Light Rails VS. Stationary Lights

[Trichome Toker]

Just to clarify. In your first post you said that light rails doubled your yield. Does this mean that you currently yield 8 ounces per 1000 watts on a light rail?

If we are talking investments, lets do some math. We don't want to go investing blindly now do we.

Same setup as above. 8 lights with rails and compared to 14 stationary lights. all 600 watts. Ok, lets assume we get 1 gram per watt with stationary lights and 1.3 grams per watt with rails. So the stationary lights will pull 8400 grams or 18.75 pounds. the light rails will pull 6240 grams or 13.9 lbs. So we are talking almost 5 lbs difference per harvest. keep in mind the setup cost was the same and the area used is similar since you are giving more space per light with the light rail. now you are using 3600 watts extra in power for lights minus 22 watts for 4 light rails. 3578 extra watts. 3578x12x30 gives you 1288 KWH per month extra. at the average of around 10 cents per KWH that is going to cost you an extra $128.80 per month in electricity. So over the course of a normal 60 day flower period you are paying $257.60 for 4.85 pounds. this happens each and every month.

Even if you were getting 50% more with the rails (1.5 grams per watt), which I guarantee you is not the case, this would only be 7200 grams or 16.07 pounds. Still around 2.7 lbs shy of the 14 stationary lights.

those lights look like a better investment to me.

Now if you had 14 lights with light rails, would it yield more than 14 lights without light rails?

Your only argument is that 14 lights without light rails, will yield more than 8 lights with light rails?

We are dancing around in circles.

4+ extra ounces per 1000W bulb, while using all most no extra electricity, is a great investment, no matter how you twist it.

I am not the only one, 3LB, from CannabisWorld.org, will tell you that light rails vastly improved their yield, and ther did tell people that for years before CW got shut down.

They are medical growers with years and years of experience.

I am giving a conservative estimate on how much light rails can improve your yield.

If you only have a limited amount of money to spend, an extra light will give you a higher yield than a single light on a light rail for sure.

If you have the money to invest, a light rail will give you more herb, for the same power bill, which is something an extra light will never be able to accomplish.

 

[pico]

I have agreed from the start that a light on a mover is going to yield more than a stationary light. I am just saying for how much they cost it isn't worth it on a large scale. You said light movers are a good investment. I say for the same ammount of money more lights is an even better investment.

We are not dancing in circles. I am just saying that light rails have certain applications and that they are not for every setup.

 

[pico]

woops, looks like you edited your post while i was typing a response.

If you have a limited ammount of money why are you buying a light rail when I just showed all the math that a light will give you a better return on investment than a mover. If you have money to invest then the same thing applies.

The only reason I would use a light mover is if I could not use more power for some reason at my location and needed a higher yield. But then if I needed more power I wouldn't buy rails I would find a new spot with more power. Or like I said I use a mover for small veg plants because they don't need much light.

 

[Trichome Toker]

A light rail provides a continuous return on your investment.

Say you have 10,000W on movers.

You get an average of 4 more ounces per 1000W because of the movers, but they barely effect your electric bill at all.

That is an extra 40 ounces, for an extra $20 electric tops.

That is a good investment, one that will more than pay for itself in a single crop, and continue to pay even more dividends with every crop.

You pay $350-500 for a quality light, and it gives you 40 ounces for around $75-100 a month depending on your area.

You pay $150 for a mover, and it give you 4+ ounces for around $2 a month.

I don't know what else to say.

 

[pico]

Yes but with the same initial investment you could have a bunch more lights and be yielding a lot more so the extra power doesn't even matter. I did the math all above and can't make it any clearer. Why bitch about a coupe hundred dollars in power when you have 5 lbs of extra weed?

I think the problem here is that you are looking at things in terms of efficiency. Sure a light on a mover is more efficient. Hell my Omega garden is even more efficient. But I am talking return on investment here. Lights give a better return on investment than movers. No question.

Oh and the omega garden has its own application as well. I bought them when I was living in a small apartment and they were going to be perfect for the small space. Now that I have a lot of space they are not so perfect.

 

[pico]

ok you really need to stop editing posts right after I post. Very anoying.

your math makes no sense. Especially since a light doesn't give you 40 ounces. Movers cost more than $150. You didn't factor in the initial cost or the fact that you are still buying lights.....

 

[Trichome Toker]

I guess we will just have to agree to disagree.

Plenty of people get 40 ounces per light.

3LBs at CannabisWorld got 40+ ounces per light... using light movers.

You can get a good light mover for $150 at my hydro shop.

 

[southwind]

Hello

Hello

I wanted to thank everyone for their input and remind them that I did not want to start an argument.

I think that direct experience is the thing I am looking at the most, and I myself do calculations for investment [Thanks Pico] but I have found that at times things in actual practice turn out quite unexpectedly different from my calculations.

I cant tell you how many times I have seen people ask all sorts of questions about yield per watt and endless questions about fertilizers and how much they can expect to get...etc etc etc..

And then grow a Sativa dominant plant and get nothing close to all their
equations.

There are just too many factors, all I was asking for was if in your experience have you seen a difference.

I think it is great to think everything out first, but in the end it is only personal experience I can really rely on.


I seldom answer questions if I have no experience myself with the issue.

We can theorize all day about how it should go.


But how often does it?

And how many times have I been late to an appointment because it "should" take me 1 hour to get there...


Not counting the three car pile up that happened 2 miles from my exit.

 

[pico]

I agree with most of what you are saying.

Light movers make lights more efficient. This is a good thing for a variety of reasons. Yield more for basically the same ammount of power used. Using less resources is always a good thing and all of us dirty pot growing hippies should do our part.

You put the word investment out there and I showed very clearly how for the same investment more stationary lights will yield more no matter how you slice it. The return on investment is much greater. This doesn't mean that light movers don't accompish the job they set out to do. This doesn't mean that stationary lights are more efficient. This doesn't mean that stationary lights are better for the enviornment.

This means that if I have $2800 to spend on lights and want the most weed that stationary lights are the answer. To the tune of 4.85 lbs minus a few hundred bucks in electric.

 

[Trichome Toker]

Your short term return on invest will definitely be greater if you buy more lights.

Over the long term, light movers will give a greater return on investment.

 

[pico]

Southwind- I am just voicing my opinion and am not yelling in to the monitor or anything. I think a good debate is good for everyone. I do have personal experience by the way which is why I posted here. If you want just personal experience not relating to yield etc, here it is. I have had 2 light rails break on me during normal use. Light rail 3.5. I also don't like a lot of stuff moving around. That means I have to have my cords and ducting setup just right to allow for movement.

I guess you must be talking 1000 watters when you say 40 ounces. That is possible but I wouldn't say that a lot of people are doing it. I was thinking 600 watters.

 

[pico]

Your short term return on invest will definitely be greater if you buy more lights.

Over the long term, light movers will give a greater return on investment.

No, not even close. Look at my math post again. I think you are forgetting that I will outyield you every single harvest by 4.85 lbs. This is with the same initial investment and only a few hundred dollars in extra power.

 

[Trichome Toker]

Only a few hundred in extra power on the first crop.

After 5 crops, that is $1,000+ in extra power.

25 crops down the road $5,000+.

The more time that goes by, the more light rails save you money.

It is a long term investment.

 

[pico]

8 lights on movers will cost you $173.60 per month in electric at 10 cents per KWH.
14 stationary lights will cost you $302.40

Return On Investment (ROI) = (Profit-Investment)/Investment

So lets assume we are getting $3000 a lb for the weed which is actually low balling it by a lot in my area.

so for the stationary lights here it is for the first harvest. Lets assume we are only flowering in this room and it is for 60 days.

ROI= ((18.75 pounds x $3000)-($2800+$604.8))/ ($2800+$604.8)
or ROI=($56,250-$3404.80)/($3404.80)
or ROI=15.52 for the first harvest.

Skip ahead to 10 harvests deap and it will look like this.

ROI= ((187.5 pounds x $3000)-($2800+$6048))/ ($2800+$6048)
or ROI=($562,500-$8848)/($8848)
or ROI=62.6 after 10 harvests


OK now lets do the same thing for the light rails.

ROI= ((13.9 pounds x $3000)-($2800+$347.20))/ ($2800+$347.20)
or ROI=($41,700-$3147.20)/($3147.20)
or ROI=12.25 for the first harvest.

Skip ahead to 10 harvests deap and it will look like this.

ROI= ((139 pounds x $3000)-($2800+$3472))/ ($2800+$3472)
or ROI=($417,000-$6272)/($6272)
or ROI=65.5 for the first harvest.



So yes after 20 months and 10 harvests your ROI is better with movers. But keep in mind that the stationary light guy still made more overall money.

After 10 harvests the stationary light guy has put out 187.5 lbs and the light mover guy put out 139.

So stationary light guy has $562,000 worth of weed he grew. Minus his expenses of $8840 he has $553,160 to play with

Light mover man has $417,000 worth of weed. Minus his expenses of $6272 and he has $410,728 to play with.



So the long term deffinately shows the efficiency of the mover. But Like I have been saying You will end up with more weed and or money with the stationary lights in the end.

 

[pico]

Oh and just another note. I had 2 movers break after about 2 years and Southwind just told me his light rail broke too. So it doesn't really seem like a good long term investment if they don't last very long.

 

[Fonzie]

8 lights on movers will cost you $173.60 per month in electric at 10 cents per KWH.

How is a 2 watt motor times 8 is goiing to cost HOW MUCH TO RUN?

2 watts per hour times 8 =16 Watts per hour (Lets run em 24/7)
That's 384 watts PER DAY and less tha 12,000 watts per month - that's $1.20 in electricty costs.
How much bud is a dollar and twenty cents? - and that's to run EIGHT movers twenty four hours a day

 

[pico]

what, you run movers and you magicly don't have to pay for the electricity on the lights? Did you even read past the first line on my post?

8 lights is 4800 watts plus 22 watts for the movers is 4822 watts. movers are 5.25 watts. so at 12 hours per day and 30 days per month that is 4822 watts per hour x 12 hours a day x 30 days. devide that by 1000 to get KWH and then multiply by .1 for 10 cents per KWH. guess what 173.60 per month.

Any more brain busters?

I am not going to convince you people. Clearly you are too far gone. I am just presenting my reasoning for not using movers. Obviously when it comes down to it either way movers or stationary is going to get you perfectly fine weed. No matter what you spend on initial setup everything always pays for itself in short order.

 

[MaxYield]

This is some good math, if you live in a perfect world!!

I think that you forgot a lot of things in your calculations:
1st: no lights can get to 10 harvest without being changed for new ones, their's a difference of 6 lights to buy on the long term run!!

2nd: you don't include the heat that need to be dissipated, 6 more lights gives out a lot of more heat, so you would need a bigger heat dissipation setup (fans, A/C) or make your setup use more energy to get to the same temps as in a rail setup. By the way, the additional power cords that you add to your setup will also produce some impressive heat, even more if they are closed for one another.

3rd: I know it doesn't really apply on your example since we could consider it a legal grow (4800w or 8400w). But if you put it on a smaller scale, with people that are using (4x600w) 2400w w/ rails, is equivalent to someone using (7x600w) 4200w w/o rails. If you are looking for a more stealth grow want to diminish the risk of being cut but can still get the same amount of yield, I don't see any reason to go to 4200w when 2400w would be enough!!! Even more, if someone don't want to have more then 3000w/month but want to get the best yield possible, I don't think stationary lights will get you more yield when fixing the power consumption!!

4th: I've read a bit on LED grow, and found out that HID growers where wasting some amount of light since the plant need some time to process the lights it's receiving. If this affirmation turns out to be true, we could say that light movers will waste you less light (lumen or photon). But I think that the speed of the displacement must be tuned to get it more efficient.

BTW: I'm right now studying various way of growing, using the light more efficiently. I'm studying in electrical engineering and have done a technique in electronics, so I have good knowledge for building myself a light mover. But I intend to use a circular one.

I've done this with paint in like 10min, so don't be too hard on my lack of artistic talent

As you can see, the idea is to use 4 BOG on 1 plant with 4 circular light mover. I was thinking about using 150w for the first time this setup is on, because of the low price of the ballast (18.90$ us ea.). But later on I might change the circumference of the screen and get like a 250w with a home made electronic ballast (which is relatively easy to build).

I would like to use 4 cylindrical screen, and each of them would be consider as a chamber, in each chamber I would have a small fan, CO2/temp/humidity sensors(btw the CO2 climate control are total rip off!! the sensor alone cost less then 30$ and the circuitry related to it maybe 15$ TOP, and they sell it 400$, wow, nice profit there!!) and 1 circular light mover per chamber (which would be a simple step motor, I can build the driver, and step motor are cheap).

The goal would be to let the plant grow like a tree while using BOG light efficiency and adding the light mover so I can get closer to the plant yet still having all buds receiving light at all time.

I've been reading about ganja grow since last summer, and I've tried to find a way to maximize the yield while reducing the cost (consumption, start cost, efficiency) of the grow. I think that I'm getting closer everyday to a system that would give me stable amazing yields. Btw, my goal is to have 3 system like that. Presuming a 1 month veg + around 2 months flower starting one plant every months would give me 1 harvest every month .


**EDIT**: on the image, you should be reading "Front view of 1 chamber" not "Side view of 1 chamber"

 

[FOF]

pico nails it in #95.

 

[pico]

you present some worthwhile arguments to my math however nothing that convinced me of using a ton of movers.

The replacement bulbs is a good point, but then again neither of my mover motors lasted 10 harvests during normal operating conditions. Southwind, the guy who started this thread, told me he was just asking the question because his mover motor went bad and was wondering if he should buy another light or another mover.

Either way, I don't like things moving around so movers are not my cup of tea. Ever seen a warehouse grow with all the lights moving around? I sure haven't.


Nice paint skills by the way.