Simple,
just clip 15 days off your flowering time by running a 10/14 on/off lamp cycle.
Don’t know about saving two weeks off a cycle, but it is based in science. The last rays of light before the sun go down trigger the Phytochrome
1 Like
Yes, I know. Although I’ve never seen evidence that far-red initiators have any effect on yield or quality.
I was referring to some other ridiculous lamp-cycle claims.
Edit :
I run my lights 11/13 in flower. It allows the plant to finish 5 to 7 days faster as well as showing different phenotypical traits. Coupled with the fact that I use cmh lights which also allow the plant to finish faster, I can finish a 60 day plant in 45 days. This has become very popular for commercial grows here in Washington. -Beancracker
-Sounds like flooding the system with shitty unfinished cannabis for the purposes of greed. Not magical growing techniques.
3 Likes
Yeah, I seen that too. There’s a lot of really sensible arguments about why it would but I’ve not seen actual data either.
2 Likes
I have been using the red/blue SolStrips alone in a sunrise/sunset cycle (15 minutes before and after main light cycle) for several months now. Anecdotal observations suggest it cuts a few days (3-5) off of finish times, without any significant change in production plus or minus. Seems to help the stragglers that want to go on and on to finish up. I haven’t tried the far red initiators, just the deep blue (450nm) and deep red (665nm) SolStrips.
With the sunrise/sunset cycle, I’m actually running a longer daylight period, 12.5/11.5 hours light/dark. Which has always struck me as the direction we should be experimenting with light cycles - how to shorten the dark “down” periods, not the bud-producing light “up” periods. If we could shorten dark periods to 8-10 hours, we might be able to harvest sooner or just bigger by cramming the same amount of light-hours (DLI) per harvest into a shorter number of 24-hour days.
-b420
10 Likes
Do you think running the Red/Blue strips for a few hours while the lights are on will make a noticeable difference? I’m going to give it a go, but I have nothing to gauge my results against.
@ray I think the red/blues are a nice augmentation to the 3500K spectrum of the white SolStrips and should be used throughout the light cycle. That’s how they were intended. But I’m also using them on a separate circuit operating outside the main lights-on period, switching them on 15 minutes before the white strips switch on, and running them 15 minutes after the white light cycle ends. The idea is to mimic the sunrise and sunset periods where deep blue and red wavelengths dominate the natural daylight spectrum.
Anecdotally, I’ve noticed somewhat earlier bloom initiation and maturation with these cycles. But that’s all I can say, I haven’t measured it against a control grow. It seems to shave a few days off the cycle, and seems to not effect production output or quality. However, we are speaking of ranges of variation of less than 10%, so I may very well be saving 10% on harvest time and losing 10% on weight. For a seed maker like myself this could be beneficial, for a production grower not so much.
-b420
8 Likes
Salutations,
After all the numbers talk has there been mention of a harvest’s performance when ready for evaluation, at the ultimate stage: the « smoke test »?.. It is, after all the final most decisive criteria - except for those like me, who converted to vaporization, i’d re-label this as “sampling” which i find more inclusive.
Good day, have fun!! 
this is good question… i run veg lights 24/0… clones, moms, seedlings, 24/0… my counterparts overseas ran 18/6, bc of power usuage (also why they use 400’s and 600s instead of 1k’s like over here) I did read some papers like 10yr ago, talking abotu lgith stress, like too much can be bad, but to me, all i ever saw was more growth and in a shorter amount of time.
the darkness, supposedly yes a dark period to transition into a 12/12 is suppose to ease them into it. i have heard of and ive known people who swear by the part about darkness final 2-7 days of 12/12… like, unplug the lights from day 50 throgh day 55.
its said to increase resin content… i never tried myself so idk… and tryng to compare one dudes rooms to your rooms, is not only impossible and not fair, too many vairbles… I know that increased UV a and B (liek form reptiple lamps) will inscrease resin in certian strians…
2 light cycles that are not mentioned.
what i call the “Haze cycle” of vegging 14/10 and flowering with a 10 on 14 off… i think it was the Canadians that taught me that. this was for extreme sativas… i used it to burn through generations when breeding with those unruly equatorial sats… it a special cirucumstance lght cycle, that has a specific purpose. IDK abut applying that to production runs… i never really ran no 14wk sat for production, just for personal and breeding… 6wk indicas are for production ya know what i mean?
The other cycle is what i call the “daylight” cycle. this is 12hrs on and 6 off veg. and flwer with 6 on and 12 off. This means your day is only 18hrs. U need a digital timer, not a manual timer for this one. It works on the theory that in the wild, due to variables like clouds and rain and whatever, on a yearly average a plant only recieves 6 hours of full sun a day… the rest its shaded to some degree… This cycle works but u cut yeild from 15% to nearly 30% for some strians. Upside is u cut 2wks off a 8wk cycle. U gotta serously have your setup and strian dialed in, though. Also, since its a 18hr day, and we run on 24 days, the rooms will come on and off at different times each 24hr period… its challenging to figure out when the rooms are on and when they off… especially if yur stoned and stupid like me… i played around, few times… it was more a novelty, like something cool to try… went back go tried-and-true 12/12 shortly thereafter… I recall, HT running a piece on the 6/12 cycle…maybe it sinsemilla tips? idk… but yeah, its a real thing, im not making it up, lol…
3 Likes
its not the 11/13 or whatever that you will lose days. if the two numbers add up to 24, you will not lose or gain hours/days etc over a 12/12… Now, u do lose a couple of weeks running an 18 hour day. 6 hours on and 12 hours off. here is how. u need a digital timer to do this.
if they take 56 days to mature, that;s 56 times they gotta get 12 hrs of darkness.
56 times of 12 hrs, equals 672 hours time needed for darkness.
now, if u run a standard 12 hour light time, then that means its double the 672, 12 more hours each period. 672x2 = 1344 hours or, 56x 24hour days.
ok, so if u only run your lights 6 hours a day. the you’re cutting your 24 hour “day”, into a 18 hour “day”. so it’s only 6 hours per period, rather than 12 hours of “light time”…
so, that is 627/2 = 336. 336 hours are the time the lights are on.
so, 336 light + 672 darkness = 1,008 hours.
now switch back to a 24hr day, and divide 24 into 1,008
it’s 42 days. So yeah, u can make a 8 week strian flwer in 6 weeks.
the drawbacks are that you will loose 15%-30% yield, depending on strain and all the million other factors and variables that go into growing… and the lights come on and off at different times each calendar day, and its confusing and annoying… the 18hr day is a specific, niche, light time that is used for quick turn over when yur short on time. its not for everyone… 
3 Likes
Respectfully, no you can’t.
3 Likes
yeas u can bc i’ve done it dude. i just worked out the math for you dude…
18 hours day , versus a 24 hour day.
and if i can find it i’ll scan or photgrpah the old HT article… i think it was Hans, like the dude from SOG, who wrote the story… it was 98 . Chong was on cover, it was travel issue… i can pciture it in my head… So ive done it personally, and its documented in a HT article.
the math checks out. try it if u dont believe me or Hans. use some 2x4’s and panda film make a small cbainet grow, toss in some clones in small cups or 3" blocks. flower them with a 6 hours on and 12 hours off. You will reach 56 dark 12 hr periods in only 42 days, instead of 56days. I promise you dude, it is real… no bullshit man.
4 Likes
my bad yo, it wasnt Hans that wrote the story, but here i found the issue about 18 vs 24. attached is the story man… I dont have no photos from when i did this those few times… this as like back in the day, but the article serves as proof, this technique exists and can be done…
**again, like i said, there are drawbacks, yield is lower and this is an extreme method that is not for everyone.But the pooint is, it is real, im not making u stories, and it can be done.
im not tripping man, its all good. I hope this helps clear up any confusion…
– cheers
5 Likes
OK, I’m sure your method is great. Not sure why anyone would sacrifice 30% yield for 25% time savings tho. Especially when you end up with a lower-grade final product.
I can’t argue, because I haven’t tried it.
My position on the original argument of 11/13 drastically changing days to finish remains firm.
Edit: That HT article makes some bold claims without backing them up with any evidence tho.
Lemme chime in to this thread too…
I have used all kinds of schedules and I just wanna put this out there as we are pondering about weird light schedules.
The most interesting schedule, in the context of this thread, is the 4/4 schedule.
I came up with the 4/4 after realizing that a plant takes up majority (70-80%) of its daily energy intake in the first four hours of light. And that it takes roughly 4 hours to spend most of that energy.
If you are the dotfucker type, it takes roughly 3 hours for the plant to “detect” darkness and then start to use that energy it has got during the lights on period.
One time when I used this 4/4 light schedule, two plants out of 40 made balls to the very bottom branches somewhere in late flower (regular 12/12), but thirty eight out of 40 did not respond negatively. The grow speed was maybe slightly above average.
Nowadays I mostly go 24/0 for mothers, and maximum of three weeks of veg at 18/6 or 20/4, then the cuts go to 12/12.
Why I don’t use the 4/4 anymore? Because I find that its easier to remember the schedules so I don’t go to the growspace “at night”, no other reason. I might go back to it in the future, just to have a comparison with the same light + same cut + same nutes to see how it compares to the normal schedules, in terms of hard numbers.
2 Likes
Salutations Scissor-Hanz,
The day may come soon when it’s more important to be done before unwanted visitors arrive, because a stolen or ceased harvest means ZERO % garanteed…
Good day, have fun!!
1 Like
I’ve been running lights on one side of my plants for 6 hours, then on the other side for 6 hours, followed by 12 hours of darkness.
Kinda like morning and afternoon sun.
They sure do seem to like it…
6 Likes
That’s awesome, I have always wanted to simulate heliotropeism, that seems like a simple and effective way to do that. Do you have two sets of lights, or are you physically moving them?
2 Likes
Two sets of lights. The plant is trained onto a trellis panel and gets half a day’s light on each side. The idea is more yield from the same space.
2 Likes
Very interesting idea, keep us posted on the results. 
