Good grow tent grow lights have some requirements and benefits versus using grow lighting in greenhouses or grow rooms, provided you choose wisely. Grow tents can be a great choice for growing crops indoors and come in a very wide variety of sizes, for example for creating a light tight grow space from a spare space like a closet to large or multiple walk-in grow tent enclosures filling large areas.
What Makes A Good Grow Light for Growing in Growth Tents?
One of the advantages of a grow tent is that it is a tightly enclosed space with a high degree of reflectivity to all of the surfaces; maximizing light usage by the plant canopy, ie no light powering is wasted, it is redirected until it is used by the crop for growth and flowering or fruiting.
At the same time, this level of tightness to the growing environment means that it can heat up very quickly inside the grow tent enclosure. Further, while durable, there is little insulate factor to the grow tent covering material so the surrounding area outside of the grow tent can heat up easily too. Remember, most grow lights give off strong light intensities in order to fuel plant growth, all of this light from artificial sources can generate considerable heat levels.
Overheated plants produce poorly and are prone to insects and disease problems, especially in the context of grow tent grow lights.
Getting More Grow Tent Grow Lighting with Less Heat
In the past, early grow tent cultivation meant meant investing in cumbersome and expensive air cooled reflective lenses for common HID (high intensity discharge) grow light sources like HPS (high pressure sodium). For these to work correctly, they also required loud and costly high output ventilation fans; the whole process definitely makes growing in a tent anywhere people also cohabitant nearby intrusive, to say the least.
Ceramic Metal Halide grow lights, also called CMH (ceramic metal halide) & LEC (light emitting ceramic) grow lighting are a more recent innovation versus traditional HID light sources. One of the biggest benefits to growers looking for grow tent grow lights is that they produce considerably more light in the wavelengths used by plants versus regular HPS and MH lamp types and lighting systems.
Because CMH grow lights operate more efficiently in producing light for photosynthesis (versus lighting parking lots) in grow tent grow lights applications, growers can achieve excellent results using much less power per light source to cover the same sized area for growing crops.
Sizing CMH Grow Lights for Grow Tents
CMH grow lights are also popular with large scale commercial growers due to their high rate of photosynthetic light delivery relative to power used. In these situations, one well designed 315 watt CMH grow light like an Summit Lighting SUM315, is often used to illuminate an area from three feet by three feet to four feet to produce high quality and heaving yielding flowering and fruiting crops.
The same proven lighting print can be used in grow tents, although you increase the area of coverage from 15 to 25% because of the high reflectivity and close proxy city of the grow tent walls and ceiling relative to the CMH grow light source.
Our goal at Summit Lighting, Inc is to continue to bring the most innovative products to market that allow the professional agriculture community to produce higher yields while consuming less energy and using fewer nutrients and additives.
We do this by constantly trying to create an environment that is closest to what the sun produces naturally. This approach reduces the amount of stress placed on the plants and allows them a chance to grow as natural as possible in an artificial environment.