compact flourescent lamp

[donruancarlo]

aw! really? also the cost of aluminum foil is a little bit high. im not familiar with mylar. how does it look? is that a wood? just ordinary white paint will do?

[n1zjd]

yeah ordinary flat white paint does just fine. Just dont use a shiny paint as they absorb more light. You can find mylar on ebay.

[donruancarlo]

i am located here in middle east. ebay don't ships items here or it will cost me a lot. where can i find mylar? in school supplies, hardware, textile shops or where? im sorry i don't really have an idea. tnx!

[donruancarlo]

how about flourescent bar light? will it work the same as cfl or other HID lights? i saw on this site grow lights|hydroponics lighting|high pressure sodium lights a 4 flourescent barlight. is it the same with the one we are using at home?

[n1zjd]

If you have a local plant nursery that would be a good place to look. Flat white paint reflects 90% of light, mylar reflects 95-100%. Just use regular white paint, its what I use.

[donruancarlo]

tnx for your replies. if i cannot find that film, i will just use white paint as you advised. tnx and Godbless....

[kbhale]

I'm growing in a 12' x 12' out building in zone 7. I have blocked off all windows. So no natural light. I run my lights 14 hours at night since it's the coldest part of the day. The heat produce helps heat the grow room. The bulbs I'm using are daylight bulbs, labeled at 5000K. Since I'm growing salad greens I don't need much cool lights about 3500K for flowering.


This is my grow bed. Flood and drain.

My nursery for newly germinated plants. short tank with air stone.


Flood and drain bed for adolescent plants.

A CFL daylight 5000K bulb Rated replacement for a 100 watts bulb uses 23watts gives off 1600 lumens and rated to last 10,000 hours. They also cost $6.00-$8.50 a piece.

Since greens need room and have low light requirements the compact florescent work. They allow me to spread the light out over a larger area.

If you noticed I have a few dirt plants that are flowering so i think it shows I have good light balance.

[KevinL]

If you have ever seen camping supplies, they ussually have "Emergency Blankets" they are ussually refletive enough to use just like Mylar, and I think I've seen in some pictures in here someone else uses them also. (the little square folds in the material is a dead give away) their usually a couple dollars each and are pretty good size.
I use 4' T8 bulbs wen sarting my plants, and then I use either my 400Watt Metal Halide, or 600 watt hps depending on needs. I have seen the T8's do perfectly fine for lettuce and greens all by themselves and you can get them very close to the plants, even right on top of them if you have at least a small fan running over your plants.
Lately I've heard more people using the T5 lights, but their still fairly new and the prices on the fixtures and bulbs are a little higher for now.
There are tables on the Hydroponic Lessons on the site that talk about lighting, and needs per square foot etc. check those out.
Good Luck!

[kbhale]

The emergency blankets I got from Target More like $2.85. I have a 400 watt MH track mounted that would give better quality of light. But since my grow room that is an outbuilding I'm limited on power/ voltage, of one 15 amp circuit dedicated to light. So to cover as much area as possible I went 400 watts divided by 23 watts and came up with 17 CFL's with the output of 1600 lumen.

I currently have 29 CFL's 667 watts 46,400 lumen and 12 40 watt florescent tubes 480 watts 30,960 lumen.
total of 1147 watts divided by 110 volts equals 10.42 amps. This covers the 12'x12' grow room. Back to why I'm using the lights to heat the building at night.

I have an other circuit that powers Air pumps, water pumps and timers.

The local store sells Roman $3.00 for 9oz. I can harvest about a pound of mixed lettuce per day. One can get tried of eating a salad every day. Sad part I'm throwing away some. So I'm trying to grow some other cold tolerant plants to balance out the cost.

Fluorescent Lighting Energy Savings and Product Comparisons

[KevinL]

What about Swiss Chard? It can be used in place of spinach in recipes, and also it can be dehydrated for future use, unlike lettuce. Also, if you grow broccoli, even if you don't get much flowering, you can dehydrate the leaves, and stock, crush them up and use the powder for Broccoli flavoring in soups etc because they have all the flavor and nutrients as the part you usually eat.