grow as i know( i think lol ) u cant clone from them.
We will be using the spare bedroon, the cellar (basement) is bigger. 17'x17', but i'm concerned the heat from just the lamps won't heat it sufficentially.
I've also read that organic nutes, that u can't overfeed, am i right or totally wrong. I don't wanna kill my babies through kindness :o

[Just A Beginner]

Are you speaking from experiance Mega ? kinda sounds like you are lol

[MegaOctane12]

Alot of research mate, trust me on this one

[Just A Beginner]

So how many would you suggest for an area of 9'x9' ?

[santacruz_organic]

i agree with mega to a certain extent. obviously if you have more light fixtures you will have more lighting. but if you put toghether the amount of 5 600w lights, balasts, and reflectors you will probably spend more then 3 1000w lights, balasts, and reflectors for the same wattage. also the higher the wattage the faster they will grow and the more penetration i belive. its up to the grower and its about the same in the long run (besides growth speed) i think. theese are all educated opinions but my plants grew almost two feet in one month.

[xcrispi]

i agree w/ part of what mega octane 12 is telling you , but do consider how tall the plants will get when deciding between 600 / 1000 w. lights . penetration is very very important . lots of 400/600 might be nice for cloning tables / scrog / sog but if they end up trees the lower parts of plants are gonna be fiendin for light where they wont be w/ 1000's .
do lotsa research and learn from everyone on here's mistakes so you don't havta make them all yourself as they can be incredibly costly .
peace

[mendokid]

USE the best 600 WATT HPS lights you can find

Also you might look into using a track

It is also true that the 600 watt hps system give you the best watt to light ratio. The new bulbs have a fair amount of blue and do a decent veg cycle. I used two of them in tandem in a 7' x 4' space and got great results. I did my veg cycle under fluorescents however.

GL

[OregonsDank]

I have seen 400 / 600 watt bulbs in full action, they are very dim imo.

If you want big plants stay with big watts per bulb, SOG of scrOG 600 / 400 would be ideal.

[Cyclonite]

I would start off with a couple 600 watt lights then add more as needed....especially if this your first grow. You will make more mistakes...wait till you get everything dialed in before you invest tons of cash on many plants. You will get a pretty good yield off of 2-3 600W lights. I would go with 2 HPS 1 MH if you go 3....your light coverage will be much better than with the 1Ks...the lights may not heat your entire basement but I'm sure they will have no problem keeping the air around your plants warm....move em in until you get you desired temp and light footprint. You can always put up plastic that would trap the heat from the lights better than without.

[MegaOctane12]

So how many would you suggest for an area of 9'x9' ?

Sure man, I can work out exactly how much you need but it'll take a few minutes or so and I'm going out soon but I'll post it all up later.

[Just A Beginner]

Hi again :thumbsup:
We've been moochin and have decided on..
2 x 600w lamps with metal halide for veg & sodium for flowering, throwing in a couple of 125w envirolites as well.
As the room is 11'x12' would an extractor fan of 350sm be sufficent with a carbon filter attached or should we beef it up ? Obviously a couple of oscilating fans would be directed on the plant as well. Hoping this would be enough to get us going, and probably add another light or two as we get greedy and wanna grow more plants lol. We have 13 seedlings, 3ish weeks old under a 100w cfl at the mo, which we would like to grow to be big bushy plants with lotsa bud, well we can dream n hope lol :p