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Grow Light Tutorial
Providing sufficient light for plant photosynthesis of indoor plants is a common problem that many indoor gardeners face. A
grow light is an electric lamp, which simulates natural sunshine, and
provides the appropriate light spectrum to promote plant growth and
blooming. Vegetronix caries innovative innovative grow light
systems for indoor potted plants.
Vegetronix Grow Light Products
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Plants that
struggle for sunlight now have an attractive solution. You
can place beautiful plants in areas that once were off limits, adding to the décor of
your home. The LiteStik uses energy efficent LED technology
optimized for indor plants. The LiteStik's innovative light sensor allows it to
turn on automatically when the light dips below recommended levels.
See
more....
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Grow Light Tutorial Anyone
who has played with a prism will know that white light is a spectrum
composed of all of the visible colors. The goal of a grow light
is to provide just the right amount of light of the appropriate light
spectrum to the plant. When evaluating a grow light the following
criterion are important to consider:
- Light Spectrum
- Just because a lamp is bright, does not mean that it is
providing the correct spectrum. For example, a green lamp is of
no use to plant growth, because plants reflect green light, and
that is why they appear green. In addition, plants utilize light
spectrum that isn't visible to humans, namely, the infrared ultraviolet
bands. When selecting a lamp, select one that is intense in the
desired spectral bands.
- Power Efficiency
- All lamps generate heat in addition to light. Generated
light is measured in lumens. When selecting a lamp, chose
one that generates lumens in the desired photosynthesis bands and
minimizes the Watts. Since grow lamps are typically constantly on
they can be costly to operate, especially the higher power ones.
- Bulb Lifespan
- All bulbs have a finite lifespan. Replacing bulbs can be
costly, and so this should be a consideration in making a
purchase. Incandescent grow lamps tend to burn out the fastest,
since they have a hot filament that burns up over time.
Florescent bulbs have decent lifespans, and LEDs typically last a
very long time.
- Aesthetics
- This may or many not be important depending on the application.
Many of the grow lamps for commercial applications tend to be
boxy looking, and just plane ugly. For home decor, the grow lamp
should be slender, attractive, and unobtrusive.
Types of Grow Lights- Incandescent Grow Lights
- These are the most energy wasting of all of the lights and at 750
hours they have the lowest bulb life, since the filament tends to burn
out over time. They tend to put out visible spectrum in the red
and yellow bands.
- Fluorescent Grow Lights
- Fluorescents grow lamps are typically twice as efficient as
comparable incandescent bulbs. They also can last up to 20,000
hours, which is more than 25 times longer than incandescents.
Standard incandescent lights can be used to grow leafy vegetables
such as lettuce, and spinach and herbs or start seedlings. High
output fluorescents produce twice the light output as standards, are
slim, but have half the life span. Since they produce white light
which is not fully utilized by photosynthesis, they still are not as
efficient as they could be.
- High Pressure Sodium Lights
- These tend to produce a yellow spectrum, and so are usually
only used in the reproductive or blooming phase of growth. They
have long bulb life, but tend to generate a lot of heat.
- LED Grow Lights
- Grow lamps that utilize LEDs are capable of having all of the
desired benefits discussed above, without some of the limitations.
They are highly efficient, produce a narrow spectrum that can be
tuned to optimal photosynthesis absorption, and are compact, and so
they can be used to design highly attractive lamps for the home
gardener. A good example of this technology is the LiteStik.
LED Grow LightsMost
traditional commercially available grow lights are unattractive, bulky
and use excessive amounts of power, and tend to have short life spans
as bulbs burn out. With the advent of LEDs many new grow lamps
are overcoming these limitations by leveraging their inherent power
efficiencies, small size, low cost, and long life.
How LED Grow Lamps WorkThe
key to LED grow lamp efficiency is that photosynthesis only requires a
few spectrum bands. Since plants leaves are typically green, this
means green light is not reflected, and not used by the plant for
growth. Because green light is reflected, a lamp that provides green
light is wasting energy. It is common knowledge within the
scientific community, that there are only 4 light bands that are
necessary for plant growth. The upper blue and ultraviolet bands
are most important for plant growth and the lower bands of red and
orange are related to plant blooming. LEDs operate in fairly
narrow spectrum bands, and so LED grow lamps can target the narrow
bands required for photosynthesis and ignore all other bands, thus
increasing power efficiency.
Grow Lamp Applications- Home herb gardens.
- Potted plants for home decor.
- Indoor hydroponic farming.
- Aquatic plants.
- Home production of personal use medical marijuana and cannabis.
Grow Light Manufacturers- Hydrofarm
- Sunshine Systems
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