Grams-Per-Watt is an erroneous measure of productivity

[TickleMyBalls]

Yes, it is a FLAWED ALTERNATE measure that is pretty much useless in defining a baseline. And I don't need to do anything to suit my needs; just trying to point out the flawed measure everyone uses on here.

Yep, just a hobbie that pays about as much as my real job and I earn pretty good money for what I do. What do you do?

yeah, which as you stated you do outdoors, which it is a lot easier to grow large amounts of herb, therefor it is easier to equal your salary of your real job. now try to do that only indoors. your hobby mindset won't do that for you. so I'm still with dongle, pics or it didn't happen.

 

[StealthyStalks]

yeah, which as you stated you do outdoors, which it is a lot easier to grow large amounts of herb, therefor it is easier to equal your salary of your real job. now try to do that only indoors. your hobby mindset won't do that for you. so I'm still with dongle, pics or it didn't happen.

I could blow away what I make in my real job indoors very easily if it wasn’t for the law. This isn’t rocket science and I did start out as an indoor hydro grower years ago, so I do know just a little. Now that I have a perfect space to use, I am only growing indoors more or less for fun and to see how productive I can be compared to other growers; which is the main reason I kept shaking my head when I seen people using grams-per-watt as a measure of their productivity. I guess with my background I like to use measurements that are a little more precise than that.

 

[TickleMyBalls]

I quit, you never seem to acknowledge arguments to your measurement, such as climate/location skewing the numbers, or the fact that you don't have any experience actually using this method because you grow outdoors mostly and are only now just starting to grow indoors again. or have you been calculating your grow productivity like this since you were growing indoors in the 80s? since this thread seems to be drawing all of the LED nutjobs out of the woodworks, I guess I now see what it is.

 

[MeanBean]

were nitz!

 

[toohighmf]

wanna get the most GPW/KWH?
run 4 hoods off 1 ballast. 16 hoods run off 4 ballasts with a "double flip..

half the cooling-
half the total power consupmtion
1/4th the ballasts

 

[StealthyStalks]

I quit, you never seem to acknowledge arguments to your measurement, such as climate/location skewing the numbers, or the fact that you don't have any experience actually using this method because you grow outdoors mostly and are only now just starting to grow indoors again. or have you been calculating your grow productivity like this since you were growing indoors in the 80s? since this thread seems to be drawing all of the LED nutjobs out of the woodworks, I guess I now see what it is.

Good we both quit. Now lets just smoke a bowl.

I did address climate/location along with many other factors like strains but I just don't have the time or the energy to address it with every comment.

As far as experience calculating energy consumption and optimizing production efficiencies, I guess that is sorta kinda part of the job I do as a controls engineer. You might even call me a professional at it since I do do it for a living.

Now I have took your smack for long enough, but comparing me to an LED nutjob is hitting below the belt!!!!....lol....Maybe someday in the far off future LED's will have a place with me. Right now they just don't have enough intensity for penetration to be of any use to me. This is a case where I would agree with you in using my "limited growing space" the most efficient way possible with total disregard for Grams-Per-Kilowatt hour return.

 

[EdIsOnnOsIdE]

I cant contribute much to this thread aside from........yeah......love the activity........keep on keeping on.........

 

[puffin fresh]

So what about g/w/month this takes into consideration everything except veg time which if you work it right is irrelevant for anyone with more than 1 space? And gram/watt is quite a reasonable measure of productivity as long as you take into account flower time I would think. This negates any dodgy measurement due to electricity usage to combat environmental issues and allows a purely light/strain/time based comparison.

 

[superultramega]

g/watt/day is probably the best comparison. Certainly a more useful number than g/kWh considering the small expense it represents. Time in a clandestine location seems the most valuable unit of measurement.

 

[Ickis]

My turn to take a shot at being the Devil's Advocate.

GPW is all that is needed IMHO because GPW should only be used to evaluate how YOU are doing. And more specifically how YOU are doing with each strain or combos of strains. As pointed out already some strains yield more than others.

These numbers were never meant to compare one grower to another. It is just a way of checking on yourself. Did you do better? Are you dialing in a strain? You can use whatever you want. GPW, pounds per light or grams/kwh as long as the equipment stays the same the only thing that will make the number go up or down is your skills.

These numbers were meant to give you a way to measure and judge your own grow. They are meaningless to use to compare with others because the strains, climate and whatever are not the same.

So it doesn't matter if somebody uses GPW. It isn't misinformation as the original poster claims. It is a reliable way to judge if your harvests are getting bigger and you are getting better at growing.

The only reason the original poster could have a valid point is if one grower was comparing to another grower. But that wouldn't be useful in the end because the climate, conditions and strains would not be the same for both growers.

So the misinformation is thinking these numbers can evaluate one grower against another. That is false. These numbers are for measuring your own progress.

Anytime someone veges with HPS GPW and G/kwh are no longer anything they should ever mention or be concerned about if trying to compare to others. You can veg 8 weeks with T5s for the same amount of kwh with a 1 week 1000w HID.

It really does only matter if you are growing as much weed as you want. Use the numbers to help you get there not compare you to someone else.

 

[toohighmf]

take GPW/KWH/# of annual crops. I don't really veg anymore, so the gpw of my 4 bulb T5 running for upwards of 3 weeks to propagate 24/7, and 9-10 weeks of 12/12 with 4kw flipping 2 eight hood rooms every 12 hours, I run 16 hoods over 2 rooms/photoperiods. 4kwh + the cost of cooling & misc pumps, fans, timers/controllers, etc. I can get over 5.6 harvests using minimal veg, and blooming. I guess you have to calculate your year in utilities x overall dried weight to get the true GPW/KWH. you can break it down to just one harvest, but I would want a true average based on the differnces of running during the different seasons.

 

[puffin fresh]

toohigh
What are your yields like with the light only half the lights on at a time? What losses do you suffer as a result?
pf

 

[toohighmf]

last throw room the A room pulled just shy of 7#. B room pulled a little over 7. It was just a better environment. totaling a bit over 6000 grams. I'm no good with math and am trying to figure out how to calculate my approx low ball gpw. 1.5GPW????? is that right?. I'm having a mental block right now and came to that number dividing 6000g/4000kw. if thats right, how do I get my GPH/KwH? consumption in just lighting is 4000kw constant 24/7 for 65-70 days. whats the equation? PLEASE HELP!

 

[puffin fresh]

toohigh

24 hours x 65 days x 4kw = 6240kwh
6000 grams / 6240kwh = .961g/kwh

Sounds pretty good to me....what area does each globe cover?
pf

 

[blackone]

If you're up against a certain kWh/year limit for how much power you dare use without drawing too much attention to yourself then g/kWh translates DIRECTLY into how much bud you can grow in a year. It's really that simple - and I don't see how anyone can argue against it really...
If your only problem with electricity use is the cost then it's a totally different beast of course... electricity cost is pretty low compared to the value of the product and other measurements like production/(time*area) takes over.

I do believe most people belong to the first group though...

Don't use this measurement for comparing growers - it doesn't make much sense because of different conditions - but DO use it for yelding the most considering YOUR conditions

PS - g/W taking into account the flower time does help but it really needs to take veg time and wattage into account too - because a sativa that needs a long flower time typically also has a lot of stretch. This means that veg time can be reduced a lot and veg time is 18 hours.

 

[toohighmf]

toohigh

24 hours x 65 days x 4kw = 6240kwh
6240 / 6000 = 1.04 g/kw

Sounds pretty good to me....what area does each globe cover?
pf

PF: thank you for doing the math. I actually use tubes and they throw really wide. Remarkably wide actually. if you can keep them cool enough I imagine you can get a good 5' wide spread at 12-16" if you pump enough cool air through them. I'm going to be testing some iceboxes, a hydro-Gen and H-I's new simple co2 monitor/controller that just maintains 13-1500 ppm. I will also be using a chiller from them thats big enough to handle all the ice boxes & co2 burner. I want to see if I can actually run a grow with no AC. the parabolics in the pics are just the reference from the flip co I use. after I figured out how to flip from a flip, the owner and I discussed it and they drew up the schematic only using 2 ballasts to fire 2 4 bulb rooms, but I run 2 eight bulb rooms instead.

 

[puffin fresh]

Nice, I use the same tubes so I know what your saying. Thanks for the info, sounds like it is definately doing you some good, I might give it a go when I get some more space.

 

[newhiddengrower]

tell me if this is good.

vegged 3 weeks

8# for 4000watt flowered for 9 weeks

 

[toohighmf]

thats benchmark.

 

[StealthyStalks]

tell me if this is good.

vegged 3 weeks

8# for 4000watt flowered for 9 weeks

That ends up being .79 grams per KH. Like the poster below you said, that is your benchmark because this measure is strain specific. There was a guy a few pages back who goes strait from rooted clones to flowering and got 2 grams per KH in less than 60 days, but I am sure he was growing something totally different.