Ceramic Metal Halide (CMH)

[simba]

Mole..
here ya go the lamp 70-150 watt CMH MHP get the protected versions..

as far as ballast match the lamp Part number to the Ansi Code..
and thats it..
Magnetic (50=m148, 70=m143, 100=m140 150=m142)

Yes as far as SAD CMH Totally helps as its FULL SPD as close to the sun as we gots.. (used by Gvt in Bunkers and Some subs)

ya a 250 in that 2.5x2.5 would be good..

Remember we dont (well do) care where you buy your CMH however I must emphasis DON'T Deviate from the part numbers provided..(IE dif lamps have diff spds and Safety features..

 

[MoleMcHenry]

Simba, thank you so much for posting that link! Think I'm going to go and buy one now. -Mole

 

[Deft]

Well you've spent a lot of time answering questions and being on hand in person which goes a long way.

I just want to make sure I have a bulb and ballast that are compatible, so should I get a 250 hps core and coil from BGH or somewhere else (do you sell them?) and what bulb is the right one for horizontal for a 250 and is 4000k a good color temp for flowering?

 

[gramsci.antonio]

little question: if the power goes out... how much should i wait before turn on again the lamp?

 

[Deft]

Does anyone (Simba?) know if the BGH magneto ballast is UL or ANSI certified? I need a source for a 250 magneto ballast if I am to buy the bulb your pitching and want one that is safe and compatible, any info would be much appriciated.

I hate to sound impatient with constant questions but I want to have everything shipped during the X-mass shipping rush as I don't get many packages at other times of the year and want to be as safe as possible.

 

[Laura Kush]

Simba whats the chance that you could be wrong about all this?
Im not asking for your qualifications. Some of the smartest people I know who can get things done dropped out of high school or never went to college. Not saying that your either for all I know your a botanist whith degrees in lighting fields but could you be wrong?

I mean could these lights be just for lighting up big warehouses as they are intended?
Isn't it important that ALL horticultural lights for the veg state on the market are in the 6000 K Blue range?

If you were C-3PO what is the probability that you would spit out that these lights arent as good as the marketed horticultural lights out there?

 

[MostHigh]

lol....funny.
Lets see, Hortilux, Sunmaster...and wait, who else out there makes horticulture lamps out of a garage?
They've sorry designs, lousy heat signatures, and absolutely pathetic CRIs. Then there's the rip-off price. And they know they've been ripping people off. Indoor growers are fortunate that MJ can still turn out fairly well under those sub-par lamps.
Then ya have manufacturing, design and engineering powerhouses like Philips, Osram/Sylvania and Venture lighting...all with massive efforts to light the world with quality products backed by companies who have far more resources available to them than any small time lamp manufacturer does.
And then there's this...it's just a lamp. And when you become familiar with the engineering, materials and manufacturing, you'd absolutely shit yourself at the mark-up so called 'horticultural' specialty lighting puts on the consumer.
If those manufactures truly were all about indoor growing...they'd make a lamp that wasn't a parking lot light rip off.
Hortilux, agro-sun, sunmaster...or anyone sticking to tired old HPS/MH HID designs...they're all obsolete.
Simba has it right. And really, he's no different than the cat 30 years who was telling buddies that they could grow indoors who got lol'd and ridiculed by people whos brains were stuck on OD growing being the only way to snag a good yield.
It's not as if any new age indoor types questioned the validity on yields from HID lamps back when they knew absolutley nothing about indoor growing. They'd have to be utter dope heads to believe they have the one best lamp no need to ever change or update.
Me, I'm estatic to move away from so called horticultural specialty lamps. Goodbye loser marketers that sold me and others on a POS...hello better performance for a 1/3 the price!

 

[payn4school]

i took the plunge.


in its new home


spreading lumenescent joy!




How long should this 400 beast last? Is a year reasonable at 20 and 4?

Thanks for all the great info!!

 

[stupor]

Deft, I haven't ordered from this company but it looks like a good one for a magnetic 250W HPS ballast. They also have kits.
http://www.htgsupply.com/viewproduct.asp?productID=48384
Another kit
http://www.bulbs.com/eSpec.aspx?ID=9414&Ref=Ballasts&RefId=16

 

[Deft]

I was looking at that site the other day, but that was before I found out that there was a better setup than a digital ballast for flowering... kinda weird how they use the low tech ballast but thats fine with me if the plants can use the power the ballast is sucking up better.

I'll take another look at HTG, I just want a quality ballast and bulb really.. And I like the Max-89 reflector at BGH which is why I was asking about the quality of their magneto ballasts.

 

[simba]

thanks..
mainly im on this cause.. most other shops dont want ya buying this cause it makes them no money on the inital sale and you relamp less therefore eating into return bulb buy earlier.. and then when they do come back for another they dont make the high profit margin like on horti hps..

Now dont get me wrong in your local Hydro shop id say 400 cmh SRP $65.00 (just cause they do need that profit margin cause its a Brick store not selling QTY like a internet shop)


Deft,
ya ballasts are cheap at eco light or econolight i can look (sorry im spending short time online lately and just geting the base out and trying to come back so ill post a link ifyou haven't found it.)

ya 4k is great for flower.. the spd is higher red to blue ratio..
the 3k is actually crapy for flower (sofar in tests cause literly half the outputed energy on it is unusable to plant, 4k only 25% wasted HPS IMPHO 20-30%)

if power goes out leave it alone chances are one of the times u go to pull the plug after the glitch it could be starting to fire again and it is SO HARD on the cmh to half ass Fire them up.. however if u turn lamp off wait 5 minutes abouts..to refire..

almost all Magnetic ballasts are UL and ansi Cert.. Dont buy china ballast ull regret it (sorry but they use less pure coper) and i dont know how that affects life etc..

Laura,
i haven't the foggiest % of me being wrong,
i so could be wrong... thats allways in my mind.
not to any part of my exp but i am very concerned about what i say i like cause if its crap later whos going to listen to me on something else.

as far as Kelvin rating.. you can have 3 lamps all with the same K but the SPD would vary enough to have one great for plants one horrid, one ya iffy
k is more of what the perception to the humen eye..over what makes up the Kelvin.
thats the spds job for us to see the actual energy and where it is.. vs where we want and in what ratio..

ya if i was that lil rubbish Bin LOL> JK id say Simba May be ahead of the game and a bit of the green could be removed and pushed in red and blue.

as far as cmh compared to Horti lamps.. i have as a customer asked EYE if they had anything specifically there EYE BLUE and EYE Cera arc that could compete with Philips CMH in SPD initially and they said they had nothing comparing (wich they dont.. Cera is close but iffy)
safety of bulb IE OPEN FIXTURE RATED CMH and ballast is 2nd and 3rd in line..
we all agree mh and HPS rocks so combining those into one lamp threwout grow with more red than blue would promote more yeild while keeping short and providing the blue ranges needed for to fully force plant to grow like outdoors...



most high hits on the head..
some stores i have spilled the beans on real costs they about cry..
even from there huge Horti dist they buy from is making double..from what they sell for..

k im spilling the beans a 600 Philips SON T Plus in china is 10USD each.. not with big qty discount either.. u should see what a skid will bring discount down to.
and was designed as street lamp yet in euro its huge as horti..
and abouts 70 usd and one here about 100 but china 10 WTF>>
oh an in us the horti lamps the store gets screwed.. by the dists..

ill give the stores the credit they need to make more profit margin than the dist but unfort the dist makes 100%-200% on lamps. (dist sells mass qty yet they make Boatloads of money per lamp that aint right as sales qty goes up profit per item should go down..)

Philips CMH does have a higher Cost to Mfr than MH or HPS as its combo of both vs any and the Horti lamps.. and cause they make so many less than HPS or mh at this time (in the hps retro whites) so cost per lamp is higher than lets say a son t plus that they make 10k at each run whereases cmh 400 2-5k per run so later philips drops price as QTY goes up (hopefully)

i can guarantee adv tech Makes a boatload more off HPS and has More stock of HPS than CMH yet They refuse to sell HPS..


ya cmh doesn't like High frequency ballasts (anything over 175 hz = 175 flashs per second basically)
most digi ballasts are 250 hz
just cause its old dont mean it dont work any more LOL

ya reflectors ill be on next.. actually im looking outside the Horti industry and finding better reflectors LMFAO


Stu.. 20/4 X365= 7360 so you can get about 2 years if u pushed it.. to end of life..
However id say ditch it after 12k hours abouts (if your a Hoby grower) if commercial dump at 10k hours. but compared to EYE BLUE it u have to dump at 10k and 8k and thats giving it credit at twice the price..
hps ya has more lumen ya ya but dont hold it and at half life its noda abouts.. IMPHO of usable energy.
(this is for the 400 hor as its life is 15k hours For now Gonna get better)

 

[Laura Kush]

Okay, I went ahead and bought one.

Simba, how far away should I put a Phillips 400 W CMH horizontal from 3-4 week old plants?

My biggest problem right now is Im having temp. problems. They are going into the 80's.
Should I take down all the mylar I tried so hard to tack up? Under the mylar is an offwhite almost yellow paint.

 

[MostHigh]

Kush... http://www.icmag.com/ic/showpost.php?p=1367958&postcount=153

 

[Laura Kush]

Wow! They are pretty close!

 

[JohnnyToke]

I have 2 x 400w cmh sitting over my 4' x 4' grow and they are 1" - 6" above the tops at all times. I have them in aircooled hoods with glass however with the cooling fans turned off, they still are not to hot for the tops.

my plants love these lights verses my last grow with a 1000w eye hortilux. Im 3 weeks into flowering and the plants are very healthy.

no complaints here.

one caution though, my eyes were hurting after spending 10 minutes in the grow area so I have to wear dark sunglasses in there. that took care of the problem. these lights are brite white...lol

 

[Deft]

Yea, I found out that the kelvin rating of a hid bulb does not tell you much about the spectrum.. Phillips seems to have a very nice line up and quality bulbs... I will be getting a re-based pair of 9007 35w Phillips bulbs to replace the cheep ones in my car some time... I wish they manufactured retrofit bulbs in 9007 but only the cheapo companies in china do so far as I know, and the light they throw sucks compared to the OEM bulb makers.

 

[Deft]

I think I'll buy this one and wire it so it can be used remotely, I have a multimeter and some experience with normal wiring and I think theres a guide on here somewhere for re wiring high bays. Too bad I cant find a 250hps high bay that would be best (anyone know where to get one online)?

http://www.e-conolight.com/Product/EProductDetail.asp?ProductFamilyID=3&FGNumber=E-HR4H25QZ

 

[JohnnyToke]

CMH's in Action

CMH's in Action

here are a few pics from my current B52 grow under 2 x 400w cmh's.

I vegged the rooted clones under cmh for 10 days before switching to 12/12 on the 11th day in the dwc's.

anyone know why some of the bud hairs would turn brown on a young bud like this in pic #6?

1st pic - rooted clones installed in dwc on 11-08-07




2nd pic - clones in dwc's on 11-14-07




3rd pic - pic taken 11-26-07 which is one week into 12/12 cycle




4th pic - taken on 12-04-07





5th pic - here is the jungle on 12-15-07




6th pic - bud from 12-18-07 which is 4 weeks into 12/12

 

[MostHigh]

Hey JohnnyT...have ya tried it without the hood lens yet?

 

[JohnnyToke]

not yet since my setup is aircooled with vortex fans.

I can turn the vortex fans off and they are fine a couple inches under the glass however I do not know if this would still be true without the glass inserts.

I wouldnt be able to pull the glass this far into the grow to test it out. it's a jungle in there and not much room to maneuver around.

regards,
JT