moving on up

[ericst11]

I grow indoors and grow with a 400 hps and 2 sets of forescences. I was wounderind if i bought a 1000 hps and used that instead of the 400hps would that change thing a lot. would my plants grow a lot better and faster.

[Vanessa]

well you can grow Marijuana under 400hps...not that I have personally. 1000 hps sounds pretty intense.

[ericst11]

I don't know about you but i grow orchids not dope and was woundering if some one could tell me about the growth rate between a 400 and a 1000 and is a halide or sodium better for in door growing.

[Vanessa]

Whoa! I was not suggesting you grow "dope" NOR do I but thought you could pick up on the fact that Marijuana needs very high light. Hope some one can answer your question about your orchids.

[RoyalOrchids]

Metal Halide and High Pressure Sodium bulbs put out different color light. One is more blue, and the other is more red - I can't remember which is which. I don't think it will visibly affect the growth of your orchids, though. The wattage on the other hand, is a huge jump from 400 to 1000. It'll be more than twice the light. You could grow corn indoors with a 1000 W!!!

[camille1585]

I don't know a whole lot about light, but 400W is already a good amount of light, and you can bloom everything (I assume) under it. But 1000W? That's alot of light! The low/medium light orchids will not tolerate it (unless they are very far away from the light), and you will have to deal with the extra heat generated by the lamp, not to mention the increased electric bill! It's the hps which produce light more in the red, favoring blooms. Blue will tend to favor growth more.

Personally I would stick with the 400w and possibly add (or even replace) another light with a higher color temperature (more in the blue end of the spectrum) to promote growth. A balanced light will be around 5000k, same as daylight.
How long are you leaving the lights on? What distance from the plants?

Feel free to correct me if anyone thinks I'm wrong! Like I said, this is just my !

[ericst11]

I went with a 1000 to see if it would increase growth the lamp its 4 or 5 feet from the plants and has a fan on high to direct the heat from the plants and the growing space is 5 foot wide by 8 foot long and 10ft tall. I grow a wide rang of plants and theres about 80 of them or more.

[Magnus A]

I would say that the 400W versus 1000W talk is the wrong way to think.

There is three main factors in light.

1. color temperature, what wavelenght of the spectra do you cover. Nothing to do with Watt.

2. Light intensity at the leaf, lux or foot candela. Here you have an optimum depending on species! to much not good, bad growth, to little not good, bad growth. Watt has some to do with this. Bigger lamp gives longer distance and larger surface area with same light intensity. As light intensity is proportional against the squared distance you probably cover more area with the same intensity with 2*400 W than 1*1000 W.

3. heat, higher Watt produce more heat and therefore more problem with not burning your orchids. In the example above more heat from 1000 W than from 2*400W.