I'm looking at building a nurture box for seedlings, mums, clones etc, looking to keep this fairly small and have seen the use of standard household CFLs

I've heard of people using warm white, and cool white..

Went to the shops last night and found GE 20w "soft white" 1200lumen bulbs for like £1.37

Could I use four of these or would i be better off mixing two with two other bulbs or what? bit confused really as i've not looked much at the differences

4x these is 80w, i've got some cool reflectors made up for them.. would six be better? planning to have initially one mother, then add another strain if successful.. probably only need 4-6 clones each flower period, so a small box is the order of the day...

Would hope to be able to veg up the clones to, say, 10-12" high, and no more than that in said box.. 8" would be fine

They're just fine for keeping small mums and rooting clones and seedlings - check out what Owd's managed with 80W of flouro light in his 'Cuckoo' thread.

Hurm.. all depends on if "cool white" is the same as "soft white" - If it is, they're well cheap and in plentiful supply so i shall be purhcasing 4 or 6 of these

Soft white has a bit more red - not less blue.... in my limited experience they're all good.

One hint with these is that because the electronic ballasts are built-in, they don't last nearly as long if they're mounted in enclosed fittings.

I wish these had been available when I bought my eight 4 foot fittings all those years ago ......

Not quite - the 'cool' ones have a more blue-y light to them than the 'warm' ones, which are more orange-y/red - there's not that much difference in performance between them, though, and the 'warm' ones are much easier to find (& cheaply) in the UK.

Aye the ones i found were £1.37 which i wont quibble at.. have seen 11w ones cheaper like 69p but £1.37 is cool.

Check out my CFL reflector thread on DIY kit - i've made a reflector hood for a 20-25w cfl for £0.00, it's just an experimental tryout for now but once i've got some proper cutting discs i shall be making 4 proper finished articles, complete with 20w bulbs.

compostverte - enclosed fittings? the bulbs themselves will be in hoods but open to airflow - i'm thinking about active cooling for the hoods and lights. I've also seen a guide on how to shorten CFLs by taking the bayonet/screw off and wiring them, it takes off the plastic cap of the bulb - you think i should do this bearing in mind the humidity in said room?