Budding Stage: 400 watt vs. 600 watt vs. 1000 ??

I am growing 8 plants indoor which are now just at budding stage with a hydroponic set up, currently with a 400 watt bulb.. But the process is rather slow, how much would a 600 watt or 1000 watt speed up the budding process?

It would be expensive for new bulbs, so I want to know if it is worth it to speed up or improve the budding, or if I should just stick with the 400 watt bulb?



Any tips welcome, thanks!

How many watts is your ballast? A 600 watt bulb in a 400 watt ballast will only produce 400 watts.

AirAnt said:

How many watts is your ballast? A 600 watt bulb in a 400 watt ballast will only produce 400 watts.

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Sorry, I meant buying everything new including the ballast, so it produces 600 or 1000 watts?

Would it make a big difference to the speed of the process / yeild if I got one of these two options?

Thanks

I've got the same Q!
I'm currently building my grow space.
DWC, 2 bins, 3 plants each.
Appx 5x5 for both veg and flower, 6 plants to start.
Want to set up the veg room for the tightest coils I can get in the shortest amount of time.
600 or 1000 MH?
Going w/1K for flower, to start out.

There's a chart around here somewhere...Off the top of my head a 400w hps puts out 50,000 lumens, a 600w 90,000 lumens, and a 1000w 140,000. I know that's not exactly correct, but it's close. A MH puts out less lumens than a HPS and I don't know those numbers but I imagine they're roughly the same ratio of lumens per watt as the HPS. Going from a 400w to a 600w gives you almost twice as many lumens, so that's definitely worth trading-up for. A 600w HPS is the most efficient HID.

I use a 400mh for veg starting week 2 from germination and switch to 600 hps's for flower. My first few grows were with a 400hps. Then 400 side by side with 600 and now solely 600w, since the 400 yield/bud size/bud density are dramatically less than with a 600w. For my set up a 1000w was too hot and couldn't get my plants anywhere near as close to the light. But, a 1000w'er is scary, if you can accomodate. It's good to put more light as going into flower and 600W side by side are best.