good or bad idea to light with cool white fluorescents?

Hope all is well with you all, I just have a quick question in terms of lighting. Any help would be appreciated.

What's the best lighting? for about 4 plants?

Are (2) 4 ft cool white fluorscents enough to veg? It just seems not to have any power coming from them. Feels like it won't do anything.

they should be enough to veg your plants, but they will be leggy. CFL's work a little better as they put of more lumens/watt. they also put off more heat...
good luck!

You will be fine with the 4 foot lights. When you say 2 does that mean you will have 4 bulbs or 2 bulbs. I would recommend 2 four foot fixtures with 2 bulbs each for a total of 4 bulbs. You might mix a Gro Lux bulb or two in with it. I've been getting better results with the 4 foot fixture than CFL's. I think the four footers disperse the light better because the CFL's are more focused.

4 cool white bulbs
or
2 cool white bulbs and 2 gro lux bulbs

that's my recommendation

Flower with a 400 watt or bigger HPS

You will be happy with the results, I personally guarantee it.

You should check this system out. It's a good deal... T5 4FT 6400K KIT WITH REFLECTOR COMPLETE [LGT001] - $50.67 : Hydroponics, Hydroponics - Horticulture - Gardening

I have a similar ? Would it be a good idea to mix cool white 4ft tubes with soft white cfl?

I did try a bank of 4 of those 4ft floro tube fixtures. It covered a lot of room, but for as bright as it was, I saw extremely poor results.

I tried using small 26w ho t-5 bulbs. I was hoping to run (4) 24" tubes in a small 18"x30" cabinet. My grow before this, I was hanging 26w cfl's. Unfortunately, the plants did not respond to the tubes very well! I pushed the limit on how close, and still VERY slow growth. I think floro tubes will work for getting clones to root, and perhaps to germinate. I replaced the floro tube lighting with (1) 150W hps i had laying around. Within' 24hrs, I could see the tiny seedling grow again!!!

My last grow (for short veg) with the cfl's worked out well, but I was hoping for more, even, lighting with the tubes. I would say that if you flower at 8" or less, you could defintely get away with runing 1 cfl per plant. Of course, more light = more growth! So far , NOT a fan of floro tubes for more than cloning.

Big!E! I wouldnt see any reason why not to run both lights. Aside from temp issues, more light is good. A LOT of farmers even use the 4' tubes for side lighting in flower. I was going to use my 4' fixtures for this, but space and pita requirements stopped that.

I love the cfl's because of their ease and versatility. However. I wouldnt dare waste my time flowering with them. You want good nugs, you gotta be willing to get some serious light. 400w minimum, and with that, be careful of stretchin'. Dont even think about trying to flower in a small cabinet, w/o a vented light. I know someone had used cfl's for the entire grow....but.......400w of cfl's prduce heat too.

Here's my mother/clone cabinet. I am slowly working on it to make it better, so its all kind of a rough trial. Im most concerned with heat and ease of use. So far im gaining 5deg above outside temps, but im going to have to put in probably about 100watts of cfl's in the corners of my mother chamber. Thus, I have (120mm cpu fans on the way. For $4 each, I'm gna b using 6 in the cabinet, and will have spares. DONT get caught without back up fans and bulbs!!


Good luck with the grow. Im NO veteran farmer, but I have tried and failed on so many ideas, perhaps i can help someone else not waste the time and money I have. Course, learning aint a waste. Besides, even tho i bitch, I love this hobby!!! Keep tokin'!!