I was gifted a bunch of T8 light fixtures yesterday along with bulbs and covers. It couldn’t have happened at a better time really since I was (maybe still?)going to purchase some LED strips for my veg boxes. These are free and with a little DIY I should be able to light up both boxes really well.
Anyone have tips or experience vegging successfully with T8s? I see a couple posts where they are mentioned as being used for clones. Anyone run them and thought of or thinking of switching to LEDs because of benefits LEDs have?
I’m handy enough to dismantle and reassemble these in groups of 8-10 per veg box, but LED strips have such a small footprint and are much more “tunable”. Could probably gain a few extra inches for growth with LEDs.
Could run the bulbs in the boxes (4100k) or upgrade them (5000k+). These are all new and never used so they’re nice and clean too.
Thanks for any help!
I vegged and flowered under 4 foot t8s😂 it worked great. Bud was airy of course. Smelled and tasted great though. Super low yeild too. For veg it was great! Nothing like leds though
Damn, atm i will sell my soul for your stuff lol Nice shot.
Big fan of T8 for seedlings and clones, you can set an entire wall of 2 meters height with at least four floor surimposed. There is nothing special to known outside “the closer, the better” imho. Maybe take care to rightly vent horizontally your babies from the start, but that’s more optimization that anything else.
Can’t tell for LED strips. I guess in theory that it is a lot easier to set and that it can handle more floors on the same height.
You can veg no problem as long as they don’t get to tall. I use a chain to hang mine when I use them. The lights should be as close as possible, so with the small link chain you raise the lights evenly daily or almost daily.
i think the main advantage to LED is the extended lifetime and not having to buy/replace bulbs, but since you have all of those at no cost i’d definitely use them. whats difference between t5 and t8, i think i remember someone saying t8 is even more efficient for some reason?
The heat production is the main difference. When you stack them in “veg shelves”, it’s less tricky to don’t cook the roots with T8 of 120 centimeters that with T5 in high density of plants. Specially when you have twos lefts hands like me ^^
On plants i will maybe say that the seedlings grow a bit larger (large/horizontal scale) under T8, but it’s a very picky feedback that don’t mean a big difference.
I regret this space but absolutly not what i was forced to do inside. I’m 100 times more happy now in my shoes box, even if i swear all day long on it.
Yeah for pretty much free it seems like a no brainer.
In the process of building two veg boxes that are hopefully more environmentally controllable. Both same size. Height/Width/Depth = 32”x48”x30” meant to be stacked on top of each other. Kind of re-thinking the entire thing, now that I’m experiencing some of the challenges of growing in my climate. The rumor mill spouts PM, mite and aphid infestations are normal here.
Anyway. Probably mix and match with an 8 rack in one and see if a 12 rack fits into the second. Might be tight, but without having to rewire anything and simply hack them a bit, it should work. These are in sets of three or four bulbs per fixture.
@lotus710 I’m only going to veg with them. Ha, TRY to veg with them. See, airy buds I don’t want, so that’s a factor. Thanks.
@Fuel that’s a sweet set up. Looks great. Did you paint the wall purple on purpose? Hadn’t thought of the heat being emitted from the shelf below. I’ve got a couple small fans, taken from a screen printing that can be placed strategically. My climate is warmer, so thanks for heads up. Cooking my roots would be one of the last things I would have thought of.
I still use my bank of 8 - 4ft - T12s and they veg plants just fine so T-8s should be even better.
I have a few 4 and 3 bulb vanity light strips that take regular bulbs and was going to use CFLs to make a veg light with 2 of the 4 bulb ones but just recently bought 36 - 9w LED bulbs for a buck each and will use the two 4-bulb strips with a 3-bulb one in the center to make a bigger light box for about 90% less money than using CFLs.
Just have to figure out how to remove the globes off the Luminus® bulbs to get direct lighting. Hoping a heat gun and a bit of twisting will do the trick.
Recently saw a post somewhere about popping the plastic lense off LED bulbs. The example was for aquariums but the literature suggests those same bulbs are horticulturally ready.
Mine should be up and running by end of the weekend. At least ready enough to hang and prep a Dry Run…
The lighting options becoming more and more available to average consumers is borderline overwhelming. Product trust factor weighs in as well as peer recommendations, shit the list goes on. Cheers
You ever run them supercharged? Essentially 2 lights become one. Double the ballasts. Lights dont last as long but my friend does this in his photography studio and my god the light it puts off is impressive! And you have so many so you can make a nice setup of super charged lights
I’m late to the party but I grew several varieties of peppers under t8’s without a problem, keep the distance close as you can, maybe overdrive them if you have the bulbs to spare, and enjoy
Just realized I started this thread. What a dick! Thanks everyone for chiming in. I must have been really high because it didn’t dawn on me til just now. Shit… Lol.
May have a solution to string together a 12 rack that I didn’t think of before. Good thing I slacked off. Building it won’t be the issue, electrical will. Shit scares me.
Yeah man over drive them bitches… I wanna see the glow and what they do for veg. Youtube had a video on how to do it, that should show you how simple it really is
What a nice gift. 
We dont have the same friends 
