400W Medicine Cupboard

[indifferent]

The bulb I used was also a reptiglo 10.0 26W, I am a little concerned that the UVA output caused some premature oxidisation of the THC in the trichomes closest to the lamp (10cm) as they were fully amber when the rest of the plant was still clear triches. For this reason, I'm interested in trying the Philips bulb which has UVB and no UVA.

I think i used the UV bulb incorrectly, from reading I've done, it would seem the best way is to mimic nature and use it for 1 to 3 hours after the midpoint of the 12 hour lights on cycle, thus mimicking the high UV of early afternoon. Perhaps this would give the required boost in cannabinoids and terpenoids without the damaging effects I saw.

Here's some pics of the damage I'm referring to, the first pic shows the amber triches from close to the bulb, the second pic is from the other side of the plant and has clear trichomes.

Also, the parts of the plant close to the bulb have turned purple, not sure if this is because the UV has damaged the chlorophylls or whether the colouring is down to greater levels of the carotenoid type terpenoids which are stimulated by the deep blue 400-450nm light put out by the Reptiglo bulb, the carotenoids are responsible for red, orange and yellow colours.

First pic is a cola near the UV lamp, second pic is the other side of the plant that wasn't getting much UV:

 

[indifferent]

Rather than repeat my UV experiment I decided my next experiment will be with Actinic 10k blue T5 tubes and a Ceramic Metal Halide as they both have a strong blue output and blue stimulate terpenoid production. I'll come back to UV but for the moment, the kit I have is setup to have a lot of supplemental blue.

Output spectrum of the Actinics, loads blue:

Output Spectrum of an 830 3000k CMH like I'm using, has plenty of blue and a decent amount of red too, much nicer spectrum than a HPS:

This is the spectrum of the UV lamp I want to use, a G40T10E type, they are expensive though:

 

[itsmysubaru]

yea, its all in how you use the bulb. i like the idea of a peaked schedule, but want to get the most out of limited lighting space so i use it for the full 11.5 hrs. i turn my plants when i water, so as to keep the uv 'tan' nice and even

im under the impression that the high energy uv spectrum is a major driving factor in stimulating resin production. all of the herbs ive grown under the uvb, including some bomb ass basil, have had more oils/resins, and a much stronger smell. maybe thats the correlation between high altitude and potent plants, uv penetration?

 

[indifferent]

Sounds like you have worked out a nice way of using your UV lamp. I just stuck it directly above one plant at close range so it was blasting all of it;s output straight onto the plant, not the right way to use it, so I learnt that at least from my experiment.

You are correct, there is research data that the glandular trichomes of basil only fill with essential oils when receiving UV light.

Cannabis doesn't require UV to make THC, otherwise all indoor bud would be useless.

Blue light in the 400-500nm range stimulates production of some types of terpenoids, UVA in the 380-400 range also has this effect, but at a much lower level of effect than blue.

There is some research to show that UVB in the 280-300nm range will increase THC production so it is this type of UVB I am most interested in adding to my grow.

If we look at the spectrum of the reptiglo lamp, it does have some output in the 280-300nm range, but it is only a tiny fraction of the overall output. The Philips UVB lamp I want to buy has a peak at 306nm and a large portion of it's output is in the 280-30nm range I am interested in.

 

[Elevator Man]

One other interesting coco detail - the OTM I recently chopped had to be replaced as a clone as mine died unexpectedly - my friend gave one back me potted in coco, and I didn't have any soil for a few days and only the BioCanna organic nutes, which I had to use with some trepidation. It was absolutely fine, and I actually only repotted it into soil last night, so it's had three weeks of organic nutes in coco.

What I'm thinking is, given I don't want to swap nutes again, whether just mixing in some coco amidst the organic soil might improve performance and yield, as it doesn't seem to have suffered at all from 'non-coco' nutrients...?

 

[indifferent]

i would suggest taking three cuts of the same strain, doing one in straight coco, one in your usual soil and one in a mix of 60% coco, 25% worm castings and 15% perlite or vermiculite, see which gives you the best yield and if the quality differs any. i did organics with straight coco 2 years back, ran El yuc and a couple of others, had zero issues, just yield was 25% less than with chems, but you are a better soil/organic grower than me so you might do better.

 

[The Hummus Monk]

Right...that's it...I will add coco to my soil mix this summer!

 

[indifferent]

One down, few more to go, I'll get everyone to at least try coco before I'm done!

You know, a coco bed would rock outdoors, the free draining properties of coco would make an ideal medium for a large raised bed, just put a couple of inches of rocks or hydroleca clay pebbles at the bottom.

 

[Hazyfontazy]

use dia hydro instead of perlite ,,then watch the yields soar

oh and bye bye flying little feckers

 

[sondeos]

hello indifferent, there is a thread in a Spanish forum where they discuss the terms that your light to increase the level of THC.
http://www.cannabiscafe.net/foros/showthread.php?t=172938

if you have five minutes with google translator, you can learn a lot of strange things. It is more useful to put a 400W MH lamp in combination with a HPS to achieve a sun-like spectrum, with respect to ultraviolet rays. a greeting.

 

[indifferent]

Hiya Hazy

I bought a 40 litre sack of diahydro a while back, I mix it with my coco. I originally bought it to fight a fungus gnat infestation, I topdressed pots with it as well. It did feck all to stop em. I use liquid silicon for silicates so what other benefit does the diahydro give?

Hola Sendeos

Many thanks for the link, I shall go and read the info!

Spent most of the day today doing some electrical wiring for my new lighting, I've done it properly this time, no more Heath Robinson lash-up affairs, I got some waterproof electrical junctions boxes and even bought a load of new 240v 3 core cable to replace the old scavenged stuff!

 

[Hazyfontazy]

Hiya Hazy

I bought a 40 litre sack of diahydro a while back, I mix it with my coco. I originally bought it to fight a fungus gnat infestation, I topdressed pots with it as well. It did feck all to stop em. I use liquid silicon for silicates so what other benefit does the diahydro give?

topdressing alone is no good,use ya brain man they just crawl out the bottom , u need to block there escape route put an inch in the bottom too ,stops em dead ,
it deffo increases yield,i use liquid silicon too don't forget,tis all about experience ,keep trying you'll learn eventually ,but don't give up

i spent the night at college learning electrical ,just passed me first exam with a distinction hehe

 

[indifferent]

Duh, i never thought of them coming out the bottom! I thought they lived at the top of the soil and came out the top cos that's where I see em. Reason I gave up on the diahydro was i saw gnats sat on pieces of diahydro looking at me and I thought it was supposed to slice their exoskeletons to pieces on contact!

I got some Gnat Off which is BTI and it worked a treat, didn't wipe em out but it drastically reduced their numbers and I have loads of sticky traps.

Congrats on the sparkies bit of paper, I'll take some pics of the wiring in my cab, should give ya something to shake your head at!

 

[Hazyfontazy]

Congrats on the sparkies bit of paper, I'll take some pics of the wiring in my cab, should give ya something to shake your head at!

i been shaking me head in amazment lately, earthing is amazing lol,you wou'ldnt believe how dangerous electrics really are

i been thinking how to help u improve the build on the leds ,,soon as i figure somet out we be in business me old mucker lol

 

[indifferent]

Wait till you see my latest LED design, it's half built as i ran out of cash to buy the rest of the bits, but it;s a monster of a thing. The other key issue in designing LED arrays is keeping the damn thing cool, the LEDs pump out a shitload of heat, my 60W veg light has a few kilos of aluminium as heatsinking and it still feels rather hot to the touch. I think peltiers and liquid cooling and gonna have to be used once we start getting big with the LEDs.

 

[Hazyfontazy]

Wait till you see my latest LED design, it's half built as i ran out of cash to buy the rest of the bits, but it;s a monster of a thing. The other key issue in designing LED arrays is keeping the damn thing cool, the LEDs pump out a shitload of heat, my 60W veg light has a few kilos of aluminium as heatsinking and it still feels rather hot to the touch. I think peltiers and liquid cooling and gonna have to be used once we start getting big with the LEDs.

just saw some wicked leds in a shopping centre,prolly 200 in each ,nice looking reflector too ,we can easily convert,i'll research em and post ya the info

 

[Hazyfontazy]

just found this quickly ,,i knowu like ya crees

http://www.compoundsemiconductor.net/csc/news-details.php?cat=news&id=19608273

 

[indifferent]

CREEs are very nice but the Luxeon Rebel, Luxeon K2 TTFC and Osram Platinum Dragons all match the best crees for efficiency and have slightly better spectrums for what we want. I believe in using a full spectrum approach and using a wide number of different LED types.

No need to convert those lights mate, the chinese are using exactly the same designs for comemrcial white lights as they are for red/blue horticultural ones.

My interest in LEDs has wained somewhat since I discovered you can get t5ho tubes with 100 lumen per watt efficiences and all kinds of different spectrums. Also, the latest ceramic metal halides have a really nice spectrum for growing and are getting more efficient all the time.

An actinic T5HO 24w tube puts out a pretty narrow spike centred on 425nm so as a source of blue pisses all over royal blue LEDs. The one thing that is difficult to get from fluoros and discharge lighting is red above 630nm and you do need red in flowering. Handily, 635nm and 660nm red LEDs are common now in 1 to 5 watt sizes so i see the ideal setup for personal sized grows with current lighting being a mix of a ceramic metal halide supplemented with T5HO tubes for blue and UVA and red LEDs. Chuck in a good UV source like a 100w mercury vapour reptile basking lamp and you have a setup that will far surpass the traditional HPS and MH lamps.

 

[sondeos]

Hello, I have built my LED lamp. very easy to build, it only needs a soldering tin of 40 vatiosy a little patience. the price, around U.S. $ 2 per watt. mine is 66 watts which is worth 140 euros are three bars of 90 cm. long.
3 bars 1 driver 16W +20 W +30 W - 66W

RARBRARRARBRAR
BRRARRBBRRARRB
RARBRARRARBRAR

for you to understand the table, is the distribution of colors R for red, to blue A, B white. 16 W White, 20 W and 30 W red blue. The driver has a potentiometer which may be calibrated I have for growth in 560 Nm. Regarding the heat I say outside temperatures of 12 degrees would I need to supply heat to the cabinet qu is approximately one cubic meter, because I left with about 18 degrees. with the fluorescent lights are on I 24. good temperature. I have this lamp in the cabinet mini-mothers. If you want to upload the driver flowering to 740 Nm. and would also need to the side panels, oh I let you some pictures and other materials inside the closet and draiver dell, the nice thing is that gives no heat, a greeting, I hope you do not mind you upload the photos, sorry my bad English.

 

[indifferent]

Wow Sondeos, I like your design very much, the idea of tuning the spectrum isn't something I've looked at, very nice work. I see you used some Osram dragons, how did you find those, easy to mount and conenct? I only used the star type emitters on aluminium stars.