Diary explo and his new mate, Cultimate 🦫

[Rocket Soul]

I also checked with Photone app, and it says tops get 500 to 900 ppfd, depending on height and location. Ofc, it's nowhere near as accurate as it should be, I think the real value is probably a bit higher, cause my eyes hurt even when looking twards the general direction of the light. And we are just around 50-60% on the dimmer.

Thank you, @Absorber !

On parmeter/luxmeter/photoneapp.

Par meter is really only necessary for measuring blurple. Or if you want to add lots of blue and reds. Its quite expensive, especially for a really accurate response curve.
Luxmeter (for white led light) is enough in order to get an idea of how even your light is. Since you have proskills afaik, you can just use your eyes to estimate at what lux level is too much for your plants and the use the meter. Though you can usually give more lux if you have high humidity, good temps (in fact with leds its more important not to give high light intensity in cold environments) and great nute supply.
In the end its your plants that determine how much they can take, not forum guidelines. Good thing is that good lux meters are not very expensive, but they are not good at measuring outside the green range of spectrum.
There are conversion factors for lux but they depend a bit of what white cct/spectrum and how much red and other stuff is added. Back in the day i calculated roughly 150ppfd for 10k lux for 3000k 80cri whites. So 50000 is good intensity normally. For my tuned up lights i just estimate from there and add a percentage, sometimes as much as 25% for my GLA strips (UV and loooots of red).

Do you really have a pet beaver or just a fan? I was going to say Show me youre beaver but that could get me arrested but if you do have one id love to see it
Me im an Otter guy but love all the sea mammals. Something makes them look so happy, maybe the freedom of the sea.

 

[Absorber]

Samsung 8 i think it was about 10 year old phone.
My new samsung s21A wont work it doesn't have a light sensor in the phone .

Won't that stunt them?


Is it a top tier/newer phone? I use an older one and it says it wasn't calibrated by them for this sensor so it's just an aproximation.

 

[exploziv]

@Rocket Soul if I am "upgrading" from a guesstimate, I would try to get the real thing, a par meter, and not get involved with other estimated measurements. Do you have any recomandations on a good one available to the european market? Maybe Santa will help me get one, altrough a continous PH/ECmonitor is higher on my "Santa list". Maybe time will come for the PAR meter as well.
The beaver is my imaginary friend. Maybe I can get him to guess the light level??
Thank you for your input, brother!
Later.edit: lots of "maybe" in this post, but I guess that's how life works.

 

[WHIPEDMEAT]

Cult of the bober started with this guy

 

[exploziv]

Too bad that's an age restricted video.. fk youtube.

 

[Rocket Soul]

@Rocket Soul if I am "upgrading" from a guesstimate, I would try to get the real thing, a par meter, and not get involved with other estimated measurements. Do you have any recomandations on a good one available to the european market? Maybe Santa will help me get one, altrough a continous PH/ECmonitor is higher on my "Santa list". Maybe time will come for the PAR meter as well.
The beaver is my imaginary friend. Maybe I can get him to guess the light level??
Thank you for your input, brother!
Later.edit: lots of "maybe" in this post, but I guess that's how life works.

If you gimme some time to get some info together ill try to make a beaver school: theres a few reasons to opt for lux over par meter if you have priorities. Tonight i got babysitting two demanding rascals.

 

[tobedetermined]

Too bad that's an age restricted video.. fk youtube.

View attachment 19047992

He gets quite excited doesn't he?

 

[exploziv]

He gets quite excited doesn't he?

Who wouldn't??

 

[tobedetermined]

"At least one beaver attack on a human is known to have been fatal: a 60-year-old fisherman in Belarus died in 2013 after a beaver bit open an artery in his leg." Wiki: Beaver Attack



p.s. the plants are looking great!

 

[WHIPEDMEAT]

Pingviiin

 

[exploziv]

I am sorry to interupt the beaver talk, but I wanted to post an update:
EC 1.63 mS, PH 5.7, 25.2C, 69% RH.

Now, back to the bussiness!

 

[tobedetermined]

Now, back to the bussiness!

Well, aside from the canoe story, my only other encounter with a live beaver in the wild was one time I was motoring between Atlanta and Nashville and damned if there wasn’t a beaver hustling across the highway. It is a divided highway at that point and a pretty busy one so he was lucky it was bright and sunny. I saw him and slowed down to let him get to the side of the road. It was on Hwy 24 around Battle Creek – so after the crap of Chattanooga traffic but just before the run up to Monteagle. A pretty area btw.

OK . . . and I better shut up . . . or I'll start with my DEAD beaver stories . . . And yes, I have a couple . . .

 

[exploziv]

EC 1.52 mS, PH 5.8, 25.0C, 67% RH.
I added enaugh nutrients to raise EC to about 1.75 mS, and PH down to go to about 5.6.
They are now drinking about 10 liters of water a day.

 

[exploziv]

EC 1.68 mS, PH 5.7, 25.2C, 72% RH.
All going good. I started supercropping (crushing the stems of the tallest tops) and also tieing them a bit to the sides so the canopy gets more even.

 

[WHIPEDMEAT]

Nice but anyway

 

[exploziv]

Yes, time for a dance! It's on repeat for now!

 

[Absorber]

EC 1.68 mS, PH 5.7, 25.2C, 72% RH.
All going good. I started supercropping (crushing the stems of the tallest tops) and also tieing them a bit to the sides so the canopy gets more even.

Have you ever tried using branch trainers like these .
I 3d pintened some similar i find theres no need to tie them down at all if you place the trainer in the right spot.
I used them last grow they work really well

 

[exploziv]

I've seen those, but I have no 3d printer. I do have thick copper wire i can use to obtain good results and many kinds of other plant ties, problem now is that is hard to reach in especially in the middle part of the canopy. I thought it gonna be easy with autos, looks like I'm growing trees anyway.
Btw, have you thought about making those adjustable? I am sure it's something that would help with installing and using them, if made from 2 wings that adjust angles.

 

[Absorber]

I've seen those, but I have no 3d printer. I do have thick copper wire i can use to obtain good results and many kinds of other plant ties, problem now is that is hard to reach in especially in the middle part of the canopy. I thought it gonna be easy with autos, looks like I'm growing trees anyway.
Btw, have you thought about making those adjustable? I am sure it's something that would help with installing and using them, if made from 2 wings that adjust angles.

They sell these you dont have to print them and they make adjustable ones .
I found the style in the picture are actually easy to fit , the branch thickness is generally half the size of the gap on trainer and as branch grows it makes the curve a little tighter ,the branch still has room at the side of the trainer so it doesnt restrict nutrient moving up the branch.

That plant had branch trainers on it not one bit of tying at all , and thats a about 1.2 mtrs across in size

 

[Rocket Soul]

Promised some Beaver School and i Rocket Soul always pays his debts.

Par meter measures light in photon count, an absolute term, how many photons per square meter while a Lux meter measure how bright a light is to the human eye, sorta brightness/Lux per m2, 1lux/m2 is a lumen.
This means that a lux meter is very biased to green light (which is the main component in white light) when something has very high brightness the way our eyes tend to see it is white. Par meter is better for blues/violets and reds. Yellows are sorta in between. When leds were all blurple par meter was really the choice cause it was impossible to get a good reading, even the light from the room outside the tent could throw of your reading. Also comparing between 2 slightly different spectrums could be difficult.

Why would you need a light meter, of any sort?
- you could say to find out how hard i should push with the lights.

- In order to present my results to the forum and show of nice metrics.

For nr 2 you of course need a Parmeter cause you want to show off your nice metrics and you have money to splash on the respect and awe of your peers at the forum.
For nr1, you could argue that you dont even need a lux meter: the plant handles what it handles, not what it shoul handle. It might be light sensitive or light hungry in comparison to what it "should" want. But in the end the light levels needs to be assessed thru looking at the plant - is it happy or over pushed? Still its nice to have a meter, gives you an extra indication.
But if your spectrum is static, youre not adding extra reds for flower or similar, just the same spectrum all the time all you need are reference points, to be able to dial in how much to change; more light means more nutes and its nice to have an idea of how much more rather than just by eye "plant happy or no?"
Heres the around 400e apoogee response curve: View attachment 19049027

Very nice, but 400$? Id rather just wait a bit more and get a spectrometer which also handles ppfd for 1000$ but hey i play around a lot with spectrum and sciency stuff.

I looked for the same info for a lux meter or the eye but couldnt find it quickly. But basicly, under the hood, both meters are the same just with different filters and ways of presenting it. Think about it, theres no engineering reasons why it should be easier to make a lux meter, infact its an extra layer of complication since your trying to replicate how the eye work rather than just measuring light. I guess maybe cause you have to get those tight limits at 400 and 700 rather than just a sorta bell curve peaking around 550nm (green).

To me it smells like they are making us pay premium for parmeters just cause were growers. Its like a Gucci bag for women, made for 20 bucks and sold to foolish souls for thousands. Good brands would be apogee and licor but at Prada prices. Those guys that do the Pulse vpd meter also have a par meter that would be my go to if i bought one, it also has a very rudimentary spectrometer iirc and shouldnt be much pricier than the mid brands.

My experience of parmeter is that it helped convince my growbuddy that led would work. But the meter was broke after a year, it was low end somewhere between 100-200e. I wouldnt buy a new one, unless i went all in for spectrometer. We still use the same very durable lux meter as 10 years ago, and it still keeps up. From use and reading way too much old threads at riu ive worked out good enough adjustment factors for lights with lots of nonwhite light. Add 10-20%, sometimes even more. You can usually figure it outt after a while.

If your planning to in the near-mid future start adding in extra channels of red or something then go ahead with a parmeter. If youre sticking with the same type white based light then get a luxmeter and with the remaining 300-something euros get something real nice for yourself or your beaver. If youve had a few failed grows it can be nice to have as a sorta talisman but those grows can also be improved by just general growing better.



No man needs two meters, if you find it twice the fun you should really try two beavers. Yet no man really needs two beavers (nor can he handle it), its twice the hassle. Infact, its only when you realize and deeply understand that infact you need NO Beaver (or meter) that youll get two beavers wanting some fun with you.
Real men needs no meter he just grows with God in his heart and trust the divine Beaver to stand by his side.