Dialing In MEGA CROP for Auto's

[InkAddict$]

I didn't see a PPFD map (AKA "PAR map") for the HLG 650R but the 600R is here. It's a board light so it's generates a lot of light in the center and then falls off pretty quickly toward the edges so it's not easy to get even illumination from that light.

The first key indicator if your light levels are too high is light avoidance - leaves not just "praying" but continuing to incline so as to reduce their exposure to light and/ or turning on their horizontal axis, with the edge of the leaf rotating toward the light. That happened to me when my current grow was in veg. I was using a Mars SP 3000 and I shut off the light to take a picture and, when I turned it back on again, I used the wrong switch and it flipped it on to 100% power. A few hours later, I saw the heat rising in the tent and went out to check things out. A leaf on one of the plant had turned about 45°. I set the light to the proper power level and after about 30 minutes, the leaf had turned back to its normal position.

A more serious symptom is interveinal chlorosis and spots in the leaves which is tissue death. That's pretty hard to miss and hopefully you haven't run into that.

" I'm pushing in the high 900's about 1000 in the center" - how are you measuring that?

I think it's HLG that provides a way to convert lux to PPFD so all you need is a lux meter and you can get valid light readings.

"Might have to start buying my water.... Shit that will get expensive..... But it will be so worth not having the hasle of deficiencies.... Only if I can find the perfect water..."
Yeh, buying water hits the wallet pretty hard. What about getting a small RO unit instead of buying water?

Attached is a screenshot from a Bugbee video. It was really helpful for me because it's sort of a map to getting things set up.
Some of them are pretty simple - O2 in the res just means an air pump and some air stones. But some of them can be more than a little bit of a challenge.

View attachment 1466074

What do you think about this meter? It does lux and ppfd.....

 

[Delps8]

I use the proton app... None of my leaves are turning upside down... I got praying but it's got some serious deficiency's going on.... I have 2 ro buddies they clean my water great... But I got a pH of 10 in my tap... So this is what i do now instead of pure ro and cal-mag... I cut it 50/50 ro and tap use air stones for a few hours ... Then I add hydroguard and absoric acid.... Now since I'll use the mega crop every water as suggested I don't have to use pH down... I added the mc and be and got a pH of 6.1 and ppm of 500.. worked out great.... I think I was using to much cal-mag before and not the right kind of soil for sip buckets..... I hope I figure it out..I wonder if I can put air stones down the tube and into the res of my sip buckets??? What do you think??? Thanks for the help....the 650r gets damn good coverage.... 1000 in middle and 600 in corners.....

Sounds like you're making progress on a lot of the pieces of the puzzle. Good to see.

"I wonder if I can put air stones down the tube and into the res of my sip buckets" - I don't know what a sip bucket is. If it's hydro, you should have something in it to aerate the water.

"the 650r gets damn good coverage.... 1000 in middle and 600 in corners....." - that's exactly my point. Board lights, whether they're from HLG or whomever, are an older design and one of their characteristics is that they have significant light falloff between the center and the edges. If you look at the PAR charts for any of the HLG lights on ppfdcharts.com, you'll see the characteristic big numbers in the middle and then rapid, consistent fall off toward the edges. That's a function of the board light design. Flip over to the Migro array or the Spider Farmer SF 7000 and the numbers are very different.

Light manufacturers have moved to light bars and, in one case, they've put the LED's in the center of the light are have non-consistent spacing so as to increase uniformity.

The reason I brought up the light fall off issue is that you might be getting, say, 700 µmols in the center but, unless you're actually measuring light at different parts of the canopy, you may not realize that the center right and the center left are at 500, for example. Again, just something to be aware of.

 

[Delps8]

What do you think about this meter? It does lux and ppfd..... View attachment 1466086

If I had an HLG and didn't want to spend the money on a PAR meter, I'd get a lux meter and get the conversion info that HLG publishes.

I would not give the hardware in the pix above a second thought. The light meter is $60 which means the cost of manufacturing is $10 - $20 which is a fraction of the cost of just the sensor that's needed to measure standard PAR much less ePar. Add in design and manufacturing costs for a reliable, robust, maintainable product that's marketed and supported and you're way over the $60 that this device sells for.

When I was looking for a PAR meter last spring, I passed on the HydroFarms PAR meter, as well. That model is a rebadged version of a PAR meter that was being sold by a couple of retailers. That was one of the reasons I passed on it. The others were lack of support and poor construction. I ended up getting an Apogee MQ-500. It's more expensive but it's also a very different product. Besides the Apogee, I'd look at a LiCor, or the Spot On.

Bang for the buck though, is to get the HLG conversion info and run it through a PAR meter.

 

[InkAddict$]

If I had an HLG and didn't want to spend the money on a PAR meter, I'd get a lux meter and get the conversion info that HLG publishes.

I would not give the hardware in the pix above a second thought. The light meter is $60 which means the cost of manufacturing is $10 - $20 which is a fraction of the cost of just the sensor that's needed to measure standard PAR much less ePar. Add in design and manufacturing costs for a reliable, robust, maintainable product that's marketed and supported and you're way over the $60 that this device sells for.

When I was looking for a PAR meter last spring, I passed on the HydroFarms PAR meter, as well. That model is a rebadged version of a PAR meter that was being sold by a couple of retailers. That was one of the reasons I passed on it. The others were lack of support and poor construction. I ended up getting an Apogee MQ-500. It's more expensive but it's also a very different product. Besides the Apogee, I'd look at a LiCor, or the Spot On.

Bang for the buck though, is to get the HLG conversion info and run it through a PAR meter.

Oh I'm buying a Apogee mq-500 also it's on my list just be a month or so .. I'll buy a par meter for now though .. thanks again..... I appreciate your help..... I won't be buying that.....

 

[InkAddict$]

If I had an HLG and didn't want to spend the money on a PAR meter, I'd get a lux meter and get the conversion info that HLG publishes.

I would not give the hardware in the pix above a second thought. The light meter is $60 which means the cost of manufacturing is $10 - $20 which is a fraction of the cost of just the sensor that's needed to measure standard PAR much less ePar. Add in design and manufacturing costs for a reliable, robust, maintainable product that's marketed and supported and you're way over the $60 that this device sells for.

When I was looking for a PAR meter last spring, I passed on the HydroFarms PAR meter, as well. That model is a rebadged version of a PAR meter that was being sold by a couple of retailers. That was one of the reasons I passed on it. The others were lack of support and poor construction. I ended up getting an Apogee MQ-500. It's more expensive but it's also a very different product. Besides the Apogee, I'd look at a LiCor, or the Spot On.

Bang for the buck though, is to get the HLG conversion info and run it through a PAR meter.

Ok this is what I did.... Here's a pic of ppfd chart for the hlg 650r.... It's center what I got circle..... It says highest is 1189 at 24in.... Well the proton app I have kept coming up at 1380ish the most.... So that would be around 200 ppfd over... So at center I set it at 1100 so that's 200 over so really it's around 900 right... Or am I doing this wrong.... Or you think the proton app is junk????? Thanks I'm still buying one though...

 

[Delps8]

Ok this is what I did.... Here's a pic of ppfd chart for the hlg 650r.... It's center what I got circle..... It says highest is 1189 at 24in.... Well the proton app I have kept coming up at 1380ish the most.... So that would be around 200 ppfd over... So at center I set it at 1100 so that's 200 over so really it's around 900 right... Or am I doing this wrong.... Or you think the proton app is junk????? Thanks I'm still buying one though...View attachment 1466621

I'm not familiar with Proton. You might check with manufacturer to see how to calibrate it.

Here's a link to some interesting research by the people who sell Photone. They tested a variety of programs and some did a lot better than others.

 

[4d-Rock]

Grrr. The frustration continues…

Day 31, Dark Devil strain, things have been going relatively well except some odd spots here or there. But in the last couple days the Lower leaves are starting to look hurting.

1/3 promix, 1/3 perlite, 1/3 organic soil.
MC 1 part v2, Started at 1g/gal and increased by 1 each week. Last feed was 4.5g/gal plus 0.5g Epsom. ~690 ppm, runoff was about 610ppm.

 

[CannabisMingus]

Ca def?

 

[4d-Rock]

Possible Ca def. Though previously whenever I added CalMag it ended up getting worse. Tried just Epsom this time

 

[InkAddict$]

Possible Ca def. Though previously whenever I added CalMag it ended up getting worse. Tried just Epsom this time

Mine too would do the same... I'd ad calmag and it would get worse.....