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Grow lights are essential for your indoor plants. The grow lights should be hung at a specific level so it is beneficial for the plants. You can use rope hangers to hang your grow lights. Before you lit those lights, you should be aware of how to hang them appropriately above your plants. If you hang the lights too low, it can burn your plants, and hanging them too high can leave the plants weak and stretched.
Some of the grow lights have to be hung far away from the plants; however, some lights are too weak and need to be hung within 10 inches away from the plants. You should hang your lights at an effective and safe height. The aim of hanging the grow lights above your plants is to allow power to your plants so that they can turn nutrients into food and grow well.
Why are grow lights important?
Your indoor garden should mimic the plant’s natural environment. The grow lights play the role of a sun that helps the plants to grow. You have to control the type of light and how much of it your plant can receive. The growers think that the more amount of light means the better yields. However, that does not imply that you should bring in more lights and hang them too close to your plants without touching them.
You should make sure that your plants receive enough energy so that they can grow healthy and quickly. There are various kinds of grow lights available that include LED, HID, and T5 Fluorescent. You should choose the right kind of lighting for your plants so that they do not get more or less. Some lights deliver more heat energy whereas some provide a better spectrum. Each of them needs to be hung at a particular distance from the plants.
The problems that you face while hanging lights from the ceiling
Every grower would be in danger if the light system is not hung well from the ceiling to cover the plants. Some of the struggles that they usually face are:
- The supporting hooks are too weak to hold on to the light systems properly.
- The heights are not easy to adjust. You have to take proper measurements before you hang the grow lights.
- At times, the holes that you make on the ceilings may cause damage to the well-being of the ceiling.
6 steps to hang the grow lights successfully from your ceiling
You can follow the below-mentioned steps to hang the grow lights without any hassles:
1. Select the right place on the ceiling
Irrespective of how much weight you hang from your ceiling, the starting point should be the studs. That is because you cannot hang them from the ceiling with the help of few hooks only. The lighting systems are quite heavy and need proper support while they are hung on the plants. Therefore, your initial work would be finding a ceiling joist. You can use a stud finder to perform the job successfully. To reconfirm, just knock the area with your knuckles where the stud finder beeps. If it sounds like a hollow space, then you can hang the grow lights from that point.
2. Make holes on the walls
Next, you need to mark the place where you are going to make a hole on the ceiling. Before you do it, you need to be aware of what kind of system you are going to use for the entire lighting system. Here you will get two options and they are:
- You can install light hangers directly with a hook from the ceiling.
- Alternatively, you can get a joist installed for the completely heavy-light system.
No matter whichever option you choose, you will have to make few pilot holes into the ceiling. Based on the building of the joist or the number of hooks, you can decide where to hang it from the ceiling. To make things easy, you can make the points with a marker pen or pencil.
3. Install hooks or a joist
This is the most important and complicated step of the entire process. You can either a grow light-reflector combo or several grow lights. If you install grow light-reflector combo it would weigh about 10-20 pounds. For this, you would have to install a wood joist on the ceiling. You would need a wooden joist frame and joist hangers for it. As the ceiling joist is located in one place, set up the number of hook screws over the wooden joist. This will support the light-reflector combos that you need to hang. If you are installing single grow lights, it gets a bit easier. The steps involved are:
- Place the hook screws into the hole that you have made from the ceiling.
- Turn and twist it clockwise and keep applying firm pressure.
- When it flushes with the ceiling, stop twisting the hook.
4. Set up a Yo-yo light hanger or rope ratchet
Now that you have to build support centers for the whole light system, you have to place the ropes that will control the height of the lights. To get the maximum yield you need to adjust the height of the light from time to time. You can use Yo-yo hangers or rope ratchets that can be adjusted with a screw drilled into the ceiling. There are two options of the rope ratchet and they are A1/8 and A1/4 nylon rope ratchet. Both can be used for the same purpose, however, capacity eight matters. If you have fewer HPS grow lights or LEDs, A1/8 would be efficient. For heavier equipment like carbon filter r light reflector, go for A1/4. If you want to do the adjustment manually, you can use an S-screw and chain that will hang the lights in the grow room.
5. Hang the lights from the support
When you reach this stage, you are almost done with your job of hanging the lights. You just need to find the spots where you want to hook the screws, If you require more than one hooks for a single light system, you should ensure that you balance the heights proportionately.
6. Set the correct height above the plants
The last work of the process is to set up the plants at a proper height from the plants. It neither should be too close to the plants nor too distantly placed.
The height of the grow lights matter a lot for the growth of your plants. The height of the light changes as per their stages like vegetative, flowering, and seedling stages. You would certainly not want your grow lights to fall upon your plans and cause damage to them. Therefore, you must hang the lights on the grow room ceiling and hang them properly. Before you start with the process, you can go through the various steps mentioned here. If you can follow the steps correctly, you will be able to place your grow lights in the right position. If required, you can take the advice of an expert grower. They would be able to help you with their real-life experiences so that there is no scope for mistakes.
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FAQs
What grow lights are needed for?
Grow lights are needed for indoor plants as it helps them to grow. With the help of grow lights, you can cultivate a wide range of plants in any climate. These LED grow lights are designed to replace natural sunlight, and thus, help in stimulating photosynthesis in your indoor plants.
Do grow lights make any difference?
The short answer is yes. The best thing about LED lights is that they are customizable. Every LED bulb is unique and produces the perfect mix of blue, red, and other wavelengths that are needed by your plants. White light is great for growing plants.
What are the struggles of hanging grow lights from the ceiling?
Most growers struggle when trying to hang grow lights from the ceiling. Some of the problems are:
- Supporting hooks are too weak to hold on to the LED lights
- Holes made in the ceilings could lead to ceiling damage
- Height is difficult to adjust
Can LED light be used as a grow light?
Yes, you can use an LED bulb as grow lights for your plants. Just make sure that they produce enough light. That’s because plants need warmth from the light source.
Should I buy cheap cannabis grow lights?
When buying grow lights for your grow room, we’d recommend choosing the LED grow lights instead of the other variants. LED grow lights typically start from as low as $50 and can go over $500 and more. It depends on the setup and arrangement.
If you are reaching for the cheaper variants from unreliable brands, it will reflect on the overall quality and usage. They don’t last much longer and tend to get overheated a lot quicker than you anticipate. So, the value of money is not great.
Will hanging grow lights from the ceiling cover the entire grow room?
This depends on the coverage of the grow lights you are installing. Typically, they do take care of the coverage and ensure to provide the same range of light intensity to every part of the plant. However, we’d recommend that you still check the coverage before buying one online or offline.
Is blue grow light better for cannabis?
Cannabis strains have very specific requirements when it comes to their growth. So, if you are installing new grow lights in the room, we’d recommend using the white grow lights instead of the blue lights. The white grow lights are exponentially a better choice compared to the blue grow light.
The cannabis plants require blue light exposure during the vegetative stage, so you can adjust it according to the needs.
Can I keep the grow light switched on for 24 hours?
If you are attaching the grow light from the ceiling, we wouldn’t recommend keeping it switched on for 24 hours. This will drastically affect the plant’s vitality and also alter the yield. 16-18 hours or less is considered ideal. However, this will also vary depending on the type of strain you are growing.
A rotating team of writers and editors dedicated to providing reliable information for the readers of American Promise. We’re all passionate about cannabis and actively engaged in this “budding” industry.
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