Lighting concept

[BabyBlueAir]

Your 400-watt HID used way more electricity than your eight bulb T5 setup did? I was estimating the latter to be roughly 432 watts (8 x 54).

Is its ballast inside the reflector? That would add a good bit of heat. If so, it's pretty simple/easy to "remote" the ballast and move it out of the space. Afterwards, you'd only have the 3.412142 BTU per watt that any electric light source is going to produce inside an enclosed space.

For the HID that was a remote aluminum sealed ballast. I kept that outside of the grow tent. The T5s the ballast and starter are in the housing. They don't get real warm but I have found the plants love to grow up to them real fast and burn themselves if I'm not careful. (T5)

The T5s cut the power usage almost in half

 

[TorturedSoul]

Must not be 54 watt bulbs then. Uh... Are they two-foot bulbs or...?

 

[BabyBlueAir]

4 foot SHO, 4 in a set. 54Watt 6500K

I have two of them

 

[BabyBlueAir]

Interesting that the main leaves are curling in and up. Never seen them do that before. I'll have to keep an eye on them as this is a new strain I have never done before.

 

[TorturedSoul]

Well that doesn't make any sense, then. You're looking at 400 watts for the HID vs. 432 watts for the T5s that you stated "cut the power usage almost in half." With an old, poor condition C&C ballast, you'll have a bit more electrical "loss" - but not that much more, and your starting with a higher base load with the T5s (FFS!).

And your looking at slightly more heat production with them, lol. Well, plus a bit more for the T5 ballasts, unless they're remote ones, too.

 

[BabyBlueAir]

Not sure what to say. What I do know is, the proof was in the paper. A single 400 Watt HID (MH or HPS) cost almost $22 a month to run. I ran two 4 bulb (for a total of 8 bulbs), 4 ft at 54 Watts, and that outlet dropped to $12. a month.

Same power company, no change in rate

 

[Barney86]

The led wattage thing, seeing as nobody actually explained it.
600w led has 100x 6w leds or some multiple thereof so they get away with calling it a 600w light.
The thing is though that if the leds ran at full power they'd burn out in months so they use drivers that only run at usually 40-45% power. Some of them even less.
I've got "600w" leds that pump out 240w which in theory should last around 10 years before blowing bulbs.
Always go by the draw wattage though. They're still half decent lights, just that you need 2 of them per meter.

 

[BabyBlueAir]

The led wattage thing, seeing as nobody actually explained it.
600w led has 100x 6w leds or some multiple thereof so they get away with calling it a 600w light.
The thing is though that if the leds ran at full power they'd burn out in months so they use drivers that only run at usually 40-45% power. Some of them even less.
I've got "600w" leds that pump out 240w which in theory should last around 10 years before blowing bulbs.
Always go by the draw wattage though. They're still half decent lights, just that you need 2 of them per meter.

Thank you Barney for adding on that! I have two "600W" running in my 4 X 4 and the plants seem to be very happy with that. I'm not sure how many bulbs are in each but I do know they are dual chip with an IR and UV band in between them. Lenses focused at 90 degrees and measured 220 PAR.