If I got say 6 of them, will they be strong enough to veg around 8-10 plants for about a month? Or should I just buy 4 200w enviro lights as its not worth fucking around with 6 of them lights from Halfords.

I think there only 11watts. dont know the lums they give out.

Well heres my plan and ill let you decide, rembering I want as big bud as possible, as I dont wonna be constantly growing all year.

Ive got a seedling and clones box, with a 115w fluro or somthing like that in there.

And Ive got a big flowering room with a 400w HPS light.

I want to build a vegging box that will be nice for building up my plants whilst im flowering.

So basicly, I build up the seedlings, then move them to the veg box, veg them for a month, and somtime during that time I start of more seedlings. Now I move the ones out of the veg box ( after around a month of being in there ) into my flowering box, whilst moving my newer seedlings into the veg box, and then start of more seedlings, and so on till I got enough to last me they year.

So do you reckon it would be better to maybe use them halfords lights for seedlings, or will they simply not work? so I can use my fluro as the vegging light?

OR should I buy some enviros, if so, what spectrum, just blue for vegging right?

Hope this made sense... Thanks.

As soon as someone suggests they're about to use more than 125 watts of enviros, I can't resist asking why they can't use a small HPS or MH instead .... (given you're already using a 400 for flowering).

I think you may be misreading marketing hype about "equivalent incandescent watts". Six 11 watt fluorescents is not the same as an envirolight - you would need 11 or 12 11 watt CFLs to replace a 125 watt.

I plan to use six 18 watters for my next batch of seedlings - over one seed tray = 100 wpsf.

I bet you can find CFLs cheaper than in Halfords too. 99p for a 20 watt in a lot of places ...

I would use a HPS, but I want to do this bit in my room, and I dont really like the idea of a HPS exploding ( small risk I know, but still a risk ) whilst im asleep..

I think im just gona make some boxes and then have a long think about what to put in them

Metal Halides are slightly prone to it apparently, but I would hazard a guess no one on here has ever had an HPS fail that way.

You should always design your kit for the worst possible occurence in any case.

For the sort of quantity you're trying to produce, you want an 8 foot high box, good ventilation and a 400 watt HPS for veg.

, my flowering room ant even that big

Im sure I read a story on here on how a light failure ( Ill be fair and say I dont know if it was a HPS or not.. ) pretty much burned down there house..

Maybe it would be wiser to just build a small closet and just do seedlings and veg, then move to the flowering room.

That was a loose IEC connector I seem to recall.
I live and sleep with a couple of 250 watt HPS lamps - they're much less hazardous than a halogen uplighter.

Hmmm thats kinda Kinky Compo

if you dont want to use an MH then get yourself down to pound land and pick up some of there energy savers for £1 each, they give off a very blue light, i used them for 3 weeks in veg and my plants loved them ( i used 3 over 1 seed tray)
T1

I'm guessing that might be a uniquely Scottish store though ?

Nope they have Poundland south of the border too, i see one when i was last down visiting my girlfriends parents in Durham, plus i have seen lots of Poundland warehouses near the motorways down there.
have a look around mate i am sure you'll find one
T1

Its Poundsaver down here.

I was in Tesco on Saturday and they have a fairly wide range of 'own brand' CFLs. Couple of quid or so for most of them.

No its not its Poundland google poundland and have a look at there store locator

I got some of mine from poundland,None in at the moment though because of all the christmas stuff

Bah Humbug !!

G.A.T.I

dunelm stores (yes they are all over the country) sell 20watt compact fluro made by osram for 79p yes you heard right 79p. they are the dogs balls.

do not buy chinese or tywanese compact fluro as they are pants, same goes for the ikea ones.

stick with philips or osram.

i have used a good number of different types over the years and the best ones to date are the philips ones.

another top tip if you replace the bulbs in your house to compact fluro you will save ££££££. i converted to compact fluros in every room in my house a couple of years back and have saved a fortune. i dont need to replace bulbs at all now and before i was replacing 1 about every 2 weeks.

lets take an average of a light being on for 6 hours a day

100watt x 6hours=600watts=.6kw x 365days=219kw x.11p per kwh=£24.09 per year to run

20watt x 6hours=60watts=.06kw x 365days=21.9kw x .11p per kwh=£2.409 per year to run

as you can see you save £22 a year per light.

so if you are like me and have lights burning all over the house coz u have kids, the savings are huge.

on average i think i save around £100 per year with just replacing standard incandesant light bulbs to compact fluro.

Yebbut nobut ... the cheap and nasty ones are horrid for lighting your house, but nice and "blue" for growing plants with

nobut nowt... the cheap nasty ones have inferior ballasts internals, crap glass and less fluro in them, they go pale within 3 months.

so this means that instead of outputting lovely white fluro they give out a nasty yellow fluro and take ages to warm up.

then you have to go buy more, which is less cost efective.

enviros would be best imo

Ermm pardon me but I DO know how to read the name of a shop thank you. There are NO Poundlands here.

Osram yes. Philips no. It is always the Philips CFLs that go pink/take ages to startup/flicker when turned off first. Always. Without exception. For more than 10 years it has been Philips CFLs that went first. I've had unbranded CFLs that have outlasted THREE equivalent Philips CFLs. I don't believe anything it says about CFL life on Philips boxes as in my experience they are lying.

Getting the idea?

poundland and poundstretcher are 2 completely different shops where i live there are both shops relatively near by, so i might invest in some bulbs but ive neverheard of dunelm :S also where can i get cheap light fittings?

Screwfix or Toolstation or electrical specialist.

i have just checked and they have stores allover england