Any Advice?

[DecemberZeppelin]

I am about to start growing very soon, and I was wondering what types of lights, including the brand, any features, type, that I should use. I intend to do soil growing and make clones. My first batch will be probably 12 plants with three spaced in a triangle per large pot. I intend to have 4 large pots and pick the best one and make it my mother. I will have them set up in a 2 x 2 manner or possibly do more and get a 3 x 3.

I was wondering what lights would anyone recommend? After some reading I thought about getting a switchable balast with an HPS light, 400W, if the price isn't too extravagant, or a 150W HPS. This would cover the 4 sq ft area very well I believe.

For the mother I was thinking about a flourescent tube, but I would prefer to get a 175W MH lamp because from what I understand it would be better for the vegetative growth.

I wanted a switchable balast so I could try the MH early for the clones, which are going to start out as seedlings and then I'll continue with clones, and use the HPS for flowering, but my book says that HPS can also be used the whole time; figured I'd want the option to experiment.

I tried Lowes to check out their lamps, but they don't have any ballasts. I tried a nursery but all they had was plants.. ordering online I heard some bad things about.. any ideas?

 

[bombbudpuffa]

You can get compact fluorescents at lowes and also 175w MH security lights which should have a ballast and bulb included. You need the 4200k-6500k bulbs for veg and the 2000k-2100k for flower. I'd use compact fluoros to germinate, MH for veg and HPS for flower. Imo, a switchable ballast would be a very good investment.

 

[The Hemp Goddess]

I have very good luck vegging with T5 fluoro tubes. I have a MH that I do not use because the T5 does just as good a job with fewer watts and less heat.

For flowering, there is nothing like a HPS. You should size your light to your grow space. You want a minimum of 5000 lumens per sq ft to flower. So if you are using a 2x2 space, a 150-250W light HPS would be great. If you are using a 3 x 3 space, go with a 400W. A cool tube will allow you to get your light a lot closer to the canopy and it makes it easy to cool.

 

[POTUS]

DZ, during your decisions of what type of light to buy and what type of fixture to hang it from, remember that as you look at your plants from above, they will take up a changing amount of area.

The light that you supply should be of an amount that is equal to more than a minimum of 3,000 (Three Thousand), to 5,000 (Five Thousand) Lumens per/square foot of area.

HPS will give you better flowering than the others.

Use whatever you like for vegging as long as the amount of Lumens is correct.

When your plants are smaller, they will take up less area. As they grow, you'll need more light to cover the increased area and keep that ratio of Lumens per/square foot.

Good luck to you man!

 

[DecemberZeppelin]

Thanks a lot to everyone for the posts.

Ok, so I will probably go with a 400W HPS just in case I want to expand my grow room later. Any brand names to stay away from? Or, look for? Because when I go shop for them I will probably just buy some random one that just looks right and has a good looking reflector.

As for the mother.. I was thinking about flouros because it would be easier to get.. but wouldn't the electricity cost over time jump up a lot and from my book it says they lose their effectiveness very quickly; one year and you lose 25% efficiency.

At Lowes they told me to use the Grow Bulbs.. they didn't look right and seemed to be too weak of a bulb.

For the mother I didn't want her to grow really large. I'd rather she grow slower so that's why I was looking at flouros, specifically the Chroma 5000, but reflectors are a bitch from what I saw on flouros. You have to place them in between every tube to maximize light. The MH might make the mother grow too fast, but I was thinking that when she grew really big I would just flower her and start a new one, but would that be a big mistake?

How does everyone feel about ordering online? Police tracking and such.. from the looks of it the police have better things to do and Phelps seems to be attracting all the attention anyway

 

[POTUS]

"At Lowes they told me to use the Grow Bulbs.."

Please tell me you said you were growing lettuce...

As for your Host plant (Mother), you can keep her small forever. You simply top each branch, making sure to NEVER top more than one third of the total branches at one time. ALWAYS wait for at least 10 days between topping the next and the last you did. The plant will never stress enough to cause a hermie and it will stay at whatever height you want it to remain at indefinitely.

 

[The Hemp Goddess]

I live in a teeny tiny town community in the mountains. I order everything on line. This is not something that the police "track". I don't know what a Chroma 5000 is, but you don't need anything special for your mom. You want to keep her small anyway. Check out a 2 tube 2' T5--it should do fine.

Since your space is small, you might want to check out a cooltube type reflector--they take up less space and are easier to keep cool. A digital ballast runs cooler, quieter and is more energy efficient than a magnetic ballast, but is also a little more money.

 

[DecemberZeppelin]

Hehe, I most definitely did not say lettuce, but also most certainly did not mention my intended use. I'm not in a city.. in the middle of nowhere basically on a mountain. Lots of people here have gardens and green houses so I just said I was looking for lights to start a green house, and they recommended the grow bulbs. I don't think they produce enough lumens, but the packaging for the bulbs didn't specify.

I'll check out the T5. My space isn't too small. I am making a grow room so I can make it large, but since $$$ isn't exactly free, even though it does grow on trees.. I didn't want to space everything out too much and have to buy more lights. I wanted to just start out with 2 nice lights, and look to be able to supply myself for the whole year without having to buy.

So, I figured that clones grown under a "sea of green" strategy would yield good amounts and quickly. I figured I would have about 4 harvests a year with each plant yielding about .5 - 1 ounce per. Originally I wanted to do a pot for each plant, but that would make the space too large and would require more lights.

With the 400W HPS light, according to the book, Closest Cultivator by Ed Rosenthal, I could cover an area of 8 - 20 sq ft.

Are there any websites that you use in particular that offer secure ordering and quality products?

What do you all think the average cost would be to set it up in terms of lights? I realize that price can range quite a bit, but say I wanted a bit better than average lights, since I'm only buying two. A magazine that I have that had some HPS, MH, and Flouros was selling the set up for about $230, with a small range for the different wattages.

 

[Johnnyrotten123]

High Tech Garden-google it, prices good and excellent customer service