Moving the light; Does it acctually work?

[Femora]

Heya!

I start of with beggin' pardon if im just the worst searcher/googler around...​

But I can't seem to find any serious tests with lightmovers...

icmag, roi, google.. blah!

Does it acctually work? Whats the intervall for moving around the light? (continuously or stay 1?/10?/30? mins before going back)
How much would it acctually increase yield? What genetics likes it?
Well, lots of questions! I would love anyone to contribute to give me more info about them! acctually im just interested in how the moving light effect the plant...

Fem~

 

[Femora]

34 people without opinions or thoughts?

Comeone folks, please speak up! Noone will hang you for speaking up about hearings, rumors, thoughts, facts, links...

 

[Hammerhead]

yes if your using a light mover in a horizontal setup.. If your doing Vertical then no its not a good idea to mover the light or rotate the plants. I would be guessing at yields. No way to accurately predict that. I used it along time ago to mimic sunrise to sunset.. I had it moving very slow. In 12 hrs it would travel from left to right. Ea day was diferant. left to right on Monday right to left on Tuesday back and forth ...

 

[argo430]

light mover

light mover

I have been using one in my two 2x2 tray set up.The light travels back and forth all day I did it Just to conserve on my energy bill. I was running 1200 watts, now I am just using the 600 on a mover. there might be a small yield decrease. but not enough to warrant the second light.

 

[Harry Gypsna]

Light movers work great for making your light more evenly spread out across the room. Unfortunately many people make the mistake of trying to cover a lot of extra area with the same light by using a light mover, which cuts down the amount of light the plants get.
If you use a mover to cover the same space with the same lights, then you should get a more even canopy, but if you try to cover twice the area with the same lights, yields will suffer.
They can also be tricky to dial in. Most now come with an adjustable time delay at each end of the rail, it takes some trial and error to set this time delay correctly, if you get it wrong, you will have excellent growth at the ends but weaker growth in the middle, or vice-versa.

 

[Femora]

yes if your using a light mover in a horizontal setup.. If your doing Vertical then no its not a good idea to mover the light or rotate the plants. I would be guessing at yields. No way to accurately predict that. I used it along time ago to mimic sunrise to sunset.. I had it moving very slow. In 12 hrs it would travel from left to right. Ea day was diferant. left to right on Monday right to left on Tuesday back and forth ...

Thats a cool light-movement!
But aint it counterproductive to trick the plant to use energy to adjust to new lightangles?
the thing is..
The setup I had in mind would shine 360 degrees around the plant every 10 minutes~
Would that stop the plant from attempting to adjust, or would it go crazy on me u think?

I have been using one in my two 2x2 tray set up.The light travels back and forth all day I did it Just to conserve on my energy bill. I was running 1200 watts, now I am just using the 600 on a mover. there might be a small yield decrease. but not enough to warrant the second light.

Hmm.. errrr... are you saying that you get your yield up about 400-500w on a 600w-light with a mover?!

 

[Hammerhead]

Not in A horizontal setup. The light should never run outside its area what ever that is 3x3 or 4x4.. It should not go outside of this. In vertical light movers are not used bad idea...The angles are the same.. They just start on the left or right and end on the left or right so its alwys the same everyday

 

[Harry Gypsna]

The thing with light movers is the short amount of time it takes to travel from one end of the rail to the other. The plant "thinks" the light was overhead the whole time and so doesn't start any phototropism. The light just doesn't stay away from the plants for long enough for them to start turning.

 

[Femora]

The thing with light movers is the short amount of time it takes to travel from one end of the rail to the other. The plant "thinks" the light was overhead the whole time and so doesn't start any phototropism. The light just doesn't stay away from the plants for long enough for them to start turning.

I like what I hear!
You re-ignited my hope for a sick attempt to a gpw-record some beautiful day..


Any ideas for studies/links/thoughts about ideal time to move the light back and forth to prevent the phototropism <- lol at that! "Word of the day"!

 

[Hammerhead]

When I had one it would travel 3x in the 12 hrs..4hrs one way 4 hrs back. I had it moving fairly fast?. I never really tweaked this. You need to test what works best for your setup. Try allot of diferant times.. See if you can find someone that is using one start off with his times. It will give you a good starting point.

 

[Harry Gypsna]

I like what I hear!



Any ideas for studies/links/thoughts about ideal time to move the light back and forth to prevent the phototropism <- lol at that! "Word of the day"!

I've never seen any, that's where the trial and error comes in. Usually the motor will take about 2 minutes to cover 1 metre of track(based on Jupiter/Lightrail brands), this is not adjustable. Then you have an adjustable time delay, this is the amount of time the motor sits still at each end. This is adjustable from about 1 second to about one minute.
Unless you turn your light rail off at one end of the room for extended periods, you shouldn't get any phototropism. The main thing you have is the issue of better growth in the ends and weak growth in the middle or vice versa, this is something you can only work out for yourself within your setup, again, trial and error.
Jupiter light movers (Australia) used to have a lot of good info on their site, but I haven't visited in a long time so it may have changed. You may get an answer by emailing Jupiter or Lightrail and asking them if they have a rule of thumb for the time delay at each end for a given length of track.

 

[Harry Gypsna]

When I had one it would travel 3x in the 12 hrs..4hrs one way 4 hrs back. I had it moving fairly fast?..

How long was the track? That seems awful slow compared with the movers we get over here.

 

[Weird]

sauron the blue had some mover threads as well as others

great tool if you are wattage sensitive

 

[Hammerhead]

my track was 4'. It was a short track. It would run the distance in 4 hrs then go back.. I could have changed that but the yields where great so I never tested any other speeds...This is what we all used 10 years ago. Might have been 15 years I dont remember allot of those times

 

[guyyug]

Have you searched for light spinners? They spin fairly quickly, not enough time for the plants to move looking for the light. I have no experience with them however

 

[Hammerhead]

They also make plant spinners for vertical growers. Keeps the plants from getting the 1 sided look.