Grow Light Position: Horizontal or Vertical?

[420]

Re: Grow Light Position: Horizontal or Vertical ?

harry, if you ask boss, he can remove anything from your journal that stray from what you are trying to achieve here... him being gone for a month brought some lack in organization and policy around here, we are working to restore order as fast as we can... sorry for any hassles anyone is going through as a result...

 

[Harry Red]

Re: Grow Light Position: Horizontal or Vertical ?

Ok, thanks 420!!

The most efficient use of a HID light is in the vertical position, base DOWN, just above and below the plant heights in multiple locations throughout the room, with an almost flat circular hood hanging 6" from the top of the bulb.

I've been thinking about this configuration with the reflector that you mentioned, Boss. It makes perfect sense to have a reflector at the top to help horizontally scatter any light that is directed up. I've saw the hexagonal reflectors but are these types of reflectors commercially available? Although, it shouldn't be too difficult to fabricate one, with pretty much any kind of stiff material and mylar.

alot of cage and vertical growth systems like the coliseum take advantage of a light with no reflector, getting growth all around the light.

That is another good thought NoLogo. Arranging your plants like coliseum style seating would be beneficial. Taller plants on the outside and smaller plants on the inside rings.

Great food for thought guys. Just the kind of info I was looking for.

Thanks!!

Harry

 

[Alien Hybrid]

You might want to check this out...It is true that you get a much larger yield per watt growing vertical, if you can afford to do it right that is.

Vertical Gardening Hydroponics Systems and Vertical Grow Light Systems: Hydroponic Kits | Octagon Hydroponics

 

[RageMonkey]

vertical side lights cause a taller (stretched), stringy plant and overhead lighting that is adjusted to 6" from the top will produce a more compact plant.

Also the more cool the spectrum is, the mor ecompact the plant will be.

 

[triploidgntcs]

if you notice in the picture you posted as example, they are using mylar. this is the key ingredient when it comes to your idea. but in order to acheive maximum light availabilty, you must have your walls and even roof in the right place , depending on how many lights you are using. 1000whps per 30 cubic feet is plentiful. keep plants 2 inches away from mylar minimum. heat problem? use vertical glass cooling tubes. keep your floor white though plants dont see down and its easier for cleansiness. you could never do what i do with horizontal lighting and shades, save those for the streetlights, follow your heart my friend. ps i seen this post and made an acount because what these people are telling you is 1 dimensional, and also untrue. move your lights up and down side to side, stretch em, stack em. the choice is yours . and remember . the bottom third is what triggers negetive phototropism of your roots .(growth away from the light) .. its a good thing.

 

[triploidgntcs]

Re: Grow Light Position: Horizontal or Vertical ?

haha, leave it to stoners to over complicate simple things.
I am still uncertain on what your goals are.
if you pull your hood back father away then 10 inches, your hood will cover a greater area. you should be able to get more then 2 plants per hood (if you want too)

one reason the grower you saw had good results is because they moved the plants around as they were needed. again, something you could do with a horizontal hood.
larger plants don't always mean better yield. due the the light being unable to penetrate the plant foliage.

of course light may be bent, outside of the grow room, but i don't anyone has the ability to do it within the grow room, thus is why I made the comment, it was to help with the understanding on why its not commonly done.

the light won't bend, so the light will be going horizontally the whole way across the room, it will never 'fall down' and hit the plant, the majority of the light will hit the plant will be light reflected from the walls of the room.

like racefan said, its your room. do what cha like.

Be IRIE, if your planning on adding another light to your system, of course your results are going to be better. you would have to stick w/the same strain, and same bulb type and watts to make a fair reference.

woah. leave it to the stoners? simple things? . pull your hood back 10 inches? light intensity decreases by %50 every 6 inches.

 

[Be Irie]

ahaha, had to bring this one back now.... Wish my friend Harry was still around.....

 

[Poke Smot]

What happend to him IRIE you guys were legends when this all started get big and big fast

 

[Grandpappy Sr]

I love the topic, the ideas, the thoughtfulness behind it all and the intensity of the conversation, just not all the "I'm right and your wrong". Lets chill and try to help further our cause, which I believe is how to grow better and get it legalized. If anyone knows a good thread where we can see actual pictures of a hanging hid light and it's overall production compared to a hid light in a hood I would love to see it. Overall, great topic!

 

[Be Irie]

I personally like mixing the overhead with the vertical... I am seeing great results from it..

Gators journal, done with a vertical....
Gator's Cage

 

[mrgreengenes]

Just thinking about a mixed set-up myself. Thanks for the pic and link Irie. After battling PM in a basement I have stripped the room to the bare walls, removed some old carpeting and have painted every surface. It is now going to be my clean room but since I am remodeling I get to reconfigure. I have been wondering whether going vertical or sticking with hoods is in my future. Maybe I should start a journal.

Funny this thread came back from the dead. Wish Harry was around so I could thank him myself.

 

[Pop Kulture]

I personally like mixing the overhead with the vertical... I am seeing great results from it..

Gators journal, done with a vertical....
Gator's Cage

B - Man, that has to be tough on the eyes! Do you use any kind of eye protection? If so, what? Also, what kind of wattage are you running for the verticals?

 

[Be Irie]

I try not to look at it... When I have to work in there for an extended time I will unplug the 400 until I am done.. Right now I am only running one CMH 400 vert, I should be adding another one to the other side of the flowering room. I let a friend borrow my other 400, so as soon as I get that back there will be two total... Should end up with 800 watts vertical and around 3000 watts overhead...

 

[Pop Kulture]

I try not to look at it... When I have to work in there for an extended time I will unplug the 400 until I am done.. Right now I am only running one CMH 400 vert, I should be adding another one to the other side of the flowering room. I let a friend borrow my other 400, so as soon as I get that back there will be two total... Should end up with 800 watts vertical and around 3000 watts overhead...

Nice!

Just a thought. You might want to check out Growgles - saw two pairs out there for between $50-$75 - supposed to filter out UV and IR from HPS lights. When I first saw them I thought why waste my money if my lights are in a reflector - heck wear a hat and don't look up. But with the vertical lighting it seems it would be really easy to burn your eyes with HPS blubs.

Be careful and

 

[gate13]

what are the best for cuttings

 

[Notch Johnson]

Re: Grow Light Position: Horizontal or Vertical ?

For sure yields are affected by the amount of lumens the plant is able to get, but I think, ultimately yields are determined genetically.

 

[cross1420]

Do both for optimal performance lol

 

[HiTech-Hate]

Parabolic hoods with vertical lights would increase the amount of light reflected to the plant

 

[too old]

I'm hoping someone is still watching this thread......a question for you HiTech: I have been playing with making parabolic reflectors for my lamps, and for the horizontals it's a piece of cake, use the trough configuration. With the horizontal lamp, you have a fixed focal length which relates to efficient reflection. However, with a vertical lamp, for the life of me, I can't figure out how to get a proper focal length. Am I missing something simple?

 

[HiTech-Hate]

I'm hoping someone is still watching this thread......a question for you HiTech: I have been playing with making parabolic reflectors for my lamps, and for the horizontals it's a piece of cake, use the trough configuration. With the horizontal lamp, you have a fixed focal length which relates to efficient reflection. However, with a vertical lamp, for the life of me, I can't figure out how to get a proper focal length. Am I missing something simple?

I don't know what kind of information of any importance you're trying to extract from the focal length, but the reflector on a vertically mounted light is just a parabolic (concave) reflector.

Thus focal length is just f = -(r/2) where r is the radius of the reflector, its value (r) being negative if the reflector is convex (giving a positive focal point) and positive if the reflector is concave (giving negative focal point).

Since all reflectors we put on lights for growing are concave (parabolic for vertical mounting), whether they be horizontally or vertically mounted is irrelevant. The focal length's value will be negative (that is the focal length will NOT be below the reflector, because the reflector is scattering light downwards, not focusing it), so its value is meaningless (unless your reflector is not opaque and you are trying to determine the relative efficiency of the reflector to let light pass through it, which in turn would reduce the relative scattering intensity ... that is why reflectors ARE opaque we want all the light scattering off it, not through it).

That's why I don't understand why you want the focal length, the function of putting a reflector on a lamp, horizontal or vertical is to scatter the light downwards, not focus it.

To focus would create a fire (think magnifying glass + sun + ant) and only provide a very tight beam of light downwards. You want your light SCATTERED downwards, so that the light being produced by the lamp ... 'fills' (scatters) the space below it. (that's also why we use reflective coating, to FURTHER reflect the scattered light to the plants).

If your looking for a positive focal point (a point below the reflector), the reflector for one thing would need to be concave (and none are obviously). The only importance this positive focal length would provide is what distance from the lamp the plants MUST NOT REACH, or there will definitely be a fire. Furthermore, almost none of the plants would receive any light since its being focused and not scattered.

Moral of this story, the focal point is an irrelevant value to this application (where by application I mean the use of opaque, reflective, parabolic lenses to scatter light from the light source downwards onto your plants)