I’m looking to replace some florescents and wondering what you guys would recommend as a new light for my 4 mother plants. They are just in my closet, and it’s only 2ft x 6ft. I clone and plant outdoors, so I just need something that would be affordable and maintain good veg growth. I’m sure this is covered, but I was hoping for some links to some lights you guys prefer.
Glad to be back on overgrow. Last time I used it was in the late 90s.
Thank you!
Love this community!
-Rhino
Off the shelf LED light bulbs, take the domes off (or don’t), just need 20w/sq.ft. For veg growth. Use the actual draw of the bulb for those wattages, not their equivalent. So using 9w bulbs, 26 bulbs would cover you if you get some keyless sockets to mount to a strip of wood, or bathroom vanity lights. Vanity lighting looks nicer to me, and much fewer screws and wire nuts to mess with.
I made a pvc frame and used led 4 ft strips from amazon.
they have 5000k 4000k and some lower, they work very well for me and They can be real close to the plant without burn. I use these on my temp mothers.
I like t 5 for vegging running a 4 ft 6 bulb ho 52 watts per bulb covers a large area and the plants seem to like it . You could probably get away with a 2 bulb for that area .
Recently I bought a 2’, four tube, T5 HO veg light from Amazon for around 65 bucks that I’m happy with.
I got it to replace my 4’, four tube, T5 HO that stopped working properly after a decade of constant use.
The four foot T5 was great when I had more room for veg and would be plenty of light for four mother plants… and then some.
I love that eclectic collection of SILs you have in those fixtures, brother! 
Cheers
G
In bloom, it’s a Blend of 5000k and 2500k for yield and frost. Can’t beat it for $2 a pack of 4! plus the reptile cfl bulbs (one is of different brand) for UVb and supplementing other spectrums.
I like the idea of the keyless fixtures for the convenience of changing bulbs, in case I want to bloom in there some day. Is it worth adding some uvb bulbs for veg too?
I haven’t bothered with uv in veg, they can actually burn the plants too much if they get too close.
Wait, you say your transferring them outside? Then maybe some uvb in veg will help them adapt to outdoor easier, make the hardening off period not so stressful.
The vanity fixtures I use are just sockets anyway, so change bulbs at will. Your space could use just 6 of the 30” fixtures with 5 bulbs each. Or go with the sockets and do the individual mounting and wiring.
I prefer t5 for moms and young veg plants. At the moment im using lm301 quantum boards dimmed super low. Probably only pushing 10 watt a square foot tops. Keeps em nice and slow and easy to maintain. When i need cuts throw em in the veg chamber with a little more light intensity and a feed of flower ferts. I prefer t5s for moms and will eventually go back to t5s.
Good call on the uvb bulbs. I will incorporate one at least. I have been an electrician in the past, and now am a carpenter, so I’m excited to get this going. I’m thinking I’ll probably over build the lighting and have 10+ sockets. I have a bit more room in there that could be expanded into. Thanks for the info!
T5s is what I’ve always had for veg, but in the move lots of equipment was given away, and some broken.
So just looking for maybe an upgrade to my 20 year old florescents. My old HID ballast is still intact though. I like seamonkey84s idea of being able to use the common edison screw bulbs to change up the spectrums. Sounds like I could do some experiments with that setup as well. But now that I have 20 acres to play on I plan to utilize the outdoors!
T5 tubes are the way to go for moms and young ones in my opinion. Its easy to keep the moms nice and healthy under them. To each their own though. More then one way to skin a cat.
I would still be using my 4 ft t5 fixtures but i went from a 4x4 tent, to a 3x3 and a 2x4 tent and the 2x4 tent is not really 4 ft long so it wont fit. I was quite disappointed.
I use T5’s for Mothers
Just need 30-35w/sq.ft for bloom 
I’m also a huge fan of T5 for moms.
Why?
They work pretty darn good. They are reliable, and will keep running for years. And most plants are pretty happy with what they put out.
Yeah, LEDs are more efficient, and there are lots of decent cheap LEDs (and I’ve used a bunch). But, what I find is that after about 2 years, they all die. That’s a bummer if you don’t have a backup light on hand.
A T5 bulb may burn out, but it’s easy to have a backup on standby. If you’ve got a 4 bulb fixture, one burning out will not affect your plants much.
The internal ballast/converter in the T5 fixture might burn out… but, those are pretty generic, and can be bought at a hardware store and replaced in about 15 minutes.
T5. for the win!
I’m talking about standard led light bulbs you get at HD/Lowe’s/Walmart. I got mine at a habitat for humanity store for $2 a pack of 4, then regular light socket.
I’ve had T5HO units for my fish tanks, bulb replacement cost and ballasts failed on several units.
I like T5 for moms, but hated replacing the bulbs. Went with LED strips, im sort of happy, but have to run them super low, like 10‐20% nominal current.
Same thing i found when i switched to leds from t5s. Dimmers definitely required. I have a few 4ft t5 shop light fixtures that jave the same bulbs in them for years now. I dont know if they are severe duty bulbs or im just lucky. I know they are not horticulture bulbs. They work great for moms. Wish i could fit them in my tents. Lol
