Side lighting do I need it

I’m in first week of flowering. Was doing a photo shoot with girls and noticed the lighting was different from back to front. Some areas were bright some not so bright. At first I thought it was because the tent was open but when I moved girls around the shadows were different.
I’m using a 400 HPs so I was thinking about side lights. My tent is 39 X 39 X 72. I’ve got a t5 for seedlings . Can I or should I put in tent?

You could probably benefit from some side lighting. Keep in mind you’ll want to add it evenly throughout your tent, or rotate your girls regularly. As far as wattage goes you’re probably fine, it’s going to be more of a canopy coverage issue the further from light you get.

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I’ve been rotating them and turning every two days

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You should be in pretty good shape then.

You’re essentially in a 3x3, and 400 does fairly well there. You’re kind of on the edge of where a good reflector and higher efficiency set up really shines. The watt/ft ratio is reasonable but the par on the edges is kind of lacking. This is where you see the benefits of side lighting. Grabbing a few t5’s or led replacement tubes and placing 1 per wall would definitely increase your yeild. For some people it’s not worth the hassle. Others will go as far as putting several in vertically. Your plants will be fine either way.

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when I’m not sprouting with my T5’s I use them for side lighting @Laurap

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Would I put them above plants?

I’ve got a t5 setup Lakewood suggested when my ballast went out. How much more lighting do I need.? I also have a couple single cfl fixtures but dunno anything about cfls, what amount of watts due I need to add

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how many more watts do you already have with those t5 and cfl’s? @Laurap

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It says 10000 lumens

take a pic of the lights for me. just so i know what we are talking about :grinning: Bob has his meds and needs details… lol :thumbsup: @Laurap

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ok gotcha! How long are those tubes? And there are 4 tubes correct? @Laurap

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4 tubes, two feet long. Since I got new ballast was keeping for seedlings, and had planned to order beans at end of month. But the girls will have one more month at that point so if my present girls need it the new babies will wait

@Laurap so my answer is still eluding me. since they are t5 they come in a large range of wattages. Can you look at one of the bulbs and see if it has the wattage included on the printing on the tube. usually on the glass of the bulb near the end. If you cant find anything I was gonna say to add that back into your tent. the only thing is that because it is a lower wattage they would need to be down closer to the plants, probably like a foot above them. Which then may actually block the other light…

So is there another way of mounting them to the side so that the angle down towards one side?

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Hmm, good question. I’m about 30 min from home. I’ll have to get back with you

sure, no problem! I’m here so no worries. Catch you then.

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Not sure if this is it. Don’t know squat about electricity. Four 6500K bulbs?

the 6500 is the amount of Blue or Red in the bulb, I believe… anyway I’m pretty sure most of those are like 24 watts. so 96 watts I imagine they are legit about 40 watts draw ish. So you could for sure add those to your tent. Try putting them at the same height as the other lights or slightly closer. maybe they will blend with the other lights and help fill in the shaded spots

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@bob31 has you set. Get them in there however you can without blocking your main light.

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@Laurap

Side lights would be a big plus

Will

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