Blue berry indooor grow
- Thread starter Kushop
- Start date
KK26
Well-Known Member
Just a "tad" you think.
Seriously, they are weeks behinds.
Sorry but you've fucked them up basically for not providing environmental suitability.
Live and learn.
It's all good.
JoeBlow5823
Well-Known Member
You serious man? The lights you are running are NOT 100w. Take the bulb out and look at the fine print. Im sure it says 11w, maybe 12w. And they look like a major fire hazard. You need to buy a real grow light. Light bulbs from the hardware store are not for growing.
This is how my girls looked exactly 4 weeks after flipping to 12/12. I had some pretty bad nutrient issues and they are still 100x better than yours. The one in the back left is a blueberry too. This tent is 5 feet wide and 5 feet deep. Do you really not see how bad your plants look?
JoeBlow5823
Well-Known Member
No man. Its called light penetration. When you are running a real grow light, it gets surprisingly deep into the canopy. Buds top to bottom. The tops always end up bigger and better but the lower buds still turn out just fine. I get what you were trying to do but its not going to work the way you think.
The first picture i posted, as the grow went on, i did remove some of the fan leaves.
Plenty of light getting everywhere it needed to.
JoeBlow5823
Well-Known Member
Yeah if you have the weather for it, outdoor is the way to go. To cold for me. You dont seem interested in buying a real grow light and that will prevent you from ever having a good indoor grow.
OldMedUser
Well-Known Member
I have a similar light setup but run it as close as 12". Mine are 60W equivalents so you should be a little higher but 3' is way too high.
I just start my plants under fluoros and that DIY LED then switch to HID lights. When I'm running a 1000W it's a 1000W. lol
BobCajun
Well-Known Member
But when did he say it was 100w equivalent lightbulbs? He just said "100 watt LED". But 100w equivalent means 14 watts so it's really 140 watts of LED, which isn't much, considerably different from "1000 watts". Now that he posted a pic I can see that's exactly what it is. For some reason he put them all in a straight line and hung them way up. Probably explains why the plant is so skinny. I do give him credit for building his own unit, don't know what the foil and tape is for though. The tape is probably making them too hot and they'll burn out sooner.
Those kind of lights do work though, I use them myself, just more of them and mounted on a metal sheet, not in a straight row. Though actually mounting on several bars woud have made better air flow, but I had some metal plates just the right size so I used them. Why buy "grow lights" when you can buy those bulbs at any hardware store and replace them as they burn out instead of having to buy a whole new grow light because the whole thing burned out at once? They are a little hot though, since the power supplies are right on them. You can also mix the colors, change them for different wattages, take some out, it's very versatile.
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JoeBlow5823
Well-Known Member
Yeah I would need at least 71 bulbs to put out as much light as my 1000w hps. 71 bulbs and fixtures would cost a hell of a lot more than a 1000w hps setup with spare bulb and ballast. Plus imagine all the cords and power strips lol. Most HID grow lights last a long time. HPS needs new bulbs every couple grows. CMH lasts for years. You can get a 315w cmh setup for under 200$ and it should last you about 3 years before you even need to put a new bulb in it. How many watts is 200$ going to get you from the hardware store? I doubt 315.
JoeBlow5823
Well-Known Member
Yeah that setup looks like a fire disaster waiting to happen. Much better to just drop a hundred bucks on a cheap LED board off amazon; at least they have built in cooling and thermal protection.
CannaOnerStar
Well-Known Member
Looks like for some reason it doesent have many leafs to collect light with
BobCajun
Well-Known Member
Yes but CMH bulbs have mercury in them, which is toxic, what if one breaks sometime? And it's also all concentrated in one small arc tube so you need to try to spread it out with reflectors. Same with HPS, except I don't think they contain mercury. Anything with an arc in it is going to get hot as hell, LEDs are much less intense heat. Arc lighting is just old tech, LEDs are the best light source these days but ordering special LED grow lights is too much trouble really. Just go down to the hardware store and buy a bunch of 14 watt LED bulbs and lamp sockets and you're good.
Yes,it's kind of a pain to build the socket mounts but once they're done all you need to do is replace the bulbs as they burn out. For a 3x3 area you would need to make about 5 rows of 5 bulbs, 25 bulbs at 14 watts each for 350 watts. Then you put some more on the bottom pointing up to light the bottoms of the plants and all is well, like about half as much wattage as on the top. Can't do that with CMH or HPS, which is why all those kind of growers get half the yield that they could get. Only lighting the tops of the plants is a waste of space.
You do need to cut the diffusers off though, or it dims them too much and makes them get too hot because the heat is trapped inside there. I leave about 1/4 inch of diffuser so it's easy to screw them in and out. Just gotta make sure nothing drops onto the bottom ones, like leaves. You could leave the diffusers on the bottom ones, I just like to cut them off for more light intensity. A serrated knife works well.
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OldMedUser
Well-Known Member
I used bathroom vanity fixtures to make my 11 bulb LED light rig. All mounted at 6" centres on two aluminum angle iron pieces and a chain hanger on each. I have since found two more 4-bulb fixtures to put on outriggers so I can have an 19 bulb unit and expand it's footprint. I just popped the globes off with a screwdriver and mark them with 50 for the 5000K and 27 for the 2700K with a felt pen so I don't have to get a magnifying glass to check each one. I just have the 60W equivs in there as they were on sale for $1 each at the time. I'd like to load it with the 100W ones but $$$.
I stuck an 85W CFL in the middle spot and hung foil down the sides as reflectors for extra light.
I stuck an 85W CFL in the middle spot and hung foil down the sides as reflectors for extra light.
BobCajun
Well-Known Member
JoeBlow5823
Well-Known Member
Its such a small amount im not worried about it. Fluorescent bulbs also have mercury in them.