First grow ever, a few lighting questions.

Hey everyone, first grow coming up soon. I've done as much research as I can, I'm not one to just count on the research of others in a forum for all my info, but I'm hitting some roadblocks. Here's my plan of attack so far:
1. AK48 seeds - chosen for yield potential and speed of cycle to get what I'm sure will be many mistakes out of the way
2. DWC grow - not redistributed to start (completely autonomous buckets), though I'll probably move to that once I get my process down.
3. We'll be growing in a shed. Lining/paint not sure yet, three, maybe four separate rooms.

The question is lighting. Because initial budget is tight but I'm looking for yield, I'm leaning toward a 1000 watt HPS. Is this one lamp good for 4-6 plants?

Also, originally I had considered staggering. Starting with two plants, two weeks later two more, etc. so that I could hopefully rear the newer plants with lessons learned from the older ones. With one lamp, it'd obviously not be wise to have plants growing at different heights under one lamp, correct?

If these questions make me sound like someone who doesn't know what they're doing, I'd call that pretty accurate. Any help appreciated, thanks.

first off
go soil since it is more forgiven.............hydro if something goes wrong u can lose the plant fast and since u are new it will (murpay law if it can go wrong it will go wrong)

second look at a autoflowering ...............they have ones that can do LB a plant (auto pounder/biodiesel mass) ...........u are new this will remove the light cycle and all that for this grow so u get product ............and with a 60 to 90 day turn around on the plants u could be all covered and repaied on the money u put out with in 60 days

thrid go for a 600 watt system .............u can pick up a whole system (lights MH and HPS ballast cooltube timer and rope ratches to hang it ) for 167 bucks ..........some of the better bulbs for the 1000watt cost this much ......................u will get more bang for the buck and with several of them u get more light and instead of getting a dual arc bulbs for 1000w u can just use a HPS and MH at the same time for 140000 lumens........2 hps would be 180000 lumens

justugh said:

first off
go soil since it is more forgiven.............hydro if something goes wrong u can lose the plant fast and since u are new it will (murpay law if it can go wrong it will go wrong)

second look at a autoflowering ...............they have ones that can do LB a plant (auto pounder/biodiesel mass) ...........u are new this will remove the light cycle and all that for this grow so u get product ............and with a 60 to 90 day turn around on the plants u could be all covered and repaied on the money u put out with in 60 days

thrid go for a 600 watt system .............u can pick up a whole system (lights MH and HPS ballast cooltube timer and rope ratches to hang it ) for 167 bucks ..........some of the better bulbs for the 1000watt cost this much ......................u will get more bang for the buck and with several of them u get more light and instead of getting a dual arc bulbs for 1000w u can just use a HPS and MH at the same time for 140000 lumens........2 hps would be 180000 lumens

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i tend to agree about the 600 watter. a 1k lamp seems to be a bit of overkill for 4-6 plants imo.. it can be done of course, but bigger isn't always better ime..

i'm not a fan of auto's, and a pound per plant for an auto?? jesu.. not sure on that one either.. not saying it can't be done, but you better have your setup super dialed in if you want to get any where near those kind of numbers.. also, auto's use ruderalis genetics, which is basically ditch weed with lil to no potency, so obviously breeding with that is going to lower your potency..

as far as the stagering, you could always do that, but you'd probably won't at least two rooms to do something like this, one for veg, and one for flowering.. start from seeds, go how ever many of weeks, start some more seeds, or take clones from the first set of plants would be even better, move the first set into flower, and start vegging the clones for x amount of weeks.. move the clones into the flower room after you take a set of clones off of them for the next run.. this is called perpetual harvest and works great if you have it down pat..

and lastly, i have seen people come out of the box and jump right into hydro, although i am a dirt grower and never grown hydro myself.. some people fail at hydro at first and some do great and never have an issue.. some people also can't grow in soil right away either, so it's not really just a hydro thing, although if you mess up in hydro, it's much less forgiving than soil for sure.. if you feel like you know what you're doing, i'm not one to talk you out of it..

btw, you could always train your plants with say lst to keep them all the same height if that would be an issue for your style of grow, that way you could have different aged plants in the same grow space and not worry about it too much..

i did my work on autos ....................if the plant outside gets 80 grams and the one inside can be up to 350 400 grams ...............u can figure safe about a QP or maybe even a HP

as u get better u can pull the lbs they talk about .........................i was a t5 system and getting a OZ off each plant different strain the different with the HID is so great i have no words for it ...........i am doing a trans siberna (20.4 )thc ........it is into the first week of flowering oh my god bud sites all over and they are thicking fast........the stalk of the plant is the size of my thumb (maybe big toe now) and i am a 230 lbs 6 foot guy

I would agree with the last to posts. I tried a DWC grow for my first one in my early 20's only to have disastrous results. DWC is probably the hardest and most equipment heavy style of hydro you can do. I'm not trying to stomp of your plan, I just think you probably would be better off getting your feet wet with something a little simpler. The basic rule of all engineering is more moving parts is more stuff to go wrong. I do a top feed hydro system in a coco medium, very simple. Basically just like you would water any house plant. With DWC, your well has to be properly aerated, the water has to be the right temp, your ppm's have to be perfect, it's a giant pain in the ass.

I stagger my crops but it does take a good deal of space. About 75 square feet for me. If you want to stagger in a small space you probably want to look into vertical growing. There is a dude on RIU called Heath Robinson who is a vertical genius who gets more then 2 pounds per 1000 watts of light.

https://www.rollitup.org/grow-journals/133316-heaths-ghetto-grow.html

Good info man, thanks (and thanks to you all for your input so far).
Your take on DWC is interesting sikkinixx... so much of what I've seen on this forum and others has been selling it as SUCH an easy, close to full proof system. And that's really what I'm looking for. I know nothing is full proof, anything worth doing ain't necesarilly easy, etc. I've got about three more weeks I'll be able to dedicate to research before I'm ready to start germing my seeds... So the closest I can get to something that will be simple and high(ish) yielding, the better, obviously.

So given all this info, what do you guys think about Hempy buckets? I've heard a lot of good stuff about this setup, and that in ways it's similar but without nearly as much risk...
[h=3]Oneshot Grow Guide - Episode 3 : Hempy Buckets - YouTube[/h]

http://www.amazon.com/General-Hydroponics-GH4120-WaterFarm-Complete/dp/B001ID8CMG/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1376162565&sr=8-3&keywords=waterfarms

same thing ...................it is still a hydro system ............if u need to turn something around for sure do soil and run one hydro if u put all your cards into something goes wrong (root slime temp troubles .....something not forseen) like hydro does untill u have done it a few time

if u are going to do the hemp bucket thing thin order that water farm atleast that gives u a decent shot (rem when u get it to clean it before using it )

justugh said:

http://www.amazon.com/General-Hydroponics-GH4120-WaterFarm-Complete/dp/B001ID8CMG/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1376162565&sr=8-3&keywords=waterfarms


if u are going to do the hemp bucket thing thin order that water farm atleast that gives u a decent shot (rem when u get it to clean it before using it )

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This looks more like something for a DWC setup though... with the risks I've been newly finding out about such a setup, it just has a water level indicator. I'm looking now to something more simple, like this. All thoughts appreciated:
http://bubbleponics.com/forum/showthread.php?3455-An-Idiot-s-Guide-to-Hempy

with dwc its important to not let the water get warm. ive had and seen other gardens become a total loss because of this. feeding is easy but chillers can be costly and def run up the power bill. im a coco guy myself. its cheap, fun and easy

racerboy71 said:

i tend to agree about the 600 watter.

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If I end up going with separate rooms for grow and bloom, what would you recommend for second light?

600 watts .........the bulbs are cheaper then the 1000w even the good ones ...........been looking at digilux ones they are designed for digital ballast......MH and HPS seem to have good light spec graphs mh has little more red then normal and hps has little more blue .......and the lumen outputs are little higher then avg bulbs for same watts

with the price of the 600w for a full system compared to one bulb 1000 watt the good one

u can even do a open hood or ........just have one or 2 cool tubes to extract the air

justugh said:

u can even do a open hood or ........just have one or 2 cool tubes to extract the air

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You guys have been very helpful so far, so I'll ask here what I also asked in the room setup forum...
I've got two fans, and that's all I've got and will be able to afford til I can throw more cash at my room.
The way it was explained to me was "simple, you throw your smaller fan near the floor pulling air into vent leading to lamp, then your larger exhaust fan is hooked to reflector pulling air out of lamp and vent out of room. Negative pressure, cools lights, etc"


but now as I'm mentally mapping out the (imagined, since I'm inexperienced) science of the room, I'm wondering isn't that not enough? Especially with a glass sealed reflector, that can't possibly be pumping the air needed for the room itself can it? I'm planning on having some oscillating fans to move wind around, but do I need separate exhaust/intake (or maybe just exhaust for passive intake) for the room ITSELF?


I've also thought maybe of having the intake fan just pumping air into the room, and having one side of the lamp open so that the exhaust fan hooked to the lamp pulls the room air through and out of the room?


As always, ANY AND ALL INSIGHT APPRECIATED.

Got this figured out, thanks.