Lighting Coverage and light height

[BigSm0]

Gavita hps has this great marketing scheme, “don't light your plants light the room”. I have always taken the cost effective approach to lighting. “Don’t light your room, light your plants”

Every room, space, grower and strain is different. After watching hundreds of grows including my own the easiest way to put an average on it all is to say that one AutoCob per plant is all that’s needed for most plants. If your doing a solo cup competition this won’t fit, or if you are pulling 3/4 lb autos it may not either. The general average is 1 per plant. I just spoke to someone looking to fill a 5x5 tent. He didn’t tell me till afterwards that inside had a 6x 36” charcoal filter on the floor, a 50pt dehumidifier and a floor fan. Surely this 25 sq’ space won’t be wall to wall with plants. So we started at 9 cobs and worked our way down to 5. The BEST part is if he feels he needs more light it’s easy enough to buy another single.

As far as heights go this also depends on way to many variables to nail down an exact height that fits for everyone. I do recommend 30-36 in veg and 20-30 in flower to start. I always recommend starting higher and lowering till you see a change in the plants leaves then backing up gradually. Also consider improper temps and humidity can mimic signs of to much light. Nutrient issues as well can show similar signs. If the top is yellow and the bottom is green than that’s a sure sign you are overdoing it. Something that will never change in my opinion is not enough light is better than to much. Plants can only absorb so much light before it has a negative affect.

I’d also like to apologize for not being here as much as I once was. Got a little burnt out over the past few months. I’m back now and here as always to help answer any questions.

 

[Madness]

Always glad to see you man.

I have always wondered about height for the lights and I was averaging around 19"-22"...

I was just in my mom room and the 1 autocob was over my bigger mom and then the smaller kosher tangie. I ended up moving the autocob to more over the kosher tangie @ 24"....within the hour she started bending over at the top. at 24"!!!!!

I've never seen such a thing. These lights are so damn powerful. I raised all 3 of my lights in my flower room from 22" to around 24" give or take. Just wow.

 

[lunarman]

Gavita is freaking nuts man. Peeps today are so energy aware they would look at that motto or slogan and run far away. Just plain stupid in todays times to say or think like that. All it says to me is buy our product and then waste a bunch of energy using it.

I've been following your and others ideas on light height and it works great. 30ish for veg and 20ish for flower.

For how many lights per plant I'm experimenting with 1.5 per plant. Take two plants and put three lights above them like this.

COB PLANT COB PLANT COB

Or with 3 plants it works out to 1.333 cobs per plant.

COB PLANT COB PLANT COB PLANT COB

The COB"s are never directly over the center of the plants. But the center gets lots of light from the overlap of the lights that are on either side of the plants. My thinking, which is just my thoughts with no science behind it, is that the side branches are the hardest to get light to so I want my COB's on the sides instead of the center.

 

[BigSm0]

Gavita is freaking nuts man. Peeps today are so energy aware they would look at that motto or slogan and run far away. Just plain stupid in todays times to say or think like that. All it says to me is buy our product and then waste a bunch of energy using it.

I've been following your and others ideas on light height and it works great. 30ish for veg and 20ish for flower.

For how many lights per plant I'm experimenting with 1.5 per plant. Take two plants and put three lights above them like this.

COB PLANT COB PLANT COB

Or with 3 plants it works out to 1.333 cobs per plant.

COB PLANT COB PLANT COB PLANT COB

The COB"s are never directly over the center of the plants. But the center gets lots of light from the overlap of the lights that are on either side of the plants. My thinking, which is just my thoughts with no science behind it, is that the side branches are the hardest to get light to so I want my COB's on the sides instead of the center.

This is by far the best way to run the lights if you have more than 1 per plant. I really only recommend it for bigger plants that can handle the light mixed with a bit of grow skill as well. Putting lights like this while not having a clue will hurt more then help. If things are on the up and up then it’s great. Side branches are indeed the hardest to get light to. Big leaves cover everything below. Coming from the side Prevents this.

 

[midIN]

This quick one by Royal Queen has been under a cob since flower and it's 25" tall and 16" away from cob, I have fed mega to it at 10g per gallon by accident for two feedings til i noticed what chart i was looking at, now shes at 3 g per gallon and I do give her 3ml of calmg which is 1ml more than the bottle recommended, but she has not shown any damage only growth, maybe because the calmg is what's saving her I don't know but the say this bean can reach 150g will from my experience I'm going to hit well over that and her swelling has barely beginning, also she should have been finished two weeks ago according to royal. I can see growth daily by how I rotate the plant under the cob, i have one only one pistol burn up but that was two days ago so could be just her doing her thing before chop day. I also feel from looking at my other plants I'm able u get better control at keeping them bushy from the cob, instead of tall lanky light deprived plants from my old full spectrum led Chinese lights. And my other plants very from 34"-24" from the cob.

 

[lunarman]

This is by far the best way to run the lights if you have more than 1 per plant. I really only recommend it for bigger plants that can handle the light mixed with a bit of grow skill as well. Putting lights like this while not having a clue will hurt more then help. If things are on the up and up then it’s great. Side branches are indeed the hardest to get light to. Big leaves cover everything below. Coming from the side Prevents this.

Good to know that bigsm0. appreciate you providing your thoughts on it. I'll be careful doing this. Actually I already did it last grow and didn't notice any issues. Got any tips for the best way to do this? Or things to beware of? I just go with trialing and looking for burn or bleach or leaf curl. I'm doing it now with some plants that are only 3.5 weeks old. I just finished some other plants so had a couple of autocobs free up today.

 

[AutoWonders]

I’d also like to apologize for not being here as much as I once was.

We humans need to rest up from time to time. Burnout can be dicey, so it's good that you looked out for number 1 in this case.

 

[BigSm0]

Just figured I’d pop in and show off the new title

 

[AutoWonders]

Just figured I’d pop in and show off the new title

Somebody get BigSm0 a top hat and diamond cane stat. Now strut around so we can get some pics of you and your fresh new title. Very cool by the way.

 

[HemiSync]

I have been lighting my 2x2x3 seedling/clone tent with one AutoCob. I had to leave for over a week and the babies are quickly getting bigger. All four of the Crop Circle autos are already in flower and the multiple photo girls I have in there are all doing fine. The Barney’s LSD clones are almost done reversing back to veg and should start growing upwards now.

I’m posting this here to show the lack of distance between the cob and the tops of the plants. The light is barely over a foot away and still not seeing any light stress.