Defoliation mid flower?

Not here for the discussion of people who are totally against defoliation and those who are.
Simply, my plant is very very bushy and even after tying down a lot of my plant, I am having trouble with light reaching some of the lower growth. FYI I have lollipopped it before it went into flower, about 65-70% from base.

So question being, should I defoliate now or is there an alternative I haven't taken into consideration?
Under 400w HPS atm, Can't get more light.
4 weeks into flower

I personally would not strip them clean 100% but would in this situation give them a decent cleaning. My routine for flower is Days 1/21 full strip down, anything else would just be on an as need basis. In veg I just do what the plants tell me so when they need it constantly.

Should not hurt anything. Any leaf covering a bud site on your plants would go if they were mine to start witrh then I would re assess the situation with the light penetration air flow etc.

Thanks Evil-Mobo, Yeah I'm thinking the same, I don't really want to defoliate to an extreme, just clear out the masses that are covering up bud sites and also the dense areas where I'm a bit skeptical about Mold. Thanks for the input

I usually do a medium defoliate right before I flip to flower and then another medium one between day 21-28 of flower. Other than that if I have a plant that needs more I only take about 2, 3 leaves off a day till I have achieved the defoliation I need. hope this helps