How A 5x5 De Fixture Footprint Can Backfire On You

  • Thread starter Judaz
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Judaz

Judaz

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A lesson learned.

I've been using DE fixtures like gavitas and have been enjoying harvests of 2.5-3.5 a light consistently. But this last grow really kicked my ass because I overlooked something very important.

First I want to stress the importance of changing your DE bulbs and fixtures at least once a year and if you really want to do it right, go and purchase a quantum par meter.

I decided to help a friend dial in
His gavita room and share with him my footprint and technique that has been giving me the optimal results. To make a long story short, I was barely able to hit 1.9 per gavita light. Scratching my head as to why, I started to question the light and fixtures and it ended up being that my friend had purchased his gavitas from a used hydro store. The guy who sold it to him told him that he rebuilt them and they were as good as new. So what happened? What went wrong? The light intensity was not optimal to pull weight.

You see back in the day when I used to grow with hoods, I would get my best yields over a 4x4 square footage and not anything bigger. It ends up being that a 4x4 area using digital ballast and hortilux bulbs provides the right light intensity to hit over 2 a light for og kush. When I experimented by increasing the area over the same lights I would hit less weight given that I added an extra 20 plants to my 6 light setup. My numbers would go down to 1.5 a light whenever I added more plants and increased the 4x4 area. Why? Because In order to illuminate the bigger area I had to spread my hoods further apart from each other decreasing the light intensity of the overlap between lights. Basically a 4x4 area under a 1000 watt hood gives you around 97 micromoles per square foot. When you spread your hoods further apart to cover the bigger area you go down in overlap intensity lowering your micromoles per square feet to a number that is not enough that does not produce enough light intensity depth to handle a 3-4 ft tall plant. Therefore lowering your yield. Even if you add more plants. You will still hit less.

So going back to the story these gavitas were not putting out enough light intensity to handle the bigger 5x5 area that requires at least 95-97 micromoles to produce the desired weight. Same situation like when I experimented with my 6 lighter back in the day. I probably would have hit more on those old gavitas on a 4x4 footprint then a 5x5 footprint that lacked the proper light intensity to get the right results. LESSON LEARNED. Never buy used Gavitas. Not worth it.
 
Dick Terpene

Dick Terpene

129
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I've got a brand new gavita to use when I set up my new space, it's gonna be like Christmas! Sorry to jack the thread folks!! But, yesssssssssssss!!!!!!
 
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