Cfl vs hps?

[romulanog]

ok so i been growing outdoors for a while now and i been interested going hydroponic and see what comes out best in the end but what i would like to know is what does everyone think about using cfl lights for all stages or using hps lights for all stages or using cfl lights for vegetative stage and switch to hps lights during flowering stage??

 

[MaoZebong]

Re: Cfl vs hps??

I'm using CFL's for my first grow, and will definitively continue using them. The heat from a comparable HPS would fry my plant. I think you can get 300W bulbs now, specifically tinted to the light spectra you want for veg, bloom and cloning. According to the "hype" the cfl's also produce more light/W than filament type bulbs, so you waste less energy to heat. They require no ballast type hardware, just an E40 socket. And they're supposed to last a very long time, saving you dosh in the long run.

Those are my reasons for going CFL. Other factors may be more important to you, though.

 

[ItsChrome]

Re: Cfl vs hps??

Yeah CFL for veg and HPS for flower is an excellent way to go. You can also take the CFL's the full way. How ever if your willing and able to deal with the heat from the HPS there are benefits to them over CFL. Just as there are benefits for CFL over HPS. The main difference really comes down to the radiance intensity. The puts of a much more intense energy that allows further penetration into the canopy over CFL which requires the use of side lighting or cropping/listing Technics to fully utilize them. How ever in the defense of CFL's you get a much more targeted light spectrum which leads to higher efficiency with them. You waste less energy by producing a higher amount of usable light per watt.

It really boils down to whats right for your grow space.

 

[Giantsfan24]

I use HID for both veg and flower. You can get metal halide lamps that are spectrum specific. I've got 7200K in veg right now and 2100K hps for flower.

My plants have tolerated the light very well and I can't wait to get these girls into flower..

If I weren't using MH..I'd definitely go with CFL's for veg at least.

 

[Growing247]

CFL are ok for vegging although a T5 would be much better. Your plants will veg faster I believe and have closer internodes than running basic CFLs. This is just my opinion. I run a Sun Blaze T5 for vegging and CFLs for germinating seeds and rooting clones. For flowering, I have tried using CFLs and I was not happy with the result. The buds were leafy and just looked like and smoked like crap. I ended up turning the whole plant into hash. With CFL I don't think the turpenoids and flavinoids develop to their full potential. On the other hand buds that I flower under my 1000 watt HPS lights are dense, full of resin and you can grow something you can pull out in a group of friends and have them look over your buds and be impressed. As far as the heat issue goes, HPS does generate quite a bit of heat but not nearly as much as metal halides. All you need is a air cooled reflector and they make a Yield Master II for 100 bucks which is really cheap for an air cooled reflector. An exhaust fan like a Eco Plus. You could get a better reflector but they can cost as much as 200 bucks for a Magnum XXL. Then you will need to get a ballast. Electronic ballasts costs a lot more than magnetic ballasts but are more efficient in terms of power consumption and a lot of them have special features like the ability to dim or turn up the power of the bulb an extra 10%. Personally, none of that stuff really matters to me and I use Sun Master Harvest Pro switchables and I also have a Budget Grow switchable. The ballasts put off a ton of heat also and its good to have them outside the grow room if possible. Also, when it comes to HPS bulbs not all are created equal. I am currently running a Sun Master Cool Deluxe and a EYE Hortilux HPS, both 1000 watts. There is a visual difference in color between the two. The EYE was more expensive and has a lot more blue in the light. The Sun Master HPS are notorious for lowering yields. So be very careful what bulbs you select because it can literally decide whether your plants reach their full potential or not. It may not be cheap to buy a fan, a air cooled reflector, a remote ballast and a bulb but I bought 1 last week and the whole system was 360.00 with a 10% discount because I am a medical marijuana patient. Good luck. Hope this advise helps.

 

[ItsChrome]

. For flowering, I have tried using CFLs and I was not happy with the result. The buds were leafy and just looked like and smoked like crap. I ended up turning the whole plant into hash. With CFL I don't think the turpenoids and flavinoids develop to their full potential.

I agree with the rest of your post, but here I have to take a bit of offense. I agree that bud will in fact be denser under the HPS this is a result of the intensity of radiance intensity. deeper penetration of the HPS is the reason here. Thats not to say any product from CFL is going to be of a lesser quality.

Its the grower that can make or break a grow. Yes there are environmental factors that come into play as well. Some times your genetics just aren't up to par and we do the best we can to over come this. But to make the blanket statement at CFLs dont bring a plant to full potential is a cop out.

A growers gotta be able to adopt and learn to grow with what they have. With CFLs it take a bit more tinkering to get your setup right. Once you have your setup tweaked you will produce some amazing full flavor beautiful smoke. Take my last grow for instance. I had genetics against me from day on but I still milked some one the smoothest, resinous smoke you've ever had. Smells like skunky fruit loops.

 

[glasseye]

hps all the way imo, costs a bit more off the start to get going, but well worth it. i cabinet grew cfls for my first grow, beautiful tight noded beauties, but not the volumn of harvest as compared to hps. more of a commitment, and a bigger fotoprint required thou with hps. i didnt think that i could grow enough in a small cfl cabinet grow to keep me medicated, so i took the next step. but cfl's are a very cost effective way of lighting too! but you dont get anything for free. hps produces much bigger plants. and more bud

 

[MaoZebong]

Your plants will veg faster I believe and have closer internodes than running basic CFLs.

There's a difference between basic cfl's and the growing cfls I'm using. You could still be correct though. I'm not even done with my first grow, and I've made many mistakes that'll affect the yield more than the cfls have.

 

[Growing247]

I agree with the rest of your post, but here I have to take a bit of offense. I agree that bud will in fact be denser under the HPS this is a result of the intensity of radiance intensity. deeper penetration of the HPS is the reason here. Thats not to say any product from CFL is going to be of a lesser quality.

Its the grower that can make or break a grow. Yes there are environmental factors that come into play as well. Some times your genetics just aren't up to par and we do the best we can to over come this. But to make the blanket statement at CFLs dont bring a plant to full potential is a cop out.

A growers gotta be able to adopt and learn to grow with what they have. With CFLs it take a bit more tinkering to get your setup right. Once you have your setup tweaked you will produce some amazing full flavor beautiful smoke. Take my last grow for instance. I had genetics against me from day on but I still milked some one the smoothest, resinous smoke you've ever had. Smells like skunky fruit loops.

I think their is a time and a place for everything. For small grow cabinets and stealth grows where you grow a few plants CFLs are an excellent option for the budget minded grower who still wants to grow some of their favorite ganja. However, when you read HIGH TIMES, or SKUNK, or 420 or any of the cannabis or grow magazines, when you see articles about high end medicinal grow operations...you don't see CFLs hanging from the cieling, you see HIDs. I rest my case.

 

[MaoZebong]

I'm afraid that's not evidence enough to make a judgment. They may not even have done experiments to check what's best. It's a fact that most people suffer loyalty bias toward things they've already made their minds up about. That's not saying light from filament bulbs aren't better in some circumstances. Just that your "case" is severely lacking in rational evidence.

 

[romulanog]

yeahh cause ive been growing outdoors for a long time now and was always interested growing indoors so this all new to me and i do have 23 watt cfl lights any idea if that would be good for vegetative stag and i cant seem to really make up my mind on what lighting system to use but i will try out cfl and see how it goes i will only have one plant for now and see how she comes along she will be a skywalker clone and post up pics soon but any idea how close i should put her to cfl lights?

 

[MaoZebong]

I would go for the actual growing CFL's. They are 150w and above. Actual watts, not the equivalent stuff they put on the smaller ones. Just do a google search for "250w cfl growlight." You'll find the ones I'm talking about. They come in many sizes, but other search strings give other hits as well.

 

[Giantsfan24]

Jorge Cervantes and Ed Rosenthal both say that CFL's, if done correctly, are great for growing in small spaces.

That's all I need to know...I grow with HID cause I had heard and read they were better for growing not because I don't think I can't get it done with CFL's.

 

[Heks]

CFL's are very deceptive, you think you're saving money, but what's really happening is they nickel and dime us more in the long run. To me, it's pay more now for the ballast, hood, bulbs (minimum 200$ total +s&h) or pay over the long run with multiple bulbs that can get fairly pricey, especially the high wattage CFL's, and pay through lower yields due to less total light saturation (yes, smaller bulbs put out more lumens per watt, but who has, or much less, wants that many tiny bulbs to match the lumens of a 400 watt HPS/MH?)
i'm also fairly certain 400 watts of CFl bulbs + sockets + reflectors will equal near the same initial investment of the HPS/MH system.


As long as you have acceptable ventilation, temperature, and some extra change for the electricity bill, get a HPS for flower. T5s for veg.

 

[Giantsfan24]

CFL's are very deceptive, you think you're saving money, but what's really happening is they nickel and dime us more in the long run. To me, it's pay more now for the ballast, hood, bulbs (minimum 200$ total +s&h) or pay over the long run with multiple bulbs that can get fairly pricey, especially the high wattage CFL's, and pay through lower yields due to less total light saturation (yes, smaller bulbs put out more lumens per watt, but who has, or much less, wants that many tiny bulbs to match the lumens of a 400 watt HPS/MH?)
i'm also fairly certain 400 watts of CFl bulbs + sockets + reflectors will equal near the same initial investment of the HPS/MH system.


As long as you have acceptable ventilation, temperature, and some extra change for the electricity bill, get a HPS for flower. T5s for veg.

Agreed...

 

[romulanog]

yeahh i do agree with you the other day i went over my friend house and he just got a mh 400 watt system and ive seen such a huge difference in how rapid growth is but today i will go to home depot or local hydroponic store and check how much they go for and probably get a hps 400 watt system so i can finally get started on my medical grow.

 

[MaoZebong]

i'm also fairly certain 400 watts of CFl bulbs + sockets + reflectors will equal near the same initial investment of the HPS/MH system.

But it's not the initial purchase you save on, it's the long life and high energy/lumen ratio. At least I personally have never said (or even thought) that the CFL's are cheaper to buy than filament type bulbs. You just don't have to buy the same number of bulbs over a long period.

As long as you have acceptable ventilation, temperature, and some extra change for the electricity bill, get a HPS for flower. T5s for veg.

"Acceptable ventilation and temp" is extremely relative. No amount of ventilation would allow me to stick an HPS in my grow space. Not even a 150W HPS, and then the 150W cfl I use, which incidentally has the correct color tint, puts out more light/W than the HPS would.

I've tested the energy consumption on my light, and it's almost exactly 150W. Now if the 150W HPS also clocks in at around 150W, that means the CFL puts out more light since it doesn't create even one third the heat. That's the way of the filament type bulbs. There's a reason why they make heat lamps the same way. Because of the heat generated from the HPS lamps you need to shove a lot more W into it to generate the same amount of light.

I'm still not saying any of them are better or worse, but the efficiency and practicality of the CFL's make them the obvious choice for small time and/or environmentally minded growers.

 

[Silent Bob]

I've tested the energy consumption on my light, and it's almost exactly 150W. Now if the 150W HPS also clocks in at around 150W, that means the CFL puts out more light since it doesn't create even one third the heat. That's the way of the filament type bulbs. There's a reason why they make heat lamps the same way. Because of the heat generated from the HPS lamps you need to shove a lot more W into it to generate the same amount of light.

I'm still not saying any of them are better or worse, but the efficiency and practicality of the CFL's make them the obvious choice for small time and/or environmentally minded growers.

A 150 watt HPS is not a very efficient light - it draws well over 200 watts if it has a magnetic ballast.

A digital ballast 600 watt HPS is the most efficient light HID light, typically 95,000 lumens, which is more lumens per watt than just about any other light including a 1000 HPS.

The heat issue is misleading - HPS puts out a LOT of radiant heat... however, total waste heat per lumen is higher for CFLs... you just don't notice it because it escapes from the internal ballast - it heats up the air instead of your plants in other words.

I've gone to using CMH bulbs on a 400 watt HPS mag. ballast - not very efficient per lumen, but very efficient in PAR terms (photosynthetic active radiation)

 

[Heks]

But it's not the initial purchase you save on, it's the long life and high energy/lumen ratio. At least I personally have never said (or even thought) that the CFL's are cheaper to buy than filament type bulbs. You just don't have to buy the same number of bulbs over a long period.



"Acceptable ventilation and temp" is extremely relative. No amount of ventilation would allow me to stick an HPS in my grow space. Not even a 150W HPS, and then the 150W cfl I use, which incidentally has the correct color tint, puts out more light/W than the HPS would.

I've tested the energy consumption on my light, and it's almost exactly 150W. Now if the 150W HPS also clocks in at around 150W, that means the CFL puts out more light since it doesn't create even one third the heat. That's the way of the filament type bulbs. There's a reason why they make heat lamps the same way. Because of the heat generated from the HPS lamps you need to shove a lot more W into it to generate the same amount of light.

I'm still not saying any of them are better or worse, but the efficiency and practicality of the CFL's make them the obvious choice for small time and/or environmentally minded growers.

every grow is different and as such requires a different approach, if I was confined to a pc box or small dresser, yes watt for watt CFl will show itself as the more efficient light. Since the OP is coming indoors, away from the most powerful light of all, my thoughts are he wants comparable results, something I don't think he would gain using fluorescent for flowering.

 

[MaoZebong]

The heat issue is misleading - HPS puts out a LOT of radiant heat... however, total waste heat per lumen is higher for CFLs... you just don't notice it because it escapes from the internal ballast - it heats up the air instead of your plants in other words.

[derail]
I'm not arguing here, just getting something straight.
Heat is always radiant, whether it comes from the internal ballast on CFL's, or if it comes from pushing electrons through a filament. It's not the light in HPS's which create the heat, it's the glowing metal bar inside the glass bulb. They are both above the plants. They're exactly the same kind of heat (i.e. heat), it's just generated in different places. And since the HPS does get hotter (I can touch the ballast on my cfl while it's on), it wastes more energy to heat than a cfl. That's what the whole environmental argument for CFL's over tungsten filament bulbs boils down to.
[/derail]