Using CFLs with no reflector. will my lumen output be cut in half?

My 3 cubic feet stealth cabinet is painted flat white. Iam hanging CFLs horizontally with no reflector. I have 6x42 watt cfls in my cabinet giving me about 12,000 lumens. Would this 12,000 lumens be reduced to only 6,000 lumens because I have no reflector?

Worst case scenario, my flat white paint will reflect some light but will half of my lumen output be lost?

I've read that your basic white flat paint will reflect aprox. 60% of any light that hits it. so maybe a good estimation would be to take 60% of half of your lumen count then add that to the other half?

midnitetokr said:

I've read that your basic white flat paint will reflect aprox. 60% of any light that hits it. so maybe a good estimation would be to take 60% of half of your lumen count then add that to the other half?

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I think flat white paint reflects about 90% not 60%.

Iam sure the lumen output on my lights will be 12000 lumens, but the actuall amount of lumens that the canopy of my plants will see is about 6000 lumens? The CFL lights are hang horizontally so half of the light is being directed upwards, my cabinet is flat white paints, so it will reflect some of the light downwards, but worst case scenario, my plants will only see half of my lumen output?

id get a hood

Iam hanging my CFL bulbs horizontally, with out a reflector. The ceiling of my stealth cabinet will be painted flat white. If my entire cfl light setup outputs 12,000 lumens will my plant canopy only see 6,000 lumens because my CFL lights are hanged horizontally?

If my cfl bulbs are hanged horizontally will my scrog canopy only see half the lumen output of my lights?

cfls are designed to put light out equally in all directions...the only accurate way to measure what your plants are getting is to buy a light meter and measure lumens that way, otherwise youre going to be making alot of calculations to figure out what you could by just looking at a meter.

Martian Farts said:

cfls are designed to put light out equally in all directions...the only accurate way to measure what your plants are getting is to buy a light meter and measure lumens that way, otherwise youre going to be making alot of calculations to figure out what you could by just looking at a meter.

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hmm, so if I want 10000 lumens on my scrog canopy, I will need a cfl light setup puting out about 15000 lumens.

basically...but i think it really depends on how you set them up...look at my pics on my grow journal in my sig...i dont have any reflectors but my plants are dense and happy