Indoor Grow Lighting Explained

  

Using homemade fixtures and off the shelf light bulbs you can grow your own food year round.  Here's a link to how I built mine.  There are some basic terms and features to understand before you dive in and I hope to explain those terms here.
 

 

 

The first thing to consider when choosing lights to grow indoor plants is color temperature. Color temperature is measured in Kelvins and is a measurement of a lights color spectrum. This normally ranges from about 2700K up to 6500K for most off the shelf light bulbs. Different color temperatures have different effects on your plants. The higher 6500K light will induce green leafy grow in your plants and is going to be at the heart of any grow light. 2700k light will induce flowering in plants and although this is not 100% needed for most plants it can help keep fruit production up in your plants. Anything in between 2700k and 6500k is not efficiently used by the plants and therefore should not be used in a grow light.
 

 

The next term to understand is lumens. Lumens is a measurement of light intensity and should be listed on most modern bulbs. The higher the lumen rating the more light power the bulb can produce for grow in your system. This is commonly confused with watts which are a measurement of power consumption and not the amount of light power that a bulb is capable of producing.

This leads into the next term which is lux. Lux is a measurement of lumens per square meter of space and is a great way to test your grow light's potential growing capability. You can use an app called RGB sensor for android to test your Lux power by installing the app and holding your phone at various levels under your light. This app also shows you the color temperature of the lights as well which can be handy to help you determine if you are getting the correct 6500k or 2700k spectrum.
Lastly, the terms watts should be understood. Again, this is not a measurement of anything more than how much electric energy a light bulb is using. The lower watt rating the better (given the same lumen rating). For example a CFL bulb might use 23watts of power to produce 1400 lumens but an LED bulb might only use 14 watts of power to produce the same amount of light power (lumens) making the LED the best value.
 

 

The more energy efficient you can make your grow lights that happier you will be with your energy bill! This is one of the many benefits of going with LED bulbs as much as possible. CFL bulbs also degrade over time so after a year or two you will notice a drop in light intensity. LED bulbs do not suffer from this degradation and also last much longer than CFL's.

 

LED bulb options for grow lights:
6500K Corn Cob style - http://amzn.to/17Y2h6Z
6500L Green Leaf - http://amzn.to/1BOlvI6
2700K LED - http://amzn.to/18Xb3mE

CFL options for grow lights:
6500K - http://amzn.to/1MeIoYs (Best Deal)
2700K - http://amzn.to/17Y3efv

 

 

 

All of these products and more recommended items from the SSL Family are available at the Simple Suburban Living General Store
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Aquaponics System Design - Setup and Maintenance Costs

This aquaponics project has been one of the most interesting and rewarding things that I have ever built and I never could have imagined how it would have turned out over a year ago when I got the idea. My wife and I were looking for ways to be more sustainable and wanted to get more into gardening and growing our own food in the upcoming year. We had watched a few documentaries on food production, organic food, sustainability, and a few other related topics and were becoming more and more interested. We also kept finding it hard for us to eat healthy foods on a budget when it seems like the healthier you try to eat the more and more expensive it becomes. That is when we decided to start into this aquaponics adventure and let me tell you, it has been an adventure!

I have been running the system in the basement now for coming up on a year now and have recently completed all of the grow lights and grow media needed for full production. I have had a lot of questions surrounding the various costs and upkeep of the indoor aquaponics system and so I thought I would provide as much detail as possible on that. There are two categories of cost to set up something like this, maintenance costs and the one time setup costs to build the system. I will start with the setup costs listed below. I have also included links to many of the items on Amazon that I used in the system.

Setup costs -
Here is a list of the components and their costs -
55 Gallon Drums - 5 @ $10 - $50
Wood and Screws - $40
PVC pipe and fittings - $50
Aquarium heater - $12
Float valve for automatic top-off - $15
Air stone and air pump - $15
Aquarium water pump - $40
Bulkhead adapters 2" and 3/4" - $50
Light fixtures - 4 @40 - $160
Grow media - $70
Bulbs - $90
Misc - $10
Giant bucket of fish food - Priceless

Total system build cost - $602

When we originally planned to build this system we had budgeted about $400 and thought I could have it all setup in a couple of weeks. Well, as my wife always tells me "figure twice as much and twice as long". It wasn't quite twice as much but it surely took twice as long to build it! Now, many of you are saying "$600, that is a lot for growing some lettuce in your basement!". At first thought, you are right, it is a lot of money. However, if you are looking to build something similar you do not have to be as elaborate as this setup, there are many ways to cut costs as I discuss in the video further. There are cheaper bulkheads, lights, and other components that you can choose from and if you put this in a greenhouse you can cut that cost in half. This setup has been such an amazing experience for me though, I would have paid twice that to do it again.

 To justify the cost think of it like this, how much do you pay for organic vegetables? How much do you spend on other hobbies such as golf, bowling, sports, games, and other things that you probably don't need. What is it worth for you to have year round vegetables available for you to pick right off of the stem? For us it is a no brainer, it is worth every penny! Once the system is setup the running costs are minimal and the production is just getting started here so lets see how much food we can produce!

Now, on to the matter of running costs. Many people have asked about the lights and what they cost to run as well as the rest of the system. I have  made some estimations here and attempted to calculate an accurate monthly cost to run this system. The calculations are based on 12 hour run times on the lights at .13 cents per kwh (kilowatt hour).

Running costs -

Lights - There are 32 light bulbs combined between all four lights. Each light consumes 23 watts of power for a total of 736 watts. This can be converted into kwh by first converting 736 watts into kw (kilowatts) 736/1000 = .74 kw. this can then be converted into kwh (kilowatt hours) by multiplying by the number of hours the lights are run. I normally run the lights for 12 hours so that makes .74 X 12 for a total of 8.8 kwh's. I currently am paying about .13 cents per kwh with my power company so to calculate the total cost per day I take 8.8 X .13 = $1.14. For one month that is about $34.

Pumps - I have one small air pump and a small water pump, both are estimated at less 12 watts combines power consumption. Using the same calculations as above (((12/1000 * 24)*30) it comes out to about $1.13 per month.

Aquarium heater - This is estimated at about 300kwh per year based on running it at about 70 degrees. Using the same calculations as above ((300 X .13)/12) that comes out to $3.25 per month.

Total month costs - $34+$1.13+$3.25 = $38.38.

 So for just over $1 per day you can have fresh produce growing right in your home 365 days a year! When you relate the monthly cost to so many of the other things that we pay monthly for, Netflix, cable bills, cell phones, data plans, XM radio, hobbies, and other unnecessary things you can easily justify growing your own food indoors. In the end it comes down to what is important to you and your family, yes we can go out and buy fresh produce in the winter. But, where does it come from? Mexico, Brazil, some other far away country? How long has that been frozen or in a truck or airplane? What chemicals were put on it to make it look nice for you at the store? The ultimate goal for us here is to grow enough in the summer to get us through the winter through preserving and canning our fresh food. However, this system will always have a place in our home producing fish and produce for us year round! I hope this info has helped you in your own aquaponics build, happy building!

 

 

This post has been shared at:  Homestead Barn Hop



 

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SSL Family Dad Provides an Update on the Aquaponics System in our Basement - Walkthrough Episode 2 - PH Problems

This is an update on the aquaponics system here in the basement with the addition of a new light, another grow bed completed, and some healthier fish. I am still struggling with some PH issues and trying to get things to stabilize but the system is working so far! We have broccoli, tomatoes, bell peppers, and several varieties of lettuce surviving in the system so far. Resources: http://youtu.be/xCKYREoBos8

Thanks for watching!
Todd

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How to build a CFL Grow Light (Inexpensive Utility Light)

In this video we go through the steps to build an inexpensive grow light fixture that could also be used as a utility light. This fixture costs about $40 to build, not including light bulbs. We am currently using these as grow lights for our indoor aquaponics system and they have been working very well.

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