Grow lights?

[Snadger]

Ok, I've got my windowsill propagator sussed! 4'0" long, angled at the front and clad in tinfoil.
The windowsill iis over a radiator in the spare room so heat is no problem.

Windowsill is about 1'0" wide so plenty of room widthways. So far so good!

Now the not so good bit, it's on an East facing wall which only recieves direct sunlight in the afternoon!

How about........I drill an appropriately sized hole in each end and fit a osram energy saver 20w=100 Watt lamp in each end? You know the ones I mean like a mini striplight with multiple tubes!

Surely this combined with the natural daylight, combined with the reflective surface (should burn my house down!) Noooooooo.....should work a treat!

[Mrs Dobby]

Sounds good in theory Snadger, but I'm not sure whether a normal bulb will give out the correct wavelength of light that your plants will need, I know there are special lights / bulbs that do so however, but they arent cheap!

Having said that, if you go into any of the illuminated caves in Castleton then they do have plants growing from the man made illumination in there, so it may well work!

I'd also watch out that the light is far enough away from the plants that it wont 'cook' them!

Now after all my possibles and maybes all we need is NTG to come in and give us a definitive answer! lol!

[Snadger]

I think the energy saving bulbs are quite cool being miniature strip lights (last for 12 years apparently!) and after having a mosy on ebay and google they seem to fulfill some of the needs of the plant!
You can buy expensive setups but hey, we are all amateurs here and they are only an extra to the natural daylight the plants will recieve.
Must admit, can't find any cheap DIY Gro-lamp projects ,but still looking!

Might tune in, and try and find a cannabis growing forum as they seem to manage ok!

[Mrs Dobby]

Lol! That was my thoughts too Snadger, there was a bust in Congleton (the town in which I work) recently, an old mill had been converted to a Cannabis factory, apparently they had over a £1000000 of crops growing, and had loads of lights, perhaps a call to Cheshire Police may give you a cheap supplier of the right type of lights!

[nick the grief]

Difficult that one Snadger,

Any will be better than none and it is only supplimentary lighting after all. Ideally a striplight (a la fish tank) would be better as it will be along the whole length of the propagator rather than concentrated at the ends.

You can get grow lights but they are really expensive for what you are going to use it for. If you were a mad keen Veggie shower ( like a friend of mine) you but Philips Son-T agro lamps at about £100 a time but I guess your not that keen

The guys at the Cacti club I go to use ordinary strip lights but 2 or 3 of them to give loads of light so maybe you could try that & if possible have them on seperate switches so during the afternoon you could know one off maybe

[Mrs Dobby]

This may be worth a look Snadger, not sure why he's selling them on ebay, but it looks like the sort of lamp you may need

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/GENUINE-ENVIRO...QQcmdZViewItem

[Snadger]

This may be worth a look Snadger, not sure why he's selling them on ebay, but it looks like the sort of lamp you may need

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/GENUINE-ENVIRO...QQcmdZViewItem

One step ahead of you this time Mrs D!! I had already seen these but if you notice, they are a screw fitting which I think needs a starter module costing mega amounts!

The ones I intended using look like those mind, but have a bayonet fitting and work (cos I have one in the bathroom)

And NO, before you ask, I'm not even going to ask OH if I can use the bathroom for starting my plants off!

Might even go for a fish tank light as Nick suggests, but I'll have to check out the cost!

I love all this flying by the seat of your pants stuff, don't you? Makes life a lot more interesting!

[nick the grief]

......Might even go for a fish tank light as Nick suggests, but I'll have to check out the cost!.....

Hi Snadger,

I think I may have misled you - I did answer in a rush as I was on my way out.

I wouldn't buy a fish tank light, they cost an arm and a leg & you don't really need them for what you're doing. They are designs to replicate the sunlight thru water & to enhance the colours of the fish (grolux is also used by butchers as it make the meat look bright red ) All you need is a normal strip light or two they would be good enough for suplimentary lighting.

I just used the analogy of the fish tank to illustrate the point, I wasn't actually advocating one.

I Say, that sounded posh did it not

[Geordie]

Snadger have a look for an 'Envirolite'...................heres a homemade contraption:

[Snadger]

Snadger have a look for an 'Envirolite'...................heres a homemade contraption:

[ATTACH]905[/ATTACH]

Have you and LJ gone all Spanish then?

I know what LJ's signature means and I can hazard a guess that yours means 'If the cap fits'

[Mrs Dobby]

Go on then Snadger, spill the beans on what LJ's new signature means then!