churchhaze
Well-Known Member
Yes, of course. Cannabis vegs great under HPS. The only reason I'd prefer tubes over HPS is the lower profile. It's all moot point now because my veg area was converted to vero 18 about a year ago.
Light ???
- Thread starter RM3
- Start date
ttystikk
Well-Known Member
Just put some of mine under CXB3590 and... ..yeah. Let's just say that it's incentive to get the rest of them up over my bloom room!
TheChemist77
Well-Known Member
i am very happy with the ceramic lamps,, 945 watts or 3 315 watt cmh hit over 1200 grams dry yield.. so 3 315's compete well with 2 600 watt hps, better resin production and plants finish 1 week sooner under the 3100k spectrum..never got over 1.3 gpw with hps, with cmh imgetting it almost every run...
ttystikk
Well-Known Member
I have a dozen of these kits. They won't fit in my racks, watts are too low. Then I had a inspiration yesterday; I'll use them for veg!
TheChemist77
Well-Known Member
i havnt used them for veg yet,, but im going to do some testing of the 3100k and 4200k cmh bulbs for my veg room...i can not say how happy i am to not have to replace bulbs every 6 months,,, this is just great.. i really,,really need to invest in a few cob's.. how long does a new cob last?? i like a few different 200 and 300 watt cob's its hard to decide but im sure ill get my money back after a run or 2... you know me,, ill be doing testing,,,i think my plants are asking me to pick a light source,, they must be getting confused going back n forth from mh and hps for so many years,then to cmh to hps then back again..
ttystikk
Well-Known Member
Depends on how the COB is mounted, how hard its driven and how warm it gets. Solid mounting stays cooler, driving it softer and keeping it cooler will also help longevity. Cree says they're good for 50,000 hours, I believe running them soft and cool will see them last many times that long.
TL;DR? FUCKING FOREVER! LOL
TheChemist77
Well-Known Member
thanks ty,,, good to know people who know there shit!!! grow well and be well
ttystikk
Well-Known Member
That's for Cree chips; apparently there's a lot of crappy knockoffs and so on out there, so buyer beware. Also, even other reputable manufacturers are using different technologies and so their expected lifetimes would also be different. Best to check.
TheChemist77
Well-Known Member
i will research a few different ones and let you know on the decision before i buy
Skunk Baxter
Well-Known Member
This is a move I'm going to be making myself sometime this year, and I'm really interested to see someone who recently made the switch. Mind if I pick your brain a bit?
I'd be looking at replacing 1K HPS lights with 315 CMH bulbs, 3 CMH for each 1K. I was wondering about 3 things - temperatures, energy cost, and configuration, and I'd much rather ask you than the guy at the grow shop. Nobody at my shop has actually used CMH except as demos in the store, and I'd rather hear it from someone who grows for a living than someone who sells for a living.
How is the heat output of 3 315s compared to a 1K HPS? I know you compared them to 2 600Ws, but I'm guessing you're familiar with 1Ks as well.
Also, how do they compare in electrical usage?
And lastly, I'm concerned about configuring 3 lights into a space that I designed to hold a single 1K fixture. How heavy and bulky would they be? Do you have to configure any kind of elaborate duct systems to vent all 3 of them? Do they throw enough heat that you have to air-cool the hoods?
Oh, and one more - how does the light penetration compare to a 1K or twin 600s?
Thanks in advance to anyone who can chime in on any of these questions.
TheChemist77
Well-Known Member
penetration is good to a 4ft depth at 2ft above canopy and even lower branches will have good size buds,,no more popcorn.. i ran 3 315's in line above the center of a 4x6 table, but placement is really up to you.. my hoods are not air coolable, open hoods, but heat is much less than a single 1k hps..wen i ran the 1k i had a 6inch aircoolable hood venting heat out, then ran 3 315's open hoods, no venting exept my normal intake and exaughst for the room set on a thermostat and the exaughst only kicked on once or twice during lights on,,,i took exaughst off thermostat and put it on a timer now so it exaughsts the room every 3 hours or 4 times during lights on for 5 minutes.. my intake and exaughst are a 400cfm in and a 450cfm exaughst 4inch inline fans and my room is 12ftx11ftx7ft high so about 1,000square feet, my in and ex, fill room and replace air in 5 minutes or less... each 315 produces the heat of maybe a 150watt hps,,so 3 315's put out heat equivilant to say 1 400 or 600 watt hps...pluss replacing a 1k with 3 315's is saving you 55watts of electricity and better gram per watts than hps any day....hope this helps,,grow and be well
Skunk Baxter
Well-Known Member
Oh, definitely. The only reason I care about the electrical usage and the heat are to keep the power usage within a reasonable and unremarkable range. Lower usage for the lights is one thing, of course, but reduced heat adds up to less electricity needed for cooling. In the summertime, in a hot climate, when you have several thousand watts of HID lights in one room, plus the air conditioner needed to neutralize that heat, the bill really gets up there. I like every single aspect of the house to look completely normal and inconspicuous to any outside observer, so cutting energy costs whenever and wherever I can is useful - and one more factor in pushing me in that direction.
Only thing I'm wondering, though, is what sort of CMH technology is coming down the pike. Because of certain physical limitations on one of my grow areas, it's a hell of a lot easier to hang one light than three smaller ones. I can't get into detail, but the dimensions of the walls relative to the ceiling are atypical. Short of knocking down walls, there's not much I can do to get around that. It's not quite a dealbreaker, but really very close to being one.
It'd be nice to know if the next generation of CMHs will include a direct replacement for the current 1K HPS, in a single unit of 900 watts or so, rather than having to use 3 fixtures. I haven't really been able to find out any reliable information about that. If that's something that were coming soon, I'd be more tempted to wait until later in the year, but if it's not on the horizon I may very well convert one of the spaces to a 3-CMH configuration right now, and just do what I have to do to figured out a way to squeeze them in and hang them. .
Only thing I'm wondering, though, is what sort of CMH technology is coming down the pike. Because of certain physical limitations on one of my grow areas, it's a hell of a lot easier to hang one light than three smaller ones. I can't get into detail, but the dimensions of the walls relative to the ceiling are atypical. Short of knocking down walls, there's not much I can do to get around that. It's not quite a dealbreaker, but really very close to being one.
It'd be nice to know if the next generation of CMHs will include a direct replacement for the current 1K HPS, in a single unit of 900 watts or so, rather than having to use 3 fixtures. I haven't really been able to find out any reliable information about that. If that's something that were coming soon, I'd be more tempted to wait until later in the year, but if it's not on the horizon I may very well convert one of the spaces to a 3-CMH configuration right now, and just do what I have to do to figured out a way to squeeze them in and hang them. .
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ttystikk
Well-Known Member
This is prescient. I've been running a larger lamp for years, the 860W CDM Allstart. On a magnetic ballast, its efficiency is relatively poor. However, there are several low frequency digital square wave ballasts now on the market that may drive this lamp at the same efficiency as the smaller lamp on its LFSW ballast- only at 1000W.
This would seem to be an ideal solution for your problem but there is one caveat, the lamp must be operated in a vertical orientation, base up or down.
Skunk Baxter
Well-Known Member
Thank you - yeah, I've seen that one, and have really been tempted, but how do you orient the vertical bulb to cast a uniform footprint on a horizontal canopy? Is it only suited for vertical growing, or is there some special reflector? Did you design your own reflector? That is the Philips bulb, is it not?
And thanks for the response, by the way...
And thanks for the response, by the way...
ttystikk
Well-Known Member
There are reflectors that will reflect a vertically oriented lamp's output onto a flat canopy. Some are even air cooled.
I run them bare, vertically.
http://advancedtechlighting.com/cdmea860.htm
The site says that electronic ballasts that run below 174Hz don't exist, this is no longer true.
Skunk Baxter
Well-Known Member
I really appreciate your taking the time to share this with me, because I haven't been able to find anyone in real life with firsthand experience, and the information I've found on the web is sparse and often contradictory. I've read enough of your posts to know what you're about, and have a lot of respect for your bona fides. This is very valuable information for me, and I really appreciate it.
ScottyBlaze1
Active Member
Hello everyone, im so glad i found this thread! Im really interested in these lec's and i have a few questions i hope you guys can answer. So here we go, the space has a 8x16 canopy which will be double scrogged with 7 ft ceilings with co2 using promix. Now my qustions are should i go with the 630's one light per 4x4, or should i go with the 315's? With 315's how many lights would i need? Lastly would you guys recommend 1 big plant per 4x4 or 2-3 smaller ones?
ttystikk
Well-Known Member
I think the double fixture defeats one big advantage of the 315W, which is being able to spread the lights out to cover the space.
Do at least 3 if not 4 plants per 4x4. Don't expect as much stretch as you might with HPS.
Best of luck, tag me into your thread when you get this going!
MeDiHeRbMaN12
Member
I just started my own T5 GROW I can only hope I grow something as good as youThis morning, I read this thread ,,,,
https://www.rollitup.org/t/no-lower-budsites-do-not-need-light-to-develop-get-educated.829061/
I wanted to post a response but couldn't because it had been locked.
I decided to start a thread and see if a discussion could take place without the negative nonsense? IOW have a discussion that benefits growers and our gardens.
If you remember when I was here as Riddleme, my pet peeve was lights and I pulled 2lbs from 4 plants with 2 400's. Now I flower with T5's and yeppers it's 1000 watts of T5's but still T5's and when I post I pretty much always have someone that says I should just get an HPS (which I would never do lol) I simply ignore it and move on. I understand why some like and use HPS, I understand that we as growers all have different methods and ways of doing things, different goals, different needs, hell it's kinda like just bein human.
To be honest, I kinda enjoy reading the threads that go sideways as it can be entertaining as just an observer, not fun when your the poster and your intent gets stepped on so much I guess. I think a lot of us have been there. And yeppers, I like Uncle Ben, he is a gruffy old dude but he knows his shit when it comes to plants and I well know there are some that disagree with that but I also am guilty of posting in threads to try and protect or steer new growers in a more sane direction. IMO once you move beyond new grower status, you should start experimentin with things and see for yourself. Much like I did in a thread here where defoil was concerned, I took 3 clones (same plant) and removed all the fans on one, some fans on one and no fans on one. The one with no fans removed yielded the most and the one with all fans removed yielded the least. I moved on. I didn't prove anything IMO and I wasted a couple ounces of yield but I saw for myself and have not done it since. With that said, I still tell new growers to do it and see for themselves, because that is what should be happening, it's how we learn.
The problem with light is most do not seem to understand it. You have the Inverse square law driving a point that is moot and you have the more light is better (it's not) you have the get it closer and even cool it to get it even closer nonsense. When it is the other things in your garden that make a bigger difference. The truth is the plant can only use so much light and then it stops. Google Mid day depression in plants and read up on it. I, the guy flowering with T5's actually have 1/2 hour of darkness interrupt my light schedule after the lights have been on for 6.5 hours to give the plants a break and thwart the effects of mid day depression. I have it because I keep my canopy at 89 ~ 92 degrees while my ambient room temp is 77 ~ 84 (the minor fluctuations are seasonal) I learned a long time ago that heat is your friend if you use it properly and the high canopy temp mimics what happens outdoors under the sun. There is also a way to adjust temp and humidity to put the plants in a condition where they grow their collective asses off, but rather than learn these things and make adjustments, most simply add more light and fight with heat? I have never understood this which I suppose is why it has been a pet peeve lol.
As to the post I wanted to make in UB's thread that was locked, I am sharing a pic of popcorn that is over 3 feet from the closest T5 bulbs and is under leafs and is thriving. Nice and dense and covered in trics and my point is,,,,, if your garden is tweaked properly penetration is not an issue, less light is actually better and the end product is better as well. Light is simply one of many elements/tools in our gardens that we have control over (unlike outdoors).
I hope that we can now have a discussion about it and that those participating and reading this will have a chance to learn a thing or 3View attachment 3311363 View attachment 3311364
