GPW? Should we start focusing on GSQM instead?

Here is another interesting comparison, I think we would all agree that someone who has a perpetual grow, commercial or personal, doesn't matter is definitely going to be the most efficient, just intuitively it makes sense as your cloning/vegging runs concurrently to your flowering, Same as if someone has a veg tent and a flower tent, you are saving piles of time, but you require additional square meters and power to achieve it. kWh/g/m-2 takes all that into account.

wietefras said:

That's not how science works. You have to be able to explain how your idea is better than what everybody else is already using to good effect.

Besides I actually did provide arguments and you just contribute ... well nothing.

So explain what is the benefit of adding an almost random number of kWh to the cost of flowering when only flowering actually produces the yield? It can be anything between 75kWh and 250kWh (ie as much as a third to 100% of what I use for flowering), but the yield doesn't change.

Which means that instead of a reasonably stable 2g/kWh/m2 (between say 1.9 and 2.3) I now fluctuate between 1.1g/kWh/m2 and 1.7g/kWh/m2. Making it a completely incomparable metric.

Nothing changes on my flowering tent. No different lighting, same nutrients. Nothing changes in my annual yield. It's just whether I was keeping vegging plants alive waiting for a free flowering room (or if I threw them away and didn't use them) or if I use cuttings and push things through at max speed.

The price difference is only €40 per m2 even between those two huge extremes for a yield worth thousands per m2. So money wise I really don't care a rats ass. Logistics in keeping the flowering rooms occupied at 100% and producing at optimal levels is the only thing that produces yields. The rest is just overhead.

So that's the actual science of economics right there.

Click to expand...

I dont know why there is an argument about this. If we are talking about our own personal comparisons use whatever parameters you want.

I veg and flower a seed plant at a time for a staggered perpetual medical garden and am I concerned with total monthly/ yearly cost and per plant yield.

But in business overhead = cost. So it is always considered.

If we are going to compare the efficiencies of each others grows we dont need to use cost, @wietefras already pointed out that geography and electricity rates would make this an unfair basis for comparison, which is why I peeled it out of my original formula, just use g/kWh/m-2 , really its grade 3 math, not rocket science. If you dont want to, thats your prerogative, your opinion, your choice to not to, there are no random numbers in this. The hypothesis as per the scientific method is that there is a more accurate way to draw comparisons from one grow to another than with grams per watt. The experiment is doing the bloody math, from which we can draw a conclusion. Collect the data and do the math. Its as simple as that.

MichiganMedGrower said:

I dont know why there is an argument about this.

Click to expand...

What is more important, a flowering room producing thousands of dollars worth of crop or spending a few bucks extra on keeping extra plants alive to make sure this flowering room keeps running at full capacitiy?

Say the flowering room produces $2500 per m2. Does it really matter that you spend $40 extra to make sure it's running all the time? In fact that flowering room not running for a day would cost you that $40 in yield.

Keeping track of overhead costs is fine. Convolution a metric designed to keep track of your flowering performance with irrelevant overhead costs is not.

MichiganMedGrower said:

A proper sea of green would have a fuller area ready to flower with a shorter veg time yielding a higher gram per watt amount.

Less of the same plants in same area would take longer to veg to fill the space and likely yield the same so less grams per watt.

But again. Same yield per meter squared (or cubed I like that as I grow bushes not screens of colas.)

We hear only flowering numbers most times but professionals with commercial grows take all parameters into account for cost.

Click to expand...

The Dutch figured this out years ago when they perfected the SOG technique. They didn't have to worry about plant numbers and realised that by keeping mother plants they could take clones and start flowering them almost as soon as (up to a week after) rooting to dispense with veg times and harvest constantly under the same lights every eight weeks or so. Indeed, in the early days when indicas and hybrids were less common, the only way to manage landrace sativas indoors was to flower them from seed or clone, otherwise they grew too tall after flowering for 14-16 weeks or more.

In terms of SOG, the higher yields come down to a few of things: less internodal distance from the root zone to the top of the plant to transport nutrients (less distance = more efficient uptake); uniform canopy for uniform light distribution; shallow canopy for better light penetration; maximum number of main bud sites for a given area (wall-to-wall buds); less plant energy expended on growing deep root structures and main and branching stems; almost no veg time (less wasted energy, taking into account additional energy used on maintaining clone mothers and cloning chambers); very little head height (more compact grows).

The highest yielding systems I have ever seen combined the SOG technique with a stadium style vertical grow fed by aeroponics. Way over 2gpw with HIDs and - again - almost no veg time.

BTW, I yielded a consistent 3.5lb - at times pretty close to 4lb (60oz) - from a 4'x4'x6' box using 1200w of vertical HPS for over a decade. The main reason I moved to LED was a narrow space in my new abode necessitating a horizontal grow. There are many ways to skin a cat.

Here's another example, lets take a 16"x16" mother tent from which we will take clones, uses 60 watts for 18 hours a day.
After conversion to metric, thats 0.16 m-2 for the mother tent
That is beside a 0.47 m-2 veg/flowering tent.
Veg period: 100 watts 18 hours per day for 6 weeks
(we shave 2 weeks off veg time by cloning instead of growing from seed, hypothetically)
Flowing period: 150 watts 12 hours per day for 8 weeks
Total energy use:
Mother = (runs concurrent to the veg+flower time which is 1764 hours) 105.84 kWh
Veg = 75.6 kWh
Flower = 100.8 kWh

Total time:
mother = 14 weeks concurrent
veg = 6 weeks
flower = 8 weeks
That equals 282.24 Kwh

Wet yield at harvest 400 grams

Total area = 0.47+0.16= 0.63

400/282.24= 1.42 grams per kWh x 0.63 = 0.89 grams per kWh per square meter.

Decidedly less efficient compared to growing from seed in my previous example, even with shaving two weeks off veg

Makes perfect sense to me. I would get to harvest faster but it is cost me more to do it because I am running an extra tent.

wietefras said:

What is more important, a flowering room producing thousands of dollars worth of crop or spending a few bucks extra on keeping extra plants alive to make sure this flowering room keeps running at full capacitiy?

Say the flowering room produces $2500 per m2. Does it really matter that you spend $40 extra to make sure it's running all the time? In fact that flowering room not running for a day would cost you that $40 in yield.

Keeping track of overhead costs is fine. Convolution a metric designed to keep track of your flowering performance with irrelevant overhead costs is not.

Click to expand...

I get your point of view but different methods require different veg time and the cost of grams per watt to get to the final number can be very different.

I am comparing 12/12 from seed to 5 week veg from seed of strains I know well right now. The results will differ in my total cost and likely grams per watt flowering as well. Or per plant in my case.

Prawn Connery said:

almost no veg time (less wasted energy, taking into account additional energy used on maintaining clone mothers and cloning chambers)

Click to expand...

lol, wait wait, I thought veg time didn't matter

It doesn't. I'm sorry, what's your point?

canadian1969 said:

Here's another example, lets take a 16"x16" mother tent from which we will take clones, uses 60 watts for 18 hours a day.
After conversion to metric, thats 0.16 m-2 for the mother tent
That is beside a 0.47 m-2 veg/flowering tent.
Veg period: 100 watts 18 hours per day for 6 weeks
(we shave 2 weeks off veg time by cloning instead of growing from seed, hypothetically)
Flowing period: 150 watts 12 hours per day for 8 weeks
Total energy use:
Mother = (runs concurrent to the veg+flower time which is 1764 hours) 105.84 kWh
Veg = 75.6 kWh
Flower = 100.8 kWh

Total time:
mother = 14 weeks concurrent
veg = 6 weeks
flower = 8 weeks
That equals 282.24 Kwh

Wet yield at harvest 400 grams

Total area = 0.47+0.16= 0.63

400/282.24= 1.42 grams per kWh x 0.63 = 0.89 grams per kWh per square meter.

Decidedly less efficient compared to growing from seed in my previous example, even with shaving two weeks off veg

Makes perfect sense to me. I would get to harvest faster but it is cost me more to do it because I am running an extra tent.

Click to expand...

Again, I'm not sure I really follow. Are you referring to a SOG?

The mother plant is perpetual. The flowering chamber is perpetual (harvest every eight weeks). You take clones from the mother two weeks before your next run. The mother and clones share the same chamber. That's how SOG works.

In any case, the main point is veg time makes no difference to your flowering metric - as wietefras pointed out - as you can actually yield more with out it.

The reality is, almost no commercial grower grows from seed: they keep mothers or clone perpetually.

Prawn Connery said:

It doesn't. I'm sorry, what's your point?

Click to expand...

Its not a "flowering metric" its a metric of your entire grows efficiency, g/watt is limited to flowering because no one is counting the electricity and time of the other growth phases, its not a complete view of your grow.

as @MichiganMedGrower states different methods require different veg times. VEG TIMES MATTER good god.

Lets do the numbers for an actual SOG, give me the tent sizes, veg and flower times and wattages. I'll do the rest.

Sure. If you're not keeping a mother plant or cloning chamber, then to be fair, neither am I.

Femmed seeds - as many as you like - straight to flower (let's say 64 seedlings, or 8 x 8 ). One 4'x4' tent. However many watts of light you would use in your own hypothetical 4'x4' tent.

My yields will be higher. There will be no veg time. I get free seeds (coz I'm a nice guy and know a few breeders).

Let me know what you come up with

Prawn Connery said:

Sure. If you're not keeping a mother plant or cloning chamber, then to be fair, neither am I.

Femmed seeds - as many as you like - straight to flower (let's say 64 seedlings, or 8 x 8 ). One 4'x4' tent. However many watts of light you would use in your own hypothetical 4'x4' tent.

My yields will be higher. There will be no veg time. I get free seeds (coz I'm a nice guy and know a few breeders).

Let me know what you come up with

Click to expand...

okay I was looking for a mother/clone tent size, and the sog area size, the time to harvest, the yield and the wattages for each area. No hypotheticals, lets use your real world numbers. Got it, SOG no veg time, right from one tent to the other. Also need how many hours the light are on in each area.

Same tent. New seeds each time. You don't need clones to SOG - you can flower straight from seed.

You can use the same tent and wattage, too. You can also use the same seeds. The difference is, you can grow one seed and veg it for six weeks, and I will grow 64 seeds and veg them for zero.

I will have higher yields with no veg time and a harvest every eight weeks. You will have a harvest every 14 weeks, and your yields won't be as good as mine each harvest, because SOG is more efficient.

Are you starting to understand now?

Prawn Connery said:

Same tent. New seeds each time. You don't need clones to SOG - you can flower straight from seed.

You can use the same tent and wattage, too. You can also use the same seeds. The difference is, you can grow one seed and veg it for six weeks, and I will grow 64 seeds and veg them for zero.

I will have higher yields with no veg time and a harvest every eight weeks. You will have a harvest every 14 weeks, and your yields won't be as good as mine each harvest, because SOG is more efficient.

Are you starting to understand now?

Click to expand...

No games, lets do a real SOG, with a mother/clone chamber and flowering tent, no seeds, we will assume the mothers are already established and you have a set of clones ready to move over.

MichiganMedGrower said:

I am comparing 12/12 from seed to 5 week veg from seed of strains I know well right now. The results will differ in my total cost and likely grams per watt flowering as well. Or per plant in my case.

Click to expand...

I did 12/12 as well with no significant difference in g/W and g/m2

canadian1969 said:

Its not a "flowering metric" its a metric of your entire grows efficiency, g/watt is limited to flowering because no one is counting the electricity and time of the other growth phases, its not a complete view of your grow.

Click to expand...

It IS a flowering metric.. Exactly because everybody leaves out that incomparable bit of electricity used during veg. So no indeed it is not a metric for the entire grow and that's by design.

canadian1969 said:

No games, lets do a real SOG, with a mother/clone chamber and flowering tent, no seeds, we will assume the mothers are already established and you have a set of clones ready to move over.

Click to expand...

I'm only going to say this one more time: You do not need clones to SOG.

Like-for-like metrics, my SOG tent will produce almost two yields for every one of yours and yield a significant amount more each time.

If you still do not understand - given the above example - why veg times don't matter to yield, then I cannot explain it to you any simpler. I'm sorry.

wietefras said:

I did 12/12 as well with no significant difference in g/W and g/m2

Click to expand...

I think we are alone here in being able to understand this concept.

Well, you, me and the entire Dutch growing nation!

wietefras said:

I did 12/12 as well with no significant difference in g/W and g/m2

Click to expand...

From my initial testing with T-5 5 week veg I got the same yield and quality but the branches needed support on the 12/12 plants. The pre vegged ones had thick strong branching.

So far in testing with a 315 cmh rather than the fluorescents for a 5 week veg the plants grew almost a third larger in flower with much thicker branches and an increase in yield near 20%.

But the bushes are too big for my space like that.