thewanderingjack
Well-Known Member
I vegged 12 plants under... well starting at about 48 watts (2x24w CFLs to sprout) and slowly building up to about 480 watts (24 x 20 watt avg... some 24s, some 16s, some in-between) about 2/3rds of the way (I vegged for six weeks... so by the end of week 4 I was running the 480 and used those for the last 2 weeks, though at the same time I also went down to 8 plants, with 4 turning out male). These were all cheap 6 packs of spiral CFL bulbs, mostly the ace brand ones.
I used the same 480 watts of CFLs for the first 2 weeks of flower and finally switched to an LED with 4 of the CFLs as supplement. I was using the LED at 300 watts full spectrum, but just switched down to only 150 watts of red light and added 2 more CFLs. I am now 4 weeks into flower and I chopped the smallest plant down cuz I'm out of buds and got around 3/8s dry... good smoke, fairly potent... maybe not as long lasting). I still have 6 bigger plants to finish... they're not huge or anything (around 16" wide and maybe 18-24 tall) or full of long giant colas (way to go whitebb2727!)... pretty nice sized tops though, more like the smaller ones in whitebb's pic... and very frosty.
So IMHO, CFLs can do a very good job. Of course other options may offer better results... but for myself, just starting out, and doing so at the lowest possible cost, it has been great. I certainly am making back what I spent (in fact even if I only get 1/2 oz per plant that's 3 ozs, which would cost me at least $600 at the shop... total grow time will be ~12 weeks, @ maybe MAYBE $50 a month in electricity... plus the cost of clamp lamps/bulbs... ~$250 MAX). And I was able to do it slowly, which was an added way to "save money" or at least stretch it out.
(note: most of that time I only used 2700k bulbs, unaware of the difference. I probably started adding some 5500-6500k bulbs around week 4... mostly in 16-20 watt, as it was all I could find locally without spending a lot... also, my conditions were otherwise pretty crappy... temps in the 50s-60s, high humidity and no ventilation... so those are big limiting factors to consider... as to genetics... unknown... decent I'm sure... seeds were from a friend's inherited home grow op... no idea what they were, but being from a 'local' grower, I'm sure it was good stock)
HazedandConfused: Bricks vs feathers... makes sense to me... 400 lbs is 400 lbs, as is 400 watts... and yeah in fact for high powered lights that's always XXX watts + cooling. The question is then about returns... ARE high powered lights producing consistently greater yields (enough to offset the added cooling costs)?. IDK. Anyone have links to experiments that actually take all that into account?
I used the same 480 watts of CFLs for the first 2 weeks of flower and finally switched to an LED with 4 of the CFLs as supplement. I was using the LED at 300 watts full spectrum, but just switched down to only 150 watts of red light and added 2 more CFLs. I am now 4 weeks into flower and I chopped the smallest plant down cuz I'm out of buds and got around 3/8s dry... good smoke, fairly potent... maybe not as long lasting). I still have 6 bigger plants to finish... they're not huge or anything (around 16" wide and maybe 18-24 tall) or full of long giant colas (way to go whitebb2727!)... pretty nice sized tops though, more like the smaller ones in whitebb's pic... and very frosty.
So IMHO, CFLs can do a very good job. Of course other options may offer better results... but for myself, just starting out, and doing so at the lowest possible cost, it has been great. I certainly am making back what I spent (in fact even if I only get 1/2 oz per plant that's 3 ozs, which would cost me at least $600 at the shop... total grow time will be ~12 weeks, @ maybe MAYBE $50 a month in electricity... plus the cost of clamp lamps/bulbs... ~$250 MAX). And I was able to do it slowly, which was an added way to "save money" or at least stretch it out.
(note: most of that time I only used 2700k bulbs, unaware of the difference. I probably started adding some 5500-6500k bulbs around week 4... mostly in 16-20 watt, as it was all I could find locally without spending a lot... also, my conditions were otherwise pretty crappy... temps in the 50s-60s, high humidity and no ventilation... so those are big limiting factors to consider... as to genetics... unknown... decent I'm sure... seeds were from a friend's inherited home grow op... no idea what they were, but being from a 'local' grower, I'm sure it was good stock)
HazedandConfused: Bricks vs feathers... makes sense to me... 400 lbs is 400 lbs, as is 400 watts... and yeah in fact for high powered lights that's always XXX watts + cooling. The question is then about returns... ARE high powered lights producing consistently greater yields (enough to offset the added cooling costs)?. IDK. Anyone have links to experiments that actually take all that into account?
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