Just making sure… 24 x 1000 = 240kw. And they’re all for your flower room, which is 360 sq.ft.?
At 100%, that’s 667 w/sq.ft. At 75%, that’s 500 w/sq.ft.
With a loose reference for HPS lights providing 107 lumens/watt, that would provide 71,333 lumens per sq.ft. at full power. The Sun typically produces 10,000.
Personally I’ve found that you can indeed go higher than recommended with good yield and profits. My grow runs about 18,000 lumens/sq.ft. and I can’t imagine adding too much more. Am I missing something though? Does anyone else here have experience with that much light? Lots of light, especially cross-light, is great! But it costs a lot to run that much AC, fans, and CO2 to keep up. I’d recommend running them at 25% if my numbers are correct. See what happens before you go to 75%.
Can I ask what your yield goals are? (assuming a somewhat average veg and bloom time, say 6weeks and 9weeks)?
Other growers weigh in! Let me know if I missed something here.
Ahhhh OK, sorry. I overlooked the “vertical hanging,” aka single-ended. Any reason in particular you decided to go with the SE? You can get better efficiency with DE HPS bulbs.
I think you added a zero in your calculations. The plan is 24 - 1000watt vertical lights. That’s 24000 watts not 240kw which is 240,000watts. 24000 watts divided by 360 sq. ft = 66.66 watts per sq ft. I believe 65 watts/sqft is the max recommended for a CO2 enriched environment. My plan was to run with digital ballasts and slowly ramp up to 75%. I’m not sure if my 7 tons of AC is enough to maintain 100%. I might turn them up individually running an alternating pattern. It will be an experiment.
Currently I’m about to purchase my lighting. I might change up the original plan and go with all DE HPS. I’m looking at 22 DE HPS fixtures at the moment, and they have step dimming at 50/75/100%.
Awesome to see progress on another grow setup! Way to go Gary! I’m excited to see your vertical in action. If you go DE and use Gavita’s, my 2 cents is to stay away from the 1000 watt 277 volt. Super high failure rate. I have over 20% ballast failure BNIB, they replaced them no problem but I still see some weirdness. Where as the 240 volt and 120 volt fixtures are beast and rock solid. I have 56 of those Gavita 277 volts in each of the 4 flower rooms. The veg flex 750’s are super reliable in comparison. Would love to see some LED action too, that tech amazes me in efficiency
One of my flower rooms, don’t mind the yellow color in my photos ;p
Ever hear of Stuxnet? Unless your SCADA vendor is also an expert in locking down against its inherent security vulnerabilities when connected to IP networks, I’d stay away from that technology. It’s more compromised than the SS7 telecommunications signaling network and the “Intel Inside” windows operating system.
Anyone controlling/monitoring their grow from a phone app and/or cloud based service is being potentially set up for a trip down the ‘MJ Freeway’ or worse, and why I prefer to roll my own…
Thanks for the advice on the 277v @searle1992! I’ve only got single phase connection, so I’m going with the 120/240v lighting. Thats good info to know. I’m an electrician and I cant tell you how much I hate replacing ballasts.
Great setup, I love to see grow pics. Have you got a rolling bench setup?
@JoeGrow. Anything connected to the internet has vulnerability issues. Our practice with our scada system at the electric utility where I work is to physically disconnect from the internet. We have fiber optic lines ran to all our substations and hydro, so we’re a closed network. We plug into the internet only long enough to allow our automation programmers to update or change our software on rare occasions.
It’s a chance I’ll take I guess if I have to travel. I’m guessing a little grower like me in Petersburg Alaska is probably unlikely to have a problem if connected for a week every once in awhile.
Best bet is to limit IP connectivity of your control network to your gateway only, secured with access only to very limited services with an encrypted vpn tunnel with IP address lockdown, and not connected full-time.
Here’s more on the IP side of SCADA vulnerability:
Nice @garymorgan! The woman in the red dress to go along with my red pill!
“Space may be the final frontier, but it’s made in a Hollywood basement” - Red Hot Chilli Peppers
It was a prefab kit from Future Steel Buildings in Canada. I highly recommend them. The building was pretty easy to install and it’s 12 gauge steel, built like a tank. They have a structural engineer in your state, stamp and approve the design, and in my case they had to increase the buildings thickness to compensate for the international building code snow load rating. Good company with good communication. They gave me extra of everything, and it’s really working out good.
I got the roof installed on the add on this Sunday. Still a little work to do, but was a good effort considering the temperature (we got a foot of snow last week).
The county I am in has a ban and I am not able to get more power. Aeroponics takes a lot of power for the pumps so switching to Autopots freed up 40 amps and allowed original plan of two vegs to work. One veg room has 1- 400 watt and 30 t5 bulbs. 2 veg room has 1- 1000 watt and 8-t5s. Flower has 14 - 1000 watt HPS, 1 - 315 watt CMH adding one more. Using R.O. water, shallow well that varies. Two sediment filters before the 4 filter R. O. also using Drip Clean and Enzymes Komplete so aqua valves work properly. left several clones that did not have enough root to plant in cloner. Unplugged the pump added 1oz Enzymes Komplete and left airstone in cloner. about a week later clones turned into plants a grew like crazy. Now I add 1oz of EK to cloner after about half have rooted and they love it. Check out autopot yield. Over and under watering is one of the main causes of problems. Every system will have some cons but you will not have to worry about one of the biggest problems with this sytem. If that has been a problem or if power is a concern check out autopot yield. Also trying (2) fabric containers in the autopot system and I think that will be better. They look great and more oxygen the the roots. found 2 gallon fabric containers at 24/7 Hyroponics for $1.00 That fit perfectly in autopots. Transplanting 10 Into those Today.
Ah yes, thanks Gary. Sorry for the delayed response. You’re totally on track. We run Gavitas at my operation that have been yielding admirably. We do ease the plants into the new light for bloom cycle, and they respond very well. I’m not even sure we need to be doing it. It’s commonly claimed you can get an extra 1x1 compared to SE, which in context of 4x4 vs 5x5 is over a 50% area increase!
Nice video - I like the stacked shelves for maximizing the vertical space with the LED lighting. You guys must get a lot of exercise going up and down the stepladders
