cfl/t18/t15 setup with autos

berten-ernie420

Well-Known Member
Iits a first time grow, and I didn't really have any help but from the good ol interwebs. I ordered auto seeds, 6 strains as follows
Bomb Seeds Cherry Bomb Auto Fem, Female Seeds BubbleGummer Fem, 00 Seeds 00 Bubblegum Auto Fem, Female Seeds NL Auto Fem, Auto Seeds Diesel Berry Auto Fem, Big Head Seeds Freeze Berry Auto Fem, with 4 free seeds, that I may or may not plant. If I do ill wait till after my first couple auto grows. Anyway, I decided to start with a bag of ffof, even tho I read its hot, I also bought some perlite to "cool it off" n help with drainage. I have 5 cfls, 3 100w equivalents n 2 65w equivalents, with those being in both the 6500k and 2600k I can swap em when I'm ready. Plus 2 t8's, one with the 6500k bulb, the other with the 2600k, and two t12, both the same 2600k bulb. But that's just with the bag seeds I wanted to see how my op would sustain life. Turns out, surprisingly well. I haven't planted the autos yet, since I dont have them yet, but will update soon. How do u calculate wattage and lumens, for cfls? I read u want to aim for 10,000 lumen, per sq ft of room. That true?
 

az2000

Well-Known Member
10,000 sounds high. I recall reading 7500. (Technically, lumens are what the human eye sees, not what a plant sees. The spectrum produced is what really influences how many lumens you need.). Using Cree LED lightbulbs, I run 3:1 to 4:1 (cool:warm, 5000k:2800k) in veg. 1:1 in flower. That might help you aproximate a similar average color temperature?

I didn't understand your question about calculating things. A 60w (equiv) CFL puts out 800lumens, I think. If it draws 14w, that's 57 L/w. (Keep in mind flourescent bulbs loose their efficiency with use. You have to replace them if they're old, say 6 months of constant growing?

Regarding FF, are you going to use FF nutes? From the way @gardengardian7 describes it, it sounds like it's intended to be a system, not necessarily plug-n-play. Maybe he can guide you. He talks like adding perlite is wrong. (But, according to my style, I would.).
 
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