bye bye hps!!

Hey everyone! I've decided to go all T5's due to the results I've seen on this site alone. I have been using a 600hps and I have a 400hps as well... I'm ditching them and going T5 for several reasons. Firstly I have a med card but it's just me and my girl, I don't need lbs. Secondly.... I like spending time with my girls and I hate looking at that fkn hps light. Last but not least I like that T5's retain 90% of their output throughout the life of the bulb whereas hid drops substantially. Set it and forget it, if a bulb blows ill replace it otherwise I'm not worrying about it.

Anyway... I have a six bulb 4' fixture, and two four bulb 4' fixtures.

I'm going to flower in a 4'x2'x5' tent. I have the six bulb fixture mounted above and one four bulb fixture mounted on the back of the tent hanging horizontally for intense side lighting. ill get pics up soon.

That's 50,000 lumens in that bad boy. for exhaust I have my 424 CFm 6" vortex with 6" duct pulling through a scrubber. I have a speed controller so I can dial it down.

I'm wondering about temps though. that's a LOT of bulbs in a small space (10 4' bulbs total, 6 above and 4 on the back wall)... but 424 Cfm is a ton of air... I cooled the 600w hps easily with it. the thing is the hps was in an aircooled hood where these flouros just radiate their heat all over so thereby ...technically... are a bit harder to cool I'm thinking? I realize their cooler then hps overall but they still produce heat and its not localized so harder to remove??

think it will be fine? anyone else doing something similar? How are you cooling?

Bro, your use to hids, they are full of heat, You will be just fine with a simple fan blowing under the canopy of your lights. t5's put out 75% less heat. your plant can be a half inch away and it wont really burn them unless they touch bulb.

I use a 5x5 closet, i dont have any venting, i have 6 t12,s 1 t5 and 8 cfls in there, and no heat problems, i only have a standing 9000 btu ac on fan mode in there blowing air around.

Thanks for the input. Your definitely right I am used to the hid's and I know T5's are cooler but as to how much I'm not sure. I'm not really referring to plant burn or plant proximity to the bulb but more of an increase in ambient temps. the plants will be within an inch of all these bulbs 4'x2' is small compared to a 5x5. The temp right now is about 80 degrees with only two of the ten 4' bulbs running. Once all ten are running that will be about 600 watts in a 4'x2' tent. Its going to require ventilation for sure.

I guess my best bet will be to have a fan down in the canopy somewhere to circulate the air so there's no pockets under the bulbs and then rely the exhaust fan mounted to the ceiling to clear it out often.

4'x2'x5' = 40 cubic ft. 424 CFM on the exhaust fan theoretically clears the tent 10.5 times per minute lol... minus flow for the scrubber but still I should be good lol.... I hope. Its just a lot of bulbs crammed TIGHT into a small space... has me a bit worried

thinkin too hard man.. jus get a fan on your the top of ur canopy like dj said and set it for every 15 on off and ur good no heat probs

dont worry your good

HA.... sweet titties that's what I like to hear. ill get a log posted soon.

I run 3 tents in a 8x12 room and run a 8k btu portable ac to cool the grow room. For flower I run a 4x4x6.5 600w hps tent and a 4x2x5 4ft 8bulb t5 ho tent. hps is in a cooltube and both have identical 200cfm fan/filter combos. Both flowering tents are also vented out of the grow room. Veg is a 4x4x6.5 tent with two 4ft 4bulb t5 ho's and a 240cfm fan.

Enough rambling basicly temp wise I run about 81-85 in the hps(600w) tent. 82-86 even seen 88 in the t5(4ft 8bulb) flower tent and 79-86 in veg. T5's put out alot more heat then I ever expected. Im thinking of slapping a 400w hps in my 4x2 cus its real hot with the t5. I even rigged away to hold my tent so the neg pressure doesnt suck the walls in against the fixture.

edit: I run two 6" air king clip on fans in each tent at canopy height. I hope ur grow goes smooth! But t5s gave me a bit more of a headache then I expected.

To be honest... that's what I'm expecting. I've got the door wide open right now since I'm in veg with seedlings and only two bulbs are running ... temp is 78-80. Once I zip it up and turn on all ten bulbs, I was fully expecting it to get hot as hell that's why I was looking for suggestions. Everyone seems to be sure it will be cool enough so that's reassuring...but I'm Leary. I gotta think at least a ten deg. ambient temp rise. Maybe ten bulbs is too much in there but my fans a beast too. so we'll see I guess. This weekend ill remove the plants, fire up all the bulbs, zip it up and do some temp tests

I suspect you will go back to HID's.

regards,

Why do you say that? Just out of curiosity.

Really the only issue is temps.... if I can get that ironed out ill be set.

Going to have to do some test runs I guess!

OZZZ said:

Why do you say that? Just out of curiosity.

Really the only issue is temps.... if I can get that ironed out ill be set.

Going to have to do some test runs I guess!

Click to expand...

let me know how high u can turn up that fan before the wind coming thru dims your bulbs

I have had the opportunity to help out a few growers move from 400W grows to T5's and the harvest was not as they expected, almost 40% less product and the quality was far off.

If you can replace the exact amount of wattage in T5's and have the plant surrounded with lamps you may get close to the quality of HID but nowhere near the weight.

You said your not in need of quantity, so try it out but the quality difference may have you going back to HID's, out of interest what was your temps like with the air cooled 600W HPS?

regards,

i am pretty sure that despite the heat, horticultural HPS lights have a higher lumen to watt ratio than t5's

but i like how t5's are more evenly spread, so i use both in the same closet

oh, i think t5's also need replacing less often

the spectrum of super hps bulbs like eye hortilux and the knockoffs is far more ideal for plant growth than any array of t5's, as well

i believe this accounts for the noted increase in quality and quantity, watt-per-watt, from HIDS

Well.... can't really compare the temps because I'm in a new house now...in a different part of the country no less. Also... the 600 was in a 4x4 tent.

The tent was to big.... to obnoxious. The 4x2 tents are much better and fit less obtrusively in a room. As mentioned I don't need lbs anymore.... and if I can cool it properly these 50000 lumens will be hitting the plants within an inch away... from above as well as behind.

Your correct though... time will tell I do have a 400hps I could easily throw in there if temps are a problem. pics to come so you can see what I'm working with. ill just have to try it out and see how it goes I guess.

Damn .... well the results are in. I zipped up the tent, fired up all the bulbs (I left the seedlings in since I was around to monitor temps. The exhaust fan was running at half speed. Checked the temps and in 20 minutes the temps shot from 80 deg's to 92!! I turned the fan on high, all 424 cfms of it ... and it dropped it to 90. Staying steady at 90 for 10 minutes. So I unzipped the tent completely but left all the bulbs running to see how that will affect it and am awaiting the result.

Bottom line though .. I cant be sure HID would be any different, either way I think my problem is an ambient temp of around 80 deg's in the room to begin with. Im not sure its a T5 issue at all, but theres definately some temp issues Im going to have to straighten out.

With Lights off .......... Now certainly I can pick up some CFM by getting rid of the bend in the exhuast ducting ... and Im going to do that next .... but regardless it shouldnt take 424 cfm full force to keep it cool at ambient temps.


Unzipping the tent completely and running it with all the lights on .... within 10 minutes the temps are back up to 90 degress. Tweaking is in order Ild say

i also run 12/12 from seed bubble ponic gets you big yields 12/12 same as sum soil veg/flower grows. i think the 12 hours of darkness helps keep heat down too