Quote Originally Posted by jon420
Dsitance and amount of light is the biggest step for growing with CFL's and floro's. I know that there are huge debates out there about using CFL's & floro's for the whole grow. Most people do great when it comes to vegging but when it comes to flowering time, a lot of people are dissapointed. Flowering with cfl's & floro's is not much different than flowering with HPS. Only difference is, the HPS penetrates further from the light source which means you don't need much side lighting, if any. A lot of people grow from above the plants only and that is where the CFL & floro growers make mistakes. CFL & floro grows should penetrate the plant from all sides if possible and as close as possible (CFL's do burn but haven't seen a floro burn yet). I have seen CFL & floro grows turn out just as good as HPS grows, if not better and of course less lumens and watts. It all depends on distance and amount.

I have seen 467watts (34,XXX Lumens) of CFL's & floros combined to make the goodies and amounts you see in magazines, no lie, it can be done!!!
Your post got me thinking about surface lamp temperatures since I've been using inda-gro 400 watt induction fluorescent lamps for the entire grow and I let the plants grow within 12" of the fixture @ week 12 with yields consistent in the 300 g/m range. I'm on my fourth grow now.

Electrode-less induction is really fluorescent lamp on steroids emitting 166.5 VL/W, 95% PAR usable UV/IR spectra, which like an HPS gets excellent canopy penetration but still runs much cooler compared to HPS operating temps.

With lamp surface temps having much to do with fixture design, room size and ventilation I can speak only to my particular room/lamp combination. And while I don't own a pyrometer for a lamp surface temp I don't let my plants actually touch the lamp anyway. The measurements I can give though are from readings I took with an infrared thermometer.

I have a 90 cfm fan providing a reasonably well ventilated 10 x 10 x 8 (800 CF) grow room with an maintained ambient temperature of 78 degrees F, I measure 80 degrees F @ the nearest edge of the reflector surface approximately 1" away from the lamp itself.

I was told by inda-gro was that these lamps actually function best, in terms of MAX lumen/watt output is that the room be ventilated to not directly remove the surface temperature of the lamp to where it falls below 70 degrees F.