Quote:
Originally Posted by u bada
What lights are you using, Hakumin? and how close do you have them?
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I simply don't have the place to grow outdoors since I live in a third floor apartment in a city, so I learned to make do.
I am currently growing under three 24" T5HO tubes. At least until I can find LED replacement tubes with the output and spectrum that I want, I'll stick with these for now. I am currently using Sunblaster 6400K tubes. My plants seem to do best under them after having tried several brands.
I have three shelves. All three shelves have one middle tube that turns on and off at sunrise and sunset. The outer tubes on each shelf is timed separately from the middle to give varying amount of light to each shelf during the day as needed.
The plants are arranged on each shelf depending on their light requirements since there is higher light towards the middle of each shelf as opposed to the edges.
The plants are between 4 and 8 inches away from the tubes depending on height of the plant. If a plant needs less light, I'll put it towards the edge of the shelf or on a lower light shelf. If a plant needs more light, I'll put it towards the center of the shelf or on a higher light shelf.
The most important thing to understand about growing with artificial lights is that you cannot take the usual outdoor footcandle recommendations for plants at face value.
If a plant is said to require 3000 fc, this means that it requires that intensity at peak intensity as the light increases and decreases gradually over the course of a day. It does not mean that you should give it 3000fc constantly throughout the whole day.
Artificial lights generally do not gradually rise and fall in intensity the way sunlight does, and if you attempt to give that plant 3000 fc using artificial lights, it's way too much light.
Anyway, this pic is a bit old, but this is how it's set up:
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