fluro chess - micro vertical

[Mr.Jones]

so here i am with my newest thought of building an very efficiant vertical system - i was driving around and had this idea which just would get out of my mind again so i wrote magiccannabus a message and explained it to him and he thought it could work as well ... so here is the deal: fluros have very little penetration (i read and experienced it myself) so you always have to keep your fluros very tight to your plants to get the best results possible:

-using a horizontal system the plants really just get a little bit of light because the reflector doesnt help anything:


(hope this helps) - unlike hps the reflector combined with a fluro tube is in my opinion useless! i think that only 50% maximum 60% of the light is used using either a horizontal (or even a vertical tube system which does need reflectors as well!)

so my thought is using the fluros like in a big vertical system but on a lot smaller scale - creating a chess like board to put the plants in between uses the same effect like any other vertical system but does not require any kind of reflectors:



this should use a lot more light (i would say tending to 90% or even more because the plants always have the same distance to the tubes):



there are many advantages in such a system:

-very low in height
-very cheap
-very easy
-variation in size possible
-stackable

im gonna build one the next few days i guess just to try - 36w micro system (im sure this can be extended to a very big operation)

what do you think??

 

[TheShroomDude]

Would like to see it. Like the sound of it. The only thing that I can think of would be how much $ would be spent on the lights and how many you would need to cover a say 3x3 area.

 

[alphacat]

Might work ok for a SOG style setup, BUT:

that shit's gonna get crazy hot (T5 bulb temp is around 130*F I think) and training would be a bit of a bitch - probably more so than even v-scrog.

I would think that a scaled-down version of the Omega Garden using fluoro tubes might be more easy to do though, and you get the same benefits.

 

[cork144]

seen it done, some guy had a massive fluro tunnel full of plants growing around the bulbs, its somwhere here on ic but ive forgotten where too

 

[alphacat]

Actually, on second thought - this is probably a great idea for LEDs with a SOG.

 

[Mr.Jones]

Its not 'vertical'..... but I suppose having 4-8' of light (and a reflector) when you only have short plants is a waste.

This will probably work pretty well though, I'll definetly be watching. I would just be worried about training them to finish a certain distance from the side of the lamp. I think its worth trying out since it won't require much extra work to setup.....

define vertical for me ... you could build a tower out of it and since the plants dont get their light from the top i would consider it to be vertical. (its kind of similar to vertical scroging)

i plant on putting chickenwire around them to kind of scrog them ...

Would like to see it. Like the sound of it. The only thing that I can think of would be how much $ would be spent on the lights and how many you would need to cover a say 3x3 area.

i think its completly up to you:

you could use 4x 3' to get your first level but i guess 6x will work alot better so with 2 levels of light you would need 12x 3' ( should be around 400w) and would cost you maybe 150$?

Might work ok for a SOG style setup, BUT:

that shit's gonna get crazy hot (T5 bulb temp is around 130*F I think) and training would be a bit of a bitch - probably more so than even v-scrog.

I would think that a scaled-down version of the Omega Garden using fluoro tubes might be more easy to do though, and you get the same benefits.

the heat problem i thought about as well and magiccannabus told me:

Burning is not an issue with T8 lamps. Especially not open ones like that. I have mature flowering buds that lay against the tubes and never even burn. T8 is very gentle!

the omega garden thought is what i had but think about it: you never ever just gonna use one fluro because the garden must be too tight around that fluro and if you use say 3 or 4 you have a lower light usage than such a pattern i describe (which is ofcourse just theoretical)

seen it done, some guy had a massive fluro tunnel full of plants growing around the bulbs, its somwhere here on ic but ive forgotten where too

would be good to see it ... maybe my thought isnt new at all

 

[magiccannabus]

The intensity of T8 tubes is very good up close, and the efficacy of these lamps tend to be very high. So I really think this is feasible, easy to cool, and good for even light distribution.

My only concerns would be:

1) Tubes spanning open space unsupported in the middle could break, raining poison on plants. To a degree this is a risk with most systems though. I might use shatter guards if I did this with longer lamps like F32T8(4', 32W). Some of the guards are UV resistant though so you don't want those!

2) Ballasts could be mounted remotely to keep them and their heat out of the cabinet, but the wiring for the rig itself would be pretty time consuming, with a lot of wires involved. More parts can = more things to break. It can also = redundant systems, depending on how it's configured.

3) Plants would be restricted in space, they'd have to be aggressively "side topped" to keep them inside their spaces.

4) Inevitably plants will rub against tubes, getting resin on them.

5) Requires a fixture of proportions relative to the lamp sizes. So if you used only 4' 32W T8 lamps, the fixture would have to be a bit larger than 4x4. You could use F17T8 which are 2' long going one way, and 4' lamps the other way, for a rectangular grow space. Not a big limitation, but a limitation anyway.

-----

Despite those concerns I like the project and am eager to see how it does. For cost reasons, I'd recommend getting shop lights and gutting their ballasts out. Way cheaper than buying ballasts made for DIY. Workhorse ballasts would be nice, but until you get your system figured out, it's too expensive.

I am planning to incorporate a 250W HPS into my grow soon. I'm realizing that surrounding the plants is great, but the tops are also where the best growth is at, so if you can feed both needs at the same time, the results are bound to be bigger and better. This idea you have is good on it's own terms, but I think combined with a powerful overhead light, you'd really have some powerful output.

 

[Mr.Jones]

The intensity of T8 tubes is very good up close, and the efficacy of these lamps tend to be very high. So I really think this is feasible, easy to cool, and good for even light distribution.

My only concerns would be:

1) Tubes spanning open space unsupported in the middle could break, raining poison on plants. To a degree this is a risk with most systems though. I might use shatter guards if I did this with longer lamps like F32T8(4', 32W). Some of the guards are UV resistant though so you don't want those!

2) Ballasts could be mounted remotely to keep them and their heat out of the cabinet, but the wiring for the rig itself would be pretty time consuming, with a lot of wires involved. More parts can = more things to break. It can also = redundant systems, depending on how it's configured.

3) Plants would be restricted in space, they'd have to be aggressively "side topped" to keep them inside their spaces.

4) Inevitably plants will rub against tubes, getting resin on them.

5) Requires a fixture of proportions relative to the lamp sizes. So if you used only 4' 32W T8 lamps, the fixture would have to be a bit larger than 4x4. You could use F17T8 which are 2' long going one way, and 4' lamps the other way, for a rectangular grow space. Not a big limitation, but a limitation anyway.

-----

Despite those concerns I like the project and am eager to see how it does. For cost reasons, I'd recommend getting shop lights and gutting their ballasts out. Way cheaper than buying ballasts made for DIY. Workhorse ballasts would be nice, but until you get your system figured out, it's too expensive.

I am planning to incorporate a 250W HPS into my grow soon. I'm realizing that surrounding the plants is great, but the tops are also where the best growth is at, so if you can feed both needs at the same time, the results are bound to be bigger and better. This idea you have is good on it's own terms, but I think combined with a powerful overhead light, you'd really have some powerful output.

i agree with all the points! those are gonna be the real problems ...

but imagine the possibilities usin the F32T8 it would be possible to use 4 or 5 each side to have 8"x8" plant sides: 10x32w 320w ... now stack another level of lights above maybe within a distance of 6" and you get a 640w system which should do quite well on a height of probably around 14" thats like nothing! - sure that needs some serious ventilation but you even coul stack three systems above each other filling the room with space for a reservoir under them thats like a homebox running on 1920w

im not sure if this is a unrealistic thought but if the system is yielding good this could be a quite cool setup

and even for micro growers they can take 4x18w with 4 plants going and cann keep it pretty small!

when im finished with my ketle im gonna build one

 

[alphacat]

re: excessive heat -

It's one thing when you have, say, four T8's side-by-side in a shoplite fixture or something conventional like that; however, you're talking about creating a grid of these suckers, and the intersect points are my primary concern here.

Honestly, while this setup may be ergonomically maxed out I think that it may be bordering on the needlessly complicated. After all, part of the beauty of v-scrogs is their minimalist simplicity & efficiency; this by contrast kinda complicates things more than necessary unless extraordinary benefits can be reaped.

However that's not to say you shouldn't give it a go, or at least keep brainstorming it.

For example, maybe CFL's in a "dot grid" instead of a straight tube lattice grid - sort of an scaled-down Hempy deal...

 

[dontae1000]

mmmm ive been mulling over the idea of a veritcal stadium colesium with flour tubes for the last week in a micro setup- i dont think its really achevialbe as a true ciruclar setup were the lights u use send light to all 4 sides of your garden( simply because their not powerful enough), but placing individual vertical t-5s in a circle each with its own reflector(they do sell theese) still might give u more bang for your buck, im still working the design out in my head...

 

[Mr.Jones]

re: excessive heat -

It's one thing when you have, say, four T8's side-by-side in a shoplite fixture or something conventional like that; however, you're talking about creating a grid of these suckers, and the intersect points are my primary concern here.

Honestly, while this setup may be ergonomically maxed out I think that it may be bordering on the needlessly complicated. After all, part of the beauty of v-scrogs is their minimalist simplicity & efficiency; this by contrast kinda complicates things more than necessary unless extraordinary benefits can be reaped.

However that's not to say you shouldn't give it a go, or at least keep brainstorming it.

For example, maybe CFL's in a "dot grid" instead of a straight tube lattice grid - sort of an scaled-down Hempy deal...

the intersections will be kind of a problem but i think you just could keep a little distance say maybe 2" (using normal refloectors the tubes have the same distance) and then there shouldnt be any kind of issues anymore ...

i know that its pretty complicated but i think if this thing could work you can yield a lot more compared to an ordinary horizontal tube system or even vertical tube - gonna build a system quite soon but try it out sometime later

the bulb system is a cool one as well but well using bulbs ... i was about tubes and i think the amount of effort needed to handle both systems will be not a whole lot different - i hope to confess someone to build the grid at first because its gonna take me another three month until i can start it up ...

mmmm ive been mulling over the idea of a veritcal stadium colesium with flour tubes for the last week in a micro setup- i dont think its really achevialbe as a true ciruclar setup were the lights u use send light to all 4 sides of your garden( simply because their not powerful enough), but placing individual vertical t-5s in a circle each with its own reflector(they do sell theese) still might give u more bang for your buck, im still working the design out in my head...

you are talking about an reflector and thats what i try not to do because fluro tubes and reflectors is just a waste of light and thats not gotten yield ... and i love hps so i never ever would think about a coli with tubes

 

[oregon bob]

don't know if this will help or not, but had an issue with space & had to move a single pot under t5's (normally veg here) about 2wks into flower. the comparable plants under the hps ended up nearly twice the total weight, finished. can't recall the specific numbers as was over a year ago... but it was significant. i was surprised esp cons that the lumen counts were good.

there are circumstances correct for practically everything, but i'd think that if you could avoid the flouro's, all of your other work/efforts will pay higher dividends under any other type of lamp. this is just from the one instance, so...

peace brother, will check in to see how it ends!

 

[Mr.Jones]

don't know if this will help or not, but had an issue with space & had to move a single pot under t5's (normally veg here) about 2wks into flower. the comparable plants under the hps ended up nearly twice the total weight, finished. can't recall the specific numbers as was over a year ago... but it was significant. i was surprised esp cons that the lumen counts were good.

there are circumstances correct for practically everything, but i'd think that if you could avoid the flouro's, all of your other work/efforts will pay higher dividends under any other type of lamp. this is just from the one instance, so...

peace brother, will check in to see how it ends!

yeah this is gonna be a "just for fun project" anyways - but still i belive in the potential of fluro tubes ... could you just post the wattage/light spectrum/yield of both lamps to compare would be cool!

 

[oregon bob]

MJ, cool, cool!

Just meant it as a reference, though not a good one. If I recall properly, the floor pots were near 14g each, where the t5 pot was near 8g... big difference. Standard t5 veg (3 bulbs in use to illuminate 2x4 table, though plant was 1x1... had it at one end, middle of tray, shared space) vs uhum, 1000hps... not really a fair comparison, no? The little one shared the tray w some mums, just moved her back into the flow room at night. Nonetheless, big diff. Peace.

I'm going to start a thread in the verti section outlining my final grow under the system. The hand pots on the floor will be comparable to the 14g'rs. Peace & GL with the experiment!

 

[Mr.Jones]

MJ, cool, cool!

Just meant it as a reference, though not a good one. If I recall properly, the floor pots were near 14g each, where the t5 pot was near 8g... big difference. Standard t5 veg (3 bulbs in use to illuminate 2x4 table, though plant was 1x1... had it at one end, middle of tray, shared space) vs uhum, 1000hps... not really a fair comparison, no? The little one shared the tray w some mums, just moved her back into the flow room at night. Nonetheless, big diff. Peace.

I'm going to start a thread in the verti section outlining my final grow under the system. The hand pots on the floor will be comparable to the 14g'rs. Peace & GL with the experiment!

the 1000w hps will have some better output than some random t5 ... but 8g isnt too bad - what kind of t5?