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Fluorex growlights

Hi everyone

I was just wondering if anyone has tried the Fluorex 500 watt hydroponics growlight on cps yet?

I saw It on ebay and I was wondering if I should give it a try?
Here is a link to the light
growlightEbay growlight
 
Ok my opinion based on the specs provided on the auction:

6500k daylight is a nice color temperature for strong plant growth. The fixture looks nice and probably does a good job distributing light to the plants.

The 500watt claim is meaningless. Yes it produces the same lumens as a 500watt incandescent bulb.. so what.
The 2580 sqft claim is meaningless. Yes it will light up the area of a small house but the light will be so far away to do it you can't grow anything under it anyway.

SO what is it and how does it compare to lights typically used by gardeners?
It is a compact fluorescent bulb in a nice fixture.
It produces 8900 lumens which is a decent amount of light approximately equal to roughly 3-4 four foot 40watt normal fluorescent tubes.
 
No, but if the hype is any indication, it's not as great an option as you might think.

They finally give useful specs at the bottom:
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]Lumens 4550
Okay, so if you want a single, relatively powerful light that might be expensive to replace, get this one.  Otherwise, get a T8 shoplight, which will produce more light with around the same power consumption.

Just my input.  I'm not saying this isn't a viable option, just that it's overhyped and not necessarily the BEST option.

Edit:  Okay, Tony beat me to it.  Incidentally, i can't see where it says it uses two bulbs (giving the lumens he listed).  I only see one bulb @ 4550 lumens, which makes a lot more sense for 65Watts power consumption.
 
Tony is right. I have a similar fixture on a wire rack, with a second level of plants right below lit with 4 40-watt 4-foot normal fluorescent tubes. The amount of light is just about the same, with a little better distribution from the long tubes. It is growing the plants very well, I must say, but it costs a lot more than the regular tubes.

Capslock
 
Hi Nathan,

They actually give you two figures for lumens although you need to look carefully to find them both.  Total lumens and photosynthetic lumens.  The one I was stating is total lumens since photosynthetic values are extreamly rare to come by and would be really hard to compare to other types of lighting.  Generally speaking a 6500k light should contain a fair amount of PAR (photosynthetic active radiation).  So comparing a bulb with 8900 lumens at 6500K with a 8900 lumen bulb at 3000k.  Although both will produce equal amounts of light the bulb with the higher PAR value will be more beneficial to the plants.

O yeah I should also mention I estimated 3-4 regular 4' tubes because it would depend on exactly what type of tubes these were. A 4' 40watt tube can vary between 1800-3000 lumens approximately.
Tony
 
Night vision?  What is this, a stolen military technology?

I see it now, Tony.  I was looking under the table of specs for the lamp, where they call it just "Lumens".  I see that up above there is a Lumens and a Photonic Lumens.  How is it that the term "photonic lumens" is the one normally called "lumens", and how did you know that the other one (called simply "lumens") referred to PAR?  I don't doubt your knowledge on the matter, but the way the information in the ad is worded is very unhelpful.
 
I would have to read it over again.. Total brightness is just plain lumens which is the larger number. SOMEWHERE in that mess of a description it mentioned usable plant lumens or what they are calling photonic lumens. A term I have never heard before. But if they are refering to the amount of energy (lumens) output that is useful for photosynthetic use.. they are talking about PAR.

One thing you can do is also run the calculation lumens per watt x total watts to get the total lumen figure. Think it was something like 137lumens/watt x 65watts=8905 lumens
Tony
 
Hmmm.  Okay, well to me "photonic" doesn't mean "photosynthetic", but not many people think of bandgaps when they hear that word, so i guess that use of it makes some sense.  Thanks

It's a pretty good light if it's really 8905 lumens for 65 watts with that color temperature.  I just wish they'd cut the hype down to something intelligible.

What DO they mean by night vision?  I'm boggled. Only thing i can think of is that it produces more IR, thus enhancing "night vision" goggles. However, that would suggest that the light produces MORE heat (IR) than the competition, something they disclaim.
 
Certainly a high quality bulb with very nice specs for plant growth. A deffinate improvement over the typical cool white 40watt straight tubes or the hardware store compact fluorescent which is about 2700K. Packing all that light into a small footprint is nice since you could easily fit 2 or more over a small area for plants liking high light or a terrarium where it might be difficult to fit a large number of long straight tubes. Guess it boils down to how much it cost for the fixture and bulbs. There is no doubt that fluorescent is very energy efficient as well.

Tony
 
  • #10
You can buy these exact same "fluorex" bulbs and fixtures sold as a "500 watt worklight" fixture at Menards hardware stores and some Wal Mart stores for $24.99. It looks to be the same thing from Lights of America with the fixture rehoused and repackaged as a "500 watt grow light". I use one on my Highland chamber (along with some other power compacts of a different type).
Replacement "65 watt Fluorex" bulbs at the locations mentioned are $11.99.
 
  • #11
the lights of america online store is up and running now
 
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