Quote Originally Posted by Aspire420
Basically I have a lot of questions for you guys and gals who have experience with CLF's. You know they have a 100-200 watt fixture available from Hydrofarm and some other suppliers. I was wondering if it was possible to recreate that fixture with local hardware store goodies. I found a 100 watt compact fluorescent bulb at the store. Do I need a ballast or can I just straight up wire it to a cord that will carry the voltage? Also what colors do you guys or gals prefer when you use them? I saw daylight, soft, and no warm colors in orange or red at the store. Where do you get the warm colors at and how which do you use for veg and for bloom? I would really appreciate the insight and will definitely post some pics of the project with a few reports dedicated to you all if you can help me out!
soft white is warm, that is usually 2700k-3000k, the daylight bulbs are usually 6500k and cool white is a little lower, around 5700k.
I would use 1/2 warm and 1/2 cool for veg, but I switch to hps for budding.
is the bulb you are talking about actually 100w or is it 100w replacement, actually 23w? The 23w bulbs have a built in ballast. These you can just get a painters light and put a splitter on and use 2 bulbs per fixture or use 3 splitters to use it for 4 bulbs.
here are some pics of the fixtures I use.