i didnt see anything wrong with rough either what ya mean?
i thought it was informative reading.
ima a dork you did say squared my bad dodedooo

And you are...? And what did I do to piss you off?

Thanks, man. Not saying I'm an expert, but I'm good with lighting and math and have some experience.

The reason I started this thread was for fairly new growers because, in my experience, they often don't understand light. Because of that, they either make things too complicated (PAR watts is a good example) or have too much or too little light. Often, I see first time growers describing their new grow areas and I think, "Man, you do NOT need that much light." After a certain point, extra light results in heat and stress issues. My basic belief is that people should always start small and simple and cheap and learn from their mistakes. This thread is just trying to eliminate some of those mistakes.

The height of your grow area isn't as important in terms of light. It's important for ventilation and heat questions--to see how many cubic feet your room is and figure out if a fan is clearing/circulating enough air, for instance. And a smaller overall grow area will retain more heat. But, really, height is only an issue as it relates to heat and air and how tall you want your plants to be...if you've got enough air circulation and can keep your temps down, how tall/short your grow area is doesn't matter, as long as it's big enough for your plants.

(For heat...do the hand thing. Put your hand a foot or so under your HID grow light. Feel any heat? If not, good. If you feel only a little, okay. If it's pretty warm, you need to raise your lights or have a taller grow area. I know this is covered in other threads better than I am doing it here...just search for that.)

Thanks for your input Roughrider. Your words have iron.

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sorry idk what was with me.

please forgive me D:

Question about light roughrider.. I am starting my very first grow.. My space is 3 foot wide 3 foot deep and 6 foot tall.. How many lumiens do you think I need or is there a "FORMULA" that you know so I can figure it out.. Because once I solve my light issue then I can get to growing..

Hey Gundari, if you are still around (sorry just read thread), I have a Philips fouro tube box. On the box it states:
soft white = 3000k
cool white plus = 4100k
30 watt bulb.
Just in case you can read the tube..sorry all I have are soft white right now. Don't know if this helps or if maybe I am too late.

good luck
Fishens

3' x 3' = 9 sq. ft.

5000 lumens per sq. ft. and you'll do fine. So that's

9 x 5000 = 45000 lumens

...which is pretty much dead on what you'll get from a 400w HPS. I would use that to flower. It will cover your entire grow area very well. Make the most of the light--flat white plant or mylar on the walls.

However, for veg, I stick with the budget alternative. Get two 10.5" clamp lights at Wal-Mart for $10 each. Get six Y-socket splitters for $1.50 each. Get three three packs of 26w GE Daylight (6500k) CFLs for $8.00 each. Put one Y-socket into each of the clamp lights and then a Y-socket into each end of the screwed in Y-socket. Now you've got four bulb sockets for each clamp light with a good reflector. Those lights will put out about about 7,000 lumens each...perfect for taking 6-8 plants through the first few weeks of vegging. IMO, CFLs do the best job in vegging...each one of those could even take a plant all the way through flower if you wanted. Regardless, it's $55 well spent.

There is a 32 watt CFL (by Supra Lite? I can look it up if interested) that gets 73 lumens/watt. That is the best CFL ratio I have found.

And a 2 foot 2 tube T5 Biax system that gets 84.5 lumens/watt. This appears to be the best for tube fluorescents.

Might be worthwhile to add this info as the ratios are definitely coming much closer to HPS.

Almost all CFLs are in the 65-75 lumens per watt area, and it doesn't seem to be improving much or soon. I think 75 is the upper barrier for CFLs; it may get to 80. You're right...T5s are more efficient. I've heard of them getting 90 or even a little more lumens per watt.

But once you get to a 250w HPS, you're going to get at least 100 lumens per watt. The difference between 70 and 100 doesn't sound like much, but it is. To cover a 5 sq. ft. area, you can use one 250w HPS. Or you can use about 360 watts of CFLs. CFLs are great for grows in less than 3 or 4 sq. ft. Once you get to 5 sq. ft. and above, HPS (or T5, I guess) is just better.

Thing is, a lot of people do grow in 4 sq. ft. or less, and CFLs will do a great, great job in situations like that with a minimum of hassle or start up costs.

sorry double post

Ok so I somehow found this site about Australian Street lights (who the hell makes a site about that? lol) but anyway I'm glad they did because it tells me 99% of Victorian (where I live) street lights have changed to HPS. I was wondering how much it would cost approximately to get a ffixture/lamp/whatever you use for one of these street light globes. Anyone have any idea?

Ok so dw about my last question, I went to Bunnings and tried to get a 400watt hps coz it was only $30 then I asked this guy what I would use to plug it in to and he said "I dunno" then asked this other lady working there and she said "what're you using it for" and the guy goes "growing his marijuana" and i just fake laughed and said "nah im using it for plants though". F*$^ my blood was boiling he was one of those typical 'stoners are lowlifes' people.

Anyway point is I can't get anything for HPS so can anyone give me detailed info on how to connect 4 CFL's to one extension cable? Then connect the cable into a wall socket.
I have 4 bayonet CFL's.

THANKS PEOPLE!

Any HPS bulb will require a special type of base/fixture and power regulator. The power reghulator for HPS (and MH) lights is usually called the ballast. These types of lights must have very constant energy flow to their bulbs. A sudden change in energy will cause the bulb to short out and, possible, break. So to use an HPS bulb, you must use a HPS ballast and fixture. You'll need to go to specialty light store for this sort of thing, or order it off the internet (ebay.com.au should have some). You should be able to find a 400w setup (bulb/ballast/fixture/reflector) for around AU $175-200.

As for the bayonet CFLs...sorry, I don't know how you'd get multiple bayonet fixtures. You could try to find the equivalent of the outlet/bulb converters sold in other countries. Just go to a hardware store and ask about an item that has a plug on one end and a bayonet socket on the other. If you've got four of those, it shouldn't be too hard to rig some sort of lights.

Thanks Roughrider. I should be able to afford that price. If not, summer will be round soon anyway.

As for the CFL's, I just bought some really cheap lamps from K-Mart, smashed the outside and used the cord and ballast/fixture whatever. I wired two (one on each end) of an old fish tank cover. Then I just have one good lamp that I can't smash with a home-made reflector. These three bulbs equal 4 650 lumens. For one plant. I'm working on getting another cheap lamp to smash lol. I will then put that into the fish tank cover also and this should suffice for a while right? Once I have more than a square foot to cover I might purchase four more bulbs and lamps to put around the sides and have four on top. Think this would do the trick?

That sounds okay. Remember you need less light during vegginm, because the plants are smaller. One 23w bulb will pop a seedling and get you through a couple of weeks of vegging. So if you've got 3 or 4 CFLs, that's actually enough to get 3-4 plants going for a few weeks. You can go smash more cheap lamps after that.

Actually, look into getting a 10 1/2" clamp light with a reflector at Wal-Mart. They're around $10 American. I bet one of those and a Y-socket adaptor would be less than AU $20. Maybe even cheaper than cheap lamp--and you get a reflector too!

I have searched everywhere and for the life of me I can't find any Y-socket adapters! I seriously just don't think they make them in Aus

Thanx for the info though roughrider and I'll look into getting the 10 1/2" clamp light with reflector!

Those adaptors aren't available here, damn shame they'd make things easier for us electrically challenged.

Bunnings do have large desk lamps for about $20 that will take up to 100 W incandescent and is fluoro compatible. Also have a look for nelson superior bulbs, 48W in bunnings for $26. Runs great in the oversized desk lamp, perfect for getting growth happening with the current short day length.

If you can't find them online, just give me $5 for gas (13mpg) and money for supplies, and I'll send you some. I'm not sure though but I think you might need an adapter for the adapter. Aren't you guys a different socket?

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Do you know how many lumens those put out? I've looked at them but couldn't find it anywhere on the box. Din't know whether it was worth it....

Yeah we use BC (?) and I think Americans use ES. Although we do have ES here as well, most sockets are BC so I just bought the BC globes too.

I was wondering also, how much lumens do those circular fluorescents give out? Coz they would be perfect for growing. Could get perfectly even light to the whole canopy with a few of em.

Yeah it's not on the box, I emailed the company and was quoted 69 Lm/W. They take a few hours to burn in, so if you do buy some, don't worry if they don't look that bright when you first turn them on. The brightness will improve in the first couple of days use.

no idea at all.

sara lou

thanx sarah
Oh and opie thanx for the offer but i'll pass, just found out i could use fan lights coz they have four in a circle type thing.

as i have bagweed growing, but did it very sketch.

so i'm going to begin a new harvest i suppose.
i'm am going to use rubbermaids. i have been reading a grip of info
but still do not understand lighting.... when to use what colored CFLs and can you stick CFLs in regular house hold lamps? and wtf is a ballast... i'm guessing you need it for the CFLs, and if there are built in ballast already on the CFLs

I believe CFL's are self ballasted, anyhow they just plug straight into a regular socket, you don't need anything else. You need a ballast for a HID (both MH and HPS), ballasts are matched to the bulb that will be used with it, so you can't use a 400w bulb with a 250w ballast etc.

When looking for CFL's you can find them in 2 basic colours, white, spectrum around 6500k (normailly marked daylight on the box) which give out a bright white light, these are best for veg. The others are more yellow in colour, spectrum around 3000k and will be will be called something like warm white, this is similar to the evening sun and are more suited to flowering.

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My 250w White Widow Grow

Simple nOOb instructions for growin' da dankness - Stinkyattic

Noob's guide to growroom setup - Rhizome

Cheap & easy diy cloner - Justanotherbozo

"An' though the rules of the road have been lodged,
It's only people's games that you got to dodge" - Bob Dylan

It seems that just about every store I checked carries GE CFL bulbs but most of their packaging does not list the color temperature. I thought this link to GE's site might help others. It helped me.

The only packages I found that showed the color temp. was the Daylight bulbs.

http://genet.gelighting.com/LightProducts/Dispatcher?REQUEST=RESULTPAGE&CHANNEL=Consumer&FIL TER=FT0001:Energy%20Smart%E2%84%A2^FT0025:General% 20Purpose&CATEGORY=Lamps

If i can spend 2 word on this things.

Lumens stats are inerently flawed.
For example, Deep Red Light has little to no lumens output (deep red lamp do no use lumens measurements, but watts, look on ledengin for example), however, plants use this light a lot. A better misurement of plants requirements for light should be LIGHT POWER, in W. On this site, you can see how lumens are not directly proportional to light power, and how they are inverselly proportionally to the distance to the peak wavelenght... (i know it's not this simple, i'm a physician, this will do).
What i'm trying to say is, measuring plants requirements in Lumens is pretty shitty, cause plants see light in a very differently way from us humans.
Lights Watts would be a much better approximation. This is the reason why LED, using light focused on certain wavelenght, can reproduce pretty well sunlight with a LOT less lumens output. I'm extimating a plant would need only one half or less of equivalent lumens in red and blue light.
I can do more exact calculation on the quantity of Watts given by a 50000 lumens per square foot using absorption graphics and the specter of the HPS lamps used. How i said, looking at the graphs, i suspect, using the right specter (Procyon 100W use a wrong specter on the red light, that has a very low absorption rate), that led Watts requirements are a lot lower, even if the initial $$$ investment are higher