Alternative light cycles

[BobCajun]

I've been trying some unusual light cycles for veg stage. I first tried 3/3 repeating and it worked pretty good but growth was slower than I would have liked. I've now switched to 5/3. I figure 15 hours a day of light should be enough. Why the short cycles, you may ask? It's an attempt to defeat midday photosynthetic depression and also to avoid the stretching that comes from long dark periods.

The 3/3 plants did indeed stay much more short and stocky than the same strain grown under normal 18/6, even though they only got a total of 12 hours a day of light. Some other cycles I've been considering are 6/2 or 7/1. Personally, I'm trying to keep power consumption as low as possible, which is actually why I tried the 3/3 first. Three more hours a day shouldn't break me, hence the jump to 5/3. I've also wondered if such cycles would be beneficial to auto strains or not.

 

[RM3]

check out Gas Light Veg, also know as Gas Lantern Routine and 12/1

you'll be glad you did

 

[qwizoking]

idk... ive never done anything like this, way too much work. and even harder to automate.

but as far as alternative light cycles.
all my grow houses have lights on 24/7. flowering lights get moved or crops rotated under. ive got one area, where im rotating every 8hrs. or 3 harvests off my 1k. an extra harvest without changing lighting or cost.

 

[BobCajun]

check out Gas Light Veg, also know as Gas Lantern Routine and 12/1

you'll be glad you did

I'm familiar with the gas lantern routine. But you only have a total of 13 hours light that way, which is fine for power saving but I would just use a 3/3 cycle and save an hour more. A 5/3, 6/2 or 7/1 cycle you have 15, 18 or 21 hours of light total. 15 being low enough for my purposes yet long enough for strong growth. And with the 12/5.5/1/5.5 cycle the 5.5 hour dark periods will cause more stem elongation than 3, 2 or 1 hour dark periods.

 

[BobCajun]

idk... ive never done anything like this, way too much work. and even harder to automate.

but as far as alternative light cycles.
all my grow houses have lights on 24/7. flowering lights get moved or crops rotated under. ive got one area, where im rotating every 8hrs. or 3 harvests off my 1k. an extra harvest without changing lighting or cost.

What's hard to automate about entering 3 or 4 programs into a digital timer? 3/3 requires 4 programs, 5/3, 6/2 and 7/1 require 3. Since the cycles all fit evenly into 24 hours, you only need to enter enough programs to fill 24 hours. It then repeats infinitely, going on and off at the same times every day.

 

[qwizoking]

why do you feel this way?
light intensity is what the plant biologically recognizes through receptors and hormones for stretch, ie cfls where lumen output rises exponentially the closer you get, talking inches. the plant recognizes this difference in intensity and stretches towards it.

20/4 gives less stretch than 24/0 because you can give more intense light before hitting saturation and bleaching. also get more fingers per leaf
i give 24/0 though for ease. for the same reasons...


when i said even harder to automate, its because my grows are fully automated, water everything..not that pushing buttons on a timer is really hard, digital or not

but i struggle to hit all my grows weekly, and ive had accidents before where something gives out, especially timers. not really an issue in veg i guess.... and personally i dont see any benefit to having your light's flipping on and off like that other than harming bulb life, im not worried about elec costs.. its already only about $10 to grow an oz after all yearly costs/overhead.
besides this only works in veg. so really not concerned, it really doesnt offer any benefit



now much cooler is having 3crops under your lights. instead of 2 while yielding almost exactly the same. that actually equals more product, and has real world use.
not giving yiur plants a seizure with flickering lights
but as you said, yiur main reason was lowering power consumption. which im not concerned with


anyway good luck, i was just posting what i do for alternative lighting...now i see you really meant alternating lighting

 

[BobCajun]

why do you feel this way?
light intensity is what the plant biologically recognizes through receptors and hormones for stretch, ie cfls where lumen output rises exponentially the closer you get, talking inches. the plant recognizes this difference in intensity and stretches towards it.

20/4 gives less stretch than 24/0 because you can give more intense light before hitting saturation and bleaching. also get more fingers per leaf
i give 24/0 though for ease. for the same reasons...


when i said even harder to automate, its because my grows are fully automated, water everything..not that pushing buttons on a timer is really hard, digital or not

but i struggle to hit all my grows weekly, and ive had accidents before where something gives out, especially timers. not really an issue in veg i guess.... and personally i dont see any benefit to having your light's flipping on and off like that other than harming bulb life, im not worried about elec costs.. its already only about $10 to grow an oz after all yearly costs/overhead.
besides this only works in veg. so really not concerned, it really doesnt offer any benefit



now much cooler is having 3crops under your lights. instead of 2 while yielding almost exactly the same. that actually equals more product, and has real world use.
not giving yiur plants a seizure with flickering lights
but as you said, yiur main reason was lowering power consumption. which im not concerned with


anyway good luck, i was just posting what i do for alternative lighting...now i see you really meant alternating lighting

I'm just trying different things, that's all. I don't expect most people to want to also try it but I'm reporting that such cycles do work and don't show any signs of negative effects. My plants came out shorter than usual, though it could be a fluke.

I don't understand how you get 3 crops from one light though. Do you only give them each 8 hours of light and 16 hours dark?

 

[qwizoking]

hope you didnt take my post as rude or anything..

but
no no, i mean in flower.

many people run there lights 12on 12off. thats a waste of space and the light you have. keep em on and have another set of flowering plants to swap in..
but they dont actually need 12, drop to 8 and you can fit 3 cycles under there. so each light, 1k every ~60 days could yield 3000 grams or whatever you normally get, just gpw numbers for ease. instead of 1000 or 2. so if im dropping 20lbs to san marcus every other thursday. i now have 10lbs extra to play with/sell
without doing anything different really..

 

[torontoke]

why do you feel this way?
light intensity is what the plant biologically recognizes through receptors and hormones for stretch, ie cfls where lumen output rises exponentially the closer you get, talking inches. the plant recognizes this difference in intensity and stretches towards it.

20/4 gives less stretch than 24/0 because you can give more intense light before hitting saturation and bleaching. also get more fingers per leaf
i give 24/0 though for ease. for the same reasons...


when i said even harder to automate, its because my grows are fully automated, water everything..not that pushing buttons on a timer is really hard, digital or not

but i struggle to hit all my grows weekly, and ive had accidents before where something gives out, especially timers. not really an issue in veg i guess.... and personally i dont see any benefit to having your light's flipping on and off like that other than harming bulb life, im not worried about elec costs.. its already only about $10 to grow an oz after all yearly costs/overhead.
besides this only works in veg. so really not concerned, it really doesnt offer any benefit



now much cooler is having 3crops under your lights. instead of 2 while yielding almost exactly the same. that actually equals more product, and has real world use.
not giving yiur plants a seizure with flickering lights
but as you said, yiur main reason was lowering power consumption. which im not concerned with


anyway good luck, i was just posting what i do for alternative lighting...now i see you really meant alternating lighting

The idea of having three lights switching on from one ballast is a great idea. One that I would love to see being used.
A few people I have talked to about this on here would be interested.
Do u run 8/16 times 3 right now?
You got any pictures of these 8/16 plants?

 

[BobCajun]

hope you didnt take my post as rude or anything..

but
no no, i mean in flower.

many people run there lights 12on 12off. thats a waste of space and the light you have. keep em on and have another set of flowering plants to swap in..
but they dont actually need 12, drop to 8 and you can fit 3 cycles under there. so each light, 1k every ~60 days could yield 3000 grams or whatever you normally get, just gpw numbers for ease. instead of 1000 or 2. so if im dropping 20lbs to san marcus every other thursday. i now have 10lbs extra to play with/sell
without doing anything different really..

Have you actually done this? Isn't the yield drastically reduced with only 8 hours light? And isn't potency affected?

 

[qwizoking]

course i have..its not really that off, it is lowered slightly sure. but still worthwhile. the veg is the same, so there are same number of budsites really, and you can lower lights some so theres very little difference. but yea knock a point or so off yiur current gpw
potency and flavor/smell seemed to be the same, and density seemed to be very close. my master kush for example still give great dense bud

 

[BobCajun]

course i have..its not really that off, it is lowered slightly sure. but still worthwhile. the veg is the same, so there are same number of budsites really, and you can lower lights some so theres very little difference. but yea knock a point or so off yiur current gpw
potency and flavor/smell seemed to be the same, and density seemed to be very close. my master kush for example still give great dense bud

Did they ripen faster? That's usually why people use extra long nights. From what I've read, 12/12 is optimal, but if 8/16 works for you then why not?

 

[qwizoking]

ya they ripened only about a week faster.
im certainly not saying this is best or healthiest, wont give the best quality.. but i was talking from a sellers pov - weight

 

[torontoke]

hope you didnt take my post as rude or anything..

but
no no, i mean in flower.

many people run there lights 12on 12off. thats a waste of space and the light you have. keep em on and have another set of flowering plants to swap in..
but they dont actually need 12, drop to 8 and you can fit 3 cycles under there. so each light, 1k every ~60 days could yield 3000 grams or whatever you normally get, just gpw numbers for ease. instead of 1000 or 2. so if im dropping 20lbs to san marcus every other thursday. i now have 10lbs extra to play with/sell
without doing anything different really..

Hey @ttystikk how long have we been talking about this?
If you have questions I'm sure this guy has the answers

 

[qwizoking]

idk about THE answers lol..

but ya ask away masta yoda

note that i cant possibly be the first to do this or think of this. so im sure its drawbacks will show in time

 

[torontoke]

idk about THE answers lol..

but ya ask away masta yoda

note that i cant possibly be the first to do this or think of this. so im sure its drawbacks will show in time

I've been using 8/16 for almost a year. I started playing around with 6/18 but found 8 hrs to be the sweet spot.
I have a 37 page thread on here about it and have said I won't ever use 12/12 and everyone thinks I'm nuts. I'm just glad I'm not the only crazy one.
Someone mentioned this idea in my thread a year ago. I think running three crops off one light makes up for the percentage of lost yield.
Having someone else saying the same thing makes me feel a lot better lol

How big of an op do u have running 8/16 times 3?

 

[ttystikk]

Hey @ttystikk how long have we been talking about this?
If you have questions I'm sure this guy has the answers

I think he answered them! Lol

 

[guardogz]

I've been using 8/16 for almost a year. I started playing around with 6/18 but found 8 hrs to be the sweet spot.
I have a 37 page thread on here about it and have said I won't ever use 12/12 and everyone thinks I'm nuts. I'm just glad I'm not the only crazy one.
Someone mentioned this idea in my thread a year ago. I think running three crops off one light makes up for the percentage of lost yield.
Having someone else saying the same thing makes me feel a lot better lol

hey toronto very cool. so if 8 hrs light is your sweet spot where do you think it is for dark time. for ex if you were nt rotating. ever try less than 18 hrs for dark. might there be a sweet dark time down to 12 hrs. or, any thoughts if 8/12 could work.

 

[guardogz]

sorry the last 2 lines are mine

 

[torontoke]

sorry the last 2 lines are mine

Never tried reducing the dark period at the same time.
In theory if you were to reduce it to 10-12 hours instead of 16 u might trick the plants into an even quicker finish time.
The only draw back would be your lights on time floating around from cheaper power rate time to peak.
I don't have a digital timer to try it but it's something I've been talking about looking into.