Cant afford HPS - using CFl's HELP!!!!

wat CFL's should i use throughout the entire process? and when soemthing says 100w equivalent does that mean it is actually 100w or is it only 25w???

equivalent is just that, an equivalent

soo - 4 of these should work fine then right????

Yes! For 1 SMALL plant. I would top it very short then focus a bulb on each main growing shoot. Should be two top and two bottom branches all at about the same height after topping is done correctly.

how many would i need for an average size plant??? does that work for vegetative AND flowering???

I've grown several plants under an 85W (actual) CFL with fairly good results. The bulbs you linked to are "warm white" bulbs, 2700K, which are great for flowering but not too good for vegging. What you want for vegging are "cool white" or "daylight",5700-5500K, fluorescents.

how big were u'r plants and howlong did it take for them to grow from germ to harvest???

ok, enough is enough, maybe I am on edge and need to go smoke a nice one, but.....have you read anything? If you had, you would not have asked that last question. Or most of your questions for that matter.
We all want/like to help, but hand holding is not part of this, up above, when you 1st entered the newbie section is some highly suggested reading, had you of actually read some of it, and than had a question or two based on what you've read, that would be different.

My cab at the time limited me to a 3' plant height. I had 4 plans in a 2' x 2' by 4' box running an 85W main light. Three of the four plants took the "normal" 3 months and the 4th took about 1 month longer.

i've read a shit load of stuff b4 asking these questions. i know the answer to that question when concerning MH or HPS but i was wondering about CFL's - look . . .. i've done alot of research but almost all grow guides are for very specific conditions and i'm wondering about MY specific ocnditions.

edit: thanx pastor

Look maybe I came off sideways, if so I apologize. Having said that, allow me to spend some time with you, your plants will need a few things to survive, but remember....it IS a weed!
You'll need containers, usually 1 gallon per foot of height, 2nd you'll need light, lights come in flavors, a low flavor, like what yr looking at on ebay, 2700 k, is great for flowering. higher for vegging. You can never have too many lights! I saw a plant grown under a 1000watt hps, and had two 400 watt's for side lighting produce 3.5 lbs.
After you get yr lighting decided, you'll need nutes to keep it healthy, personally I like foxfarm. Its a 3 part solution, one for vegging, and two more for flowering, it gives you complete control over yr plants this way, and its healthier than using chemicals.

thanx - i think i'm gonna get flora nova grow and bloom nutes and get a few CFl's for lights - i think i'm pretty much set thanx for u'r help guys!!!

this CFL will work in a normal household light right???

p.s. sorry for asking soooo many questions i just wanna make sure that plant will grow

From what videoman said... yes the Bulbs on that site are perfect... one is 5700k and the other warm light is 2700k you're going to need like 4 of each of those tho...

awesome - thanx for the help

i think i'll use 1 150w equivalent warm light and 1 150w equivalent 5700k at the same time throughout the entire process . . . .. . . . 300w is plenty right???

(-)_(-) said:

i think i'll use 1 150w equivalent warm light and 1 150w equivalent 5700k at the same time throughout the entire process . . . .. . . . 300w is plenty right???

Click to expand...

For how many plants?? sry..

I am using 5 45w (2900 lumens each) soft white CFL's(each 1 is 150w equivalent) to flower 1 plant. I just added 2 more 23w (1600 lumens each)cool white CFL's(each 1 is 100w equivalent).

i wondering how many do you think can be put under these amounts of light.Major_toke
sorry i must have been typing when you were

High Tech Garden Supply

$119.95 for a complete 400watt HPS system.
For that price, how can you NOT afford to buy one. I understand that not everyone can drop $120 on a lighting system but how much are the CFL's you are buying + the lighting fixtures you are using? My bet is about $12 per bulb and about $5-6 per fixture (if you don't already have them).
I just feel that the cost vs. end result isn't worth going exclusively with CFL's. CFL's are great for cloning, seedlings and very early veg but if you are gonna do it, do it right. You will see WAY more than the $120 in extra bud by purchasing the HPS system. Not to mention higher quality bud. What I mean by that is denser buds with more trichs produced by the buds.

Everyone looks at the color spectrum (The kelvin rating) which is VERY Important but remember, LUMENS are the actual amout of ENERGY your lights are producing that the plants can use.

So for your 300 watts of CFL you are probably getting about 5,000 to 6,000 total lumens, where's as the 400 watt HPS is rated at 55,000 lumens. More lumens = more plant energy = more quality and quantity of BUD!

And that doesn't even factor in that the more energy the plant has at it's disposal, the FASTER it can grow. That means you get the end product faster.

Hope this helps,
Celticman