Light questions...am i using enough?

I have 600w v/b switch. I have 96x80x60 tent. Bought 1200 v/b switch but thought leaf burn. Dropped to 600w. Both led full spec lights. PLEASE HELP…!!! If needed will keep both…i have so many questions…feel like 3 year old saying…why…why…why…why…wtf…lmao

What are the lights ? Whats actual power draw ?

They should give hanging distance and actual footprint they can veg or bloom. Every light is different.

It say 12-36 inches bit the leaves were lokking burnt so i lowered wattage and hung 36-48 inches above and doing good i think…???

Can we see a picture?

I have 600w led bit also bougbt 1200w both b/v switch but using 600w right now

If you tell us what make and model of lights you bought we can be of more assistance. Or, you can look at the label on the light to see what the actual wattage is.
Unfortunately, far too often newcomers have purchased lights from places like Amazon that are woefully misrepresented and a (for example) “600w” light is actually a 100 to 130 watt light. This would be sufficient for growing one plant under. Most of the “1200w” lights end up actually being 200 watts and are good for 1 to 2 plants.
Pictures of your plants would also be helpful. Odds are they haven’t been hurt by the lights. It’s possible they are experiencing nutrient burn or a nutrient deficiency.

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Current light is

Also own this one…tent is 96x80x60 plant pics next message

Plants

Not enough light.
The small one is 125watt
The big one is 235watt

To put in perspective with a good led, my 200watt cost $550. If your buying lights that cheap always look for the actual power draw not the total led watts.
Led watts is the total watt rating of all leds on the fixture which is pointless because leds are never drawing max watts for each led because they would burn out fast. So always read the specs to see the actual power draw from the wall.

Those two lights combined should be good enough to grow those 3 plants. They will grow the plants, they just won’t grow as well as the better lights that are available.
Be sure to have the both the veg and bloom switches turned on when you get to the flowering stage.
From what I can tell in the pictures, your plants look great. For future reference - if you need to send a photo for analysis, try to take it under natural or incandescent light. Things are very hard to see under the blurple (that’s what the lights you have are referred to because of their blue-purple hugh) lighting.

One unrelated concern I have is the pots you have them in. It looks like they might not have drain holes. If they don’t, be sure to drill some in them or transplant your plants to pots that do. When you don’t have drainage, the soil will wind up being sopping wet at the bottom and dry as a bone at the top, and your plants will suffer. If you do have drain holes and I just don’t see them, then just ignore this bit.

So i need both lights for 1800w total for 8x7x5 tent??? I also have airated fabric pots just came yesterday…transfer tonight…yippeeee cant wait…

So i should return both and get bigger light or 2 seperate for each side of tent…??? What should my wattage be???

I have 5 plants in my 8x7x5 tent

They don’t actually put out 1800w. This is true wattage for the 1200:

And true wattage for the 600:

You’ll be able to grow those plants with them. I’d run them about 24” and you shouldn’t be seeing any light burn.

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I would say both lights combined would be good for about a 2’x5’ space. For the space you are utilizing, you will need a lot more light. It’s not clear which dimension ( l x w x h ) is which in your 8x7x5 tent, but you might even conside partitioning it so you only have to light have the space.

I’ll go ahead and tag @dbrn32 right now. If you can reply with the dimensional details (l/w/h) I mentioned above, he should be able to recommend a light that would be optimal for your space. I’m guessing on a pair of HLG 550 (Horticulture Lighting Group) lights for that big of a space…

You could technically fill your tent with more blurple lights, but everyone will tell you - you will be much happier if you spend the money on good lights now than being disappointed and purchasing all the equipment again later.

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You don’t need lighting to cover your whole tent area, yours is 56 sq ft. You only need light to cover the actual area your plants take up. For 1 plant I would have an area of 18"x18", which is 2.25 sq ft per plant. 3 plants would take 6.75 sq ft. The optimal amount of light in wattage per sq ft is 50- 65w. At 65w that’s 438.75w, at 50w thats 337.50w. your two light together are 338w. So you are at roughly 50w per sq ft. Keep in mind you lose about 20% of wattage in heat loss and running the cooling fan. Your in the ball park tho still. I’ve seen people grow with 35w per sq ft.
Edit:as @TommyBahama said hlg quantum boards are the best, if your interested in going that route.

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It’s more or less a difference in how good the fixtures are at putting out light. You want a ppfd average of about 600-800 umols per second per m². The budget fixtures don’t really give you amount of light output, so you get kinda stuck trying to figure out based on best information we have.

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96 long x 80 high x 60 deep…??

I used 2 lights comparable to yours in a 2x4 tent. Was good enough to grow 2 plants but it was light and fluffy buds with the lower part of the plants being underdeveloped.