Are there many of us???

ttystikk

Well-Known Member
I would have to at this point in time agree with @goofy81
If I can put 4 plants in a space around a 1000W lamp and effectively be applying 250W per Trellis - that is impressive. If I were to switch to led and have to point 1000W or even 600-700W if they are more efficient at each trellis, that just doesn't make any sense. The wattage/canopy ratio is no better than just adding more horizontal space.
I will see soon what 250W per Trellis will deliver :hump:
View attachment 3740212
It will deliver 250W per trellis.
 

thewanderingjack

Well-Known Member
Hmm lots going on here...

As to why vert isn't more popular... so many reasons... it is very misunderstood, people are very used to horizontal, and it can be more planning/work to set up/maintain... it's also a horizontal world... sometimes hard to make things meant to be used horizontally work vertically, or to find things made for vertical growing... you know that at one point people tried to popular round houses... lots of advantages (heating, cooling, other stuff I forget). Major disadvantage: nothing's made for round houses. Pipes, furniture... most stuff in that vein... is meant to go against a flat wall.

Horizontal is what we're used to, what most things are made for (planters, trays, etc etc) and whats easiest/most convenient. After all, to start my horizontal grow I just put a bunch of pots in the corner... for a good vertical, I would have had to build some sort of framework, and one sturdy enough to hold all that weight... or spent a lot of time training, depending on my route.

There's also circumstances... I have ~3'Wx4'Lx7'H space... A vertical grow would work well... I could fit so many plants!!! But, I only grow for myself. It'd would be overkill for me to do that, and it'd be a lot more work... from the planning and setting up to the taking care of that many plants... and while my return would increase (i.e.: yields to input ratio), my initial expenditure would as well, i.e.: aside from more work, I would need to pay more per month as I waited for each harvest (which would thankfully be much greater, bringing me out ahead). That's not always convenient for everyone.

For me, it works out to have a small number of plans and do a perpetual harvest, splitting my space vertically into a veg chamber on top and flowering on the bottom. My returns still save me a huge sum (at least 50% compared to buying it a the shop... and this is from a really haphazard grow and counting the cost of reusable materials... so my future grows will only improve those returns... which is more than enough for me).

Of course I have been considering vertical... but with so many options, it's hard to know what might work best for me. I've thought about dipping into it with a half stadium set up in my current space: a stair going up from the right wall to the left, with the lamp hung where the right wall meets the ceiling (opposite the rise, angled towards it/the plants... haha I should probably upload a sketch). This is mostly to give each plant more room, and hopefully more light, rather than fitting more plants... I keep going back and forth on what would work better for me, more plants or bigger ones. Right now I have six in there and they're pretty crowded.

As to the LED/HPS thing, I feel like I missed something... a) the 360 nature of high powered bulbs is one reason people do vertical grows, not the reason... if there is a THE reason, it is to maximize space usage. Generally speaking there is a lot of wasted space in horizontal growing... meaning space that's not really serving a purpose. People want to maximize their useful horizontal space. i.e.: you want plenty of room in your living room to move around (or sit around, or whatever) in. If you take all the stuff in the room and spread it out so no one item is on (or in) any other, it would take a lot of horizontal space. So you stack things vertically. This is also why we have really tall buildings in cities: horizontal space is at a premium... vertical space is pretty much free.

As to the lights... CFLs emit 360 degrees (horizontally :-P).. there are LED cob lights that do the same... or you could just as easily angle the lights. My LED grow light is unidirectional, with maybe a 45 degree spread... so two side by side, angled away from each other, could light half a circle, or a full stadium setup (which is the same thing really heh).

Dude, the square footage of grow-space is still massive, and there are little tricks that make the difference. I don't want to give away the farm, but yeah, tricks that aren't even uncommon.

You may end up using more LEDs per square foot of floor space, but you still have more grow area per floor area. Adding lights is one thing, reframing the building...well, not as much.
Huh?

If I can put 4 plants in a space around a 1000W lamp and effectively be applying 250W per Trellis - that is impressive. If I were to switch to led and have to point 1000W or even 600-700W if they are more efficient at each trellis, that just doesn't make any sense. The wattage/canopy ratio is no better than just adding more horizontal space.
Again, huh? it doesn't make any sense that you would be switching from pointing 250 watts at each trellis to pointing 600-700w at each one... yeah it doesn't. Why would you "have" to do that with LEDs?
 

thewanderingjack

Well-Known Member
I don't know of any, but I really don't know much about that many... my cheap one does 3x4 at 300 watts, and it's like a toy compared to things like cree lights, from what I've gathered... so I kinda think they must be out there, but then again you're probably right and they're not there yet.

My imagination is now filling with thought of how it could be possible... :)
 
Last edited:

ttystikk

Well-Known Member
Hmm lots going on here...

As to why vert isn't more popular... so many reasons... it is very misunderstood, people are very used to horizontal, and it can be more planning/work to set up/maintain... it's also a horizontal world... sometimes hard to make things meant to be used horizontally work vertically, or to find things made for vertical growing... you know that at one point people tried to popular round houses... lots of advantages (heating, cooling, other stuff I forget). Major disadvantage: nothing's made for round houses. Pipes, furniture... most stuff in that vein... is meant to go against a flat wall.

Horizontal is what we're used to, what most things are made for (planters, trays, etc etc) and whats easiest/most convenient. After all, to start my horizontal grow I just put a bunch of pots in the corner... for a good vertical, I would have had to build some sort of framework, and one sturdy enough to hold all that weight... or spent a lot of time training, depending on my route.

There's also circumstances... I have ~3'Wx4'Lx7'H space... A vertical grow would work well... I could fit so many plants!!! But, I only grow for myself. It'd would be overkill for me to do that, and it'd be a lot more work... from the planning and setting up to the taking care of that many plants... and while my return would increase (i.e.: yields to input ratio), my initial expenditure would as well, i.e.: aside from more work, I would need to pay more per month as I waited for each harvest (which would thankfully be much greater, bringing me out ahead). That's not always convenient for everyone.

For me, it works out to have a small number of plans and do a perpetual harvest, splitting my space vertically into a veg chamber on top and flowering on the bottom. My returns still save me a huge sum (at least 50% compared to buying it a the shop... and this is from a really haphazard grow and counting the cost of reusable materials... so my future grows will only improve those returns... which is more than enough for me).

Of course I have been considering vertical... but with so many options, it's hard to know what might work best for me. I've thought about dipping into it with a half stadium set up in my current space: a stair going up from the right wall to the left, with the lamp hung where the right wall meets the ceiling (opposite the rise, angled towards it/the plants... haha I should probably upload a sketch). This is mostly to give each plant more room, and hopefully more light, rather than fitting more plants... I keep going back and forth on what would work better for me, more plants or bigger ones. Right now I have six in there and they're pretty crowded.

As to the LED/HPS thing, I feel like I missed something... a) the 360 nature of high powered bulbs is one reason people do vertical grows, not the reason... if there is a THE reason, it is to maximize space usage. Generally speaking there is a lot of wasted space in horizontal growing... meaning space that's not really serving a purpose. People want to maximize their useful horizontal space. i.e.: you want plenty of room in your living room to move around (or sit around, or whatever) in. If you take all the stuff in the room and spread it out so no one item is on (or in) any other, it would take a lot of horizontal space. So you stack things vertically. This is also why we have really tall buildings in cities: horizontal space is at a premium... vertical space is pretty much free.

As to the lights... CFLs emit 360 degrees (horizontally :-P).. there are LED cob lights that do the same... or you could just as easily angle the lights. My LED grow light is unidirectional, with maybe a 45 degree spread... so two side by side, angled away from each other, could light half a circle, or a full stadium setup (which is the same thing really heh).



Huh?



Again, huh? it doesn't make any sense that you would be switching from pointing 250 watts at each trellis to pointing 600-700w at each one... yeah it doesn't. Why would you "have" to do that with LEDs?
TL;DR past where you said it was hard/unproven.

"Pole beans".

Vertical is not new, nor is it difficult. The simple fact is that they sell more shit at the hydro store for flatlander grows because they're all about the money, not your output.

Look up the term 'Espalier'- proof that the French have been growing vertically at scale for fucking centuries now, lol

But you're right about two things; vertical growing isn't pushed and there isn't a lot of stuff purpose built for it. I aim to change that with a line of vertical growing equipment and supplies I'll be selling to commercial operators and enlightened home growers. Maybe even here, if y'all ask nicely.
 

Thorhax

Well-Known Member
TL;DR past where you said it was hard/unproven.

"Pole beans".

Vertical is not new, nor is it difficult. The simple fact is that they sell more shit at the hydro store for flatlander grows because they're all about the money, not your output.

Look up the term 'Espalier'- proof that the French have been growing vertically at scale for fucking centuries now, lol

But you're right about two things; vertical growing isn't pushed and there isn't a lot of stuff purpose built for it. I aim to change that with a line of vertical growing equipment and supplies I'll be selling to commercial operators and enlightened home growers. Maybe even here, if y'all ask nicely.
asking nicely please. I WANT MAOR DANK
 

ttystikk

Well-Known Member
Show me an led on the market that can effectively light a 4x6 with 250W
Word. I'm currently doing it with 900W per 4x6' @60% PARW efficiency and I'm working with some folks on getting that down while maintaining optimal irradiance levels.

Even at 100% conversion efficiency, physics tells us that 250W just won't do it.
 

sixstring2112

Well-Known Member
I'd still be doing vertical if i had high ceilings and a small space.
Using leds now which I think favors canopy moremore.
Here's a photo of the last half vertical setup I did years ago( half because I had lights on top too).
one of the better looking vert canopies i have seen in a while.but i also see some flat panels up top,hard to tell exactly how much light is getting tossed at this op from the cropped pic and tiny pixel size lol.
but i think its easy to neglect the fact that vert growing looks good in pics but on paper it comes out about equal or even less.for instance,a 1000w lamp covers 5 x 5 no problem,i actually think my gavita 750w covers much more than that.my plants are 5 x 5 x 5.5high with usable nugs to the soil because i know how to light a room. so with 5 x 5 you get 25 square feet,plus the 5.5 height,lets say 4 feet there for comparison.you get 25 sq ft x 4 ft high = 100 cubic feet (even though i think im closer to 120 cu ft) of quality buds from a single lamp.now take a well know members # which has been posted umpteen times here of 4 x 6 trellis,thats 24 square feet if in fact the trellis was full from edge to edge(which is does not appear to be lol) x lets say his canopy is 1 foot deep or thick. you get 24 cubic feet,even if we bump that to 1.5 feet deep thats only 36cu ft.what i see from pics looks to be about 8 in deep or .75 feet lol.now you factor in how much space it takes to set up these trellis x 4 (100 cubic feet ) to make a full circle around the lamps and if thats all your doing in the room great,you can take a 10 x 10 room drop this trellis contraption into it which will use at least 6 x 6 (probably more like 7 x 7) and barely give you room to walk around the outside for maint.now to me it starts to sound like a waste of space real quick for maybe a small bump in gpw if done perfectly.warehouse growers are all about the gpw(grams per watt ) now dont you think after all this time of legal warehouse grows documented on instagram we would see a shit load of vertical setups by now if it was better in all the ways its portrayed by some?
yes theres lots of ways to skin cats,although as a cat owner i would not recommend skinning them at all,but to answer the op question,vert style setups to most is just way too much work for very little if any reward.but its def cool to see all the dif methods of trying to squeeze a few more grams out of the typical lighting used to grow indoors. :)
 

thewanderingjack

Well-Known Member
TL;DR past where you said it was hard/unproven.
Huh?.. as in the sentence doesn't make sense to me...

"Pole beans".

Vertical is not new, nor is it difficult. The simple fact is that they sell more shit at the hydro store for flatlander grows because they're all about the money, not your output.

Look up the term 'Espalier'- proof that the French have been growing vertically at scale for fucking centuries now, lol
When did I say it was new? Or anything like that... nope... I said it wasn't the common practice, as you are obviously aware. It IS new to a lot of individuals who just haven't seen or thought about it before... or at the very least haven't tried it before... which is one of the reasons it's so misunderstood.

So, yeah... weird.

It seems to me we both totally agree: vertical growing has been around for... idk... millenia (hanging Gardens of Babylon anyone?)... but despite it's many benefits, it's never been popularized, which means most people don't know much about it, and most products aren't made for it.

We may disagree somewhat on the difficulty... I'd say it is "more difficult" than horizontal growing... but that's really depends more on the set up... You can totally make a vert garden that's less work to set up and mainain that a horizontal one, depending how each is set up... but at the most basic it is easier to do horizontal (plant in pot, pot on the ground, light above it, done). Though like you mentioned, using things like poles or espalier set ups going vertical is only slightly more work (plant in pot, pot on ground, plant trained up, light sideways)... and in the end, it's like anything else: the idea is that more work setting up will yield you proportionally greater returns.

Cannabis could be the crop that brings it mainstream.

I am seeing more products made for it recently (specifically vertical grow boxes), looking forward to seeing what you come up with (though I won't ask nicely, cuz I don't... I'm a DIY kinda guy).
 

pinner420

Well-Known Member
On the plains of hesitation bleach the bones of flatlanders, wilst waiting to surpass .5 grams a Watt waited and while waiting their power bills made them scratch their head in search of a way to use all of their bulb instead of half.
 

thewanderingjack

Well-Known Member
On the plains of hesitation bleach the bones of flatlanders, wilst waiting to surpass .5 grams a Watt waited and while waiting their power bills made them scratch their head in search of a way to use all of their bulb instead of half.
Meh... my LED is unidirectional, so I already use the whole thing :-P My bills are negligible as it is... I use more power to heat my desk area than to grow my plants, and still get (what I find to be) acceptable returns.

It is weird that, with most people being all about the greatest yields more don't turn to vertical... but hey, hydroponics took a while to take off too. Aeroponics hasn't yet.
 

ttystikk

Well-Known Member
Huh?.. as in the sentence doesn't make sense to me...



When did I say it was new? Or anything like that... nope... I said it wasn't the common practice, as you are obviously aware. It IS new to a lot of individuals who just haven't seen or thought about it before... or at the very least haven't tried it before... which is one of the reasons it's so misunderstood.

So, yeah... weird.

It seems to me we both totally agree: vertical growing has been around for... idk... millenia (hanging Gardens of Babylon anyone?)... but despite it's many benefits, it's never been popularized, which means most people don't know much about it, and most products aren't made for it.

We may disagree somewhat on the difficulty... I'd say it is "more difficult" than horizontal growing... but that's really depends more on the set up... You can totally make a vert garden that's less work to set up and mainain that a horizontal one, depending how each is set up... but at the most basic it is easier to do horizontal (plant in pot, pot on the ground, light above it, done). Though like you mentioned, using things like poles or espalier set ups going vertical is only slightly more work (plant in pot, pot on ground, plant trained up, light sideways)... and in the end, it's like anything else: the idea is that more work setting up will yield you proportionally greater returns.

Cannabis could be the crop that brings it mainstream.

I am seeing more products made for it recently (specifically vertical grow boxes), looking forward to seeing what you come up with (though I won't ask nicely, cuz I don't... I'm a DIY kinda guy).
Sounds like we are much closer to the same page than I thought.
 

thewanderingjack

Well-Known Member
So my imagination was working on it...

Of course I got more questions than answers. How much more efficient is LED than HPS or MH (watts converted to light vs heat) and then, how much more efficient is narrow LED lighting (Red/Blue) than full spectrum lighting... in terms of "wasted" light. Taking into account also that you could put the lights closer, so you'd get great intensity.

Even assuming we could replace the 250 per trellis with 250 or less in LED, it would definitely take something like a custom light set up to get the coverage, because of LEDs narrower range. I guess LED t5 tubes would work... I have seen CFL tubes used like that to good effect.

I wish I could experiment... I'm really torn between LEDs not being there yet to it just taking the right configuration. My 300 watt LED has 50x6w LEDs with lenses... and does 3x4... but it really seems set up to act like a typical light (more intense in the center and less at the periphery). But maybe spaced out to even coverage... it goes back to the efficiency.

For me it's also not just about watts of light used, but overall KWhrs... so if using a few more LEDs still came out cheaper than managing the temperature, it would still work out better... so long as yields were the same... on the other hand if it cost me a bit more to do the high powered light AND to cool the room (if needed) while yielding more bud to not just offset the cost (which would then be even) but come out ahead, then yeah... bottom line is return for investment.
 

Vnsmkr

Well-Known Member
I always get tickled at people who talk and talk and talk and see the results in front of their eyes, but they just keep talking (I am not talking about you thewanderingjack, just in general). To you people who yap incessantly questioning others, yes all of you, either take a shit or get off the pot.
 
Top