where do people keep getting the idea that using cfls is efficient.......they are way less efficient than hid...period.no buts or if you do this....thats it ,hid is the most efficient and less expensive lighting to run.....and packing 20 1000 lux cfls into a room doesnt give you 20,000 lux..it gives you 1000 lux that can cover a bigger area...but now you have a heat problem , because yes cfls get hotter than shit when you pack them all together..400w of cfls are going to be the same temp if not higher than 400w of hid......if you are growing one plant in a rubbermaid or something like that cfls can be to your advantage...but thats it..and even for one plant you need about 6 23w cfls positioned to encase the plant giving it light from all angles...and now you are using 138w when you can get a 70w hps from home depot for around 30 to 40 bucks and have much better results and use less energy and have less heat aaaaaaaannnnnd...its much cheaper....period.........
i just wanted to add something about 70w hps. i have a closet-type grow op with aprox. 20 square feet total so heat is an issue in my un-airconditioned top floor apartment. I have known for years that HPS is the best choice for lighting but the standard 150w-400w hps being sold at grow shops was just too much heat. So i went to a country store (home, garden and farm) to look for a low wattage hps. to my surprise i found two hps bulbs one at 35 watts and the other at 70w. i got the 70 watt one and looked for a ballast or some type of unit or fixture with a ballast but couldnt find anything. i then hesitantly asked the store clerk if they had ballasts for them. to my surprise he told me they do not carry any ballasts(other than florescent) and that a 70w wouldnt need a ballast because the watts were so low
dumbass. anyway i bought the bulb for about 30 bucks including tax and went on my marry way. i the came home and scoured the internet looking for a 70w hps ballast to buy from canada (i dont trust borders) and finally came across one from home depots industrial supply building. with shipping and taxes it came to about 80$ which i thought was a rip off,, and that was for an unwired ballast/ignitor/cap with no fixture. little to say the wiring was a disaster,, there are so many fucking random wires coming out everywhere it seems impossible,, you have to know how to read wiring diagrams because it is nearly impossible to find a "for dummies" instructions on how to wire the exact ballast you have.
so im shhhabaked right now and totally forgot where that whole thing was going,, i guess what i was trying to say is your best bet is to get an air-cooled 150w minimum (for one big or two small) HPS for your op,,, fuck that CFL shit,,, people hail CFL for it low temps but what i think they dont realize is that its the bulb on the cfl that creates nect to no heat,, the ballast,, which is mounted on the bulb creates the heat... with HID you can mount the ballast externally to reduce on heat.
p.s. i still have to keep a fan on my 70w ballast to keep it safe to touch
and thats the end of my senseless, sporadic, stoned thinking