Some short CFL Q's.

[BaronS]

I'm sorry, but I hope to prove you wrong.

 

My intention is to raise small plants in a small space, and to do so under CFL.

 

We'll see how I go.

[chuffer]

Good luck BaronS, I'll follow the results of this with interest. Very interesting thread alround too, thanks folks

[bullseye]

OH, for pity's sake. Do you know what you just said?

 

CFL's are shit because 151W of CFL does not do as good a job as 400W HPS.

 

Does that not sound more than a little silly? You were pumping ~1/3rd the power in, to what area of grow?

 

OTOH: even if you pumped 600W of CFL into it I would expect the light intensity (lux or lumen) to fall short. Do you save by not requiring 200W of heat extraction? Does it depend on the volume of the grow area? Do plants under CFL do better because you can have the light source significantly closer to the plant?

 

 

i use a 400W HPS. i can get my plants within 7 cms of the light bulb safely. closer than that and they burn. with my CFL's - 18 W 6500K philips - they burn at 4 cms. that's not significantly closer. and i'm currently flowering with CFL's. 2700K - it's fine for males.. but i wouldn't bother with a female - almost nothing happens. as said by all - they are good for veg, great for seedlings, but not for flower - no way.

in a growspace of size '1500x800x500' the answer is 'no', 7 x 20W CFL's and t5 battens won't do shit.

you would be better off starting with a 250W hps. get a $20 fan off ebay and cut holes in a box for ventilation. the heat off cfls does compete with that of hps.

i will bet my left testicle that halfway through your grow with your hps - that you will wish you had gotten a bigger one. and ventilation fans for a decent little inline one - ebay about $70 delivered.

just save for a bit, you'll get 10 times the results.