600w HPS Vertical Coverage?

Doing room planning research. Vertical seems most effective use of light.

How much vertical coverage does a 600w HPS have?

How tall should a vertical scrog screen be?

Light placement? I'm assuming you keep the light centered or upper third between top of container and top of plant as it grows?

Room is 7'x10' with 8' ceilings if that's a consideration.

Thanks in advance.

I have 2 x 600w stacked for my babies which are about 5ft tall from the top of the pot. This gives the whole plant good cover. Stacking your lights gives large consistent buds from top to bottom, the growth is obviously where the lumens are. IMHO not using 2 lights is madness and a major waste. Space was a bit of an issue for me, 6 x 6 x 7ft so I opted to go hydro (F&D) for ease and maintenance, didn't fancy the hassle of trying to water soil pots around the back of of the grow. Amazing results and will never go back to regualr horizontal grow style. Good luck.

Thanks for the information. Another light is about the same price as a light mover, operating cost is higher though.

weelherewego said:

Thanks for the information. Another light is about the same price as a light mover, operating cost is higher though.

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1 light will only produce approx 90 000 lumens, 2 lights produce 180 000 lumens. higher electricity bill but also higher yield. It similar to the difference between CFL's and HPS.

Most people run the lights 10-12" from the plant giving a circumference of 20-24" ? I'm planning a 360 DWC, I have aquaponics experience, running a 400g, goldfish fueled, hybrid ebb and flow/NFT system.

I do appreciate the help.

weelherewego said:

Most people run the lights 10-12" from the plant giving a circumference of 20-24" ? I'm planning a 360 DWC, I have aquaponics experience, running a 400g, goldfish fueled, hybrid ebb and flow/NFT system.

I do appreciate the help.

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I have aquaponics experience, running a 400g, goldfish fueled, hybrid ebb and flow/NFT system.

I have to ask how this works.

Think carefully about how you are going to maintain your pots, once your plants scrog themselves into your nets it becomes very difficult / impossible to move your pots should you needs to clean etc. I can only maintain my main res that feeds 4 small tables each containing 2 plants.
Keep a regular hps (horizontal) to force some good stretch during first week of flower. I have found that if you don't to this and keep your plant with tight internodes, your plants are heavy on foliage and create an impenetrable canopy thus massively reducing light penetration below the canopy.... in other words stretch is your friend with vertical, good stretch = much higher yield.

I plan to use one 5 gal bucket per plant, each bucket on a wheeled dolley with the V-SCROG screen attached to each dolley (I'm forced to keep plant numbers low, VSCROG seems the most logical way to increase yield per plant.) For maintenance I'll just roll the bucket dolley if I have difficulty reaching around. I have pumps and other aquarium parts laying around (also keep a reef tank) plan is to mix up a large batch of nutes and use a pump swap nutes, same way I do water changes. I plan on capped sampling ports and water level indicators on each bucket to limit opening and closing. Originally I planned on running a RDWC with flexible hoses to allow the use of the wheeled dolleys but want to make sure I run this dwc system to give me a baseline for comparison. Will this work?

For my AQ system I have a 300g water tote for my fish tank, it runs a 2" SLO (solids lifting overflow) where the siphon removes fish waste from the bottom and dumps it into my gravel filled ebb and flow bed. The drain in the ebb and flow runs to a series of 6" pvc pipes that are drilled for net pots. NFTs drain into my 110g sump then pumped via 1 motor into the tank. The SLO has a siphon break, in the vertical portion of the tube there's a T fitting set so the tank level hits the hole when the E&F be is full. The hole breaks the siphon. The drain on the bed is valved so I can time the drain rate to keep the tubes wet for most of the off portion of the pump cycle. I run the pump on a 15/45 on/off cycle. I have a secondary sump that has the capacity to hold overflow in case of power loss.

Most people raise food fish in their tanks, I make money growing the goldfish out. In one season I can get 30 of the 25 cent goldfish up to nearly 6" and sell them fo up to $10 (sometimes I have to put a few in my front yard 300g water feature). I use my fish money to buy steak I raise root veggies in the bed, determinate tomatoes and other stuff, tubes have leafy veggies like lettuce and basil and whatever else my wife tells me we need. Plan on a greenhouse in the near future so I may run it year round, although down here we really only need a GH for 2 months or so.

Edited to add: The NFT drains and pumping back into the fish tank are waterfall style oxygenate the water. The water back into the main tank is actually a T looking thing with multiple holes in it.

Edited once more: So during veg and 1st week of flower I run the HPS as a "normal" horizontal unit?

As you can see from the pic, circular vertical give much higher canopy cover but if you are going for the stadium then you don't need the regular horizontal light for first week as stretch will not really help or increase yield. If your going for the circular grow then yes, keep the light up high and encourage stretch.

I do plan on running a true circular, vertical grow. Keep the light high enough to keep everything green but stretchy. That's how I usually guess placement on my corals, move them up until they quit stretching

I noticed that in Whodat's thread he's running his lights in a 36" diameter with 600s. Is my plan of 24" diameter too tight? I'd love to open it up to gain more surface area.

Thank you.

With 24" ,Ya plants will chase the light and ya canopy diameter will have reduced by anything up to 10". When the canopy is that tightly grown, there's not alot of light penetration to develop the rest of the plant, I like to have my finished canopy well spread and allow some light through,if you have the room go up 48".

Man... How long will I have to veg to fill 48" diameter circle with 3 plants lol. Not even countinvertical growth. I'm guessing growing with the light 2' above the plant tops with them in a horizontal screen to promote stretch?

Arrh I missed the 3 plant part and am workin on my own grow. I have 8 plants, veg them until they are about 12-18" tall under CFL then flip em. week 1(under reguler HPS) I should get a good 12" stretch if ya plants are healthy, then into vertical rig. The plants will continue to grow with some vigor for another week to 10 days then slow right down.

With 3 plants it will take some additional training but should still have a similar growth pattern, maybe veg an extra week or so under reg HPS. With 8 plants I just let em do their own thing in vert, with 3 ya probably gonna wonna LST and spread em a bit more.

Should I do my veg under a single high 600 then flower with a stacked pair? You horizontal vegging under the CFL to encourage stretch?

I plan on topping this grow and maybe a monstercropping for my second.

I only use CFL's because it suits my schedule for a perpetual grow. CFL's are slow but the timing is just right for me to get from cuttings to flower. In answer to your question, HPS (horizontal) will give much faster growth but be careful putting young cuttings or seedlings under HPS can be too much for young plants.

One of the reasons I am loving vertical is (for my grow), I don't need to do any training at all. I let the plant do it's thing, Spoilt for light it goes nuts. One thing I have noticed on my current grow is that 1 plant that i totally raped the bottom half for cuttings is by far producing some of the best bud (weight) I have had to date, gonna try same on my next batch.

Well I've got a dimmable ballast so I can run the 600w high under reduced power to get stretch. Going to use either a 32w T5HO I used for a small coral propagation tank or a T8 with grow bulbs I used to grow macro algaes for initial lighting for the seedlings.

Got the seeds in a paper towel, about to start on my DWC buckets. Gotta plumb them for the level indicators, cut holes for pots and sampling ports. Materials to make my dolleys, well cut the scrap plywood and installed casters, not like a big project. Blue Planet 3 pack ready for the day to start feeding, thinking about a few drops of 25% solution around week 3.

Since the strain is Indica heavy I'll have to keep the light high and weak to get it tall?

Well I have some fem Sour Diesel and White Rhino inbound.