First grow build, advice appreciated.

jdmshiz

Member
Hello everyone, this is my first attempt at building an aero/hydro system and grow room. Everything is for medical purposes only.

I put together my own little sealed grow tent, the size is 8x9 with 7.5 ft ceiling.



The frame might be over kill but i was having fun :bigjoint:. I will also build a veg room in the near future with a 600 watt to get a good cycle going.



For my grow setup i was planning on using 6" pvc with misters for the roots. My plan was to run 6 nice sized plants to yield 500-600 grams per 1000w light.

Here is a picture of what i was building. It is a 4x2 table and now realizing i should expand it to 4x4 (which i will do later)





Im starting to wonder if 6 nice sized plants will grow in such a small PVC pipe.
Will the pipe allow enough room for root expansion to grow nice sized plants?
Im starting to think this over and wondering if im better off with a SOG setup.
With this much light and space what would you guys be doing? (Max yield is the motive, i will have a veg room as well)
 

Twohearted

Well-Known Member
Your room looks solid, and I think that those tubes are probably a fine size to hold 2 plants each, but, if this is your first grow I would recommend doing at least 1 run in soil to get the basics of growing. Your yield expectations are very high even for a grower with lots of experience. I have seen several new growers in my area jump in way over their head with a fancy hydro setup and then really struggle with it.
 

jdmshiz

Member
I have read alot about people getting up to 3-4 oz's per plant, but will this tubing restrict that kind of growth? I'm honestly thinking about changing my mind on the hydro stuff and just going soil.
 

halfaweek

Active Member
that kind of production from a plant comes from understanding of grow methods traning your plants and figuring out what not to do and what to do i would start with a soil grow from the first time. hydro can be a hard thing to do because your mistakes will not be buffered by the soil
 

JackStrawFromWichita

Well-Known Member
1) ventilation. don't mean to sound like a dick but if this is your first serious grow you've greatly underestimated you ventilation capacity and needs. get an oscillating fan to circulate the air between the plant canopy and lights as well. you have to have a way to bring air in from the outside and push it back out. best to have a bit of a buffer area for this.

2) if this is your first time, grow in soil.

3) pH. Know your soil's pH, know the pH of any nutrient solution or water you give to your plant, take note of it, and try to give it optimal levels on both fronts. people will tell you pH doesn't matter with soil - they're fucking liars. it'll help buffer pH imbalances which will minimize the impact of a lot of 'rookie mistakes' but things can still get thrown out of whack and you won't get optimal results unless you're smart about it or just plain lucky. unless you're color blind it's really not that hard to measure ph, just get the equipment/supplies you need and read the instructions. I'm not saying you should become obsessed but you should be aware.

4) if you're going organic, aerate your nutrient solution/teas, even if growing in soil. its all about promoting microbial activity to process the organic materials into nutrients the plant can utilize.

5) organic or otherwise, if you're mixing shit together like a mad scientist you're not going to be successful. measure according to instructions but also be wary of the fact that manufacturers instructions on nutrients may not give you the result of optimal pH.

6) not sure if you have enough room to get the 2-3 oz/plant yields you're looking for in those tubes. if you're going for that sort of yield/plant in soil use some 5 gallon buckets. make sure the roots can get air and you have a way to drain off excess water, at the very least use 2 buckets stacked with many holes drilled through one of them.

7) if you havent bought lights yet you might wanna start with 2-3 600watt lights as opposed to 1 or multiple 1000w lights in that space. 1000w are more appropriate for warehouse... you'll be just as efficient if not more with the 600w lights and you'll be able to control temperatures better. 6 2-3 oz plants under a 600w light isn't reaching too high-if you're capable of pulling that off a 1000w light you can probably pull it off a 600w light.



in general, whatever you're doing you're going to have to do it right to get a solid yield like that, no matter what equipment and nutes you have. pay attention to details, don't cut corners. seriously. EVERYTHING matters.
 

Twohearted

Well-Known Member
I agree with Jack about the lights, If you have yet to purchase them go with 600 watt over 1000 watt. In the Flowering space you have 4 600 will give you much better coverage that 2 1000 watt lamps. Even just 2 600s would probably be enough light to get ya started. Also now that we have confirmed that this is you first grow, defiantly got soil for a few runs and learn the basics. Keep coming back with questions and we can probably get ya 2-3 oz per plant on your first run. I also recommend being wary of expensive brand name liquid nutes. Since you are starting fresh just get right into organics, in the long run it will save you money and give you a better product than conventional nutes. I spend less than $40 on my nutes for a whole grow start to finnish guanos, teas and other organic nutrient sources. I have also never ran into a single nutrient lockout issue since I switched to all organic.
 
SOG if you can, means you can go straight to 12/12. If you Like the Hydro idea- i just started using fish bins filled with clay balls and aquarium air stones.. see of green. Timer set off the water pump, lights and air stones off then when it switched off just drained out back to reservoir for dark 12.
After a lot of this and that i just use soil, i buy a specialty tomato mix soil my version of walmart.. and add a bit of supermarket flower food and...best results yet.
 
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