I completely disagree with everyone who says 'just pay your bill and nothing will happen.'
I pay my bill every month on time, and we went from 3 1000w hps and 2 400w mh,(about $550) to 5 1000w hps (about $700) and within a month I had the electric company come, turn off my power for 1-2 minutes while they switched my meter box out to replace it with a new one. Then the same guy came out 3 times a week for 2 weeks to check the meter and make sure the same consumption was going on. (Electricity company told me all of this)
When I called the electric company to see what was going on, why there was always someone comin by and why I hadnt received a notice or anything, they said that when my meter reached about 113 kw / day (I believe that was the number) it sent out a red flag to the company saying too much energy was being taken in, and to check the meter to see if something was wrong with it. I told the guy I had 4 other roommates and that at any given time someone was always home using something. He then informed me that for the energy we were using, it would have to be a family of 10, all of them never leaving the house, for that much energy to be used.
I immediately went back to 3 1000w (fucked myself btw) and went 16/8 in my mother/veg room. I havent seen him since then, but then again I havent called, and I only saw him the one time when he turned my power off and I damn near had a heart attack right on the spot.
So.... bullshit they dont care.... or.. I'd like to hear from someone whos running a REAL, FULL set up without extra juice coming in from an outside source, or rigging their box, and see what they have to say.
Whats up guys, i never reveal my secerts, but you all seem pretty kool. I also am answering this thread because of the person who wishes to run a large grow show. I have done large grow shows, and let me warn everyone out there that in a residential home, you can ONLY draw SO much power before, like said, you would have to have 10 people crammed into a 3 or 4 bedroom home. 24 HID lights in a residential home is insane. You can only run, as a rule of thumb, 1,200 watts per bedroom, a 3 bedroom house therefore can use between 3,600 and 4,000 watts per month without much suspicion, and yes ALWAYS PAY YOUR BILL ON TIME, that goes without being said. Also, do NOT add 3 or 4 lights at once when you never had any, UNLESS you start using this much the second you move in. A constant level of usage deems as being normal. So when we do residential grows, the second we move in we instantly use alot of power to push up our highest usage peak. They track that shit. Now every state is different. I am in a non medical state, but i live in a VERY HOT state, so Air conditioners are used for about 10 months out of the year, year round, i also live in a city of 1.5 million. High bills here dont turn heads to much, everyone's bill is about 400 to 500 a month depending on size of home etc. Last grow house we had, we were running 5,000 to 6,000 watts wide open with no problems, the electric company uses electric reader devices in our area as well, meaning that a technician needs not walk up to read your meter, he simply drives by and uses a digital device to capture your usage. I noticed a new tab on the meter 3 months into our grow, so i am sure in any place it's defacto to check to make sure the meter is operating correctly when large amounts are being sold to the customer, remember, you are there customer, that reason is to make sure your not getting charged for power your not using, once again protecting there customers. The power company WILL give your info over to police, BUT ONLY IF THE POLICE COME KNOCKING on there door, asking about there customer at 3674 evergreen terrace. Otherwise who the fuck cares. Second. Start off smaller, we produced fine crops with (3) 1,000 watt lights, (1) 1,000 watt light for our mothers, using 2 portable A/C units (never use the main HVAC, if it breaks and you cant fix it, it's kinda hard to get it "serviced" with 300 plants hanging around and the place a mess with equipment and what not. SOOOO like i tell many greenhorns, dont tap into your central unit, most people dont change filters often enough and run it to low, so it freezes up and fucks up. We also used standard t8 and t5 for our cloning area. A bunch of fans, blah blah blah, our bill was 700$ a month, actual power cost was only 475$, the rest was taxes and fee's, fucking Nazi power fucks. Anyhow, we were able to produce a nice 5 crop outs in one year, it paid for itself, and we made enough money to then MOVE UP. FUCK RESIDENTIAL if you are thinking about doing anything larger then the specs i just spoke of. Dont even think about running more power than you need. IF you want to do it right, you must aquire a COMMERCIAL WAREHOUSE space. BUY one, thats better than renting, we do rent one, but we scoped it out, the guy who owns it did everything on a handshake, and be pay our rent one week in advance every month. He has cancer anyhow, so he's busy with other things, besides were a commercial business. It's all about show, our team is in the construction business, so we have trailers, trucks, vans, we look legit. You are going to need construction experience to do this right, and know about electricity. We use a 50 amp breaker, we run it to a special unit made for hydro growing, it then has plugs for you can just plug your ballast's right into it, it runs 8 lights. As easy as running a 10 gauge wire to your box, then insert on the box the correct breaker, it has a spine that it snaps into, you can safely remove any of this with the power on, the BLACK wire goes to your breaker connection. The WHITE wire, and ground wire goes to your BUSBAR, you will see other white and ground wires terminated into this location i am speaking of. Put it anywhere on the BUSBAR it does not matter, the BLACK is HOT, the WHITE IS a NEUTRAL or GROUND, they added a ground wire in the 70's, before that wires where only black and white. NOW thats simple!! A 15 amp breaker will run (1) 1,000 watt light, a light mover, perhaps a fan, at that point your close to 15 amps, but you must leave a few amps for overload pressure. So a 30 amp breaker will run (2) 1,000 watts plus a little more. Now if you do it this way, you simply run your wire from the box to your ballast. We have found that spending the extra money and buying the right equipment makes it far more easier to skin this cat, i'll get you details on the controller unit we are using. The last tennat in out warehouse was a Printer, he had huge printing machices, and we currently have 3 large breaker boxes, we only use one as of now. ALSO ANOTHER SECERT. USE LIGHT MOVERS, they work, and decrease the amount of lights you need, also WE USE COOL TUBE lights, connected to a 2,750 RPM blower. This makes makes keeping the room much easier to air condition. We build our own flowring chambers. they are 8ftw x 18ft long x 10 ft high. We make our own walls, insulate them, make them light tight, we use flat white paint and some mylar. We then build a plant table out of 2x4's and plywood. The table is 60inchs wide x 15 foot, 24 inchs high on the back and 18 inchs on the front, allowing pitch for our water to flow. This leaves about a 1 foot space completely around the table for walking and maintience. the front has 2 foot of space to accomadate a a/c and dehumidifer unit. We have a Light Rail brand light mover, with (2) 6.5 foot light rails, the unit moves (2) 1,000 watt lights back and forth quite quickly, the cool tubes, like i said are daisy chanined with air ducting, the fan is installed outside the room, and the duct blows the out air into the attic. Therefore, the air that cools the light, never comes in contact with the contaminated air in the grow room. the a/c unit ducts it's hot air into the attic as well, however we do use a OZONE generator to scrub the attic air for paranoria and safety. Your probably doing the math and thinking, thats not enough light, but with the light mover, light speaders, bat wings, and the fact that i can have my lights very close to the canopy with no burn, it works like a charm, i would say it's dong the work of (4) 1,000 watt lights. BUT the setup is painstaking, and you need a hand, and it takes some tweaking. We also use propane CO2 generators, VERY CHEAP, 1 normal size propane tank, like for your grill, i think it's 25 lbs or something, will give us 3 months of CO2 enrichment, thats 24$ to fill it up divided by 3 months, MUCH CHEAPER than those stupid co2 tanks and shitty emmiters that break!! Anyhow, any questions, please ask, we currently are running 200 flowering plants, have 20 mothers, and a butt load of clones, i have been through this many times and would love to help any greenhorns and other seasoned vets alike.
