Should i raise my lights?

ovd2

Member
I have 4 65w CFL's and 1 100W CFL that are about 2 inches to the side of the plants that are only 5 inches tall after 1 month. What should I do? The best looking plant is kind of bushy with the branches pretty close together.
 

nick88

Well-Known Member
I have 4 65w CFL's and 1 100W CFL that are about 2 inches to the side of the plants that are only 5 inches tall after 1 month. What should I do? The best looking plant is kind of bushy with the branches pretty close together.
Try placing lights overtop of the plants
 

ovd2

Member
I read somewhere the light gets emitted from the side on cfl's not sure the how true that statement is but thats what I have been going by.. how much over top?
 

nick88

Well-Known Member
I found its better to have the cfl flat about 2in above plants. You can make like wht they call a batwing reflector for it with drink cans that will help out some.
 

Greather420

Active Member
Personally, I think the side lighting is a good idea. You can let the plant get a lot bushier and still get good yields from the lower branches. I wouldn't take anything away, but if you wanted to add another light to the top it would help. I would recommend adding either a T5 light or maybe even a 150 watt hps for flower (they are a bit harder to find but worth it if you use it with other lights!). I would say, though, if you are getting close branching and your plants are nice and bushy then they are doing just fine with the way you have them. As long as the leaves don't get burned or heat stressed then you can keep those cfl's pretty damn close to the plant....nice :)
hope this helped!
 

ovd2

Member
I have a 3'x3' tent on the way so i might redo something with the lighting.And thank you. This is just bag seed. I want to do some sort of lowryder grow with a few of those so I can try to get shorter cycles. I just want to be able to smoke for free...hopefully the 3x3 and 360 watts cfl's help lol.
 

ovd2

Member
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They are 1 month old from start in 4 days. The big one is only 5-6 inches tall. They are short lol how do they look? and my setup?
 

nick88

Well-Known Member
View attachment 2367142View attachment 2367143View attachment 2367144View attachment 2367145


They are 1 month old from start in 4 days. The big one is only 5-6 inches tall. They are short lol how do they look? and my setup?
They look really good.
2 things, were the tips of those bottom leaves maybe touching the soil for a while? And if you turn those cfls on their side and reposition at same height you would get a lot more light to your plants.
You're right they are some stout lil ladies
 

ovd2

Member
any tips on what to use to hang then side ways? cheap and effective at that.
The two leaves touched the dirt yes should i chop them off?
 

nick88

Well-Known Member
any tips on what to use to hang then side ways? cheap and effective at that.
The two leaves touched the dirt yes should i chop them off?
Nah, just trim the damaged ends off so it doesnt spread to rest of leaf or turn into anything else.
Looking at your set up, if you lose the reflector in center, urn bulbs on sides and attach to your rack with mabe tie sraps around socket part. Or maybe pieces of meal coat hanger and then just raise and lower whole rack. Then you could put some type of reflective material on top of rack to reflect the light back to plants from top side of bulbs.
If you dont have any type. Walmart has those emergency blankets which are nothing but thin mylar for 3 bucks. You could put that on rack, and if heat becomes issue just cut a few small holes n mylar to allow heat to escape out the top.
 

ovd2

Member
Sounds like a good idea. Right now I just raised the plants on dvd cases so that theres 1 plant between two 65 watt bulbs with still an inch on the side. I need to do something with that center light. Do i keep a 100 watt the same distance or how far should it be? BTW this is my first bag seed run. I ordered some fem's for after my first run.
 

nick88

Well-Known Member
Sounds like a good idea. Right now I just raised the plants on dvd cases so that theres 1 plant between two 65 watt bulbs with still an inch on the side. I need to do something with that center light. Do i keep a 100 watt the same distance or how far should it be? BTW this is my first bag seed run. I ordered some fem's for after my first run.
You could arrange the plants in a triangle. Lose reflector, place 3 lights so they will be located between plants to the outside of them. Take the other 2 and place in middle of rack. Let the 3 on sides hang slightly lower than than 2 in center and adjust the rack so that the 3 bulbs are in between but slightly below the tops of the plants. That way everything will be close and you should have complete coverage, for a while anyway. lol
Judging by size its not gonna be long before its time to transplant
 

nick88

Well-Known Member
Thanks for the useful advice lol. How much longer should i veg them before goign 12/12?
If i remember correctly you said a 3x3 tent right? If your going with cfl's, i think you said you have some 300+ ones on the way.
Then your prob not far from it due to space limitations. I f it was me a would set up a screen and scrog them. That way you will have an even canopy so you wont have to worry about side lighting. This also increases yield greatly, as it brings the normally small side buds up to the same level as cola. That way they get more light=more bud. lol
 

LeafGnosis

Active Member
Here is a couple of pics of 25 to one month vegging. I added the 150 watt HPS the last week of vegging so it seemed to help some but most of my growth was under CFL.. It looks like you are using 2700 k, is that correct? I used 6 23 watt 6500 cfls moving them around periodically so I am going to keep this set up for my veg room and use a 600 watt HPS for flowering.IMG_0208.jpgIMG_0212.jpgIMG_0213.jpgIMG_0215.jpg this last pic I ended up lolly popping during the last week of veg and super cropped the first week of flowering (once I found they were female) though that one ended up being a hermi... so I had to let IT go lol

I love growing this stuff (have plenty of bag seed, which these are, for the first grow)
 

nick88

Well-Known Member
Here is a couple of pics of 25 to one month vegging. I added the 150 watt HPS the last week of vegging so it seemed to help some but most of my growth was under CFL.. It looks like you are using 2700 k, is that correct? I used 6 23 watt 6500 cfls moving them around periodically so I am going to keep this set up for my veg room and use a 600 watt HPS for flowering.View attachment 2367381View attachment 2367382View attachment 2367383View attachment 2367384 this last pic I ended up lolly popping during the last week of veg and super cropped the first week of flowering (once I found they were female) though that one ended up being a hermi... so I had to let IT go lol

I love growing this stuff (have plenty of bag seed, which these are, for the first grow)
Nice, looking good. If i can make a suggestion. I would move the plants in together a lil more. So that way your getting a more focused footprint from your lights. That hps needs to be a whole lot closer. It's fine to try and get side light, but lets face it. regardless of how you grow theres just some buds that arent ever going to amount to anything. So its better to focus on upper canopy with main lighting and just use supplemental lighting for the upper sides.
 

insan3

Well-Known Member
Here is a couple of pics of 25 to one month vegging. I added the 150 watt HPS the last week of vegging so it seemed to help some but most of my growth was under CFL.. It looks like you are using 2700 k, is that correct? I used 6 23 watt 6500 cfls moving them around periodically so I am going to keep this set up for my veg room and use a 600 watt HPS for flowering.View attachment 2367381View attachment 2367382View attachment 2367383View attachment 2367384 this last pic I ended up lolly popping during the last week of veg and super cropped the first week of flowering (once I found they were female) though that one ended up being a hermi... so I had to let IT go lol

I love growing this stuff (have plenty of bag seed, which these are, for the first grow)
More light !!! and op, i would raise the lights and switch to 6500k or add some. once you enter flowering, do 2700k
 

LeafGnosis

Active Member
Nice, looking good. If i can make a suggestion. I would move the plants in together a lil more. So that way your getting a more focused footprint from your lights. That hps needs to be a whole lot closer. It's fine to try and get side light, but lets face it. regardless of how you grow theres just some buds that arent ever going to amount to anything. So its better to focus on upper canopy with main lighting and just use supplemental lighting for the upper sides.
Thank you, it was hard to lose one to herm (I do not have space to grow it out separate)
I have the HPS about 12 inches from the top with the temp around 83. Going after a 600 watt dimmable so that I can reduce lighting towards the end of the flowering stage (though that is probably a bad idea). Heat is an issue that when I get the 600, it will be with a cool tube and a good inline fan to take all the heat that baby will push out :)
thanks nick88!!
 
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