Ok folks, I am attempting my fifth and best grow yet. So far i have had mixed results growing, its been a learning as i go process. I have picked up on many good and useful pointers on rollitup ever since my first grow. I intend on making this my most controlled grow yet. I have had all sorts of problems previously; ranging from lighting, to humidity, to temp, to grow space, to ventilation and so on and so forth. So i sat down and thought about this one long and hard before i came up with this final design. My construction is not yet complete but I have some pics of my progress so far and would like as much feedback as necessary.
The basic design:
I am using one of my bedroom closets for the "stealthiness" so to say, but what i did was frame out a 3ft by 3 ft br 5 1/2 ft 'grow closet' inside of it. Using the whole closet i found my hps was too small, and i had problems with light leak and temperatures keeping the closet door shut. i was not able to move air in and out sufficiently. With this set up i figure i dont have to keep the closet door shut completely because i can trap the light into the smaller closet i framed out inside. I figure this should also help me regulate temperature and humidity easier since it should be more of a controlled environment. My humidity in the past has ran about 35%. So my intention is to pick up a small humidifier for this grow and raise it to about 50%. I ll use a gallon jug with a sugar, yeast and water mixture for CO2. I have an 80 cfm fan working as intake on the left side framed into another box and padded to keep the noise down. I am planning on getting a bigger fan for the out take which you can see by the hole cut out on the top of the cabinet by the light. In the past i have used five gallon buckets for my plants, but i feel these may be too big. And just so you know i have a board cut 3 ft by 6 ft that fits real snug in the front to cover up the 'closet' i built not shown in the pictures. I will be painting the inside of the closet with flat white paint also.
Here are my questions for this grow:
Is this 400 watt hps going to be a good size for this closet?
Will 2.5 gallon buckets be big enough for my plants?
Does my exhaust sound practical for this space?
oh and i do have chains to raise and lower my light, i was just measuring light space between projected canopy height and hps with where its hanging in the picture
the light with your space is good. exhaust sounds fine but you may want one mroe for air intake. I use 5 gallon pickle buckets for my grows of regular variety and 2 gallon for my lowryders nad havent had a problem yet.
I think it is a good setup. I would say that the 400w will be efficient. How many plants do you plan on having in this grow space 4? About the 2.5gal I am not sure, are you trying to keep them small? can you fit bigger pots in the closet?
i can fit four five gallon buckets in the closet. I am planning on using LST techniques to keep them from growing too tall. That has been a major problem i have had in the past. The plants were growing over 6ft tall and thats just not efficient with the 400 w hps. I was thinking if i used 2.5 gallon buckets that may help keep them smaller, but wasnt sure if it would constrict their root growth too much. Maybe i should just stick with the five gallon buckets and fill up maybe the bottom eight of the buckets with rocks, to help with drainage.
i can fit four five gallon buckets in the closet. I am planning on using LST techniques to keep them from growing too tall. That has been a major problem i have had in the past. The plants were growing over 6ft tall and thats just not efficient with the 400 w hps. I was thinking if i used 2.5 gallon buckets that may help keep them smaller, but wasnt sure if it would constrict their root growth too much. Maybe i should just stick with the five gallon buckets and fill up maybe the bottom eight of the buckets with rocks, to help with drainage.
It just seems like 2.5gal are small but 5gal may be to big. LST should work well for the girls. I think I am going to have to star some of that myself. If the medium you use has good drainage I dont think rocks would be necessary, on the other hand if the soil doesn't drain great then its a smart idea. My guess is that the 2.5gal will constrict the roots but thats just my .02 get some other opinions on it for sure.
i have used 2.5 gallon buckets before, but thats when i was running a 150 watt hps with cfl's. I was able to grow two nice plants that did not get too big. I am thinking though i may be able to maneuver the 5 gallon buckets ok as long as i LST the ladies. I was thinking of possibly going scrog otherwise. I think both methods would be effective in my space, i just dont know which one exactly yet. But i am leaning towards the LST for the simple fact of it would making flushing simpler.
i like lst but its a bitch to keep tying it down vs just moving it over a [] in scrog...but with the scrog if you dont have enough room inbetween the base of your plant and the bottom of the screen your going to have trouble trimming the under brush
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New 400 watt hps grow, need some feedback pls
Originally Posted by toaster
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