Incandescent grow light, waste of money?

[OOAJ]

So I've been looking and can't find any cfl grow lights locally, can anyone suggest a good website?

[Jayfar]

Originally Posted by OOAJ

So I've been looking and can't find any cfl grow lights locally, can anyone suggest a good website?

Amazon.com for almost every kind of bulb and fixture, generally substantially discounted from list price. They usually have complete specifications for the bulbs too.

[Rowangreen]

Just been having a nosy at Amazon.com, and I notice a lot of the daylight and grow bulbs they are selling there are 5500k rather than the 6, 4/500 you get over here. Not sure what's going on with that... I found a couple that are the full 6something, but I don't know if it's a significant difference really. I think it might be to do with the split you sometimes see between 'red' and 'blue' grow lamps, with the red being for flower growth. In this case I'm not sure if having just 5500k is suitable as permanent lighting... though I'm hoping they wouldn't be selling so many if they weren't OK! I'm a bit worried that with 5500k you might get lots of leaf growth and no flowers... but don't really know!

[Rowangreen]

Or maybe American daylight is a different colour to British daylight? LOL

[Ray]

OOAJ: I am a discount Hydrofarm reseller. Find something you like and I can cut 10%-15% off of their suggested retail. Too bad you didn't ask sooner - I could have delivered it to you at your OS meeting on Tuesday.

Rowan: While something near 6400°K is considered "ideal" from a matching-the-chlorophyll-absorption-spectrum standpoint, any color temperature from probably 4500 to 7500 is likely acceptable.

At lower color temperatures, you will need more wattage, and at higher, less, in order to get a sufficient level of photosynthetically active radiation, but the growth should be OK.