Light distance at professional facilities

RM3 said:

I have tested many bulbs and I mix em to give a complete spectrum I even have 3 UV bulbs in there. I like more deep blue than red because it increases tric production so I run 9 deep blue with 6 reds + the 3 UV's makes 18 bulbs which = roughly 1000 watts

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Dear ol" Thankful Grower! said:

Do uvs really make a hive dicference thats all ed rosenthal talks about wonder if they have they that would fit a socket i wouldnt min have that in veg or flower

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Apical Bud said:

Dear OP:
I share your concern. Everything I have read and everything I have experienced while growing weed tells me more lux is better. The sun gives at least 100,000 lux around here on March sunny days. My outdoor plants cannot be matched by indoor plants, and I don't credit that growth to the compost soil in my garden.
However, recently my grow has been co-opted by more experienced growers who put all our lights 8 feet from the canopy. With 12 1000W hortilux HPS we still get almost 10,000 lux at the canopy. They claim they don't raise their lights, from veg to flower. I have to trust them because of their credentials, but their only seemingly plausible argument is that they trade light intensity at the canopy for distributed intensity from head to toe, so that their side colas will get a lot of light. That argument might hold up because I've gone around their rooms with a lux meter and the lux doesn't change much from top to bottom (because of the linear stacking effect of many bulbs).
However, I believe that their method is simply "good enough" for their purposes. They argued that one of the benefits of their technique is that canopies even out quickly, since no single cola gets more light than any other, and they claim that this disavows the need to top plants, thereby reducing stress. But when I asked them if a lighting system that provided the same even distribution of light but at higher intensity would increase growth they told me it didn't matter. I have already tested plants at 1000 FC, at 500 FC, and at 2000 FC, and I can tell you it matters.
Well, they have 2 months to prove their methods.
I will report back to you on how it goes. But damn, my other buddy grows with 50,000 lux in flower and they will be hard pressed to match his yields.

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Arcadio said:

So you are saying you can create sub optimal conditions by giving them too much light. How about the light output of the sun, you know how bright that is? In order to match the brightness of a summer day you need to get very close to a 1000W HPS. Less than 12 inches in my experience from measuring them both with a lux meter.

Now lets move away from lumens and lux meters and consider light power in Watts since
Lumens are a measure of brightness as perceived by people with the largest weighting by far being on the color green, a color which is more or less irrelevant to plants. Watts are better to consider than lumens when you are talking about the amount of light the plant can handle. Lumens are for humans.

In areas where cannabis has evolved to thrive the sun bombards with over 1000W per square meter of light power. That's huge. It is the equivalent of having inside a tiny 3ft by 3ft area, ALL of the power of a 1000W HPS in light (aka radiation) form. No losses due to heat.
HPS produce much more watts worth of heat than light to begin with so you'd need multiple 1000W HPS lamps on 1 tiny square meter to produce the light power that the sun does. That's a massive amount of light that they are used to handling and thriving in.
When you move an HID multiple feet away you are providing a tiny fraction of the light power the sun gives.

It's a misconception that HID lighting can be more powerful than the sun when it comes to lighting a garden because it definitely can't, the sun is way more powerful/intense. Can you imagine trying to getting 3 1000W HPS lamps into a 3ft by 3ft area and utilizing all that light with 100% efficiency (i.e. no light goes to sides) ?.........I don't think so. But that's what it takes to match the power of the sun. It still wouldn't quite match the sun because not all this light will hit the 3ft by 3ft area, a lot will go to the sides and top and be absorbed. And it wouldn't match it in penetration. The sun has ultimate penetration being the same intensity 1 km above ground as it is at ground level. The advantage we have indoor is light hours of course which might possibly be a reason to maintain far lower light levels in our garden than a nice summer day. But really that much lower???

Before arguing the validity of my claim about needing 3 1000W hps in a 3ft x 3ft area to match the sun go ahead and research the lighting power of the sun known as irradiance. Irradiance is a measure of solar power that only considers light power and it is widely accepted to be over 1000W per square meter at the equator and well above 900W anywhere that high grade cannabis has evolved. It seems that in the highest grade cannabis evolved in regions close to the equator and at high altitudes which are the places with the greatest light power and intensity.

When you talk about a 1000W HPS light fixture it is not a light that produces 1000W of light. Not by a long shot. It gets the 1000W name because it merely consumes around 1000W of electrical power via the outlet, usually a tad more. What it produces is just a couple of hundred watts worth of light and the rest is 800W worth of heat. That's why you'll notice that a 1000W HID lamp with the ballast will produce about the same amount of heat as an 800W heater.
If you are thinking about arguing about my claim of an 1000W HPS producing only a couple of hundred watts of light you should know this, even the most efficient laser in the world is only about 35% efficient at producing light meaning that 1000W of this laser would produce 350W of light and 650W of heat. That's just the way it is when it comes to converting electricity into light. You create mostly heat and a little bit of light.
HID's are far more efficient than CFL's though.

Should we be striving to match the sun. Our lights are already at a great disadvantage it terms of light output, spectrum and penetration even for the 1000 watter. So why would we be wanting to widen the margin by creating even dimmer conditions??
Perhaps it's simply because we give them so many hours of light but I find that it doesn't justify it. There are many places that receive over 18 hours of daylight with many hours of very bright and powerful sunlight.
And one thing I know for absolute sure is that when growing outdoors in the sun, the more light the better. The longer the days, the better. The clearer the sky, the better. It really does seem like that plant just wants that enormous 1000W per square meter of light raining down on her all day. An amount of light that you will not even get close to without frying your plants with all the heat created by HID. So if the plants aren't being fried, and in fact are at IDEAL temp with an HID at 10 inches there is absolutely no way in hell that the amount of light is more than the sun or even close.

Shit I'm explaining this to my self now. I just realized something that seals the deal for me. An HID should definitely become a heat issue before it becomes a light issue. Why?? Because of the simple fact that it creates a lot more heat than it does light.

Less than 20% light more than 80% heat...I wonder what will become a problem first?

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NYFlowerpower631 said:

Yea my buddy runs the PowerVeg T5 bulbs with there light set up suggested for his 8 4ft T5 lights and he does grow amazing quality flower but definitely and he even agreed you don’t get the yield of some of these LED’s or HID’s just my opinion but not denying you can grow some nice big amazing flower and T5’s have come a long way won’t be surprised in future they to will produce big yields

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ttystikk said:

No. LED is already much more efficient and will keep getting more so. Florescent tech has maxed out. The only thing florescent lights do better than LED is UV and even that looks to be changing eventually.

If you want a high efficiency setup, use LED and supplement with UV florescent.

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RM3 said:

For years my pet peeve has been growers crammin light up the plants ass without understanding that light is simply just one of the elements that needs to be dialed in.

Folks are always amazed at what I accomplish using T5's to flower and I keep em 2 feet off the canopy. The reason you see commercial lights so high up is they understand this.

This bud is is the the bottom branch of a plant that is over 3 feet away from the nearest T5 bulb
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View attachment 3646987 View attachment 3646988

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NYFlowerpower631 said:

Not disagreeing with you at all. Personally I don’t care for LED’s I think the good ones are WAY over priced imo I’ve had this discussion with plenty of ppl. Been told everything about LES’s but my area would need at least 2 of these good lights to cover my area and family comes first as bills so don’t have the $$$ to invest which would be close to 2000$ I’m a hobby grower I’ll just pay my electric bill which honestly is not bad at all and run my 600w and 1000w Mh/HPS I only use Hortilux bulbs and get 2 runs for every bulb so they don’t cost me a lot like everyone claims to be. If you can and have that type of money to invest into your hobby I say go for it me I’ll spend more $$$ On good genetics and run the lights that been working for me 15 years and still going lol. Far from poor I run my own landscaping business but for just a hobby growing 5-6 nice sized plants and it’s not perpetual I don’t see the justification to spending the ridiculous amount of money these lights cost

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hybridway2 said:

Lets just say led has replaced T-5's in my garden with a 3/4 power savings.
100w Of medium powered diodes on strips x5 yrs ago, puts out equal to a 470w HO, T-5
Just as good plant health as my T-5's also & does seedlings just as good. So after seeing that 5 yrs. Ago i gave away all my t-5's. Had a shit ton cuz there were 4', x4 bulb ones for sidelighting in the flower room too.
Even gave away my brand spankin new 2x2/200w T-5 to a buddy to encourage him to grow.
Only T-5 I'd us now is for UV.

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BobCajun said:

I guess a water cooled lamp would never pass safety regs though.

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NYFlowerpower631 said:

Family comes first as bills so don’t have the $$$ to invest which would be close to 2000$

Far from poor I run my own landscaping business but for just a hobby growing 5-6 nice sized plants and it’s not perpetual I don’t see the justification to spending the ridiculous amount of money these lights cost

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