Gotta test the bloom bulbs sold by HtGSupply. WHatever that spectrum is it works great
Don't they have the SPD listed already? I guess I could see if the local hydro shop sells them. I'm already quite positive that if it's a 3000k lamp, it's going to be identical to the ge 3000k and every other 3000k "yellow-green" flowering lamp. I've seen such close similarities between the German HQ T5's that I have no doubts. Especially when it comes to these cheaper "horti-lamp" type lamps.
These "specialty hydro brands" are really good at tricking the customer into thinking they have a special product when it is just a relabeled lamp from a different company. It's much cheaper for them to invest in a labeling company and buy rights to a product than to invest in an entire lamp manufacturing plant. It's also very cheap to have crap made offshore in China. There are also fewer rules over there so they can really "stretch the truth" with their products, just like the German company did with the Fiji lamps.
I have a hard time accepting the fact that people do this, it's so fucked up but it's the real deal.
These lamps are the same as a "warm-white." Phillips and other companies make them and they are labeled as "827" in their product number. You can buy them fairly cheap by the case from household type light bulb distribution centers. They work because they are very yellow, which is on the red side of the spectrum so they balance your entire T5 spectrum to the red side better than nothing. Your good results are probably more due to the fact that you are using good nutes or are running your Ph correctly, etc. rather than being a spectrum issue.
I could be wrong, but I'm willing to bet that I'm not. Either way, plants can adapt fairly easily to a light source(take HPS for example) even if it has a shitty spectrum. It's the plant's "duty" to make flowers, so that's what it does best. I still think the best spectrum is one that has a high 95%-100% absorption spectra rate, in other words, a spectrum that is intense in the red/blue wavelengths, and less of the green/yellow/orange/IR etc.
I still have yet to see a red/blue only led or T5 spectrum out-perform a MH or HPS in bud density. Quality yes, but weight no. I want to see this happen still! I'm convinced it will someday. The best "low-power" grow setup that I've seen so far utilized neutral white leds. They only used 80w of neutral white leds and got the quality we've seen in T5 buds plus the weight and density we see in HID. He used 80w in a 18" x 18" area micro-grow with 4 plants in a mini sea-o-green setup.
I tried adding 500w of halogen to a really nice MH of mine that normally works well on it's own. I thought since the halogens are so plentiful in the "deep red" zone that they would really add a lot of "power" to the spectrum. I was wrong, they didn't do shit. It might have been because I added them really late into flower and the plants couldn't adapt to the lights fast enough.
BUT, it also might be due the fact that the halogens are very high in the green/yellow/IR spectrums and throw the entire spectrum balance off. We are searching for a ratio of wavelengths, that is strain specific.
Back to the yellow T5's. You guys, there is nothing special about these lamps, they are just plentiful in the "red-spectra."
If you ever see a T5 or any other florescent SPD chart that looks like an even "wave" across the whole spectrum, IT'S A BIG FAT LIE!!!!!!! No florescent lamp spectrum is evenly distributed across the whole visible spectrum.
Most floro lamps contain mercury which actually peaks at 185nm. That's somewhere in the UVc zone. Obviously this would be REALLY bad, but when they add the phosphor coating to the inside of the glass tubes, it blocks the 185nm wavelength and turns that energy into the visible light wavelengths.
The phosphors create PEAKS across the visible spectrum and so do MH and HPS. The SPD will never look like a gradual wave or curve across the x,y axis so if you see it, you should question the authenticity and honesty of that lamp company.
But, if it works, it works. So buy the cheapest crap that works and stick with it if that's what makes you happy, but if you want to see dense ass buds that actually beat HPS and MH watt to gram and in quality or whatever and also utilizes T5's or leds or any other low powered light source, then keep trying. I'm sure we will see it happen some day.
Sorry for the rambling, wanted to clear some misconceptions up that even I was mislead by in the industry at one time.
