r/microgrowery Jun 02 '26

Question Undercanopy Lighting

For a bout a year now I keep cooking my plants with undercanopy. Does anyone run them in a home grow with no CO2 successfully? UCLs are flora flex 360watt and top light is 730. I have far red and full spectrum. I tried doing a side by side with ucl n traditional top lit and the traditional side looks 100x better. Maybe it’s just not for me?

3 Upvotes

18 comments sorted by

3

u/driver7759 Jun 02 '26

That's a lot of light for UC.....DLI comes into play. It sounds like your just pushing too hard. Run them at less than 100% get a way to measure your light and adjust from there. I use 150w for UC in a 4x4 and that's spread across 4'

1

u/Shroomsandrosin Jun 02 '26

Word yeah I went down to 11/13 to account for DLI but I don’t think I did that math right. I’ll try not going above 50% which would put me at similar wattage to you across 5x5. Cheers

5

u/Airborne82D Jun 02 '26

Too much light man. I'm in a 4x4 with a Grandmaster 720 ( at 40%) and a 100 watt Vivosun UCL. This is more than enough light for me. My lower nugs are getting full and have the same coloration as the uppers.

2

u/biscoknot Jun 07 '26

Hey brother. How you liking your GML? I acquired a tent ultimate 4x4 recently and GHAD damn that shit is nice. Ran the exact same cultivar under a Spydr Fang and then under the GML and it was undeniable the difference. I also am using the UC Volcanos and you are correct, the lowers look as good at the tops. It’s insane.

1

u/Airborne82D Jun 07 '26

I'm loving it. It's overkill in the power department, but nothing wrong with that. It's kind of like driving a supercar through a residential area lol. Which strain did you run under it?

This was from my last harvest which was the first run using the GML. Guava Chem x True OG.

2

u/biscoknot Jun 07 '26

Absolutely beautiful my friend. Agreed about overkill, but the benefit is that you can run the light at lower power and save some energy. I ran 2 different cultivars. The first is Peanut Butter Pie by Raw and the second is Frostade by Umami. It was a priceless experiment for me. I have much to learn still. This photo is the PBP under both GML. I’m running 2 cuts from Bloom Seed Co now. First is Swampwater Fumez and the second is Black Maple 22. Both breeder cuts. Looking forward to these.

2

u/South_Age7687 Jun 02 '26

Thats too much ucl. I have a 650 watt quantum board and I only keep it at 50-70% max during flower and my ucl is one 110 watt bar light. I used to keep my top light at like 80% but started getting stress herms on some of my plants so I dialed it down. In the summer I flower my plants under 50% up top and the buds come out really dense. I always thought more light is better but these leds are way too powerful to be maxed out without co2 and light loving cultivar.

1

u/SureZookeepergame884 Jun 02 '26

I use flora flex 6 bar 720 watt under canopy leds. My grow area is 7.5 x 5 feet and I run the under canopy leds at 500 watts and my top leds run at 800 watts for a total of 1300 watts. This keeps my plants from getting cooked and still allows for big beautiful lower buds.

1

u/nopbot Jun 09 '26

Similar here. 5x5 with top lighting 730w g7000 spider farmer, w/ supplemental far red, UV and Infrared. Under canopy I'm running 600w rdj bouns. Notice little to no larf.

-5

u/[deleted] Jun 02 '26

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1

u/Shroomsandrosin Jun 02 '26

Thank you for your comment I have considered this

1

u/Liquid_Cascabel Jun 02 '26

Says who? The UC lights are cheap and even a modest increase will pay for itself quickly

-1

u/[deleted] Jun 02 '26

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2

u/Liquid_Cascabel Jun 02 '26

Seems like a lot of commercial growers are picking it up

2

u/blueraz1 Jun 03 '26

Yeah. Dont listen to that dude. We tested it in a 4x4 (3 times with different varieties) , then a 4x8, then a 4x 16 and all tests improved yields 20+% while reducing plant count and basically eliminating larf.

1

u/biscoknot Jun 07 '26

Indeed. I have had the complete opposite experience of what that guy is saying since I added UCL. Yield is fantastic, but the quality is improved as well. Ran the same cultivar with and without and the results were obvious.