Using T8 shop lights to the extreme

MagicCannabus

MagicCannabus

New Member
Hi everyone. I'm new here but I have been posting at a lot of places for a long time. I'm designing a grow cabinet again after being idle from it for a while.

What I have done is take 8x 2-bulb T8 shop lights. Mostly "Lights of America" brand. On paper at least these have one of the best lumens-per-watt ratings compared to most other types of lamp. Yes they don't have the bulb efficacy of HPS, but the ballasts are enormously low-power and the heat dispersion is amazing. Since they are cheap I decided to stuff a bunch of them into a cabinet, sort of like a tanning bed turned on it's end.

So the cabinet right now is 22"Wx28"Dx56"H So that gives me roughly 3.5 square feet of floor space for growing. This is plenty for what I want. I have a shop light at each compass point, 8 total(512W), surrounding the plants completely. This gives me about 145W per square foot. This seems insane to me, but maybe because they are tubes it will make up for lack of intensity? Their vertical arrangement means the light fills the cabinet amazingly well, but there's no light at the top, and may never be.

My big question is if anyone has done this, what their results were, and what should I do with this cabinet? There's a lot of growing styles out there and I want to do what yields best results with my lights. Should I mount a CFL or two in the middle top to give the plants a point source to aim at? I was also thinking about putting them on motorized turntables. I don't know where to buy them though so I will have to build them probably. Maybe if I have a timer kick on and rotate the plants now and then for a few minutes, I could get nice even results? Has anyone tried that? I have definitely seen vertical tubes arranged around the plants, but I can't seem to track down any examples of it as the only lighting source.

Any help is appreciated. Thanks!
 
Re: Using T8 shop lights to the extreme.....

I now have pictures!

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Re: Using T8 shop lights to the extreme.....

hehe yeah phototron indeed. I just bought two more shop lights. I had to find them out of state because they don't sell them here, but I picked up two Lights of America brand shop lights. They make a couple that are only two feet long and include two 4100K lamps. I'm gonna put that on my veg side which is about 1.5sqft.
 
Re: Using T8 shop lights to the extreme.....

The hiding spot is a bit hard to see, but it's a false wall. I could have matched up the paneling better, but it'll do for now.
 
Re: Using T8 shop lights to the extreme.....

They are all 4 foot 32W T8 lamps, except on my veg side which has a pair of 24 inch shop lights with 2 17W T8 lamps. My total wattage in the flower room, as of now, is 512W in 3.5sqft., and the veg side is running 68W in a bit less than 1.5sqft.
 
Re: Using T8 shop lights to the extreme.....

looks nice and cleanly done. :grinjoint:

Do you think the plants growing into the lights will be a problem if you have too many mamas in there?

I wonder if that flowering stage stretching will go outward instead of up?
 
Re: Using T8 shop lights to the extreme.....

im also curious to see how these plant will respond with the vertical lighting on the outside of the plants.

throw some plants in there already!! inquiring minds want to know how this will turn out.
 
Re: Using T8 shop lights to the extreme.....

I know I'm anxious too! I was supposed to get the clones on the 24th and it's been one delay after another. They're coming from a really long way away so it's been a bitch to arrange. Faster than starting seeds though....

Plants react to gravity, but also to light. So in the past when I have had side lighting, it has increased their sprawl a bit when combined with topping, training, and other approaches. I'm going to force them to stay a certain diameter, no matter how much I have to pack them in. Maybe I should rig up some sort of V-Scrog..... I'm a soil grower though and adding screens is a bitch if you want to still trim roots later. If I can overcome that obstacle I'm all for v-scrog!
 
Re: Using T8 shop lights to the extreme.....

Sounds like you have a plan...:cool:

I say again, Get it goin! I'm ready to see all this in action:Rasta:
 
Re: Using T8 shop lights to the extreme.....

Ingenuity again here on 420 strikes the minds of the curious.
I see a lot of lights, in a small area, ok good. What are you doing for ventilation? Are you running lights timed?
Soil Grow? yes. How many plants do you estimate you will grow? and for how long of a veg cycle? Any particular strain? Keep us posted.
 
Re: Using T8 shop lights to the extreme.....

For ventilation I have a vent duct which I built that exits out into another room, and the door is sealed so air only comes in under the bottom, travels into the closet, goes through the bottom of the cabinet false wall and then goes up and exits out way at the top through a Stanley blower(awesome fan btw). More than enough ventilation even on low setting.

Lights will be timed, I just haven't set it up yet, but their 3.6amp load is pretty light on the timers at least. Not many plants total though. This is a personal grow really, so no need to pump out massive oodles of weed.

Regarding the veg cycle, I am not sure how long I will need to veg/train them. I'm open to suggestions on that. I need to get them to be at least 2 feet tall before I switch to 12/12 though. I'm only going to train them outward a little to develop nodes, but they're meant to have a footprint of about 8-10 inches in diameter, and they should be about that big around and 3.5-4 feet tall. I have humble aspirations on it really. The guy who has the strains right now has them over 7 feet tall, so my attempt is going to be much more humble(and my end bud is gonna be better cause he's doing it all wrong lol). Do you think three weeks might be a good target time? They don't have to all go into the flowering cab at the same time. I could just flip on the tubes on one side or the other and easily run just part of it until the other ones in veg are ready....

For soil mix I am going to do a mix of organic pro-mix, indoor pro-mix, perlite, lime, and I hope to add vermiculite when it's available again. For veg I will add a bit of blood meal tea, and then for flower I will add bone meal tea, and potassium chloride/magnesium sulfate(Epsom) foliar spray. I am also open to suggestions on my soil mix. What proportions do you suggest? I usually go about 1/3 pro-mix, 1/3 peat, and 1/3 perlite/vermiculite. This time I don't want to use the peat because pro-mix has plenty in it already, and the vermiculite because I can't get it right now. So with the soil I have, what do you recommend?
 
Re: Using T8 shop lights to the extreme.....

more details, awesome.....

Did you decide on putting a few CFLs in the top center?
 

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