hey there,
this is my first grow ever (quick one - auto). I’ve build a little grow box and now im worried that my light won’t be enough.
I have 2 CFLs
one 6000k with 11 watt (seedling/veg)
one 2700k with 9 watt (flowering)
Is this sufficient?
And if it is, how close should I put my plant?
I’m aware, that this will not give me the best yields, but is it ok for trying out?
They can be used for starting seedlings but once they get reach veg stage you will have to get different lights and bigger grow space.
You need a minimum of 4 square feet per plant, and 150 watts of quality lighting per plant.
There are many threads on purchasing lights so I suggest looking at a few. Don’t buy anything before asking the forum for an opinion, it will save you money in the long run by avoiding purchasing lights that are ineffective.
There’s never harm in trying out. I’d go with a 4k cfl all the way through, though.
In all honesty, it would be cheaper to buy weed off the street than spending the money on electricity for the weight this will produce.
3000k-4000k fluorescent light spectrum is very good for growing cannabis, but amount of light per watt is extremely low in comparison to what you will see most using.
If you’re stuck on growing with cfl’s, get yourself some splitters and try to get 4-6 23 watt bulbs in there. If you can get mounted horizontally with a reflector over the top would be the way to go. Still won’t be a heavy harvest but could produce enough to justify your time.
Thank you so much for your advise!
I think I’ll try to get a cfl splitter, to keep my costs at a minimum.
Interesting! Why that? Correct me if I’m wrong, but I thought that daylight is optimal for veg and red light for flowering?
Hard to make a blanket statement strictly limited to cct because one 4000k could be a lot different than every other 4000k. But if you look at spectral distribution graphs there isn’t necessarily less red light in a 4000k, sometimes it’s just more blue light.
ahh, I see.
what do you think about these LEDs?
edited to fix link
These may be slightly better than cfl bulbs, but still a long way from what is available in fixtures designed for fruiting horticulture applications.
Thanks for fixing the link!
Just bought these:
As you said, this is far from good, but I see it as a little experiment.
Let’s see how it goes… 
This is a self made fixture that is actually a bathroom light that i converted …
They will vegg pretty good and will flower pretty good as well , but it will be a challenge… 
Never follow only one path , follow many… 
Looks really nice
But isn’t that too hot for the plants? So close to the light?
No , they are cfls…
2 inches away and they will be ok…
Some leaves will get a lil burnt sometimes , but the plant will bounce right back…
Those are 23 watt and 6000 Kelvin cfls
My man, is this run of the mill store bought bulbs? If so how did the yield go?
Was going to to something similar and maybe run some of the bulbs down the side with a small vent + computer fan.
I was going to run 3 down each side, 3 on top. All seperate detachable pieces so i can move them around in 3’s. Did you wire yours together or something else?
I only use them for vegging…
Yes , they are just store bought 6000 kelvin 23 watt cfl’s from lowes…
That is just a 6 bulb bathroom light fixture with some y spliters to make a 12 bulb light fixture…
They work very good for veggin or gettin little ones started…
I have flowerd a couple of times just to see what i could do…
I did a see of green with 12 clones in solo cups sitting in a tray and just bottom fed them the hole flower cycle…
So when it was all done , i had 12 to 16 inch long single colas…
Both times were good runs , just alot of work…
So it can be done if your on a budget…
Thats very good to hear! What was the yield like on the times you flowered from this setup?
I suppose the extra wprk in setup and maintenance will scratch the itch to do other stuff lol
Any store bought recommendations for lights when moving into the flowering stage? Trying to keep simple, discreet but also worth the effort. With two plants if i could get 10-12oz of somehwat decent bud from regular store bought equipment id live happily haha
I used a light system very similar to that back in the day before horticultural LEDs were widely available. It was an effective way to veg out some big plants to go outdoor. they were not very good for flower though very weak yields. I would also point out that I get far faster growth out of my LEDs, but a lot that may come down to developing better methods over the years since then.
