Seedking here's some pics of some of the plants I had/have going. Not to rub it in but all 4 of these plants looked like this when they were just seedlings. Super low. Sprouted and then just spread out. But I used cfl's and had them right down on them. You can see that in one of the pics. I think maybe this is your problem. The big 4 footers put out some light but they do all along the length where as the cfl's are concentrated to one small area.

And it doesn't matter how big your arms are, it's still going to be as bitch to translplant 3 gallons of dirt with a plant hanging out of it into a 5 gallon container. One reason being that the 5 gallon container is probably not going to be that much larger in diameter than the 3 gallon. If you go from a flower pot to a 5 gallon bucket there probably won't be any difference. So how are you going to sit it down in there? You can't get your hands down there if it's the same size. Grab it by the stalk? Not this kid. Once again, sorry but it doesn't make any sense when going from a large container to one that's just a little larger. Small to large I totally agree.