# Pro Grow LED Run #1, Super Cali Haze, Onyx, Blackbriar, and Blue Diesel



## hoss12781 (Jun 29, 2011)

After having many successful runs with hps lights, at the end having two 400w hps dedicated to four autoflowering plants I realized the electricity and heat were way too much for my closet in my spare bedroom.

I've bet the farm so to speak on LEDs. As of now I have 4 going, 3 from short stuff (cali haze, blue diesel, and onyx), and one of my own creation having bred a super stud male Auto Assassin, some great local photo period Lemon G, and MI-5. It took several gens but is now autoflowering and relatively stable.

The set up - 1 - 180w PG LED from Hydropnics Hut, one 90w UFO from Led Wholesalers, 3 68w 2700k CFLS, 1 105w 5000k CFL, 1 105w 2700k cfl. Miracle grow moisture control potting soil with limited fox farm nutes added when I think they need em. 

After being shockingly happy with the 180 PG I will add another next week either a 260 PG or another 180 PG. I'll also add that I'm not affiliated with any LED company and just sharing my honest experience so if you're here to hate please don't. I aim to see if I can use this tech to pull the avg of 1.5-2 oz dried off autos like I did with my old HPS set up.

So we're on day 36 for the onyx, cali, and blackbriar (Robert Ludlum anyone?). The blue diesel was a freebie seed that is now on day 50. IMHO short stuff seeds is the tits, but haven't necessarily been impressed with the yields on the blue diesels I've grown. The smoke is good but I usually only pull an oz with strong HPS lights.

As for the LED performance thus far I am terribly upset with the 90w from LED Wholesalers. Upon further research I found they have a "F" BBB rating and their lights are most definitely from China. The 180 PG while a higher wattage lamp is easily performing at 3x the rate of the UFO. What is also interesting to note is the 30 day warranty offered by LED Wholesalers vs. the 3 year warranty from Hydro Hut. The difference in visible (at least to this human's eye) spectrum is profound. The UFO is more of a violet hue where the Pro Grow looks similar actual sunlight. This will be the end of my rant on LED Wholesalers, I'm just upset with myself for not doing better research before I shelled out $125 bucks on this light. On the bright side it would appear that the Pro Grow's "got what plants crave" (Mike Judge anyone?).

Pics below. I'm gonna update as soon as my new LED from Hydroponics Hut arrives or this time next week, whatever comes first. After that I suspect I'll be able to remove some of the CLFs without harming yield. The onyx that is just under CFL right now will also be moved in with the rest when my other light arrives.

Your thoughts and musing are welcome and will be taken into consideration. Thanks for checkin my journal!


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## goten (Jul 1, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> View attachment 1670290After having many successful runs with hps lights, at the end having two 400w hps dedicated to four autoflowering plants I realized the electricity and heat were way too much for my closet in my spare bedroom.
> 
> I've bet the farm so to speak on LEDs. As of now I have 4 going, 3 from short stuff (cali haze, blue diesel, and onyx), and one of my own creation having bred a super stud male Auto Assassin, some great local photo period Lemon G, and MI-5. It took several gens but is now autoflowering and relatively stable.
> 
> ...


Have you grown any regular size grows under your leds or have they all been autos ? 

also do you live here in the us , just asking cuz you said you get yours from short stuff seeds and i was just curious if they shipped here 

Your plants do look good though my man , + rep

iv never grown autos but iv been thinking about it


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## hoss12781 (Jul 2, 2011)

no I have not grown photo period plants under LEDs. This is the first run I've had with LED period. I chose to use autos because that's what I've primarily grown for the last four years. I'm a hobby grower who just doesn't want to interact with "drug" dealers. Four plants in the rolling hills of Kentucky is a ticketable offense, five is a felony. This keeps me safe from getting screwed by Johnny Law, and keeps my head high when I want it to be. To answer your questions I do believe these lights will grow photo period plants just fine. You might want to top or train to grow bushy instead of lanky. I order all my seeds from dope-seeds.com they always toss in a couple free ones. I also just requested an invoice for an additional 180 Pro Grow from Hydroponics Hut. Hopefully it'll get here soon to join the party.


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## hoss12781 (Jul 2, 2011)

The auto I bred was accomplished using mainly short stuff genetics. In terms of personal experience I can also highly recommend any autoflowering strain from Sweet Seeds. Just ordered some sweet carmel cream, will be in my next run for sure.


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## hoss12781 (Jul 7, 2011)

update - second 180 PG arrived today. The blue diesel was chopped and probably didn't get much out of that one, maybe 20g total. A picture below. For reference that plant was started under hps and did 1/2 of its flowering under it until I moved to LED. As I said above not a huge fan of the bd. 

Was out of town and my blackbriar has picked up a nitrogen deficiency which hopefully will be corrected with some fox farms tiger bloom that was added today. Super Cali Haze is still kicking ass, node spacing excellent, and is about to jump to full blown flower time. The onyx may wind up being a shorty like the blue diesel but the trics are far more plentiful on this one. As always comments and suggestions welcome. Incubating some Santa seeds from Flash, those will be the first to see only LED from seed to harvest. All the CFLs are gone now that my other 180 Pro Grow has joined the party.


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## dannyboy602 (Jul 8, 2011)

Nice. Nice. Nice. I'm glad now I bought two blackstars. Can't wait to harvest. And get that cigarette out of your mouth your a kid for for christ sake....


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## hoss12781 (Jul 11, 2011)

I don't own any blackstars. I considered them until I read some things on this board and other sites that made me scratch them off the list of companies I was considering patronizing. My lights are from LED Wholesalers (a mistake), and Hydroponics Hut (Pro Grow Series - a win).


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## loudpac (Jul 20, 2011)

interested to see what these pro-gro's can really can do... 
i got my chair pulled up.


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## hoss12781 (Jul 21, 2011)

will update with pics tonight. The little onyx is nearing completion and I actually chopped a sample nug off cause my stash ran dry. The blackbrair has recovered well from the nutriet disaster (my 3 year old poured all kinds of tiger bloom and cal mag on all the plants - yikes!). The super cali haze's leaves are curling upward and dying on the tips, but node spacing is excellent and hopefully I'll be able to balance PH/nutes out and finish her well. Impressed with the pro grows. This unfortunately isn't the best run to showcase them, but its cool cause I just got smore MI-5 fems and some carmel cream from sweet seeds. This will be a perpetual journal that documents my journey into the led world. Just like when I started with HPS it takes some time to get used to. I had to re-think the whole watering/nutes game since the heat factor has dropped big time in my closet. I'll post up the pics tonight, as always (constructive) input from everyone is welcome and appreciated.


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## loudpac (Jul 21, 2011)

I see you have a different medium on the soils surface, what is that and what purpose does it serve?
~What do you plan to do for modifying to the led lights in regards to feeding/watering and growing medium?
~are you going to lst, scrog, ccob or just grow these out naturally?


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## hoss12781 (Jul 21, 2011)

grow em out au natural making sure to trim fan leaves to promote the bud site growth, especially during the short veg period of autos. My general rule of thumb with autos is to trim the fan leaves when the branches are almost touching the fan leaf above them. This allows more light to reach them and IMO increases overall yield.

In terms of modifying the watering, I had to use close to 40 oz of water every day when I used 2 400w hps lights. The heat dried out the soil big time. With Leds I have eliminated heat stress issues and have to use about 24 oz of water every other day. 

Honestly this run isn't up to par with my usual grows, and its not the led lights fault. I travel on business, growing is merely a hobby and after being out of town for over a week (my wife helps water when I'm gone) found my son had decided to 'help' by pouring nutes everywhere which royally screwed things up, now its mostly rectified except for the super cali, check pics tonight advice is needed! Of the 5 fem super cali's I ordered this is the only one that has gone this far. As I said above I really do like Short Stuff Seeds but am thinking this strain is either exceptionally fickle with nutes and hard to grow, or was released to the market before it was ready. 

At any rate, as I said this will be a perpetual journal, and next in line is MI-5 a strain I've grow very successfully in the past. I'll also have the caramel cream from sweet seeds which I haven't grown but have used some of their other auto strains. 

All the mediums are the same, I just put rocks on top of the soil because I had a gnat problem from the tomato plants we started right before this grow. Putting perlite or rocks over the top of the soil leaves no room for the gnats to reproduce and eliminates the issue. 

Pics tonight for sure. Thanks for checking my journal loudpac


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## loudpac (Jul 21, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> All the mediums are the same, I just put rocks on top of the soil because I had a gnat problem from the tomato plants we started right before this grow. Putting perlite or rocks over the top of the soil leaves no room for the gnats to reproduce and eliminates the issue.
> 
> Pics tonight for sure. Thanks for checking my journal loudpac


Thats a lifesaver; I had a gnat infestation in my last grow. Didnt seem to affect the growth of the plant at all though, hence y I didnt discover it until like the last week. Flushed one day and next morning I saw the soil literally was drenched in white/opaque larvae.

-Hows the switchable spectrum on the pro-gro's working out? 
-are you goign to try and use the veg mode on your next one to see what it can do or just full spectrum all the way through?


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## hoss12781 (Jul 21, 2011)

Dig the switchable spectrum. I bought my leds after these plants were already started so these were actually vegged under hps/cfl. As the black briar and onyx are in late flowering now I've switched to just the flowering spectrum about a week ago, they've responded well to it. When I get off work I'll post some detailed pics. As I said before this first run with leds and this particular batch has been somewhat basterdized as I was out of state for a week on business, another week for personal vacation, and the nute disaster, but I still expect to pull over an oz off the black briar, maybe 3/4 an oz off the onyx. I usually take way better care of my plants but work and a week in Miami were calling my name. Gonna need some help with the super cali haze to bring her to full term, would appreciate any advice once pics are up. Really looking forward to my next grow. It will be all LED start to finish and I have little doubt the pro grows will deliver the goods.


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## hoss12781 (Jul 21, 2011)

pictures! Please help diagnose the problem with the super cali haze (big one with dead tips everywhere). Black Briar recovering from nute issues well, its the second biggest. The shorty is the onyx, which should be done soon. Pac Man - a demo of the just red spectrum. I snapped a pic without flash under the lights to give you a good idea. Cheers!


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## loudpac (Jul 22, 2011)

That light is def puttin in work.
as for the plant problem, idk if im able to diagnose properly, but heres a link to some problems and cures https://www.rollitup.org/general-marijuana-growing/1469-marijuana-plant-problems-cures.html certainly looks like she'll be able to recoup though.


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## hoss12781 (Jul 22, 2011)

thanks man, from the link possibly potassium toxicity? I honestly have no clue, given I'm using Miracle Grow Moisture Control potting soil and only know my son poured unknown nutes at an unknown level of concentration into the soil its a crap shoot. I'm flushing and hoping the roots will recover. I've noticed they aren't absorbing water like they used to. We'll see ...

By the way my grow room (spare bedroom used for storage, 4 plant pot garden and vegetable garden) is almost always locked with a dead bolt, I just happened to forget and like clockwork my 3 year old made his way in there. I'll be moving the entire set up to a locked grow tent soon enough. By the way where did you order your seeds from your PC Grow? Got mine from dope-seeds.com. They've always came through for me so haven't tried anyone else, but am interested in seeing what others recommend.


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## loudpac (Jul 22, 2011)

I ordered my seeds from http://marijuana-seeds.nl/, i've alway recieved good genetics despite never really hearing about them. I tried out W.O.S (world of seeds) this time around and they seem legit, wont be able to speak on their gentics until i start up my next grow n a few weeks. personally i'd reccomend MS.nl because the deals and package offers they have. Their prices tend to change seasonaly so when they limited time offer they mean it.

As for the girls prob, here's my solution to all probs that i run into.
~usually I roll one up and blow it down to relieve the anxiety from wondering whats going on.
~then head to borders or barnes and noble and pick up a jorge cervantes grow bible or whichever suites my needs
~read until i find what im looking for and return home, works everytime.

ay, cant be too mad at the lil one, just tryna follow in his dads footsteps haha.

one hting i've tried and has worked for (me) is if i cant fix the prob with the soil, i take the plant out wash the dirt(not all but most of it) away leaving me the roots and re-pot. Not advising it just what i do and it's worked for me.


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## hoss12781 (Jul 22, 2011)

Good advice all the way around. I may find myself at B&N looking up some free advice this weekend. The onyx and black briar are well back on track for a decent harvest, but I will resort to cleaning the cali out if nothing else works. She's too big and I've invested too much time to just watch her wither. MI-5 and Sweet Caramel Cream germing in my seed starter right now. Looking forward to round 2 with the pro grows. 

Will also consider the site although it looks like they're based in the Netherlands which scares me just a bit, only because I've read that US Customs tends to flag packages from NL, where dope-seeds is based in the UK, but hell if they shipped them to you (if indeed Cloud 9 is located somewhere in the United States) then I'm down to give 'em a whirl.

I wasn't mad at my son, I am upset with myself for not locking the door, he was just trying to lend a hand. Shit my dad has been growing outdoor in the acres of woods behind his property for years ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-Elr5K2Vuo

Ha!


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## hoss12781 (Jul 22, 2011)

Discount Pro Grows on Ebay!! Thought I'd rep Ben and his summer cleaning on his refurbed Pro Grow lights. Don't know how many he has left to flip but thought I'd let everyone know that I just picked up a 250w PG (2010 model) at a monumental discount compared to the new 260w PGs. Emailed him and asked, if won they do carry the full 3 year factory warranty. Apparently there is some good to Ebay when it comes to LED lights. If the discount is anything like I just picked up it is worth the look.


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## hoss12781 (Jul 28, 2011)

Onyx has been chopped, Black Briar has been chopped. I'm giving the cali some gravity (nutes) to see if I can help her. Haven't tried to re-pot yet that will be the next step if it doesn't clear up. Approx 20g from onyx, 35 from black briar. Sweet carmel cream and MI-5 in the germination station right now. Pics when I get a minute to myself. Black Briar is still curing, onyx is dried and ready. I'm a fan of the led buds over the hid buds. It took a little longer to flower but the wait was worth a "higher" caliber nugget.


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## loudpac (Jul 28, 2011)

good shit brah, anxious to c the pix.. 
in you ropinion, what makes the nug better? 
appearance or smoke?


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## hoss12781 (Jul 28, 2011)

Its all about the taste and getting that grab on the front of my brain that comes from homegrown. The onyx is the pictures that only show a single nug. It yielded 20.5g most of which was gifted to friends and fam. The smoke was tops even though the yield kinda sucked, very spicy. See pic of the onyx bowl I smoked before I wrote this.

Black Briar pics are the hanging buds. I managed to bleach the top of the top nug cause I had her too close to the leds, but other than that it turned out (haven't smoked it going by looks) almost equal in avg hid yield but the buds were way frostier than usual. Pistils also grew out further before retreating back into the buds. 

Next crop will be much improved not that I've more or less figured out how to run these leds. The nute uptake is a bit slower. Don't know of thats because they don't run hot like hid or if it has anything to do with spectrums. Bought grow bags at my local hydro shop and was also given a free sample of gravity nutes which will be added to the next crop. Grow bags are better for led than the pots I'm using now, smaller in diameter but same capacity allowing to better use the directional nature of the lights. 

Also, even though I've defended and advocated its use before - fuck some miracle grow. I picked up some Fox Farms Ocean while I was getting the pots. 

MI-5, Sweet Carmel Cream, Santa, & Smurf Berry will be the next four autos I grow. I wish I knew how to make fem seeds of the auto I bred, just hate growing male plants when I only have a small garden. 

We'll see about the super cali haze. I've got the house to myself this weekend and can finally get around to transplanting. It hasn't responded to what I suspected would be appropriate nutes and flushing.


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## loudpac (Jul 29, 2011)

nice nugs! anxious to c what those pro-grows do starting in the veg stage and all the way through. 
I've fallen in favor of the auto's, but that's probably plays a big part in why the yields are around the ounce mark. But being that its all personal use, it shouldn't matter. 
It looks amazing brah i'd rep ya again for it if i could.. You starting another journal?


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## hoss12781 (Jul 29, 2011)

this will be a perpetual journal. Thanks again for checkin it. Once the seeds pop on the new round I'm going to start it all over again. This was a learning experience with new lighting and I know it can and will be done better in the future.


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## avrum (Jul 29, 2011)

Hey hoss,

I've been thinking about getting a LED panel for my speaker stealth grow.. its 28"H/15.5"W/11.5"D. I was wondering if the 180w panel you got from hydroponicshut.com will fit there.. could you tell me what's the size of the panel? couldn't find the measures in their site..

I'm still not sure if this panel is a bit overkill for the space i have.. what do you think?

cheers


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## hoss12781 (Jul 29, 2011)

The 180w is 16 in by 8 1/4 inch and is 2 inches deep so it will fit and makes sense, I'm assuming you're growing autos right? 

From my experience the 180w Pro-Grow will do 3 autos to full term with little issue, but for max results you should probably dedicate 2 plants to one 180w unit. This is just my experience from using soil as the physical size of the grow bags does make it a bit crowded under the light especially during late flowering. Hope this helps. If you're not planning on growing autos you should think about it given your space. Even with dwarf plants you may get a phenotype that grows tall and could exceed the 28 inches you have allocated.

Also check ebay that's where I got all mine. I was able to score significant discounts compared to the prices on the site (saved at least $200 with the three units I bought). I was screwing around on ebay yesterday and I think there are some 180 Pro-Grows on there.


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## avrum (Jul 29, 2011)

Thanks for the quick response!

Actually I'm growing just 1 photoperiod plant with LST so i'm not too worried about height.. my first grow was in a 17" PC case and i managed to get a decent amount of bud.
If it's 16" then it wont work since I only got 15.5". guess i'll have to look for some other panel that will fit.. the biggest contender right now is the blackstar 180w which is 12"x8.5". I know some people say its not the best panel out there, I still need to research more about it. anyway, right now its the best option cause it fits.

btw, how far from the colas do you keep the light so it wont bleach them?


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## hoss12781 (Jul 29, 2011)

first I'm not gonna talk bad about blackstar but I've read some disturbing things that others have written - that they don't pull the advertised wattage, are made in china, and advertise cree leds when they don't actually use them. That being said I don't own one and can't give a first hand so take it for what you will. After researching their company and comparing price, where the unit was made and backed by the warrant, and especially a 1 vs 3 year warrant I opted to spend a bit more on the pro-grows. I just wanted to make sure the hundreds of dollars spent were gonna cover my lighting needs for at least 3 years to justify the switch from HPS (you have to replace hps bulbs to maintain efficacy every 6-8 mo and hortilux bubs are expensive).

I've seen some kick ass blackstar grows and I'm sure that will work for you if you opt for that model. 

I had the tops too close last run, about 2-3 inches from the top. This will be decreased to about 7-8 inches to test on the next run. Since this was my first led experiment I'm sure I'll keep learning as I grow. Good luck with yours and please post some pics. I'd love to see what the 180 blackstar looks like compared to the hydro hut.


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## avrum (Jul 30, 2011)

well, I might just stay with CFL lights since wasting 7-8 inches of the height i have in that speaker is not very effective... but my LED dream is not dead! I guess I will build some kind of cabinet in the next few months with more space - something like 4'x4'x1.5' and then i'll get a nice led panel to go with it. my speaker will be the veg space, that way i could move one plant to the flower cab every 4-6 weeks.

Thanks for your help and cheers on your grow. i will stick around and follow your thread.


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## hoss12781 (Jul 30, 2011)

Thanks man, good luck with yours too. I used to use the 105w clfs and was happy with the output. Last time I checked there were several brands on 1000bulbs.com in the 20ish USD range. 

If you're happy with the plants you have rock 'em, but if you've ever had the itch female auto seeds are perfect for micro grow personal users. You'll get about an oz off each in 7-8 weeks if done right. If you're only growing two at a time you could stagger them and have an oz every four weeks, not too bad. They only cost on average about 10 bucks a seed and I usually get about an 80% germ rate and so far a %100 female rate on all the fem seeds I've ordered. 

Buzz Lightyear and Rex rocking it out with the Black Briar below. Some baby pics of Sweet Carmel Cream, MI-5, & Smurfberry attached. Got 'em under the veg spectrum for the next two weeks, except for the 250w pro grow which will be running at full capacity. The 180s I have are the 2011 models with full 3w chipsets. The 250 I got on ebay as a factory refurb model. It is much more tuned to flower and has a 3w chipset in reds and a 1w chipset in blues. Pics below attempting to illustrate the difference between 1 and 3w chipsets on the veg spectrum and the reason I wanted the 250 - the 3w flowering set. As always your thoughts and musing are welcome and will be taken into consideration.


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## avrum (Jul 30, 2011)

actually i'm growing an auto right now in my pc until i get the speaker ready to rock.. easyrider (lowryder 2 + ak47). its 25 days old, but still pretty small. that's the main reason why i bought photoperiod seeds for the next grow - you cant really control the size of autos.. if you get a midget then you're stuck with a plant that will produce 10-15 grams if you're lucky, and way less if you're not.


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## hoss12781 (Jul 30, 2011)

Good points made, I have had autos that yielded at the worst 13 g dried, but at the best a tad over 80. I've found that trimming the fan leaves that are blocking light to the colas once the colas are well established is a good route for increasing cola's size & overall yield. No matter what you do, sometimes they just don't get up like you would want them to. I was just never a fan of keeping mothers, cloning, and having to stick to a 12/12 light cycle. To each his own brother. feel free to share pics in my journal or link to yours. Would love to see what you've got cookin.


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## pabloesqobar (Aug 4, 2011)

Just wondering how your super cali haze is doing. I've got one that's getting close to being finished. Haven't seen too much about them on this site.


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## hoss12781 (Aug 5, 2011)

I killed it. It was taking forever to grow and was burnt so badly from the nutrient accident that any smoke achieved would have been really crappy. The way I saw it was I had at least another 50-60 days left on it before it was going to be close to finishing and was unsure about the quality of the finished product. In order to keep within my state's small farm laws I cannot have more than four plants going at once. I had four different strains of kick ass fem auto seeds lying around and wanted to have a nice uniform grow on four plants at a time. She was mulched and put into hash bags which did produce some decent bubble hash so my efforts were not totally wasted on that plant.


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## hoss12781 (Aug 7, 2011)

New babies. Sweet Caramel Cream, Smurfberry, MI-5, & Santa. The sweet caramel is the largest having popped about a week before the others. Veg only spectrum on the two 180s at the ends, I'm leaving the 250 on full illumination, and as you can see the flowering spectrum is far more powerful (1 vs. 3 diodes) than the veg spectrum on this older model. 

Everything's moving along well.


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## tastebud (Aug 8, 2011)

Hello hoss12781,
I just stumbled upon your thread. I too use Hydroponics Hut Progrow 180's. I'm currently about two weeks out from harvest on some photo period fem Northern Lights and Blue Mystic from Nirvana. I started my grow with two 180's and just last week added two more. I like them too. I'm very pleased so far. I've got a question for you. I noticed in your pics (the one showing the top of your lights) that your lights are constructed slightly differently from each other just like mine. The first two that I received have the plug sockets faced a certain way on the case and the switches are far apart. The second two that I received have the plugs turned a different way on the case and the switches are closer together. Normally, I wouldn't care, but the lights look completely different when on as well (the color I mean). One type has more blue light it looks like and one has more red and white. I'm speaking of both pairs of lights with both spectrums turned on. I definitely see a significant difference. All are 2011 Progrow 180's. So, the question. Do you notice any difference between your 180's? I still like them very much. Not really complaining. Just wondering why they are different. Sorry for the odball question. Don't mean to take away from your journal. 

On a different note, I'm glad I found this thread. I plan on following your journal. I grow small for personal use too. Just started in fact. My first grow. I have a journal going on another forum. Thinking of trying autos. You are inspiring me. Thanks for that. Peace.


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## hoss12781 (Aug 9, 2011)

Happy to answer your questions taste. You probably have two 140s and two 180s. From what I gather from conversations with Ben and what I could find on the net before the 180 there was the 140, before the 260 the 250. The difference is the veg spectrums on the older models. I'm pretty sure the 180 was a more recent addition with the 140s still being sold into 2011. The veg on the 140 and 250 models (the one in the middle on my pics is a 2010 250 model) are only 1 watt veg diodes with 3w flowering diodes. The newer models have full 3w chipsets. Due to this I will not be using the veg only spectrum on the 250 but have found it works wonderfully on the 180s. Here is a link to a journal where someone upgraded from a 140 to a 180. If it looks like anything in these pics then that is probably what you have going on in your garden. If all else fails, email Ben and hydro hut. He'll answer your questions. Thanks for checkin my journal. I'll have some more pics up this weekend.

http://forum.grasscity.com/hydroponic-grow-journals/705349-1st-hydro-grow-blue-mystic-autos.html


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## tastebud (Aug 9, 2011)

Thanks hoss12781. I appreciate the info. Im pleased with my 180's either way. I got them all on eBay for a very good price and they work well. I'll coninue this discussion with Hydroponics hut. Don't want to detract from your journal any further. I will be following along. I'm very interested to see how your progrows work out for you. I'll be done with my grow in about two weeks or so. I'll let you know how mine worked for me if you like. Thanks again for your help.


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## hoss12781 (Aug 10, 2011)

Please feel free to post up your pics in my journal. My only request is to keep conversations civil which it would appear you're able to do. I've had to get mods to kick out two different led haters so far who obviously don't have first hand experience with this tech but wanted to drop in a friendly f-you for some reason or another. I got mine on the ebay as well, scored some fairly scandalous deals compared to retail. Happy harvest!

On a separate note I think I'll be purchasing some leds for side lighting. This makes sense since I always used cfls to back up my hid grows. Found some 50w units that are 18 inches long claiming to produce 4400 lumens - not too shabby. Figure I can hang them horizontally when they are babies then move to a vertical hang when they get older. Here's the site, will probably order one just to test the waters. There are many obvious spelling errors on this guys site but from his youtube vids he seems to know what he's talking about and abiding my my golden rule for purchasing leds he does offer a 3 year warranty. Since this is purely for side lighting purposes I don't want to drop more than $100 bucks on each light.

http://www.growlightpro.com/apps/webstore/products/show/2520243

Edit - nevermind, found a GLH spectra 100w (45 3w epistar chipset driven to about 2.1w each 2011 clearance sale) for $120 free shipping. They retailed for a couple months back for $280 according to this post. That price, with a 5 year warranty is a big bowl of fuck yeah.

http://forum.bubbleponics.com/forum/showthread.php?4755-Amethyst-E%E4rendil-Starring-2-(two)-GrowLEDHydro-Spectra-LED-100w-UFO-s

GLH Spectras were on my short list of lights I originally wanted to purchase for top lighting (in no particular order, based on my research I was down to five difference providers - GLH, Advanced, Hydro Hut, Stealth, and Pro Source) but was able to find my Pro-Grows (which I am still super happy with) on ebay for a fantasticalicious price. I have little doubt this will kick much ass as side lighting. So the total count of true led wattage once the 100w arrives will be 590w of blinding led funk (180 PG pulls 130w each, the 2010 PG 250 I think pulls around 150, the spectra pulls 100, and my pos chinese 90w ufo pulls 80). The led wholesalers 90w ufo will be used for side lighting along with the spectra 100 with the Pro-Grows dedicated to the top. One plant under each 180, 2 under the 250. I may still pick up the 18in 50w panel just to test it out, and keep true to the design of my original hid/cfl set up which employed many 105w cfls as side lighting. I've always been a fan of overkill when it comes to lighting, but I think I may be able to see the light at the end of the tunnel when it comes to purchasing more led grow lights. If I do wind up getting another smaller wattage led to add as side lighting it will be more than enough to blast the hell out of four plants which is all I can grow where I live.

Ebay is good for finding deals on LED lights folks, you just have to research research research before you pull the trigger on any company.


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## PuffPuffPassed (Aug 11, 2011)

Looks like this should be good  Im subbed up.


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## hoss12781 (Aug 11, 2011)

thanks for dropping in man, feel free to post away suggestions at your liesure or pics of your ladies. I'll have pics up soon (today hopefully). I already had to trim the Sweet Carmel to make sure the colas have the room they need to do it to it.


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## hoss12781 (Aug 12, 2011)

moving along, about 2 weeks old as of these pictures. The sweet carmel has shown sex. Just fed with 1/2 normal dose of cal mag, 1/4 normal dose of Tiger Bloom, and the regular dose of Bush Dr.'s microbes. This is my first run with fox farms ocean forest soil. Feeding it what my buddy at the local hydro shop said should be about right for autos this age. Pro-Grow 180s have been switched from veg only spectrum to full illumination and will stay at full until the last two weeks of flowering. I'll turn on the spectra for the left side of the room in a couple days. Anyone using different feeding schedules/nutes with their autos feel free to chime in.


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## StonedGuru (Aug 15, 2011)

No rest for the wicked eh? LED seems to be doing a good job man lookn forward to seeing the sweet caramel and smurfberry, bet that together will make one mouth watering spliffage!


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## hoss12781 (Aug 15, 2011)

No rest indeed. My lights (except for the 90w ufo) have a three year warranty on them. I will be running them 23 hours a day for the next three years, and hopefully beyond, that is unless I decide to go back to growing photo periods which I probably won't. 

On an interesting side note, I was screwing around on Ebay today. To re-iterate what I've posted earlier *I am definitely not a fan of cheap 90w ufos from China and do not recommend anyone use them as primary lighting,* that being said an absurd deal is an absurd deal - I found someone selling a lot of 3 and no one had hopped on the bidding train so I was able to pick up 3 (brand unkown but in "almost new condition" according to the listing) 1w diode 90w ufos for 120 bucks shipped! Assuming this guy is a legit wholesaler and the units arrive functional that was too good to pass up. If they're bullshit, at least I'm covered by Ebay total buyer protection. I know this journal contains a lot of posts about what I've found on Ebay and probably seems like an Ebay commercial at times, but in my experience Ebay is the tits for finding good deals if you do your research. 

At any rate, when they arrive I'll make a judgement call - these _*could*_ make decent side lighting, even if they only toss out 2-3k lumens in a close to correct spectrum, or if I deem them total crap I'll flip two of them on Ebay and easily get my $120 back and have a free cheapo 90w ufo to add into the mix for side lighting. Gotta figure someone will pick up a used 90w for at least 60 bones. 

With 2-180 PGs, 1-250 PG, my shitty 90w UFO from LED wholesalers, and the 100w Spectra UFO from GLH I'm probably well set considering I never have more than 4 growing at any given time, but nothing exceeds like excess. 

Speaking of the 4 I have going right now they are growing very rapidly, with the Smurfberry and Caramel definitely showing faster and more robust branching development than the MI-5 and Santa. I'll update with pics next Friday to show exactly what has gone on since the 12th. They've responded very well to the light feeding I gave them. My target end game for this run is no less than an oz per plant, hopefully close to 2 oz from the caramel and/or smurf. If I'm able to pull that I'll have something to throw at everyone on the led hate wagon and will have fully justified my investment in LEDS by equaling what I used to do with a shit ton of hps and cfl


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## StonedGuru (Aug 15, 2011)

Now thats a deal if it all goes well, I am intrigued by LED but the price usually put me off from what I heard but I am certainly intrigued at such prices, Ill be watching the grow but from what ive seen LED's looks good, Ive got to leave a bit imbetween my next grow so I think ill spy how yours goes before I buy one! This is turned out to be damn fine thread hoss!


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## hoss12781 (Aug 16, 2011)

like I said we'll have to see what they look like when they arrive. They could be total pieces of shit which a lot of generic 90w ufos are. Either way two of my buddies are going to check them when they arrive. If they like they'll each pick one up for $65 and I'll get a freebie. I honestly don't even know how many spectrums they carry, but 3 for $120 is crazy cheap. If I had to guess for that price they're either all blue, all red, or dual band and probably use automotive grade leds. Hopefully I'll be pleasantly suprised. 

If you do wind up getting leds for your garden my advice would be to hunt for bargains on reliable brands Guru. Since mine is pretty much dailed in I just figured I'd make a quick buck by flipping some lights and possibly get something worth while for side lighting. Single watt diode 90w ufos will not deliver the goods as a primary light source. Anyone claiming they are equal to a 400w hid light should be cock smacked and is the reason people have a bad taste in their mouths when it comes to this tech. A good 90 to 100w ufo will cover at the most about a 2X2 foot core coverage area, not close to the outrageous claims most bs scamsters. LEDs are highly directional compared to HID and CFL. Don't get me wrong I love mine and wouldn't consider going back to hid. In terms of what you really need to replace hid/cfls I think even if I don't keep one of the three cheapos I snagged I've replaced my close to 1000w of hid and clf with somewhere in the nieghborhood of 600 watts of led (actual led power output not chipset capacity advertising) to do it effectively.


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## hoss12781 (Aug 19, 2011)

now things get interesting. Note this pictures were taken 7 days after the last pics. They've totally exploded with new growth. The only one that isn't up to snuff is the MI-5 sometimes you get get small auto phenos. Doesn't really matter cause they other ones look like they'll wind up 1 oz plus plants, especially the carmel which is the bushiest of the four. Smurfberry also looking great, and yes Virginia there is a Santa and she will be coming to my house early this year. 

I'll take some better pictures with the leds turned off next week, can't really appreciate how healthy these are turning out with the martians landing in the background.


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## StonedGuru (Aug 19, 2011)

lookn g.oo.d!


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## hoss12781 (Aug 22, 2011)

on an interesting side note one of the 400w air cooled hps digital ballast and hood I sold my buddy when i upgrayeed to led lights has busted. It was less than a year old. Weak sauce GYO, weak sauce. Felt kinda bad about it but I only charged him 60 bones for it to begin with. The air cooled hood retails for almost that. At least it didn't burn his house down and I gave him one of my old 105w clfs to help make it right.


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## StonedGuru (Aug 24, 2011)

Sounds like a decent deal to me =P


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## hoss12781 (Aug 24, 2011)

In case you were curious the 3 90w ufos I got on ebay were legit. They are older dual band single watt diode models which are perfect for side lighting. Some wholesaler was having a bad day - I opened them up and they still had the original msrp tags on them listing $129.99 a piece, I got three of them shipped for $123. Two will be sold well below msrp to friends of mine giving me 10 bucks in my pocket and a free new side light. It is interesting to compare the spectrums employed on these older no name brand models to my other higher end panels and UFOs. The red and blue diodes, while similar to the Pro Grow and GLH diodes are not quite the same shade (or brand) leading me to believe they just threw in whatever was close to disco, labeled it red 660nm, blue 415nm and hoped for the best. In my research I found that 660nm diodes are far more expensive for some reason, but what the plants actually crave for flowering. 

Anyway got a solid deal, if you can pick one up for $50 bucks or less do it any more than that is a rip IMO, but don't expect it to be more than an effective supplimental light. If I have the time I'll take some side by side comparision pictures this weekend when I update. It would also appear that these no names have a larger viewing degree on the diode lens (probably 120 degrees as opposed to the 90 degree - mostly used and 60 degree - sometime used, in higher end models). I guess the idea behind that is to spread it out as far as possible but actually doesn't benefit the plants as much since method basically spreads 1w diodes that don't pennetrate well further apart than a smaller degree angle.


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## StonedGuru (Aug 24, 2011)

Ah nice even for some side lighting and the fact it looks like there are aliens in your cupboard its a good deal especially for your m8s. I think I will invest in a one or two for my next grow after some works done on my house, itll be interesting to see your results. Good if you had kids, dont go in the secret cupboard with the glowing purple light thats where the bogey man lives.


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## hoss12781 (Aug 25, 2011)

that was part of the reason for switching to led. If I did happen to leave the extra bedroom unlocked and my 3 year old happened to get in there and touch a lit hid bulb that would have been seriously bad news. I'm pretty sure it would melt the skin off your hands.


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## StonedGuru (Aug 25, 2011)

Oh deffinately those things burn you before you even touch them!


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## hoss12781 (Aug 27, 2011)

Four weeks and one day as of these pics. They're all kicking ass except for the MI-5, which is unfortunate because I have grown many MI-5's the smoke is fantasticalicious. I managed to bleach the top of the Santa, had her about 4 inches from the top of the pro grow 250. I've moved it back to 6 inches, the bleaching stopped spreading. Just started adding Gravity from Humbolt nutes. Still running Tiger Bloom, Cal Mag, and Bush Dr Mircrobe brew. Using Bush Dr. at full strength and Cal Mag and Tiger at about 1/2 strength as I have found autos don't typically like full doses of nutes (the rec dosages are designed for photo period plants which are a totally different animal).


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## StonedGuru (Aug 27, 2011)

Plants are looking good hoss man, rooms looking creepy..lol also glad to see your N defficeincy is receding.  Im sure MI5 will be fine its in safe hands! I eased up on the nutes as you said the plants are recovering so thanks for that dude  got a quick question if you would oblige- Ive got a very irritating fan leaf on vertigo atm and if I removed her it would make some already decent size nugs very happy but she is very late in, thoughts?


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## loudpac (Aug 27, 2011)

watup hoss,
Are those pro-grows you bought, performing as you expected?
I see all is goign well still.... watching


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## hoss12781 (Aug 27, 2011)

Yes I am very happy with the Pro Grows. If I hadn't found the GLH 100w cheap I would have gotten another PG to round everything out but as is everything is fit for disco. This run is totally equivalent to similar grows I've had under over 1000w of HPS and CFLs and I'm currently only running 690w of electricity so my power bill is also thanking me. Temps in the room are also way easier to control. I'm running about 78 degrees F right now. While my first run was kinda screwed as can be expected when experimenting with new lights this one is legit. I was highly skeptical about leds going into this but figured what the hell I might as well give it a run and if they had failed I could always sell and get my hps back which I will not be doing. I can in good conscience rec that anyone looking to switch to led can buy high end panels from Hydroponics hut and look to use 2/3 the power they had with hps and cfl and get totally equal results. 

Guru - I trim my fan leaves all the way up until the end to make sure colas are getting their due. Some disagree with this strategy and to each his own, but I have found that as long as the bud site attached to the fan leaf in question is growing steadily on its own (sprouting out and forming its own leaves) I can trim it and that trimming will benefit overall yield.


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## StonedGuru (Aug 27, 2011)

Thanks again Hoss, Its not even that healthy a looking fan leave but no the buds have their own leaves so I shall snip! Thanks again dude I appreciate all the help so far


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## hoss12781 (Aug 31, 2011)

I will no longer be using Gravity from Humbolt's Own Nutrients. Glad I only used it twice on this run so far. I will now have to flush. For an explanation see below ...

https://www.rollitup.org/general-marijuana-growing/459639-warning-carcinogens-found-humboldt-countys.html

Was given a 4 oz. sample bottle at my local hydro shop. It was dumped down the toilet this morning.


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## Red1966 (Aug 31, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> Its all about the taste and getting that grab on the front of my brain that comes from homegrown. The onyx is the pictures that only show a single nug. It yielded 20.5g most of which was gifted to friends and fam. The smoke was tops even though the yield kinda sucked, very spicy. See pic of the onyx bowl I smoked before I wrote this.
> 
> Black Briar pics are the hanging buds. I managed to bleach the top of the top nug cause I had her too close to the leds, but other than that it turned out (haven't smoked it going by looks) almost equal in avg hid yield but the buds were way frostier than usual. Pistils also grew out further before retreating back into the buds.
> 
> ...


 To get feminized seeds, just don't harvest your girls. Eventually, some will hermy and pollinate themselves and the others. The resulting seeds will be "feminized" seeds. Don't use the seeds from the girl that hermied, the offspring will be more likely to hermie, and sooner, than the others. Cloning would be more efficient, tho. I'm watching your grow with interest.


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## hydrofarm2011 (Aug 31, 2011)

You get four times harvests if you use LED grow lights , do anybody know which LED grow light is the best for marijuana growing ?


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## Red1966 (Aug 31, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> that was part of the reason for switching to led. If I did happen to leave the extra bedroom unlocked and my 3 year old happened to get in there and touch a lit hid bulb that would have been seriously bad news. I'm pretty sure it would melt the skin off your hands.


Air cooled hoods, man. Mine are barely warm to the touch! By the way, you're lucky your three year old didn't DRINK your nutes. Lock the door!!!!!! Sorry for the rant, I lost a two year old son. That's someplace you don't want to go.


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## hoss12781 (Sep 1, 2011)

[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]In terms of cloning - you can't clone an auto due to its short life cycle, but will try the fem seeds plan with my next batch. I want to get some good sensi off these girls. [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Hydro Farm - I really like my Pro-Grows from www.hydroponicshut.com As stated earlier I would personally only put 2 plants max under each PG 180, although the website says you can fit 3. They are highly efficient full spectrum leds. I like them better than my Grow LED Hydro unit which costs much more retail. Since those are the only two major led players I have experience with that's all I can provide in terms of first hand experience. That, and letting you know the cheap-o 90w ufos that are all over Ebay are really only good for side lighting. If you can pick one up on the cheap, cool, use it for that. If you want a quality led grow invest in a reputable panel for top lighting. I would also say get more quality smaller wattage (180-250) panels as opposed to one monster 500w panel. This allows for a more modular set up where you can move lights around to make sure each plant is getting maximum exposure. It will wind up costing about the same. Just my experience so far. One solid piece of advice would be to not to listen to people spouting off about different led brands on this site unless they have a journal backing it up. A lot of people love to talk shit about this technology without having really used it.[/FONT]


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## hoss12781 (Sep 1, 2011)

Red1966 said:


> Air cooled hoods, man. Mine are barely warm to the touch! By the way, you're lucky your three year old didn't DRINK your nutes. Lock the door!!!!!! Sorry for the rant, I lost a two year old son. That's someplace you don't want to go.


For sure, my spare bedroom is now dead bolted in addition to the lock already on the door. After this grow all future grows will take place in a mylar tent, in the double locked bedroom, with an additional lock on the tent door. All nutes are now hidden well out of reach and curiosity.

I had air cooled hoods on my 400 units, but they still threw out a shit ton of heat. They weren't wired into an exhaust system. It was when I started looking at exhaust fans, venting, ect and that I started taking a serious look at leds. I'm glad I did exhaustive research and found a brand that is working very well for me.


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## StonedGuru (Sep 1, 2011)

Hey Hoss how are the babies?


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## hoss12781 (Sep 1, 2011)

its almost showtime. The caramel is still the king with flowers everywhere. The Santa has formed some quality nuggets as well but the node spacing left a little to be desired. The Smurfberry is rocking very hard, although she would appear to be a week or so behind the Santa and Caramel. The MI-5 is pidly, but forming solid nugs, probably will get a half o off her. The other three will be at least oz yielders, the carmel and the smurf def closer to 2 oz. This judgement based on past experience with autos. Should have at least a quarter pound comprised of four different kinds of funk in about 4 weeks or so. Good bud porn coming this weekend if my g-d internet at home is working by then (killing time at the office right now). The interenet at my house went down cause a squirell chewed through the cable which allowed water to rot the line. Fuckin squirells man.


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## StonedGuru (Sep 1, 2011)

Lol fucking terrorist squirrels! Looking forward to seeing them, they sound promising man!


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## hoss12781 (Sep 2, 2011)

Five weeks old as of today and these pictures. The flower development is really starting to take off. Although the Smurfberry is behind the others in terms of maturity I think it will be a great yielder. So will the Caramel (largest of the four pictured). All but the Smurf got a tad bleached on the tops and some on the sides from having the leds too close. The problem with bleaching is it occurs after you've already done the damage so its kind of bitch to catch but, this being my second led run I think I'm getting the hang of it. Gallons in the pics to give perspective. I imagine myself being stoned to the tits sometime in late Sept/early Oct.

Note the set up on the lights. This is my argument for more smaller wattage panels being better simply for a modular set up. The MI-5 was such a small pheno I can put the 100w GLH on tilt and have it effectively cover the MI-5 and provide a bunch of quality side lighting for the Carmel. When the first one is ready I will plant a new bean under and old floro and move more lights in on the remaining to maximize coverage. You just can't do that with only one large panel. For reference I've probably spent about a grand, maybe a little less on this entire set up.


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## StonedGuru (Sep 2, 2011)

Niceeee your gonna have a hell of a collection and a heavy good yield-they have grown at some speed under those ufos, plus is that a simba toy second pic in man? Lion king is the shit!


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## hoss12781 (Sep 2, 2011)

Busted, it is Simba. You know Disney is re-releasing that in 3D. My son told me I had to sleep with Simba to keep me safe. After I put him to bed last night I put the garden to bed and left Simba to guard the plants.


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## StonedGuru (Sep 2, 2011)

Lol that is a paragraph I will remember for the rest of my life- Your son sounds amazing, your a lucky guy! With the plants I mean  Im actually gonna go see that, feeo baked but yeah I loved Lion king when I was a kid


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## hoss12781 (Sep 6, 2011)

As we are nearing the home stretch on this run I have, as of today, switched all my pro-grows to flowering only spectrum. The flowers are beefing up and I expect these to be done in approx 2-3 weeks, probably closer to 3 weeks. I dig the switchable spectrums, although people have said "you're turning half your lights off ... blah .. blah .. blah". IMO this is no different than swtiching from MH to HPS. If the spectrum isn't what the plants desire during that stage of their lives then why bother. 

Kinda sucks that I am muddling things a bit by having 290w of mixed spectrum leds still in the mix. I am considering flipping the GLH 100w ufo and my quad and dual band 90 watters on Ebay to pick up another PG. The UFOs are honestly shit, the GLH is pretty good - way better than your average led light - but in my opinion uses too many diodes in the blue spectrum to suit my garden's needs. I will continue the rest of this grow with the lights I already own in place and look to possibly go all Pro Grow led when the next run is ready to roll. May hang onto the GLH just to sprout babies. We shall see.


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## BlazedMonkey (Sep 6, 2011)

Very nice grow sir!
So my understanding is you prefer PG over GLH?


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## hoss12781 (Sep 6, 2011)

BlazedMonkey said:


> Very nice grow sir!
> So my understanding is you prefer PG over GLH? And that you use the "veg" spectrum until the last two weeks then switch to "flowering"???


Thanks Monkey. I use the veg only spectrum for the first two weeks of growth, these are all autos so I'm dealing with about 7-8 weeks total grow time. After the first two weeks I introduce the flowering spectrum (full illumination veg and flower turned on, on the PGs). As we are nearing week 6 I have switched to flowering only on the Pro-Grows. It worked well for the flowering development on my last run. 

Yes, given the choice I prefer the Pro-Grows to Grow LED Hydro. Don't get me wrong, they are both very well made products, but I think the GLH is too heavy on the veg side of the spectrum. I'll take a picture to illustrate when I update this weekend. It is probably 60% blues and wide kelvin temp diodes. The only reason I picked up lights that were not Hydro Hut was I either bought them before I found Hydro Hut or found a stupid cheap deal on ebay. Like I said above when this run is over I am strongly considering going all Hydro Hut. I want to be able to have spectrum control over all my leds as I've seen how the plants respond. 

If everything continues the way its going now I'll probably send the powers that be over there (hydro hut) a link to this journal and see if they want to kick me a freebie or heavy discount. Here's to wishful thinking!


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## BlazedMonkey (Sep 6, 2011)

Good luck on getting a freebie 
And thanks for the tips, have you noticed the price dropping on these at all or do you anticipate newer or cheaper versions on the near future???


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## hoss12781 (Sep 6, 2011)

I honestly don't know. Call Ben and ask him, he's the owner of hydro hut. I can tell you to search ebay. Every so often he'll place over stock, usually the 2011 180 unit, or refurbished Pro-Grow 140s and 250s (2010 models that have a full 3w flowering chipset but only a 1w veg chipset) for sale there and you can snag good deals. I got a 250 for $240 bucks that way. Got one of my 180s for $235.
If past behavior is any indication of future behavior I'd wager he'll have something new for 2012 but it will probably be expensive (and worth it).


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## BlazedMonkey (Sep 6, 2011)

Cool thanks for the info! 

Whats the heat like from the 180 PG light? Compared to roughly the same wattage CFLs and HIDs ?


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## hoss12781 (Sep 7, 2011)

way less heat, almost zero. This was the main appeal for me, that and the decreased power consumption. You can't put the plants super close to the light though, even though they don't produce much heat, the intensity of the diodes will bleach the pigment out of your plants. You'll notice on my last pics that I had them a bit too close for about a week on this run and leached a bit of the color off the tops. Doesn't really affect taste or quality as long as it isn't severe bleaching. It kind of looks like a N def, but upon closer inspection it isn't, the lower branches maintained their full color and health. It's a totally different game than hid or cfl, but one that has a quick learning curve. I'm getting the hang of when to move the lights up. 

The difference in temps compared to my old set up was pretty dramatic. My spare bedroom closet used to get close to 100F if not more, now its running in the low 70s, same as the rest of my house. Gotta keep leds with 3w diodes at least 7-8 inches away in flower, 10 in veg. The 2w diode 90w ufo and 1w diode 90w ufo can be put much closer to the plants (4-5 inches).


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## BlazedMonkey (Sep 7, 2011)

Thanks so much for the info! You Irish and Stoney all have great grows that are proving LEDs (at least to me)

Keep up the good growing sir!


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## hoss12781 (Sep 9, 2011)

Six weeks old as of today and these pictures. The sweet caramel is no longer the champion in terms of final yield projections. That crown now belongs to the Smurfberry. The Caramel stopped getting taller and is growing some fat buds but it looks like the smurf kept growing a bit longer and is now starting to plump up everywhere. Even the little MI-5 is starting to show some promise. I may get more than a half bag off her yet.

I flushed with some Sledgehammer yesterday as I noticed a small bit of nute burn and will probably give them one more dose of calmag/tiger bloom, flush next week then run pure water for the rest of this cycle. 

A sample nugget or several may be taken from the santa as she is the most mature of the group. I may actually harvest early just because my DEA friend, that's right I have a friend in the DEA, is moving back to Europe and my wife and I plan on renting a cabin in a nearby state forest to have one last shit kicker with my buddy and his wife. 

My buddy is a translator, he and his wife speak between the two of them 8 different languages. He smokes more pot than I do and apparently that is of no concern to the feds as long as he can provide perfect wire tap translations to break up the Mexican Mafia. He also gets to work remotely and only has to visit his main office once a year. I just like saying I get high on a regular basis with a DEA agent. I have little concern for my personal safety regarding this friend as he and I were college room mates who grew together back in the day. 

Things are moving along swimmingly, even if I do get itchy snipper fingers on the santa be assured the other three will grow to optimum maturity before harvest. I'm just running low on my personal smoke and want some fresh nuggets for this camping extravaganza. View attachment 1778333View attachment 1778335View attachment 1778336View attachment 1778337View attachment 1778338View attachment 1778339View attachment 1778340


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## StonedGuru (Sep 9, 2011)

Looking nice man! Think that will be a nice yield upcoming!


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## pottx (Sep 9, 2011)

Very interesting thread! I may have to go with the pro grows on my next purchase. I spent 300 on the 63 Hydro grow and the 180 pro grows are 300. This is the light your talking about correct?
http://hydroponicshut.com/pro-grow-led-grow-lights.html

Lesson learned and if nothing else it will make a good side light or veg light to start the little guys off. I think for now I will stick to soil and figure out the lighting and venting in my cab. Here are some pics of my setup as of now.

I will be keeping an eye on your future post and grows as well.
Thanks again!


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## fabfun (Sep 9, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> Six weeks old as of today and these pictures. The sweet caramel is no longer the champion in terms of final yield projections. That crown now belongs to the Smurfberry. The Caramel stopped getting taller and is growing some fat buds but it looks like the smurf kept growing a bit longer and is now starting to plump up everywhere. Even the little MI-5 is starting to show some promise. I may get more than a half bag off her yet.
> 
> I flushed with some Sledgehammer yesterday as I noticed a small bit of nute burn and will probably give them one more dose of calmag/tiger bloom, flush next week then run pure water for the rest of this cycle.
> 
> ...


awesome bro 
even the lower buds look like they are filling out


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## hoss12781 (Sep 10, 2011)

Thanks everyone, to answer pottx's question yes that link is to my primary lights. 2 PG 180s and 1 PG 250 as the top lights. The 250 isn't sold anymore, it uses 1w diodes in the veg spectrum, 3w on the flower. I wouldn't use this light to veg with but it kicks ass for flowering.


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## pottx (Sep 10, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> no I have not grown photo period plants under LEDs. This is the first run I've had with LED period. I chose to use autos because that's what I've primarily grown for the last four years. I'm a hobby grower who just doesn't want to interact with "drug" dealers. Four plants in the rolling hills of Kentucky is a ticketable offense, five is a felony. This keeps me safe from getting screwed by Johnny Law, and keeps my head high when I want it to be. To answer your questions I do believe these lights will grow photo period plants just fine. You might want to top or train to grow bushy instead of lanky. I order all my seeds from dope-seeds.com they always toss in a couple free ones. I also just requested an invoice for an additional 180 Pro Grow from Hydroponics Hut. Hopefully it'll get here soon to join the party.


www.dope-seeds.com doesn't ship to us?


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## hoss12781 (Sep 11, 2011)

they did when I placed my last order. Now they don't. They stopped shipping to the US about 4-5 weeks ago, unsure why, probably got in trouble with customs. Fortunately I have 3 fem seeds left (smurf, MI-5, and Caramel). I also have a bunch of free seeds from my last order that could be male or female (snow ryder, onyx, and MI-5). I also still have a shitload of Black Briar seeds (auto I made with a buddy of mine). 
Since my garden is so small I do hate wasting time on male plants. I'll probably look to the Attitude or another reputable seed bank after my next run. Hopefully the three fems I have germ and I'll only have one plant that could possibly wind up male. 
Totally open to suggestions on seed banks for my next order. Please share your personal experience with the seedbanks you've used. It is valued and appreciated. Cheers!


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## BlazedMonkey (Sep 12, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> they did when I placed my last order. Now they don't. They stopped shipping to the US about 4-5 weeks ago, unsure why, probably got in trouble with customs. Fortunately I have 3 fem seeds left (smurf, MI-5, and Caramel). I also have a bunch of free seeds from my last order that could be male or female (snow ryder, onyx, and MI-5). I also still have a shitload of Black Briar seeds (auto I made with a buddy of mine).
> Since my garden is so small I do hate wasting time on male plants. I'll probably look to the Attitude or another reputable seed bank after my next run. Hopefully the three fems I have germ and I'll only have one plant that could possibly wind up male.
> Totally open to suggestions on seed banks for my next order. Please share your personal experience with the seedbanks you've used. It is valued and appreciated. Cheers!


Tried to order through attitude and had problems with the payment/order, so i went with sannies seeds instead(read a bunch of good reviews on them). Not the selection of attitude but i had no problem ordering, got my seeds, and have had a 100% germination out of the 6 ive popped so far. They also throw in free seeds, i got two packs and a third free 

But no clue on finished product/smoke report other than what ive read.


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## hoss12781 (Sep 12, 2011)

Looks to be legit, but unfortunately they don't carry autoflowers besides the original lowryder, which at least in my case, was a disappointing finished product. At any rate plus rep for the point in the right direction. If I ever get the photoperiod itch I'll look to them for my beans.


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## BlazedMonkey (Sep 12, 2011)

Thanks! Just curious why do you prefer autos???


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## hoss12781 (Sep 13, 2011)

There are some really good auto strains out there and for me its about getting the grow done quickly with a smaller flowering period. While I have done photo period grows before I found odor was easier to control with these small plants. I use Ona Gel, and these little guys only really stink for the last two weeks of flowering as opposed to some sativa grows I've done where it was painfully obvious what I was up to the minute you walked in my front door. As long as the quality is there, like it has been with Short Stuff, Sweet Seeds, and Sagmantha autos I'm stuck on those for the quickness and short flowering period. The final weight isn't really that bad either. I went ahead and chopped the Santa although she was a tad pre-mature. Guestimating about an oz off her, which isn't bad given she's only been growing for about 50 or so days. I'll post up some pics soon. The rest of the three will grow to optimal maturity.

They're also pretty cool if you want to do a dual grow. You can set the lights to 23 on 1 off, let the autos do their thing, and meanwhile let some photo period plants veg out big time. After 7-8 weeks your autos are done and now you can flip to a 12/12 and have a massive photoperiod plant.


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## querty (Sep 14, 2011)

Hello there.
I am new to all of this. But after much reading I have decide that LED is the way forward.
Therefore I am on this amazing thread. It is so refreshinng to read a positive thread with such indepth knowledge being shared so freely. So first. A big thank you to hoss for giving me hope.

So I have constructed my grow room.
It is 15 feet long by 7 feet wide by 7.5 feet high.

I have yet to "fit" it out.
My goal is 4 kg per grow cycle. Ambitious, yes maybe, but a goal is needed to measure yourself by.

Below are some specifications for the lamp units which I am looking at.
I would very much apreciate your replies on all of my ideas please.

*The advantages of LEDs are well known and they are widely used in many consumer products. **Due to break- throughs in AlGalnP, InGan and AlGaAs/InGaAs technology, LEDs can be effectively applied to horticulture. LEDs can produce precisely targeted, diffused spectrum at a very high efficiency and optical intensity. We use this technology to synthesize the relative photon charge required for chlorophyll A and B peaks. The units we design are built to create a direct density of photons that are relative to the spectrum's required to stimulate healthy, consistent plant growth in Veg or Flowering cycles. LEDs do this at a much higher energy efficiently in comparison to a HPS with the same relative photon density flux.*
*Full targeted spectrum *
Each LED produces specialized waves of light that increase, encourage and accelerate growth in the different stages of plant development. Our 660nm red spectrum LED is the optimal wavelength for encouraging and increasing the production of fruit and provides growth acceleration in the Veg and flowering stages. Red 630nm and orange 615nm are necessary in smaller amounts to supplement the 660nm and provide consistent healthy growth during flowering. Warm white 2700k is used to provide a highly efficient, full spectrum for flowering to enhance the three diffused flowering targeted spectrum's. Our 445nm-460nm blue & deep blue spectrum LEDs offer the optimal spectrum for strong healthy growth in the vegetative stage and 6,000k cool white provides a highly efficient, full spectrum which supplements growth in all stages of plant development. We have developed our spectrum's over a period of 3 years of testing and we believe these spectrum's and ratios to be the maturity of our work with 3 watt LEDs.
*3 watt LED*
It is common knowledge that LED grow lights are amazing in the vegatative stage but now they are fantastic in the flowering stage too. Due to the intensity of the 3 watt LEDs, light is able to penetrate through the leaves allowing more diffused light to reach the lower canopies. This solves the previous issues of quality, consistency and yield in the flowering stage. Issues that the 1 watt LED units could not address even with concentrated 60 degree beam angles.
FAQ: Why does the power consumption of the unit differ to the units name?
A 3 watt LED means a 3 watt maximum part. Therefore using 288pcs of 3 watt LEDs, 900 watts is the maximum possible power consumption (including fans). All 3 watt LEDs are limited between 2.2 and 2.8 watts per LED depending on the spectrum in order to get the best lumen efficiency, heat dissipation and lifespan from each diode. When 660nm is used as the dominant spectrum on a grow light the power draw can be between one 1:3 and 1:4 less than the maximum possible output of the unit i.e 900 watt. This is because Epistar 660nm LEDs are most efficient at 2.2 watts per diode.
*Lifespan*
All our lights are designed and built to a 50,000 hour lifespan standard though the lights are capable of well surpassing this. The lifespan of the rival high pressure sodium light is between 10,000-24,000 hours.

*1&3 year **warranty's*
We are so confident in the quality of our this product that we offer hassle free 1&3 year warranty on any factory faults and also a standard 28 day return policy.

*Safe heat levels *
Combined with the highly efficient LEDs are high performance fans that are designed to maintain the low temperature of the LEDs and internal power supply's to promote the lifespan of each diode. Heat is transferred from the base of each LED on to our custom made heat sink which is then cooled by the fans and the back and side venting. The heat produced by the 900 watt light is no more then a LED TV for example. ​ 
OK, so that is the technical part. Now specificaly here is the lamp unit at which I am looking to.
It is this companies 900Watt grow panel _5watt LED system_​ 
Well..........I tried to cut and paste but it was having non of it.........this is the only bit that would come through about their 5 watt unit.​ 
*Equally equipped for both the Vegetative and Flowering stages of plant development.*
*Full **Full targeted light spectrum:*​*( Deep Red 232pcs, Red 16pcs, Deep blue 17pcs, Blue 17pcs, Warm white 2pcs, Cool white 2pcs, Orange 2pcs)*
*High power 5 watt LEDs*
Our 5w LEDs provide high light uniformity and produce more direct light than 3 watt LEDs without using focusing optics that decrease the light output. This produces a higher efficiency of delivered light and allows greater penetration through thick foliage.

Here is the link........http://www.grownorthern.com/index.php?option=com_virtuemart&Itemid=15


*Now to me this all reads good...........but what do I know?*
*Before I ask more questions maybe I should wait for feed back on this first.Please be patient as this is my first step into this world.*
*Thank you all for your time.*
*Querty.*​


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## BlazedMonkey (Sep 14, 2011)

Thanks for the info hoss! Never really tried autos but you make some very good points  

querty im sure hoss can help you more than i but glad to have you on the LED side  4kg=~9lbs!!! Damn son shooting high. Youre going to need alot of wattage in there. In my research ive never seen grownorthern but havent looked specifically for them. Do you know of any grow journals using them? 

I have no clue about how well made this is but it goes with your high yield requirements  
http://www.blackdogled.com/products/bd1300
^more for shock value I would go with progrow glh or maybe those northern ones of they're good


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## hoss12781 (Sep 15, 2011)

8.8 lbs is a lot of dope man. I wish you the best of luck but know that this target weight will take a lot of plants and a lof of room. You may be a bit crowded in there to hit that figure. Concerning your lighting choice. It would appear that this company knows their specs and is upfront about the use of step down transformers, diode type, and spectrum. The only thing that concerns me is the 1 year standard, 3 year optional warranty - I'd want the three year to be standard - it should be if they really stand behind their product. Also the beam (viewing angle) is interesting at 120 degrees. That could be because they're using 5w diodes and its ok to spread them out further. For example, my 3w diode lights use a 90 degree viewing angle, a 120 on a 5w probably provides the same amount of intensity as a 3w 90 degree but over a larger footprint. To me it seems legit, but I'd want a three year warranty to justify the cost as that light is pretty expensive. Also the spectrums seem right - that is almost exactly what I'm running on my 7 band Pro-Grows.

I would wager that this light could provide coverage for two photoperiod plants, 3 autos. Again, just my best guestimate having used this technology, but not the item in question. For the price I would suggest going with a company that has a well established track record (journals ect) and offers a 3 year (or more) warranty right off the bat, but that doesn't seem like a bad light - just based on the description.

Back to my grow - my mother in law has been visiting which is why I haven't gotten around to post pictures. The Santa is pretty well dry (quick dried it in cardboard boxes so I can go camping with it this weekend). 32.4g dry. Not bad for an early chop. It only lived 52 days (.6 grams a day). Sweet Caramel is next on the chopping block. I've also moved in the lights since the santa is gone. The smurfberry is getting hit on all sides. A crap-o 90w on its left, a PG 180 on top, and a PG 180 getting the right side. It's loving life and will be the total wieght champion of this round for sure. Hoping for 2 oz off her when all is said and done. Pics as soon as my mother-in-law law GTFO.


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## hoss12781 (Sep 15, 2011)

Also one thing I've found is important regardless of type of light you use is effective side lighting. The pictures I have but have yet to post will illustrate my thesis on why to side light (spoiler alert - the bottom buds grow at the same rate as the top buds). It doesn't matter if you have a large wattage HID or high power led light you'll want some side lighting kicking in on the all angles to orchestrate a full plant harvest where all buds are at maximum potency.


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## BlazedMonkey (Sep 15, 2011)

PICS!  And smoke report on Santa when you get a chance to sample it


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## hoss12781 (Sep 15, 2011)

The Santa (nugs with the black background, in the bowl, and in a mason jar lid) is a heavy indica smoke, spicy and smells like incense when lit. Even though harvested a tad early it still rocks you to the couch, but in a pleasant mellow way. 

Sweet Caramel is down and hanging, some pics of the tops of the nuggets attached. The MI-5 and Smurfberry remain. The Smurf will be the monster of the four. I have her finishing with the PG 250 (flower only spectrum) and a 90w ufo on either side and a 180 PG on flower hitting the top. 

The MI-5 is still and will be runty but is plumping up and just got a major dose of intensity as it now has a 180 on flower for top lighting and a 90w quad and GLH 100 on the sides. 

Sorry, I'm not a photographer - did the best I could. As always comments and suggestions welcome. I'm off to go play in the woods.


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## BlazedMonkey (Sep 15, 2011)

Mmmmmmmm love the pictures, some quality dank there sir  SO PINK!


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## hoss12781 (Sep 16, 2011)

thanks buddy. Stuck here at work for another six hours before I hit the road to nowhere. 36 hours of camping, rock climbing, and not being in my office. Thought I'd toss in some additionals about this grow. 

1.) Smart pots - next time I will be using five gallon smart pots, used 3 gal this time. I love these things but all except the MI-5 (small phenotype) seemed to be a bit crowded in the root area toward the end. I have to water them daily. That brings me to another reason why I like autos. Since I'll be bouncing around the woods this weekend I won't be able to water the two I have remaining. Since it's not a photo period plant I can switch my lights to 10 hours on 14 off and it will not herm on me. This will allow the heavy watering I give them today to last until I return. If I left them on 23/1 for 3 days w/o water at this stage they'd be irreparably fucked when I get home. 
2.) My quick dry method - this is the best way I've found to quick dry nuggets without fucking up the taste and quality (too badly). Trim and hang for 36 hours buds on branches with a fan blowing indirectly on it. Take a old cardboard box and cut a hole in the side of it. Trim nugs from branches, place in box, put fan on low and let it hit the hole in the box. Wait another 24 hours, they should be dry enough to smoke. Works well in a pinch if you need to get some dry quickly. If not obviously slow curing works better. The Caramel, MI-5 and Smurf will be slow cured. The Santa was subjected to my quick dry method. Still turned out pretty tasty. 
3.) Trimming, if you've read some of my earlier posts you know I trim the hell out of my fan leaves any time I believe they may be inhibiting cola growth. For me this grew out of trial and error. You'll find many people saying no don't do that - and that's fine - its their grow. For me this method produces more smaller buds from better formed branches that ultimately weighs more than if I grow a plant without trimming and wind up with one massive top nugget and weak branching development. This strategy is only employed on my autos, and yes there is something to be said about having one giant nugget, but I'd rather have the weight. 

You can't really see through the red, and I meant to take some better pics to illustrate the efficacy of side lighting on lower bud development, I'll sit down and try to get some better pics when I get back. Also I will be selling at least one if not both of my 90w ufos to pick up another pro grow. I'm stuck on these, and want to enable a grow where I can remove all but the proper flowering spectrum when I get down to the last couple weeks.


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## BlazedMonkey (Sep 16, 2011)

Have fun sleeping on rocks with the bugs  
But really  

Have you ever tried tucking fan leaves instead of trimming? To me that looks the best of both worlds, plant keeps its leaves and the bud gets more light. 

Now to go google smart pots....


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## hoss12781 (Sep 16, 2011)

Yeah I've tucked before, and will continue to tuck next time I get the itch to grow a photoperiod plant. Sometimes I start out tucking on autos but everything is so diminutive and the veg stage so short compared to regular plants you have to (in my opinion of course) get all light asap to the colas and maintain a really strong light presence if you want good branching. Otherwise you could wind up with a plant resembling the MI-5 I have on this current grow. It will be close to all one nugget by the time its done and while the quality will be there the weight will be lacking. I should have clarified earlier, the trimming technique I use is only something that I would recommend for an autoflower grower and if you can get away with it tuck, but that gets out of hand rather quickly with autos. 

They're definitely different animals than photoperiods. I'll take some pics or a short video of what I'm driving at on my next run. The bulk of the trimming typically happens around weeks 2-3. After the trimming is done it almost looks like I've massacred the plant. Then, almost like magic a week later the colas are busting out everywhere. 

Not trying to discredit you at all - I totally get your point and realize colas derive a substantial amount of nutrients from the fan leaves. This technique does not make much sense from a scientific standpoint, but neither does a plant that flowers under 23/1 light schedule.


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## hoss12781 (Sep 19, 2011)

It actually tastes like caramel! I've grown many strains that were "blueberry" this that or the other that really didn't taste up to their name but this one really does - big props to the breeders at Sweet Seeds for an auto that maintains the integrity of the original Caramel strain. 

On other fronts, the top nugs on the Smurfberry are pretty well done so I have removed all top lighting and now have the PG 250 and a PG 180 on flowering only working the sides to finish things out properly. 

Will post some pics of the Caramel nuggets (netted 49g mostly dry, probably around 44 or so when fully cured), which are curing right now. As we are drawing close to week 9 I will chop the Smurf soon. The MI-5, which has been slow and small since the get go will probably live to see week 10. Gonna have to start germin some more for the next run ...


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## Lucius Vorenus (Sep 21, 2011)

good stuff!


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## dannyboy602 (Sep 21, 2011)

Caramel? Hmmm. Intriguing. By accident I ordered an auto that I thought was not an auto and imagine my surprise when after a couple weeks in veg "Russian Rocket Fuel" decided it was time to flower. "Well I'll be damned", I said. So that is my first experience with an auto. Hoss I'm still liking my LED grow. They are about a month in. Sugaring up nicely. And I added side lighting as a hunch. 
You can check out my journal if you like. I hate posting my pix on other people's journals. I def like what you've done and I'll check back...


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## hoss12781 (Sep 22, 2011)

View attachment 1800558View attachment 1800559View attachment 1800560View attachment 1800561View attachment 1800563View attachment 1800564View attachment 1800565will be sure to check Dan. All have now been chopped. Nugs in the mason jar lid are curing sweet caramel. The tiny MI-5 is pictured in the pot and the hangers without much bud on them. Chopped the Smurfberry today and it is pictured hanging with the MI-5. Should be a good yield. My wife said the scissor hash from the smurfberry which was put on top of some caramel about 20 min ago, tasted like a donut.


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## hoss12781 (Sep 22, 2011)

BTW enjoy the R Rocket Fuel, I found it to be one of the better strains from Short Stuff.


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## hoss12781 (Sep 23, 2011)

heading back to the woods for the weekend. When I was at my state forest of choice last weekend I bumped into an old friend of mine from college who has recently purchased a cabin, rents it on weekdays, and would prefer kind trade, lucky me. Heading down with the fam for a nice weekend with my buddy and his wife then a couple days of R & R by ourselves. Wanted to give some thoughts on this round, mainly what I could have done better.

1.) light distance from plants - this will be moved back on my next run.
2.) Nutriet quit - I basically did a stop on nutes with a sledgehammer flush about a week before I killed the first (Santa) plant. I made the mistake of assuming all four were on equal schedules and not wantingt to add more nutes super late in the flowering period the smurfberry def got a bit of a N deficiency during the last two weeks which may have detracted from overall effect (still pretty solid smoke though). Next run I will treat each plant according to its individual growth cycle when it comes to feeding.
3.) Think things got a bit crowded in the root area with 3 gallon smart pots, 5 gallon will be used next time.
4.) Anything else you as readers can contribute that will impact the results of my next grow is much appreciated. Please feel free to post (constructive non led hate plz) your opinions - they help everyone get better at this hobby.

Will post some MI-5 and Smurf pics when I get back from the woods but more or less that's all for this run, thanks again to all who shared this little journey. Got some new seeds germing - more sweet caramel, smurf, MI-5, and Snow-Ryder. Keep it real till the next episode ... hey hey hey hey ...


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## hoss12781 (Sep 24, 2011)

smoke weed everyday? Where are my old school Dr. Dre fans at? Pics of the curing MI-5 and Smurfberry. Smurf - 61g, MI-5 - 16g. Its still curing so I'm sure I'll lose a little bit of that but still exactly what I set out to do, on average I got around 1.5 oz per autoflowering plant seed to harvest led only, even with the midget MI-5 in the mix throwing off the avg.


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## hoss12781 (Sep 27, 2011)

visited the local hydro shop yesterday, picked up some 5 gallon smart pots as I think things were pretty crowded in the root area on the last run toward the end with the 3 gallon smart pots. Got smore Ocean Forest too. Have my last three fem seeds in the germination station (peat pots in an irrigation tray above a heating mat). One has popped, hoping the other 3 will show themselves soon otherwise I'm going to have to run the gambit with seeds that could possibly be male. Its a pain in the ass, but not as big a pain as growing photos as male autoflowers usually show themselves by day 20 at the latest. I have a shit ton of blackbriar, onyx, snowryder, and mi-5 regular seeds but am looking at http://www.worldwide-marijuana-seeds.com/ as I have read many positive reviews on this and other boards. Anyone used them? Would really like to pick up some more fem seeds. Please chime in with suggestions or reviews of the single seed centre if you've used them personally.


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## BlazedMonkey (Sep 27, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> View attachment 1804866View attachment 1804865smoke weed everyday? Where are my old school Dr. Dre fans at? Pics of the curing MI-5 and Smurfberry. Smurf - 61g, MI-5 - 16g. Its still curing so I'm sure I'll lose a little bit of that but still exactly what I set out to do, on average I got around 1.5 oz per autoflowering plant seed to harvest led only, even with the midget MI-5 in the mix throwing off the avg.


Those look mighty dank sir! Nice harvest and product


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## hoss12781 (Sep 27, 2011)

thanks man, the Smurfberry and Santa were def my 2 favs of this batch in terms of effect. In terms of taste the caramel takes the cake - seriously tastes like a caramel latte. The MI-5 was the obvious loser, but if you're ever shopping auto strains don't discount this one - I've had several MI-5s that have given me well over an oz. Also the MI-5 and Santa were both bred by Stich who generally turns out some pretty killer auto strains. 

That is pretty much my one and only complaint with autos, which hasn't deterred me from growing them exclusively, you never know what is going to happen despite all the best intentions. 61 grams on the smurf, 16g on the MI-5 - that wasn't a type-o. 32g on the Santa, and 44g on the caramel, pretty wide ranges for all being under the same lighting. Sometimes that ruderalis trait runs too thick in the pheno and you wind up with a weak ass half oz plant. On average for every six plants I grow one is always a runt. Guess you can't win 'em all, but 153g in 65 days is always a win in my book.


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## LD25Delta9 (Sep 28, 2011)

I like your grow man! Too bad about the nute deficiency earlier on in your journal. Next time that happens, flush with a gallon of clean water and resume regular feeding in a week or two once the plant has recovered. Really good looking nugs, too! I hope my perpetual turns out to be this shiny on the regular!


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## Clamil (Sep 28, 2011)

Anyone know a good referral for these lights in the USA?


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## hoss12781 (Sep 28, 2011)

I'm in the usa brother, check the previous posts on this journal. I don't work for a led company - what I've shared is my honest experience with the Pro Grow Series, GLH, and the shitty 90w ufos I got on ebay. Highly rec the first two, prefer the PG over the GLH but both are solid lights that would serve you well. Don't buy no name shit from ebay, its a waste of your money and helps perpetuate companies that are giving led tech a bad name, which fuels the mad led troll rage issues we have on this and other boards. Real leds are going to cost you real money upfront, the equation corrects itself over the long haul with electricity savings, and the bulbs you would have had to replace on hid or cfl. Just make sure whatever you get is covered by a 3 year warranty (or more).

Also - thanks for stoppin in Delta, I'll have some pictures of the the next episode up within a week. Could have some male plants in the mix this time. Unfortunately I ran out of fem seeds and I think of the three I had left only one is going to pop. Still have a bunch of regular seeds from short stuff and a ziplock bag full of blackbriar seeds.


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## LD25Delta9 (Sep 29, 2011)

Good stuff! I'm interested in the Black Briar and that Carmel.... If you check out my sig, you can see we are kinda overloaded with strains right now.... We were supposed to stick with the Armageddon and the 4 freebies from Attitude, but it didn't quite work out that way. Keep up the good work with the LEDs!


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## hoss12781 (Sep 29, 2011)

Thanks Delta, the Caramel was from Sweet seeds - I highly rec excellent auto strain. The blackbrair was my own creation so until mj is legal it won't be available unless you live in my neck of the woods. So far only one of my fem seeds has sprouted, quite the bummer, had two out of my last three fail. Have some regular autos from Short Stuff (mixed the seeds all together won't know what they are until they get at least 2 wks old) in the germination station right now. I really hate growing male plants. Think I'm gonna put in an order with the Single Seed Centre tomorrow. The prospect of picking through over 60 different feminized auto strains and being able to purchase one of each is far to appealing to pass up. Pictures as soon as the damn seeds sprout!


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## hoss12781 (Sep 30, 2011)

ChronicCritic said:


> THE BEST LED and HPS COMPARE VIDEO. These guys tear apart two LED units, then they use a $15,000 light sensor to compare the 330 watt LED with a 600 watt HPS. THIS IS WAY COOL.
> 
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyjVzBNlEKQ


Looks decent but at $1500 per unit on the 330 that is crazy expensive. Also I checked your posts it is painfully obvious you're directly affiliated with Monster Garden. You have 24 posts and half of them have been pimping these lights. Please don't use my grow journal as a forum to advertise your products.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 1, 2011)

Adventure time. Only one of the three fem seeds I had left decided to grow for me, quite the bummer. I have a mixed bag of what are all regular seeds and could be either onyx, snow-ryder, MI-5, Auto-Assassin, or Black Briar. I dug into those and have 2 that have shown themselves, another will pop up by the end of the weekend. So I'll have 1 fem for sure and 3 coin flips. 

I really hate doing this but its that or wait for the massive order I placed from the single seed centre to arrive. Strains (all autos) include The Syrup, Pineapple Express, Black Jack, Santa Maria, and Big Bang to name a few. The 3 that are currently up pictured. All under veg only PG lighting with the exception of one under my GLH ufo. Also switched to 5 gallon smart pots for this run and decided to make my own mix of soil using 3 levels, Ocean Forest on the bottom 1/3, Pro Mix on the middle 1/3, and Light Warrior on the top 1/3. We'll see how this works for me. 

Feel free to post away as long as its civil and you aren't obviously working for an led company lookin to pimp your gear.


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## BlazedMonkey (Oct 1, 2011)

Looking forward to this  

I think the OP should be able to delete posts in his own thread :/ would help deter spammers. Or at least a way to flag them.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 1, 2011)

Totally agree on that front, but whatever check dude's posts he's obviously here on a marketing attempt. Mods will usually delete the more absurd posts you would be surprised to know how many led haters have attacked this journal. I've had at least 7 different posts removed from people repping their own brand, wanting to hate on the ones I'm using, or just straight jackasses like Footclan. For some reason people like to hate on leds like its their job.


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## loudpac (Oct 2, 2011)

where'd you order the single seeds from? I'm looking at bank through world of seeds currently, but was interested in your choice?


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## hoss12781 (Oct 2, 2011)

I used world wide marijuana seeds, its the first result that pops up when you google "single seed centre". It was weird though it wouldn't let me use my debit card and actually triggered a security shut down on my checking account so I had to call my bank and get them to turn it back on. Wound up using my credit card and it went through. I'll let you know when they get here. It says guaranteed delivery so here's hoping. 

Picked up 2 fem Auto Jack, 2 fem Super Sativa, 2 fem Pineapple Express (Barney's Farm), 1 Fem La Bella Afrodita, 1 Auto Black Jack, and 2 free mystery fem seeds which I really hope will be autos, otherwise my friends that grow photos will get a nice present. 

Was going to order more but really wanted to do a tester on this seedbank as I was ordering exclusively from dope seeds until they stopped shipping state side. If they come through with a good germination percentage I will look to go crazy picking up a shit load of interesting auto strains.

I've got four up now, 3 of which could be dudes - not really worth taking pictures since they're little sprouts. Will be adding Bush Dr. Microbe brew tomorrow as it is perfectly save and effective to use from the get go. Also didn't know if I've mentioned this before but in case anyone is curious I'm only using filtered water on my plants seed to harvest. I keep a Pure Water filter jug in my basement and replace the filter after every harvest. I'll update when all are approximately one week old with some pictures next Friday.


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## senorfrisk (Oct 5, 2011)

Dude, thanks for the LED journal... I have been pondering long about LEDs. There is soooo much conflicting info out there. I have been researching LEDs and I think I am gonna go with the PG180. It seems to be the perfect fit for my small area. Haven't grown in awhile, but I am anxious to get back to it. Starting from scratch and starting small. I am waiting on some beans from Attitude to arrive any day now. They should spur me on to finally buy the darn light... Thanks again!


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## orchiid.wild (Oct 6, 2011)

Mr Hoss!
Read the whole journal and subbed as well 
Thanks for the insight.

I wish ProGrow from HydroHut (or whatever the name is of the LED light you've taking a liking to is) was more transparent on the exact type of LED's they're using.
I've been reading journals about building your own LED board and I think I will head that route when I build my first panel a month or two from now.
The one guy a few pages back posted a link to a British site and as you mentioned they state very obviously what kind of LEDs they're using.

I will start with Fluorescent lighting because it's simple and will give my seedlings a head start (all photoperiod plants) and in the midst of that build my LED panel. I havent decided if I'm going to mix veg and flowing all into the same light or build separate lights for both. I'll buy some rabbits and make compost tea from their crap and feed the plants almost exclusively that unless I can find guano as well in the part of the world I'll be in. 

My main initial goal will be to make feminized seeds using home made colloidal silver. If I've made enough seeds and still have time I'll try to start some plants to grow for bud or even have some growing along side for budding purpose. A lot of scheming going&#12288;on in my head right now but I'm really excited for the next few months.

Thanks again for all your input and like I said I'll be following along.


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## loudpac (Oct 6, 2011)

ye, I'm taking a liking to that single seed centre. Let me know how your shipment goes.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 6, 2011)

LoudPac - As of now the shipment has been "sent oversees". They sent a tracking number and its being sent via Royal Mail (UK). I'll def let you know when they arrive. 

Orchid - I don't really understand what you're wanting in terms of transparency, the site lists the diode type, all CREE, the number of bands 14 including UV and IR on the latest models, and the total power draw and chipset capacity (true power draw 155w on the PG 180, chipset capacity is 180w), and the total lumens produced. If you're looking for exact nm specs I've found a lot of the higher end companies such as GLH, Stealth, Hydro Hut and others will not list the nm spectrums used as a lot of R&D goes into finding the proper blend of spectrum to maximize growth. This is especially true when you get into models like the GLH Spectra that uses 12 different bands and the new Pro-Grows using 14 bands. I'd say if you have any questions about the brand you're considering call the company. I can't speak for all of them but Mike at GLH and Ben at Hydro Hut were more than willing to answer all of the questions I brought forward.

Also I've made a decision to flip all my UFO units. Selling my 100w Spectra, 90w 2w diode quad band, and 90w 1w diode dual band to my sister for a more than fair price and intend to pick up one of the new PG 180s. The ones I have right now are all 7 band 130w power draw early 2011 models, the new one is way beefier. What can I say I'm a slave to new technology and have fallen for the PGs. I really dig the switchable spectrum and wanna have the whole closet able to flip from veg to full to flower at my discretion. This will mean I'm out of side lighting for the time being. 

Anyone that's read this journal knows I'm a big fan of side lighting but am also a fan of experimenting. We'll see how this works out, I know the PGs will do me justice but if I feel the need to pick up some side lighting after this run I may experiment with Plasma lighting or whatever else tickles my fancy after all is said, done, and weighed out after this current run. Babies growing nicely I'll have some pictures this weekend as they are all roughly 1 week old as of tomorrow.


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## PrezDickie (Oct 6, 2011)

Hoss, quality journal, honest feedback about strains and lights. I'm a big fan. Subscribed and hope you don't mind if i pick your brain in future for questions about my grow. I'm just starting out will be my first grow. will be led with cfl side and under lighting for now, I've got my lights (180watt Blackstar (got long before i read your journal but should work for my needs) and a bloombooster all red led spot light, my soil, (fox farm ocean forest and local shop organic mix with some perlite) 5 gal smart pots, my nutes fox farms grow big and tiger bloom, and i'm finishing final touches to my grow cabinet think i can only do two at once in there i've got Easy Ryder (auto mix of ak47 x low rider #2) and i've got an auto white russian from g13 i got as a freebie from attitude. I've got a bunch of photo period too but thought i'd get my feet wet with the auto's and test my odor control on those. i've got a foothills carbon canister fan i got off ebay and i'm getting some Ona gel too. My only question for now is, is a wire rack under the smart pots needed? i noticed you used one? is that just for ventilation or to check for water leakage? i was lil concerned about that with smart pots... I'm worried about height in my cabinet but i should be good for the autos. also are the smart pots able to be reused after a grow? and do you ph test your water? thanks in advance,
Prez


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## hoss12781 (Oct 7, 2011)

Prez - yes you can recycle smart pots. Just dump everything out and run them under some hot water lightly scrubbing the cloth to knock out any pieces of root that are still intact from the last grow. I do PH test my water and soil using this http://www.amazon.com/Digital-Way-Soil-Light-Tester/dp/B0034P1PWK. It's pretty good, the light meter only measures six different setting but the PH meter was all I was really after. I really like the smart pots, and I keep them on the wire rack for two reasons - to make it visibly obvious when I've watered down to the drainage point, and to let everything airate better as I have a box fan running on medium hitting both sides of the closet to improve air circulation. Smart pots will leak, so you'll want to put in a measure to control for this.

As far as odor controll goes I do use ona gel but haven't bought a carbon filter. My grow room is just the closet of a spare bedroom we don't use in our basement so no one really ever goes too close to the room and for the two-thee weeks it really does stink during auto flowering the Ona plus taping some dryer sheets to the inside of the air return vent and putting a cinnamon candle on a candle heater in the bedroom completely masks the smell. 

What are the dimensions of your cab? If you're worried about height for reference the biggest auto I've had was a tad over 3 feet tall and she was a freaky pheno. Most stay shorter and if you want to keep them extra short you could switch to smaller pots which inhibits root growth, keeps the plants shorter, but will also detract from maximum yield. Happy to help man, us Bible Belt growers need to stick together!

Edit - nevermind I checked the link in your sig - get those damn shelves out of there and you'll be good to go.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 7, 2011)

New batch babies. Not very exciting but if you're going to journal you should do it start to finish. They're all about a week old with the oldest, and hurray for me, the largest of the four being the only feminized seed. Glad she's looking like a champ already. The other 3 are grab bag short stuff freebies that will be grown until they show sex - males will be replaced with the fem seeds once they (hopefully) arrive safe and sound. 

They won't be mysteries for long, I've grown all the strains I've planted before and should be able to tell within the next two weeks who is who. I just mixed all my reggie seeds together and put them away in case I ever ran out of fems. The fem is either a sweet caramel, or MI-5.

My sister picked up my 3 ufos yesterday so right now the fem is under the PG 250, 1 mystery seed under a 180, and the two others sharing my other 180 until my new 180 arrives, which from the UPS tracking information should be here by Oct 10th. 
For reference you could easily grow two autos under 1 PG 180 - I'm just a big fan of overkill when it comes to my garden, if you read the first page you'll see I used to grow four autos under 800w of hid and at any given time at least 300w of CFL side lighting.


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## dannyboy602 (Oct 7, 2011)

what's up hoss? i grew a g13 PE and liked it. Is Barneys much dif?


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## hoss12781 (Oct 7, 2011)

Hope to find out in the coming weeks. I've been to Barney's in Amsterdam, smoked some of their homegrown and it was the tits. Never grown their seeds though, hope to have them in the mail next week.


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## PrezDickie (Oct 7, 2011)

Hoss, Thanks for checking my stuff out, i'll post pics soon of where my cab is now, i'm just finishing up light/sound insulating the doors and i need to connect the duct to my filter fan. and btw we must operate on a mutual wave length cuz i've the same ph/light monitor as you?!

i noticed you use peat pucks to get your seeds started i've got some of those and the lil "green house" (plastic dome) that goes with em. i was going to put a heat mat under the container to help give me a good germ rate, do you use one? or do you know the best temp to keep them at while they are trying to sprout?


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## hoss12781 (Oct 8, 2011)

I would rec using a heat mat as it helps keep humidity up inside the dome. It will increase your germination rate for sure. I got mine at Home Depot, it came with the peat pots and dome, not really sure what temp it keeps the bottom of the dome but it's not that hot, couldn't be more than plus 3-4 degrees over ambient temp in the room.

Also made hash last week. Haven't really mentioned that in this journal yet cause it takes me on average about 4 harvests of four plants (sometimes more) just to have enough shake to make it worth my while. I use the original bubble bags, which I bought after buying shitty ones on ebay first. Long story short - hash is awesome and super stealthy. 

My wife and I wrangled a sitter and went to a show last night. Security can be dicey at this venue, knowing this we each too two cigs, removed some of the tobacco added a healthy amount of 25 microgram full melt bubble hash, put more tobacco back on top of it (packed in with the blunt end of a pen) and put the smokes back in the pack. 

Super easy way to take hash anywhere (except an airplane). Just thought I'd share. We also took a token amount of mushrooms. Not something I do on the regular at all but when you've had them sitting in your stash box for over a year, you have a sitter and tickets to a show you wanna see .....

Didn't really trip that hard probably ate a gram or so each, just enough to feel a little funky. Good times.


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## BlazedMonkey (Oct 8, 2011)

Nice sir  I dig the funguys  
Love the cig style, i had a friend on probation put JWH concentrate in his and smoke em on break at work


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## hoss12781 (Oct 11, 2011)

Seeds arrived safe and sound. Obviously haven't germinated any yet but they were shipped in a safe case and all appear to be healthy. The two freebies were fem pakistani ryders. Got ten total, had planned on ordering more but wanted to check this bank out before I dropped a couple hundred on seeds. If they germ for me its on. Who knows how much longer we'll be able to order seeds into the states? Might as well stock up on some interesting strains while the time is right. Barring any germination issues http://www.worldwide-marijuana-seeds.com/ is now legit in my book. New PG 180 is scheduled to arrive by the end of the business day. 

Gonna let the 3 reggie short stuff seeds do their thing as they're almost two weeks old. As soon as they show any sex males will be replaced with pineapple express or super automatic sativa fems.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 11, 2011)

New toys all around today. My new 180 arrived. It is very, very different than the first 2011 model. I snapped a couple picks to illustrate the difference. The one with a shitload of red diodes is the 2010 PG250, the one that is very violet heavy is the new 180, the one with a lot of light blue and high kelvin white is the older 180. 
The diodes that look burnt out aren't - they're the IR and UV.

Switching gears, the way I trim my autos to increase cola productivity explained in the pictures of my Sweet Caramel plant. It is almost impossible to employ the tuck method when the plants are smaller and have a far shorter veg period compared to photos. For reference, I wouldn't rec doing this with a photo. I'll make sure to take pics as the cola hidden under the giant fan leaf becomes far more pronounced that it would have been hiding under the fan leaf. 

This practice grew, like almost everything in my garden came about from trial and error. Before you knock it give it a whirl with some autos, my average yield went up trimming like this. I'll trim off one more set of fan leaves once the colas under the leaf in question are sprouting their own leaves. 

Comments and suggestions welcome, if you disagree with this method - cool, please let me know what you would do instead.


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## senorfrisk (Oct 11, 2011)

Hoss! Major thanks on the PG180 recommendation!!! Hydroponics Hut rocks! It came today and I am totally stoked! I ordered it Saturday night and I got it 3 days later. Suddenly, I realize that I have so much to do! I gotta put up mylar, get nutes, get rockwool, get beans sprouting, clean grow area, hang light...<BREATHE> The list goes on... Please be advised that I may be hitting you up for some knowledge from time to time! Thanks again!


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## hoss12781 (Oct 12, 2011)

I hate non feminized seeds. Two of the three coin flip seeds I planted I'm about 99 percent sure are dudes. Bummer. Will wait until I'm 100% sure and chop em. Glad I got my fems in the mail yesterday.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 12, 2011)

senorfrisk said:


> Hoss! Major thanks on the PG180 recommendation!!! Hydroponics Hut rocks! It came today and I am totally stoked! I ordered it Saturday night and I got it 3 days later. Suddenly, I realize that I have so much to do! I gotta put up mylar, get nutes, get rockwool, get beans sprouting, clean grow area, hang light...<BREATHE> The list goes on... Please be advised that I may be hitting you up for some knowledge from time to time! Thanks again!


I'd get some chains from Home Depot or any home supply store. Makes it super easy to move the lights up and down at your leisure. I uses yo yos for a minute but found chains to be easier with the little clips attached to the connectors on the panel.

I should probably get some mylar as well. Although the walls on my closet are painted white mylar would add some benefits.

Always happy to share what has worked and failed in my garden brother!


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## HiPotency (Oct 15, 2011)

im new to this site today and i have to say thanks for all the great information hoss. After searching this thread i found the answer to my curiousity. if LEDs are sufficient for veg and flowering. do you add more for flowering?
im looking at the pro grow 180 here:
http://hydroponicshut.com/pro-grow-180-watt-led-grow-light-hydroponics-hut.html

and possibly a supplemental plasma light for flowering here:
http://www.hydroponicshut.com/50-watt-plasma-induction-grow-lamp-hydroponics-hut.html


just curious if you could share your thoughts about this set-up sustaining 2-3 plants =)


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## PrezDickie (Oct 15, 2011)

That light isn't really a plasma. It's basically an advanced cfl,but for the cost it's still a good buy. Welcome to the led community.



HiPotency said:


> im new to this site today and i have to say thanks for all the great information hoss. After searching this thread i found the answer to my curiousity. if LEDs are sufficient for veg and flowering. do you add more for flowering?
> im looking at the pro grow 180 here:
> http://hydroponicshut.com/pro-grow-180-watt-led-grow-light-hydroponics-hut.html
> 
> ...


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## hoss12781 (Oct 15, 2011)

I have not used the plasma so I can't say but as far as two to three plants with the 180. 3 autos for sure, probably 2 photo period depending on how big you're talking about growing them out. The light is super intense but like all leds the footprint isn't like hid it has a well defined maximum coverage area. 

Concerning my grow - 3 males just pulled the last one up. Will pop three of the fems in peat pots tomorrow. My bad luck.


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## WeJuana (Oct 15, 2011)

Good luck with those fems! Take clones and multiply


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## hoss12781 (Oct 16, 2011)

there in lies one of the drawbacks to growing autos - you cannot clone them. When the sprout they'll live to be no more than 10 weeks old period. If cloned they'll live just as long as the branches normally would have lived. 

Its not that big a deal, just a minor pain in the ass as those three males set me back close to three weeks on three of my four plants. The fem sweet caramel is kicking much ass at at approximately 2.5 weeks old - just started showing sex under 23/1 lighting. I'll snap some pics today. 

The fem super sativa and fem blackjack have already sprouted, I planted a fem la bella afrodita today. So far a 100% germination rate from world wide marijuana seeds!


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## BlazedMonkey (Oct 16, 2011)

Sorry to hear about the sausage party :/ 
Oh well now you got some karma built up for lots of females


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## wildrunner (Oct 16, 2011)

hey hoss, thanks for your postings. i'm just starting, i've done a bit of research, and i'm taking your advise on an all led setup. i turned on my 290w for the first time today, after taking the little seedlings from their mommy t5. i think i should now wear sunglasses when i go into the grow room! geez, it's BRIGHT. what's the fastest, easiest way for me to sex the little photperiods, so as not to waste time or money on males????.... sorry if it sounds basic but, i'm completely new to any kind or propagation. thanks.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 16, 2011)

the fastest way to force sex on a photoperiod plant would be to grow using a 12/12 light cycle from seed. Should take a couple weeks. Auto males usually show themselves by week 2 or 3 at the latest. If you're a new grower I can highly rec growing some autos. You don't have to worry about light schedule at all and the shorter growth cycle gives that much less a chance to screw things up which will happen your first couple times unless you have absurdly good luck. There is a great thread on this site "The Art of the Auto". It has strain reviews, pictures, and what I believe to be pretty good advice for the most part.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 16, 2011)

Fem Sweet Caramel at 18 days. Notice how the colas have busted out everywhere since I clipped the main fan leaves blocking their light. Also, two little sprouts. Didn't take pictures of the males just sighed, ripped them out by the roots, and planted feminized seeds. Going back to my argument for the best led set up for a small garden being multiple 100w plus panels as opposed to one massive 500w panel - I can now play puppeteer with the four panels adjusting accordingly giving the caramel light at the right height will vegin the new seedlings.


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## KawiZZR (Oct 17, 2011)

Nice looking plants, your journal was a good read. I saw a journal before where a guy claimed to reveg an auto after harvesting most of the plant. He got a decent yield off it the second time but said it took too long and it ends up better to start a new seed anyway. This being the internet I'm skeptical that he actually used an auto like he said, it could've just been a normal reveg that he claimed was an auto. Anyways, thought you might find it interesting and I'll send you the link to the journal when I find it again. Happy growing and good luck on the fems!


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## hoss12781 (Oct 17, 2011)

KawiZZR said:


> Nice looking plants, your journal was a good read. I saw a journal before where a guy claimed to reveg an auto after harvesting most of the plant. He got a decent yield off it the second time but said it took too long and it ends up better to start a new seed anyway. This being the internet I'm skeptical that he actually used an auto like he said, it could've just been a normal reveg that he claimed was an auto. Anyways, thought you might find it interesting and I'll send you the link to the journal when I find it again. Happy growing and good luck on the fems!


Indeed - the old "pics or it didn't happen" argument. I've heard some whoppers before on this and other boards. Speaking of crazy but true one of the seedlings I sprouted has three original leaves. I've never seen this before and I'm quite interested in this little mutant. I'm talking about the first visible non-serrated leaves - there are usually two as soon as the seed casing pops - one of mine has three. I'll take a pic when I can, otherwise it might not have happened . Joking aside I'm pretty sure you can't re-veg autos. Making seeds is easy enough, plus you get to make your own strains if you get crazy with it.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 17, 2011)

What hath god wrought? Seriously wtf? Check out this seedling. I've germmed my fair share of seeds, never seen anything like this. Have you?


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## Shwagbag (Oct 17, 2011)

Nope not me! 3 cotyledons! That's crazy lol


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## WeJuana (Oct 17, 2011)

First time ive ever see that too!


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## BlazedMonkey (Oct 17, 2011)

Ive seen a couple other grows where they had the tricotyledons. Would assume it would grow 30% faster right?  That would be a nifty trait if it worked like that.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 17, 2011)

I really hope your right monkey. Would make up for 3 males materializing on me. 

Apparently its a _somewhat_ common mutation. I would suspect it happens in autos more than photos simply for the twisted genetics that go into making a stabilized auto; I posted on another thread to gain perspective beyond those kind enough to patronize my journal. 

From the responses offered - it happens from time to time even with photos. I've started well over 100 seeds, never seen that before.


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## KawiZZR (Oct 17, 2011)

I can do you one better than pics man, the guy has videos! Haha still not too sure if I believe it is an auto or just a photo plant doing a normal reveg. Here's the link in any case though: http://www.autoflower.net/forums/f5/how-regenerate-autoflower-2818.html

And btw getting a triploid is awesome! you should try and breed the trait, you'll end up with three bud sites around the plant instead of two opposite each other. Theoretically you can get 50% more yield this way, but I'd guess that maybe 20% more would be realistic.


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## Shwagbag (Oct 17, 2011)

KawiZZR said:


> I can do you one better than pics man, the guy has videos! Haha still not too sure if I believe it is an auto or just a photo plant doing a normal reveg. Here's the link in any case though: http://www.autoflower.net/forums/f5/how-regenerate-autoflower-2818.html
> 
> And btw getting a triploid is awesome! you should try and breed the trait, you'll end up with three bud sites around the plant instead of two opposite each other. Theoretically you can get 50% more yield this way, but I'd guess that maybe 20% more would be realistic.


Thanks for the laugh lol.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 17, 2011)

perhaps its time to get my grip on some collodial (sp?) silver. I've been super happy with Sweet seed genetics thus far (the mutant is a Sweet Seeds fem black jack auto). Every seed I've ordered from their lines has popped 100% and always been above average auto yields with good quality smoke - that is except for their "Fast Bud V1" haven't tried the re-done V2 version, but the V1 was neither fast or great. The Carmel and Speed Devil V2 which I've grown kicked a fair amount of ass. Anyone who's ever tried to create feminized seeds please do me a solid and chime in with a link or detailed description. I'm sick of plunking down 100 usd for 10 fem seeds. Yes it's cool to have different strains but I'd really like to move beyond violating federal customs regulations to obtain my strains.


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## orchiid.wild (Oct 19, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> perhaps its time to get my grip on some collodial (sp?) silver. I've been super happy with Sweet seed genetics thus far (the mutant is a Sweet Seeds fem black jack auto). Every seed I've ordered from their lines has popped 100% and always been above average auto yields with good quality smoke - that is except for their "Fast Bud V1" haven't tried the re-done V2 version, but the V1 was neither fast or great. The Carmel and Speed Devil V2 which I've grown kicked a fair amount of ass. Anyone who's ever tried to create feminized seeds please do me a solid and chime in with a link or detailed description. I'm sick of plunking down 100 usd for 10 fem seeds. Yes it's cool to have different strains but I'd really like to move beyond violating federal customs regulations to obtain my strains.


Hey Hoss!
I'm still all over this thread. I would recommend making your own colloidal (this spelling is correct) silver. It's VERY easy. I feel like you might have read up on it already.

I have 6 germinated seeds planted with one sprouted under 24w daylight white fluorescent lighting (sorry no money or time to build my own LED rig yet). I have 2 (boy and girl) one month old rabbits that are providing me with poop that I will eventually brew into compost tea to feed my (hopefully) girls. 

You were right about that LED supplier site having the information you mentioned but I'm also interested in the specific wavelengths. I can understand why companies wouldn't want to give up that information but I feel the world would be a better place if all information was freely available.

My initial soil medium selection is CRAP. I have the germinated seeds in the different soils I've purchased and will test how they perform in each.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 19, 2011)

I have done some research on colloidal silver feminization and am torn between that or harvesting most of the fem sweet caramel I have going right now, leaving a couple buds on there to go past prime with the hope they pop wood, then using the pollen from those banannas to pollenate one of the fem seedlings I have going right now. Since I had those males earlier 3 plants are now behind in the schedule and this would be a rather easy experiment as opposed to losing a whole female plant to the silver in hopes of producing fem seeds. 

Just didn't want to throw over an oz against the wall if I can avoid it. I read the buds are pretty much useless, and or harmful to smoke if you're spraying the plant down with colloidal. 

I started out growing with just cfl, its a process man. I'd say get a couple harvests under your belt, the money you save not buying buds should allow you to upgrade to HID, LED, or whatever you see fit for your needs. Fox Farms Ocean Forest Soil is really good and not that expensive if you want to stop using rabbit poop. That just sounds nasty. 

As you've followed this thread you know my opinion on the best lighting for small indoor gardens, but it's a hard pill to swallow dropping $1,000 on leds. The good news is they pay for themselves and then some in the long haul. In terms of a more affordable upgrade to your current set here are some really good cfls (can rec from first hand experience) these are beastly and solid for the price.

http://www.1000bulbs.com/product/8255/FC105-S27OD.html

They come them in a 5000k veg spectrum too. I was able to pull some pretty good harvests using just these cfls.

Concerning the specific nm wavelengths - you're right I'd love to know as well, especially with the newer 14 spec units. Prior to ordering my most recent purchase I called and asked. I was right in my earlier post - I was told by HH they consider their spectrum mix proprietary and given the money invested in finding what works well don't want J. Q. Wild Orchid getting the specs and building essentially a carbon copy of their unit. Being the curious person I am I also sent an email to GLH they were also unwilling to provide the 12 different nm used in my 2011 UFO. Given it is their bread and butter I can't say I blame them.

If you really wanted to get ambitious about it the HH are all CREE diodes, you could buy one dissect it and figure out exactly what's up with the different nm. I'm not sure but you could probably deduce what spectrum are employed by looking at the CREE chips and cross checking the ones found inside the light with the ones available in CREE's line up. I'm not willing to void the warranty on mine but have considered taking one of mine apart three years from now just to see what's going on inside the unit.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 19, 2011)

KawiZZR said:


> I can do you one better than pics man, the guy has videos! Haha still not too sure if I believe it is an auto or just a photo plant doing a normal reveg. Here's the link in any case though: http://www.autoflower.net/forums/f5/how-regenerate-autoflower-2818.html
> 
> And btw getting a triploid is awesome! you should try and breed the trait, you'll end up with three bud sites around the plant instead of two opposite each other. Theoretically you can get 50% more yield this way, but I'd guess that maybe 20% more would be realistic.


Laughed my ass off at the first video (I'm on AFNet too so could see all the links) - He weighs it wet on a weight watchers scale. He also uses the same scissors I do to harvest. 

I suppose it is possible to re-gen an auto but from the looks of the video - not very efficient for what you'll ultimately glean. He said it took three weeks after harvest to get some tiny nodes to form - by that time any decent gardener could have a new auto sprouted from seed getting ready to jump into full blown flower mode. 

Although I won't be trying this at home, I do appreciate the link man. Thanks again.


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## KawiZZR (Oct 19, 2011)

Np, I thought it was just kinda quirky and interesting that someone took the time to do it and that's what it ended up with. If you don't wanna risk losing a harvest making seeds you could reveg one plant after harvest and use the silver then?


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## hoss12781 (Oct 19, 2011)

Look at the big brain on KawiZZR! That is a fantastic idea and what will be done with one of these fems. Thank you.


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## Shwagbag (Oct 19, 2011)

I've also read that you can force hermie with a serires of light cycle changes that stress the female and germinate another flowering female with the pollen to make feminized seeds. From what I understand the seeds are feminized with minimal risk (as you get with fem seeds) of being hermie. I've never tried it but I have read of people claiming to have done it successfully like this. Theoretically this could be done as an experiment with minimal risk since you could probably keep the amount of pollen to a minimum. I will be interested to see how your experiment works with the silver, do it do it! For humanity lol.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 19, 2011)

not my grow but the strain I made. Gave a friend who usually grows photo outdoor a ton of Black Briar seeds. I don't grow outside but wanted to see if he could use them to get two harvests in this season. He did and it turned out rather well for outdoor. Also very cool of my friend to share. Will update my current run on Friday. Cheers!


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## hoss12781 (Oct 19, 2011)

Shwagbag said:


> I've also read that you can force hermie with a serires of light cycle changes that stress the female and germinate another flowering female with the pollen to make feminized seeds. From what I understand the seeds are feminized with minimal risk (as you get with fem seeds) of being hermie. I've never tried it but I have read of people claiming to have done it successfully like this. Theoretically this could be done as an experiment with minimal risk since you could probably keep the amount of pollen to a minimum. I will be interested to see how your experiment works with the silver, do it do it! For humanity lol.


For Humanity's sake I'm on it.


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## KawiZZR (Oct 19, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> Look at the big brain on KawiZZR! That is a fantastic idea and what will be done with one of these fems. Thank you.


If it works out for you then I might do it this winter with a couple of fem Mi5 seeds I've got left. What would you say is your favorite auto you've grown so far?



Shwagbag said:


> I've also read that you can force hermie with a serires of light cycle changes that stress the female and germinate another flowering female with the pollen to make feminized seeds. From what I understand the seeds are feminized with minimal risk (as you get with fem seeds) of being hermie. I've never tried it but I have read of people claiming to have done it successfully like this. Theoretically this could be done as an experiment with minimal risk since you could probably keep the amount of pollen to a minimum. I will be interested to see how your experiment works with the silver, do it do it! For humanity lol.


Yeah pollen can be tricky to work with, gotta make sure to have that plant separate and always work with it last. Even if you do it's a good idea to clean out both grow areas after with some bleach water to kill any left over pollen in the area. Grumpy Old Dreamer on here uses the silver method with good results, his threads are a good read if looking to kill some time and learn a lil.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 19, 2011)

My favorite auto, that's a tough one. My favorite indica dom strain has def been the smurfberry it really knocks you for a loop a highly narcotic smoke. Favorite sativa dom is probably auto assassin, although I have "high" hopes for the Super Sativa from Big Buddah I just planted. My favorite blends are MI-5 and Blackbriar (since I made it, but it really does smoke well). 

The only autos I'd say I've been upset with in terms of potency have been Fast Bud V1 from Sweet Seeds, Joint Dr.'s original lowryder, and both the Blue and Blue Him Diesels from Short Stuff. The Super Cali Haze was also a big batch of fail. I hate to shit on Short Stuff though, some of their strains are straight home runs in my opinion. Being such a big fan of several of their strains I've grown everything they currently have on the market. I just really didn't like the ones I mentioned above.


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## KawiZZR (Oct 19, 2011)

Who was the smurfberry by? I like the Mi5 and do them on the side under cfls but wouldn't mind getting a second or third strain and making autos my staple in grows next year. Doing one more photo grow this winter then probably going to make the switch to all autos for a bit.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 19, 2011)

Sagarmatha seeds, its on the only one of their strains I've grown but was very happy with it and will look to give them a whirl again. They were expensive seeds, but popped 100% and were worth it. The Caramel from Sweet seeds is pretty good too. Speaking of which, might as well go ahead and update with pics while I'm killin time. Here is Caramel at somewhere around 3 weeks old, as well as the super sativa and black jack sprouts. As I wait patiently for my fourth plant (la bella afrodita seed) to pop ground the caramel is getting a double dose of lighting right now with the 250 on top and a 180 working the side.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 19, 2011)

KawiZZR said:


> Who was the smurfberry by? I like the Mi5 and do them on the side under cfls but wouldn't mind getting a second or third strain and making autos my staple in grows next year. Doing one more photo grow this winter then probably going to make the switch to all autos for a bit.


With you on that sentiment man. I used to grow all photos, screwed around with some original lowryder, was not a fan but am glad I gave autos another shot. They've really come a long way since their inception.


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## KawiZZR (Oct 19, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> Sagarmatha seeds, its on the only one of their strains I've grown but was very happy with it and will look to give them a whirl again. They were expensive seeds, but popped 100% and were worth it. The Caramel from Sweet seeds is pretty good too. Speaking of which, might as well go ahead and update with pics while I'm killin time. Here is Caramel at somewhere around 3 weeks old, as well as the super sativa and black jack sprouts. As I wait patiently for my fourth plant (la bella afrodita seed) to pop ground the caramel is getting a double dose of lighting right now with the 250 on top and a 180 working the side.





hoss12781 said:


> With you on that sentiment man. I used to grow all photos, screwed around with some original lowryder, was not a fan but am glad I gave autos another shot. They've really come a long way since their inception.


I'll check them out when I finally decide to order some more seeds, might get a few different strains then just do a big seed run of each strain and go from there. The caramel has a really nice structure to it, that's a 2 gallon bag? I agree they've come a long way, some of the newer strains sound awesome.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 19, 2011)

actually its a 5 gallon smart pot. Used 3 gal on the last run and found it was getting crowded in the root area during the last couple weeks this may have prevented me from achieving maximum yield so I went ahead and upgraded to 5 gallons. With you on experimenting too. Check out the single seed centre, that's where I picked up my latest order. They'll let you pick and mix single seeds from different banks. You pay a small premium for this service (still cheaper than The Attitude) but its pretty cool to get to try a ton of different strains.


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## Shwagbag (Oct 19, 2011)

Sorry to barge in but talking genetics.... If you like combo packs here is one from Sannies that I would recommend. 

http://www.sanniesshop.com/feminized-seed-mix.html

I've done both Shackzilla and Killing Fields, both are very good. Flowering period is long on KF but I found it to be worth the wait if you like sativas. I haven't tried the Sugar Punch but it came personally recommended by Sannie and i will be getting some when I order again.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 20, 2011)

That's actually a really good deal. I've considered doing a split grow in the not too distant future. I've done it before but its been a minute. By that I mean have two photo periods veggin out big time while two autos are running on a 23-1 light cycle. After 7-9 weeks harvest the autos and flip to 12/12 concentrating all my lighting on the photos for the next 7-9 weeks. Thanks for the link man.


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## KawiZZR (Oct 20, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> actually its a 5 gallon smart pot. Used 3 gal on the last run and found it was getting crowded in the root area during the last couple weeks this may have prevented me from achieving maximum yield so I went ahead and upgraded to 5 gallons. With you on experimenting too. Check out the single seed centre, that's where I picked up my latest order. They'll let you pick and mix single seeds from different banks. You pay a small premium for this service (still cheaper than The Attitude) but its pretty cool to get to try a ton of different strains.


How much does it look like the bigger pot will influence growth or is it not far enough in to tell? I've had bad experiences with plants getting rootbound too. First time I did an Mi5 I used a 2L soda bottle with the top cut off haha plant ended up only yielding 12g.




Shwagbag said:


> Sorry to barge in but talking genetics.... If you like combo packs here is one from Sannies that I would recommend.
> 
> I've done both Shackzilla and Killing Fields, both are very good. Flowering period is long on KF but I found it to be worth the wait if you like sativas. I haven't tried the Sugar Punch but it came personally recommended by Sannie and i will be getting some when I order again.


Do either single seed centre or sannies take money orders? I'm wary about paying for seeds or anything grow specific with credit card.



hoss12781 said:


> That's actually a really good deal. I've considered doing a split grow in the not too distant future. I've done it before but its been a minute. By that I mean have two photo periods veggin out big time while two autos are running on a 23-1 light cycle. After 7-9 weeks harvest the autos and flip to 12/12 concentrating all my lighting on the photos for the next 7-9 weeks. Thanks for the link man.


Lol those must've been some big plants by the time you finished flowering them! What light cycles have you tried with autos so far?


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## hoss12781 (Oct 20, 2011)

Pot size def influences overall yield with autos (unless you just wind up with a tiny pheno). But from what I've seen 3 gallon pots are good enough to grow an auto that will yield an oz plus. I felt like at the end of my last grow with the Caramel and Smurfberry that final flowering was a bit hindered in the 3 gallon pots. They were def rootbound when I pulled everything up after the fact. This led me to try the 5 gallon this time. Don't know how much it will effect it as I still was able to get 61g off the smurf, but we'll see.

Not sure about money orders. I used my CC which leads me to believe you could probably use a pre paid visa or something like that. When in doubt shoot them an email from a burner email account. 

On the split grow - you betcha. Veg out a photo period for 8 weeks then turn it loose on 12/12 once the autos are done and you'll wind up with some massive plants. Last time I did it I had 2 huge photos (Khola from Dutch Passion seeds). I gave each one its own 400w hps and its own side of the closet which wound up being a smart move as they pretty much filled the whole damn thing out. The yield was also very nice. Can't recall specifics but I remember one of them getting me close to a qp.

Concerning light cycles on autos - I used to do 18/6 with hps to save a bit of electricty, but found I got better yields and tighter nuggets when I switched to 21/3. Now that the electricity consumption isn't as bad as it once was I keep my lights on 23 hours a day with the leds. I'm of the opinion you have to give any kind of plant some time to rest every 24 hours, even if its only an hour.


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## Shwagbag (Oct 20, 2011)

KawiZZR said:


> Do either single seed centre or sannies take money orders? I'm wary about paying for seeds or anything grow specific with credit card.


Not sure about that, but I don't blame you. Sannie is creative the way he processes your CC though


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## hoss12781 (Oct 20, 2011)

the charge on my cc from single seed centre was 'nicey nice'.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 26, 2011)

Here we are at about 4 weeks on the caramel, I've been trimming heavily and she keeps responding with the node growth I want. Been adding full doses of cal mag and up till now 1/2 doses of tiger bloom (just switched to full as of today). I have four up now, the bella afrodita decided to show herself. She's at about a week, the other babies somewhere between one and two. I haven't done a good job of date tracking on this run since the males really put a kink in my calendar. The three leaved freak is the black jack - the one that looks like a sativa is the super sativa from big buddah seeds.

So far 100% germination rate from single seed centre. I'll have to get more Barney's pineapple express as I traded one seed to my buddy for a fem santa seed, the other was sprouted and I made the decision to gift the baby sprout to another friend who will in turn give me back some at harvest time. Got anxious when the bella afrodita wasn't sprouting and put a P.E. in the peat pots. As luck would have it two days later both popped. 

I refuse to have more than four plants at any given time in my garden as the difference between 4 and 5 plants in terms of state law is massive in my neck of the woods.


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## pottx (Oct 27, 2011)

Found this on another site... I am sure some people have seen it but thought it had some good info.
Has anyone tried this with luck yet?

Creating feminized cannabis seeds is an art. 


Just like art, there are a few different methods of application. I have written about some of my different methods of making seeds in previous HIGH TIMES articles. I have used gibberellic acid, pH stress, light stress, and fertilizer stress to force my female plants to make seeds. All of these methods are harsh on the plants, and some, like the gibberellic acid, are not organic. In my search for cleaner, more earth-friendly ways of working with the cannabis plant, I have found a new way to make feminized seeds. 

Feminized seeds occur as a result of stress, rather than genetics. All cannabis plants can and will make male flowers under stress. Certain strains like a higher pH, some a lower one. Some like a lot of food, some like much less. There is quite a lot of variety in marijuana genetics, and you can&#8217;t treat every plant the same way. 

It takes many harvests before you really get to know a particular strain. Just like getting to know human friends, it takes time. I have grown the same strains for close to a decade, and am truly getting to know every nuance the different plants exhibit. I can recognize them from a distance. I must say that I get a lot of help from my friends, both in making seeds and in learning new and better ways of working with this sacred plant. 

I named this new method "Rodelization," after a friend who helped me realize and make use of this way of creating female seeds. After growing crop after crop of the same plants in the same conditions, I noticed that if I flowered the plants 10-14 days longer than usual, they would develop male "bananas." A male banana is a very slight male flower on a female marijuana plant that is formed because of stress. Usually they do not let out any pollen early enough to make seeds, but they sometimes do. They are a built-in safety factor so that in case of severe conditions, the plant can make sure the species is furthered. 

To me, a male banana is quite a beautiful thing. It has the potential of making all female seeds. Many growers out there have male-banana phobia. They see one and have heart palpitations, they want to cut down the entire crop, or at the very least take tweezers and pluck the little yellow emergency devices out. I call them "emergency devices" because they emerge at times of stress. 

In the Rodelization method, the male banana is very valuable. After growing your female plants 10-14 days longer than usual, hang them up to dry, then carefully take them off the drying lines and inspect for bananas. Each and every banana should be removed, and placed in a small bag labeled very accurately. These sealed bags can be placed in the fridge for one or two months and still remain potent. 

For the next phase, you need to have a separate crop that&#8217;s already 2 1/2 weeks into flowering. Take your sealed bags of pollen out of the fridge, and proceed to impregnate your new crop of females. To do this, you must first match the female plant and the pollen from the same strain in the previous crop. Shut all the fans in the growroom down. Then take a very fine paintbrush, dip it in the bag of pollen, and paint it on the female flower. Do this to each different strain you have growing together. I have done it with up to 10 different kinds in the same room with great success. 

I use the lower flowers to make seeds, leaving the top colas seedless for smoking. This method takes time (two crops), but is completely organic, and lets you have great-quality smoke at the same time you make your female seeds. If you&#8217;re one of those growers who&#8217;s never grown seeds for fear of not having something good to smoke, you will love this method. 

You can also use this pollen to make new female crosses by cross-pollinating. The older females with the male bananas can be brought into the room with the younger, unpollinated females after they are three weeks into flowering. Turn all of the circulation fans on high, and the little bits of pollen will proceed to make it around the room. Do this for several days. Six to seven weeks later, you will have ripe 100% feminized seeds; not nearly as many as a male plant would make, but enough to start over somewhere else with the same genetics. 


Here is where I found it
http://forum.grasscity.com/cannabis-breeding/549981-how-make-your-own-feminized-seeds.html


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## hoss12781 (Oct 27, 2011)

Rodelization will be the name of the game this round. The fem caramel will be mostly harvest the remaining buds will be "Rodelizized" to make one of my other fems preggers. The silver method just sounds like a pain in the ass. I'd rather go this route first.


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## pottx (Oct 27, 2011)

I was wondering if you had any place to find feeding scheduals on strains? I have Big Devil 2 from sweet seeds & ICE was my freebie from sam sara seeds?
I would like to see pics of the rodelization when you do it.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 28, 2011)

I haven't been able to find a good autoflowering feeding schedule but generally give them somewhere between 1/2 and the full rec dosage. Most of my auto strains get burnt if I go full power. If you're growing autos exclusively check autoflower (dot) net. I know we're not supposed to pimp other forums on this forum but it has a lot good info and the whole site is tuned just for autos. The more I think about it the more I think I will rodelize (sp) the super sativa from big buddah as I'm really more of a sativa fan anyway and would like to have a mostly sativa strain feminized. Most autos are very indica dom.


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## hoss12781 (Oct 31, 2011)

new pictures. The caramel cream is massive about 17 inches wide. Also detailed the trimming in the pictures of the blackjack and super sativa. Trimming like this, at least for me is essentially like topping a photo period plant. When you trim as shown below the sides will wind up growing like crazy during the short veg period and the top will yield a decent sized bud instead of a real top nugget, but you more than make up for it by creating a bushy plant with massive branching. At least that's my theory. 

I've really lost track on the dates of each of them since they didn't all pop at once like my last run but caramel maybe somewhere around 4-5 weeks, the others 2, the smallest 1 - probably somewhere in that neighborhood.

Others that have a trimming method for autos please make it known. I always love to experiment. 

I also will be adding mylar when I get a chance to visit a fellow gardening enthusiast friend of mine. Probably going to get a tent sooner or later but def adding mylar for the time being.


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## luckyskindaguy (Nov 1, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> What hath god wrought? Seriously wtf? Check out this seedling. I've germmed my fair share of seeds, never seen anything like this. Have you?View attachment 1842583


I had one of these and it turned out to be a female. Mine actually split at the first node and made two tops that both had 3 sets of leaves per node.

Are you running over 600 watts and yielded just over 150g? I have grown a few times in my LED/CFL setup and I have no problem getting .5g/watt. Is there that big of a difference with soil vs hydro I wonder? MAybe it's because I fim the branches in veg too......

I actually made a second cabinet and used a 150w HPS and yielded 158g off of 3 plants. One of the plants ended up with 68.8g.

Check out my grows and let me know what you think. I am thinking about journaling my new HPS grow that I started yesterday.

Happy growing everyone!


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## IlovePlants (Nov 1, 2011)

Hey Hoss,
I Love the thread man. I have also had a three leaf per node plant, it was a photoperiod AutoxDurban cross, but my partner killed it because he was a dumb asshole. I was wondering if you could pm me so we could have a genetics discussion. The sister plant that replaced the three leaver, same genetics just without the mutation, will be posted on the new thread that I'm starting once I receive my new lights. Keep up the good work man, I can see the passion you put into these little plants, and it's impressive. Oh yeah, and LEDs FTW!!!
My best wishes,
ILove


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## hoss12781 (Nov 1, 2011)

luckyskindaguy said:


> I had one of these and it turned out to be a female. Mine actually split at the first node and made two tops that both had 3 sets of leaves per node.
> 
> Are you running over 600 watts and yielded just over 150g? I have grown a few times in my LED/CFL setup and I have no problem getting .5g/watt. Is there that big of a difference with soil vs hydro I wonder? MAybe it's because I fim the branches in veg too......
> 
> ...


To address the whole Grams Per Watt - that's really not as valid when you're looking at autoflowering grows. Consider that it took me about 55 days to grow over a quarter pound of nugs. I prefer to think of it in terms of grams per day, in that ball park I'm getting close to 1/8 an oz of free pot ... every day.


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## luckyskindaguy (Nov 2, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> To address the whole Grams Per Watt - that's really not as valid when you're looking at autoflowering grows. Consider that it took me about 55 days to grow over a quarter pound of nugs. I prefer to think of it in terms of grams per day, in that ball park I'm getting close to 1/8 an oz of free pot ... every day.


Thought it was 65 days?

I must admit I have no experience with autos. Just tryin to learn.

Why is it you use autos anyway?


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## hoss12781 (Nov 2, 2011)

55-65 days, somewhere in that neighborhood. On the last run the Santa was done in 55, the rest done before 65 days. Autos, if stable never take more than 9 weeks. That's one of the reasons I like them. That and they don't stink as long due to the shorter flowering period. The smoke is just as quality as most photoperiod plants if you get the right strains. I guess I just tried them and fell in love with the ease of growing they offer. Even if you royally screw up the light cycle they're still fine, which has happened when I've been out of town on business.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 3, 2011)

finally got off my ass and went over to a friend's house and picked up the mylar that was waitin for me. Put it up on half the closet last night. Will finish retro fitting the closet tonight and post some picks. To be honest I expected a bit more from the mylar. It doesn't seem, at least to the naked eye to be all that much more reflective than the white paint I already have on the closet walls. We'll see how the plants respond.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 3, 2011)

o.k. the mylar is pretty cool, I probably should have done that a while back. New shiny closet attached along with some well cured sweet caramel from my head stash.


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## puffenuff (Nov 4, 2011)

What up hoss? Gotta let you know I'm really digging your grows with these pro grow lights. Nobody ever really talks about these lights like they do all the other brands but they seem to do an excellent job at a good price. 

Just wondering if yours are the new 2011 versions? And have you heard anything about, or experienced firsthand, these hash tips hydroponicshut.com is talking about? Description in the link.

http://hydroponicshut.com/Pro-Grow-550-Watt-LED-Grow-Light-hydroponics-hut.html

Thanks!


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## hoss12781 (Nov 4, 2011)

Anyone subbed to this journal probably saw the last two hateful attacks on this journal. Thanks to those who came to my defense but I elected to have the mods remove all posts related to the attacks, I guess I got my e-feelings hurt. If you missed them they were rather comical but very mean spirited given the time and effort I've put into documenting my grows.

Thanks again to the mods for helping clean up the mess. One more time for the record - *I do not work for a led company*. I'm a fundraiser for a division 1 research institution. This job provides a lot of down time, especially when I've already hit my goal for the year and can "hide in my office" for a couple months. 

If my word isn't enough for the skeptics I'm sorry, but feel free to check all my posts, especially those made when I started researching leds. I've been around here for a minute and have not always grown with led. If I did really work for hydro hut it would be one hell of a guerilla marketing effort! 

I think a lot of the thoughtless led attacks and general hate spewing we see around this and other boards is directly correlated to scamster companies such as the link listed below.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/New-LED-Plan...item27bf0ce2d4

I'd be straight on the hate wagon if I hadn't bothered to do my proper research and bought something like this. Anyone who's read this journal knows I love to cruze ebay cause you can sometimes find some kick ass deals, that's where I got most of my led lighting. Some of the ads just make my blood boil though. Seriously, take a sec and check this ad, its beyond absurd. Each diode produces .054 watts. Some poor schmuck is about to get a free market invisible hand job to the tune of $122, no lubrication.


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## Shwagbag (Nov 4, 2011)

It should be quite obvious to any intelligent person that this is simply a small medical grow. Keep up the good work.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 4, 2011)

puffenuff said:


> What up hoss? Gotta let you know I'm really digging your grows with these pro grow lights. Nobody ever really talks about these lights like they do all the other brands but they seem to do an excellent job at a good price.
> 
> Just wondering if yours are the new 2011 versions? And have you heard anything about, or experienced firsthand, these hash tips hydroponicshut.com is talking about? Description in the link.
> 
> ...


Yeah man I have one of the 14 band PG 180s. If you check the last pictures I posted with the new mylar you can see it on the right hand side. It's the light that loooks less red than all the others which are early 2011 or late 2010 models. I've only used it for about a month so I can't really say much about it. Seems to be performing at the same rate as the other 180s I have but slightly brighter and more blue diodes in the mix as opposed to high kelvin diodes which were much more prevalent in the early 2011 models. The new ones also cary 14 bands as opposed to 7 bands on the older models. New ones also have Ultra Violet and Infa Red diodes, the old ones only had IR. 

The new one is actually the only one I bought straight from the source, the rest of mine where ebay scores. I'm happy with it but would suspect you can probably get similar results (if you're the thrify kind like I am) by waiting for one of the older 2011 models to pop up on ebay. The reason I say this is when I bought my ebay lights I called hydro hut and asked if they would honor the remainder of the warranty on used models purchased - they said yes and I've saved quite the pretty penny doing so. Still I am a slave to new marketing and wanted to see what the new ones could do so I went ahead and paid for a new model. I'll let you know if I can see an obvious difference when I've had a chance to grow a plant full term with one. 

I did get a mighty hash tip on the blackbriar I grew with one of the first gen 2011 models, it's pictured several pages back. I also managed to bleach the top of the plant to accomplish this. Keeping led lights at the point of optimal penetration and production without bleaching is a balancing act. From everything I've experienced with their lighting I would take everything published on their site at face value. That 550 model is a beast but if you're like me and have several plants at different stages I'd rather have more of the 180s, the total wattage adds up to the same as the 550 (or a tad more) and they all feature the same 3w cree diodes. I'd rather have the modular set up than one massive light, but that's just me.

Also thanks for the compliment!


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## hoss12781 (Nov 4, 2011)

in case you're like me and don't like flipping through 20 pages to find the picture. The hash tip from my blackbriar plant. It held a flame when lit. Not as large as the one on hydro huts website but I'm not exactly a professional grade medical garden either so ...


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## hoss12781 (Nov 4, 2011)

welcome back shroomz.


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## loudpac (Nov 4, 2011)

Take it as a compliment Hoss, someone's going through the trouble to do that.
-must be doing something right, huh?


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## hoss12781 (Nov 4, 2011)

Wow, I have no fucking clue who MickyD is. 

Thanks for the perspective pac.

I'll take it as a compliment that someone has gone through a fairly amazing effort to jack my journal ... and a lot of other led threads on this site under several handles.


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## pottx (Nov 6, 2011)

just updated my journal with pics... any feed back is welcome. 

https://www.rollitup.org/indoor-growing/480806-led-auto-not.html#post6584096


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## pottx (Nov 6, 2011)

I am a imaging professional by trade. I have to say the mylar is much more reflective then white paint. White paint reflects about 50% of the light where mylar does 95% of the light. I have heard argument on other forums that say dimpled mylar is better because it scatters light better. I am going to try that in my next cab. my 2¢ anyways...


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## hoss12781 (Nov 7, 2011)

yeah the mylar is good, I wasn't hitting on all cylinders when I dumped on it earlier. I've got mine set up with duct tape holding it to the wall so the fan kinda moves it around enough to change the angles its reflecting back on my girls. I'm still going to do a tent one of these days. Perhaps a X-mas present to myself. We'll see. Gonna snap some pics today or tomorrow. Things are starting to bloom up nice on the caramel.


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## puffenuff (Nov 7, 2011)

Sup hoss? Just wanted to offer some friendly advice about using duct tape to hold up the mylar...thats exactly how I did it too my first time...i taped the shit out of all the edges to my closet walls. I used like a whole roll of tape. But the tape kept coming unstuck after a while. After a few months of retaping, I finally stuck some push pins in through and haven't had to mess with tape since. Makes putting up and taking down soooo much easier. It was definitely a "doh!" moment!


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## hoss12781 (Nov 7, 2011)

Push pins it is then. Thanks man. 

Some pics. The sweet caramel is the oldest and largest, I'm thinking she will be a good yield just like the last caramel I grew. Also from sweet seeds is the blackjack, the lanky one with 3 branches each node.

The super sativa is kinda short and bushy for what I expected from a "sativa" autoflower. We'll have to wait for the smoke to see if Big Buddah managed to create a true sativa auto, which from what I gather is a rather difficult process. 

The baby is the la bella afrodita from delicious seeds. She's growing well but will be the runt out of this run. She's already shown sex, which was much earlier than the others this run. If you haven't grown autos this basically means she won't get as large as the caramel for sure but will probably still be a good producer given the branching thus far. This could be my fault - I watered heavily before going out of town on business and I think I may have given her a tad of root rot. I put a dehumidifier next to her for a couple days and waited until she was totally dry before watering again. This usually clears up mild cases. 

All in all, things are going pretty well. Constructive comments, criticisms, and questions always welcome!


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## KawiZZR (Nov 7, 2011)

I agree with puff. I helped a friend put up mylar for his grow before and pins in the wall are much easier, especially in corners. I finally just got around to ordering a tent last week myself, I feel like it's one of the best investments I've made for growing (several less genius purchases before this).

Also, that caramel is looking great man! How big is she compared to the last one you grew and does it seem like a consistent strain so far?


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## hoss12781 (Nov 7, 2011)

Also managed to bleach the top of the caramel just a little bit. Kinda looks like a mg def but its not, just left the lights too close when I was out of town. I've since moved them back to 10 inches and the problem went away.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 7, 2011)

KawiZZR said:


> I agree with puff. I helped a friend put up mylar for his grow before and pins in the wall are much easier, especially in corners. I finally just got around to ordering a tent last week myself, I feel like it's one of the best investments I've made for growing (several less genius purchases before this).


Yeah the more I think about it the more I'm thinking santa is going to bring me a tent for X-mas. Been there on some less than genius purchases man. To illustrate here is one of my bonehead moves before I did some reseach, they almost turned me off to using leds after I lost an entire crop (4 plants). They wound up being comically tiny (funny if you weren't me).

http://www.htgsupply.com/Product-Four-Pack---LED-Spotlight-Bulb-TriBand-Spectrum.asp

168 leds producing a whopping total of 16 watts of output (.1 watt per diode as opposed to the 3w diodes I run now) - I should have seen that coming. Anyway that was $100 bucks against the wall. I'm tempted to start a don't buy shitty leds thread with examples of bogus led lights from around the web, cause there certainly are plenty. I'm just pretty sure it would get trolled and flamed to no end.


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## luckyskindaguy (Nov 7, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> Also managed to bleach the top of the caramel just a little bit. Kinda looks like a mg def but its not, just left the lights too close when I was out of town. I've since moved them back to 10 inches and the problem went away.


Bleaching tends to happen from time to time when using LED. I have bleached a few tops before. Still good smoke, if not more potent.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 8, 2011)

I'm inclined to agree with you on this Lucky. That's actually how I created the hash tip pictured on page 20. I let the plant grow really close to the glass the last 2-3 weeks. I've since been playing around with blasting the crap out of my last plant (of the four on any given run) with almost all the leds, it seems to put it in freak out mode, does bleach a little bit but brings out the funk. 

Wouldn't do this with anything that wasn't at least two weeks away from chopping, but this guy has a good point.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 8, 2011)

KawiZZR said:


> Also, that caramel is looking great man! How big is she compared to the last one you grew and does it seem like a consistent strain so far?


The caramel is a fantastic auto strain. I only ordered a 3 pack of fem seeds to try them out but will be re-ordering. It is highly stable, of the 3 I grew two, I traded one of them to my buddy for the fem santa seed I had in my last run. All 3 have been monster autos. Although this one isn't done yet its safe to say it, like the other two will easily pull one oz plus. 

This one is slightly bigger than the last one I grew. The smoke is as advertised as well. Tastes kinda like a carmel latte. I really can't talk this strain up enough.


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## KawiZZR (Nov 8, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> The caramel is a fantastic auto strain. I only ordered a 3 pack of fem seeds to try them out but will be re-ordering. It is highly stable, of the 3 I grew two, I traded one of them to my buddy for the fem santa seed I had in my last run. All 3 have been monster autos. Although this one isn't done yet its safe to say it, like the other two will easily pull one oz plus.
> 
> This one is slightly bigger than the last one I grew. The smoke is as advertised as well. Tastes kinda like a carmel latte. I really can't talk this strain up enough.


Sounds like I know what I'll be getting myself for x-mas now. Going back to things we've bought that we shouldn't have, at least you ended up with a few cool looking lights to play around with. I ordered this http://www.htgsupply.com/Product-A-GrowBright-4in-Inline-Fan-&-Carbon-Filter-Combo.asp last year and it was horrible. In a good sized cab it sounded like a miniature jet engine but barely moved enough air to keep a 150w hps under 90F. And as for the carbon filter, I found that pc fans and dryer sheets worked better. A friend of mine just recently got some ONA and that stuff is incredible! Next time I start flowering I'll be getting some, seems like the least effort for the most benefit.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 8, 2011)

Ona gel is the tits, I use dryer sheets as well on the intake that recycles the air from my grow room back into the rest of my house. Even though I was supremely upset with the shit leds they sold me two years ago - and still have on the market for others to buy - I hate to crap on HTG cause they're hps lights are actually pretty good. Some of their products are and some aren't. Kind of like Worms Way. I think you get that with any mega retailer.

Speaking of throw backs and old crap that doesn't work well - a pic of my original set up I found on my old PC (a lemon g photoperiod plant). Old school crappy 30w floro tubes. Bought a lot of these a couple years back before I went to HPS and CFL.

https://www.cornells.com/products/20w-fluorescent-light-stick-loa%7C824554.html

Similar to these more or less I think mine were from "lights of america". They sucked big time - took 6 months to grow 2 oz on one photoperiod plant. After I took a 5 year hiatus from growing when I graduated college and went to get back into it I figured I'd just go to home depot and pick up some floros. In retrospect spent way too much on this crap before I switched to HPS and spent more $, then led and spent more $. Growing is pretty freaking addictive, good thing I'm at the point now where my hobby has more than paid for all the money spent tweaking of my grow set up.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 8, 2011)

KawiZZR said:


> Sounds like I know what I'll be getting myself for x-mas now. Going back to things we've bought that we shouldn't have, at least you ended up with a few cool looking lights to play around with. I ordered this http://www.htgsupply.com/Product-A-GrowBright-4in-Inline-Fan-&-Carbon-Filter-Combo.asp last year and it was horrible. In a good sized cab it sounded like a miniature jet engine but barely moved enough air to keep a 150w hps under 90F. And as for the carbon filter, I found that pc fans and dryer sheets worked better. A friend of mine just recently got some ONA and that stuff is incredible! Next time I start flowering I'll be getting some, seems like the least effort for the most benefit.


I actually still have the old screw in HTG leds. I used them to make my front porch look scary on halloween. That's about all they're good for.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 8, 2011)

@ KawiZZR - if you're strain shopping I thought I should mention - as much as I love the Sweet Caramel from Sweet Seeds and suspect their Black Jack (growing right now) will be awesome I would strongly suggest staying away from their "Fast Bud #1" auto strain. Couldn't remember if we talked about this before but it wasn't "fast" as described and the bud was def not on par with some of the other auto strains I've grown. Reminded me of some Joint Dr. Original Lowryder - which sucked big time but should be given props as it was the first auto strain and the building block for most of the kick ass autos we have available today.


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## KawiZZR (Nov 8, 2011)

@hoss - Hey the old fluoro tubes still have their uses, a single T8 is enough to start seeds and root clones. I'm not meaning to shit on HTG at all, some of the stuff I've gotten from them was spot on, I just won't be going generic for any grow essentials from now on. Haha I just added up how much I've dropped on grow stuff and it's a good bit. Since I started I've had 5 harvests, but have barely yielded enough to break even on what I spent for all the crap. It's kinda sad, but now that I'm using LEDs and got a tent the only things I'll be buying any more are ONA, soil/perlite, and seeds if I want more options.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 8, 2011)

won't have to replace a bulb for at least the next three years, probably more than that.


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## KawiZZR (Nov 9, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> won't have to replace a bulb for at least the next three years, probably more than that.


Only three? I'm thinking at least 5 years, by then the cost hopefully will be down to around half what it is now.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 10, 2011)

probably more like 6, that's what I figured with the way I'm running mine. At 23 hours a day X 365 = 8395 hours a year that my lights are on. If the 50,000 burn time holds true I'm looking at a total of 6 years. I was just thinking in terms of warranty, the hydro huts carry a 3 year mfg warranty. Are the haight solid states you're running a 1,3, or 5 year warranty? Either way, at least 3 years, probably a lot longer.


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## KawiZZR (Nov 10, 2011)

Haight only does a 1 yr mfg warranty but I haven't read of any units failing and they started in '09 so I'm not too worried. The design is really simple so there isn't too much that could go wrong.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 10, 2011)

Yeah I'm sure you won't be in the lighting market for a while. Never used them but had some ebay bids in on a couple of haight lights when I was shopping around. They seem pretty legit.


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## KawiZZR (Nov 10, 2011)

Yup, from now on my goal is to spend less than $5 a plant from seed to harvest (not counting electric cost). I've got enough nutes to last for years, don't need any more pots, and I just use a peat moss/perlite mix so it's pretty cheap. How much is your elec bill for the grow each month?


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## hoss12781 (Nov 11, 2011)

about ten bucks, maybe twelve. I was running close to $30 a month with my old set up which makes sense as I dropped from over 1200w down to less than 600. I took a video of my grow room but can't upload it and don't want to put it on the you tube for god and everyone to see. I'll take some pics later, the caramel blowing up big time.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 11, 2011)

That caramel is probably in my all time top 5 of the biggest and healthiest autos I've grown, a little light bleaching but that's about it. I'm really happy with the trimming method I'm using on autos and would really rec it if you want to max out your yield with a super bushy plant. 

Sometimes it does backfire - if you look at the smallest plant (bella afrodita) it top is being overgrown by the branches I think I trimmed too early. The other three are gonna be fat bottomed girls.

I'm also not missing my side lighting like I really thought I would.


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## KawiZZR (Nov 11, 2011)

That's awesome! What's your price per kwh? My 90w alone is $8 a month on 18/6. I really the structure of that caramel, even your smallest doesn't look bad by any means.


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## PrezDickie (Nov 11, 2011)

hoss you gotta label those pics or at least tell me whats what  i'm a newb and sometimes i'm not sure what i'm looking at other than some beautiful plants and proof that i must grow the caramel sometime! sweet seeds cream caramel right? have you only grow the auto or have you done the photo period version too?


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## hoss12781 (Nov 11, 2011)

Yeah it would make it easier to read. I'll label next time. The Sweet Caramel is from Sweet Seeds and I think they make it in a photoperiod as well, not sure I don't really shop for photo strains. 

On the price per kw I'm not entirely sure but I live in the smack dab middle of nowhere. I noticed our power bills decreased significantly once we moved away from city and out to the sticks. The figures I gave earlier were kinda eye balled by going back on my online bill history and checking the difference between months this year with led vs last year running hps/cfl.


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## leogets (Nov 11, 2011)

5 gallon smart pots ? thats a heck of alot of medium for auto's ime 

you reusing your medium ? if not you should ... i reuse coco 4 times , 3 indoors an last outside with veggies 

use drain unclogger instead of cannazym to break down the roots same shit 1/10 the price


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## hoss12781 (Nov 11, 2011)

whatever you want ... leogets. Nice handle man. Thanks for the input. I've gotta say though, the 5 gallons have let the roots grow out larger and by comparison my autos are larger with this pot size compared the the 3 gallon. I'm probably going to stick with them.

I don't reuse my medium for my mj but it is recycled in my compost station along with whatever bananas, old lettuce, apple cores, ect that we toss in there. The compost is then reused to grow some bad ass big boy tomatoes & other fresh fruits and veggies in my outdoor garden straight from seed every summer. 

I prefer to use new medium on every plant every time when it comes to my mj plants. Tomatoes are cheap compared to high dollar indoor mj. I'd rather re-use and recycle for my peppers, tomatoes, green beans and all the other great homegrown my wife and I plant outside every year.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 12, 2011)

Concerning the electricity consumption I should have mentioned there are plenty of times (first two and last two weeks of the grow, and when I go out of town so I don't have to water as much) that I'm only running half the diodes on my lights. I only run the veg set the first two flower only the last two weeks and like now when I'm about to go camping for two days I will leave just the flower on. So basically on the early 2011 model 180s I'm only running 65w of total power, on the PG 250 which as a lot more flowering diodes 100w of power, on the new model 180 about 77w total so that helps keep the bills down too.


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## KawiZZR (Nov 12, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> Concerning the electricity consumption I should have mentioned there are plenty of times (first two and last two weeks of the grow, and when I go out of town so I don't have to water as much) that I'm only running half the diodes on my lights. I only run the veg set the first two flower only the last two weeks and like now when I'm about to go camping for two days I will leave just the flower on. So basically on the early 2011 model 180s I'm only running 65w of total power, on the PG 250 which as a lot more flowering diodes 100w of power, on the new model 180 about 77w total so that helps keep the bills down too.


Hmm, wonder if more companies will start adding that option in the future? Seems like it could be a nice way to save some extra money on electric in bigger grows. I got my tent setup today and I was not expecting it to be this big inside. The thing is freaking huge! Once the light gets here I'm gonna get a new grow started, between 4-6 autos.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 13, 2011)

what kind of tent did you get and how much did you pay. I'm shoppin right now.


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## KawiZZR (Nov 13, 2011)

I got the Secret Jardin DR120 II off greners.com. It's expensive compared to some of the others I was looking at but from what I've seen people are happy with it and it's made of a thicker material than most so it should last a while. I anticipate that I'll be using it for several years to grow one thing or another so the cost is worth it to me. Only thing I may change is putting foil tape over one of the side zippers that is against a wall. I'm not going to use it and there's no flap over them so a little light could potentially get through where the two zipper heads meet. I'm very impressed with it otherwise, even came with a nice heavy duty carry bag to make it easy to pack up and move. Price before shipping was $207.95.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 14, 2011)

was eyeballing this one but it seems tgtbt.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/330545611023?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2649

May just go ahead and spend more on a brand name instead of chancing being really pissed with a no name.


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## KawiZZR (Nov 14, 2011)

Yeah I don't particularly trust that, the company also sells cat supplies and battery chargers. The only other grow item they offer is a ripoff led light. A cheaper tent that seems really good is the line of them offered by gotham hydro. Only issue I had with them was the vertical space, I couldn't fit one 7' tall in the basement. Wejuana uses them for his comparison grow, they look pretty nice and are only $130.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 14, 2011)

gotcha, would rather pay an extra $50 and get something from Gotham even if it is a "cheaper" it still is a brand name that has a live person on the other end when you try to get in touch for cust serv.


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## KawiZZR (Nov 14, 2011)

I wasn't trying to say anything bad about gotham, a friend of mine uses a blackstar and loves it. I was just pointing out that it's under $150 for a nicer one haha.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 14, 2011)

more of my personal opinion, I'm not here to hate but just read some things about them not using finned heat sinks on 2009/2010 models. I'm sure they work great as well and have seen some kick ass blackstar journals on this site. 

I jokingly called them the 'walmart' of leds and had a gang of blackstar users jump down my throat about 3 months back.

Did some research while I was "working" today and will most likely have a gotham tent under the xmas tree.


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## PrezDickie (Nov 14, 2011)

I heard good things about the lighthouse tents from Gotham, you guys know if they are quality or not? Other than that comparison grow which is more about the lights I havent heard much


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## KawiZZR (Nov 14, 2011)

I'll look for some more growers using them so you can get some first person responses about them. They look to be good quality to me though.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 14, 2011)

Don't doubt it man I'm sold, I've read enough pos reviews. Just trying to figure out size I really need, what I'd ideally like to do is pull out the divider in the closet, ideally a 2x5x5 tent (which no one I've found makes) so I could vent out of a closed closet area and with a small quality fan vent the area and make it absurdly stealthy in what is already a spare bedroom used for storage.


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## KawiZZR (Nov 14, 2011)

Hmm closest I can find to those dimensions would be the mother keeper tent on htgsupply, the 4x2x5 from gotham, and the secret jardin dr120w. Of those the gotham tent seems to be the best option, it's $25 less than the htg one and the same dimensions as the secret jardin ($50 more).


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## The Dawg (Nov 15, 2011)

Hoss Great Auto Thread=Reps. Check Out thelashop.com They Have A Tent That Is 36x20x63.I Have Ordered From Them Before And Been Very Happy with Their Pricing And Product's


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## hoss12781 (Nov 16, 2011)

update (although not sure of any of the plant's exact age). The caramel is the oldest, the blackjack and super sativa are about the same age, the la bella afrodita a week or so younger. Also I labeled this time so you know what the hell you're looking at (thanks Prez). The I really hope the blackjack stops growing and starts flowering because its already getting too big for my closet. I've been feeding the caramel Cha Ching for the last week and have cut the Tiger Bloom out of the picture. She'll be Sledgehammered about a week from now and pure water till harvest. The rest are still gettin the normal doses of cal mag plus, tiger bloom, and bush dr. microbe brew. 

I moved the two tallest plants to the same side so I could have the panels spreading side lighting evenly as I noticed that when I have them at staggered heights the lower one blocks potential side light from the taller and doesn't provide side lighting to the tall plant (if that makes any sense).


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## hoss12781 (Nov 16, 2011)

Feel free to chime in with your thoughts on the "super sativa" cause I'm a bit upset with Big Buddah on this but will wait for the smoke to give final verdict - from the leaves alone, doesn't really look like a sativa plant to me. I've grown some heirloom sativa, which is total pain in the ass, but the smoke is quite legendary. This looks nothing like a sativa to me.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 16, 2011)

full closet view pic, forgot to upload it on the last post.


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## leogets (Nov 17, 2011)

what lights are what hoss in the above pic


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## KawiZZR (Nov 18, 2011)

I agree, the super sativa doesn't look to be sativa dominant to me either. I wonder if the appearance could be due to the introduction of ruderalis into the genetics to get the auto-flowering effect out a sativa origin strain. I feel like the amount of crossbreeding necessary to get a sativa to flower with under 12 hours darkness would definitely impact the plant's appearance. But as you said, you'll have to wait until the smoke to see what the true outcome is. If it doesn't start to thin out as it flowers and if it finishes too quickly I wouldn't have much hope for it though.

Btw man, I finally started a new journal for my next grow with the haight light. I should have a female chosen for the grow by the beginning of next week, then gonna start some Mi5 while the photos revert to veg and grow enough to fill the scrog screen.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 18, 2011)

good plan, you'll be happy with the MI-5. The strain really shouldn't be judged by the last one I grew in this journal, that was a freak whimp. They're generally very reliable autos for 1 oz plus yields. 

So far the only real sativa dom auto I've found that really reminds me of some old school sativa photo period is Auto Assassin from Short Stuff which will probably get revisted in grows to come if the "Super Sativa" doesn't do it for me. 

A bit excited that while the caramel should be ready soon, the other three should be ready right around x-mas which will mean I get to play santa with some nuggets to those who know me well - always fun.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 18, 2011)

leogets said:


> what lights are what hoss in the above pic


two early 2011 7 band PG 180s on full illumination on the left hand side, one late 2011 14 band PG 180 set on full illumination on right hand side, and one 2010 model PG 250 with just the flower spectrum turned on on the far right hand side of the closet.

The 250 is my go to "finisher", it has way more diodes than the 180 model in the same size panel and far more in the flowering spectrum than the veg. On the 180s they're an equal balance of veg and flower diodes, the 250 has to have somewhere in the 4 to 1 ratio in favor of flowering diodes so whichever plant is winning the race gets to soak up some 250 love.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 18, 2011)

speaking of some good ol sativa autos - some pictures of some of the first auto assassins I grew under high power cfls and a old school 150w hps. The plant off in the right corner is a snow-ryder, the rest are auto assassin. Looks far more sativaish than the "super sativa" I've got cookin now.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 18, 2011)

that set up used 845w of combined CFL and HID (obviously mostly cfl), final yields were about an oz per plant maybe a little less, but I was working with smaller pots that were not air pots and didn't have my nute schedule dialed in at this point in my game.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 21, 2011)

1000 posts!

Blackjack is as tall as my old dresser. I think I'll wait to plant after the caramel is done and put a panel on tilt to finish her. 

Caramel getting pretty close, and the super sativa has now started sprouting leaves and more importantly flowers that look like a sativa so I'll go ahead and eat my words from earlier posts I'm happy with it's looks for an auto sativa.

Bellla is small put not as tiny as the MI-5 I had on the last run. She is starting to flower and looks like she'll be an early finisher. 

Starting flush on the caramel this week ...


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## KawiZZR (Nov 21, 2011)

Plants look good man, that caramel is getting close! Saw a new auto on attitude, link is below, what are your thoughts on it?

http://www.cannabis-seeds-bank.co.uk/short-stuff-seeds-super-stinky-autoflowering-feminized/prod_3863.html


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## hoss12781 (Nov 21, 2011)

Well can't comment on that one but I have high hopes for it and would order a single seed if I'm able to purchase it that way but would be skittish about ordering a full set of those. I ordered a 5 pack of super cali haze, some grown under hps, some grown under led, some didn't fucking germinate (2 out of five and I've germmed some seeds I'm blaming this on them). None of my super cali haze made it through to harvest while I have grown a lot of other strains with success. 

I hope this is the super cali haze that should have been mailed to me six months ago when it first came out. I'm a huge fan of everything from Short Stuff except either of the blue diesels (potency issues) and the super cali haze (nearly impossible to grow). 

I've chatted with others who also didn't find anything super about the super cali haze in their gardens either.

That experience alone drove me away from the 'super auto'. IMO if your plant takes 120 days to go from seed to harvest you might as well be growing photoperiod mj.

Kind of a rant, I know - but I tossed about 60 usd against the wall and a lot of time fucking around with that strain that could have been better used growing a regular auto. 

I hope Short Stuff's new one is a winner, stitch nine times out of ten brings the funk in a real sort of way, but I will probably look to see what others experience with this new strain before I decide to take the plunge.


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## dannyboy602 (Nov 21, 2011)

Caramel looks nice. Never tried it. I read it tastes like caramel. Mmmm.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 21, 2011)

It's really one of the few flavor strains I've had that lives up to its name


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## loudpac (Nov 22, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> IMO if your plant takes 120 days to go from seed to harvest you might as well be growing photoperiod mj.


........ hell ye, lls


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## PSUAGRO. (Nov 22, 2011)

Like what your doing here Hoss.......great job and subbed


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## PrezDickie (Nov 22, 2011)

so if your flushing the caramel now how long till you think you'll chop her? what made you decide time wise? trich color? or just time and experience with the strain? sorry to pick your brain but you've totally convinced me to grow this strain and i'm just doing my homework  she looks amazing i'll be interested in what you yield from her.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 22, 2011)

I hope to get two full oz off her, but am supremely confident it will give at least 1.5 oz. I usually wait until 3/4 of the pistils have turned orange and and look with a 10x mag glass to check the trich color and look to get them while they're amber. Kind of an eyeball game. It does vary from strain to strain but I've never had a well bred auto last much longer than 9 weeks before I felt it was ready to harvest.

It will probably be at least another week until I chop but I want to flush now and will do it twice to make sure I get a chance to remove most of the cha-ching as I read this is a good finisher but can give your buds the 'nute' taste if you use too close to harvest so I'll give one more flush and feed just pure water the last week.


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## leogets (Nov 23, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> I've chatted with others who also didn't find anything super about the super cali haze in their gardens either.
> 
> That experience alone drove me away from the 'super auto'. IMO if your plant takes 120 days to go from seed to harvest you might as well be growing photoperiod mj.


to be fair a super auto is bred to be an outdoor plant they are almost always backcrossed with thai or columbian land race sativa's , try growing a land race sativa indoors ... same results

stick that sucka outdoors over summer in a hole or huge pot in organic soil an just add water an you will get 8 zips + off auto in 100 days , great strain for where sitch is from 

they are auto's for the non stealth outdoor grower just like the dwarfs are for stealth indoor rarely do the excell at the opposite of their design


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## hoss12781 (Nov 23, 2011)

That makes sense. I'm more excited about this "Dr. Feelgood" strain Stitch/Short Stuff will be launching soon. http://female-seeds.co.uk/products/shortstuff-seeds-auto-dr-feelgood-feminised/

My aunt/godmother has fibromyalgia. MJ really helps her live a pain free life and most of the indica dom bud I grow goes straight to her. The sativa dom I grow is for my (clears throat) 'medical' needs.


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## PSUAGRO. (Nov 24, 2011)

Sorry if this has been brought up already.......But have you used your (14 band. ) progrow long enough to reach a opinion about its pro's and cons verses the older models.

They are selling off the older units at a good discount......or drop the extra coin and get the new panels....any thoughts????


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## hoss12781 (Nov 24, 2011)

I had the 3 leaf mutant blackjack under the new spec 14 band, which ties in nicely with this part of the story. That plant is now so big that I had to make an executive decision on the caramel. I cut it down a bit early because the blackjack was so tall and wide that I ran out of space in my closet for 4 plants. I couldn't have the panel on top without bleaching so I now have two of the old spec 180s on 45 degree angles blasting the blackjack from either side. It's going on 3 feet tall which is absurd for an auto. I'll post some pics soon. I'd say if you can get a solid discount on the old spec ones they work great but unless its a heavy discount I'd say go ahead and cough up the dough for a new one. It draws more power (25w I think) and even though I've only run one plant with it, the difference I saw on that blackjack is pretty absurd.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 24, 2011)

now have the 250 on the super sativa and the new 180 on the la bella afrodita. 260w of led output blasting the blackjack. Caramel hanging with a half arsed trim. I have company coming today so I have to hide it back in my bonus room and didn't have time to do a full trim job. I'm going to let her dry for a minute until she's dry enough to pull the excess leaves off by hand then will be put in jars. A small deviation from the way I usually cut and dry which typically includes a super extensive trim job at the very beginning. We'll see how this works out.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 24, 2011)

the caramel really only had a couple more days before it should have been chopped anyway and any minor loss in final yield I just lost will be more than made up by the final weigh in on the blackjack. I'd really love to beat the local autoflower geek consortium record if I can which stands at 82g dried. Pretty massive but we'll see if this can be achieved.


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## hoss12781 (Nov 27, 2011)

As advertised two full oz and then some in less than 70 days. Most of the water weight is gone and she's tipping in a 68 grams of which I'm sure I'll still lose a couple through burping/curing but she's dry enough to be in a jar curing at this point. The smoke the same as before - a good indy/sativa mix with a signature caramel taste.


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## BlazedMonkey (Nov 28, 2011)

Nice buds as always sir


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## hoss12781 (Nov 28, 2011)

thanks man, I wanted to keep her going a little longer but had to make a judgement call. While the caramel was doing very well the blackjack has more weight potential and my space is limited. I guess its a good problem to have. For those of you shopping auto strains the blackjack, if you have 3 plus feet of space in either direction has been an incredible grow - behaves like a photo period plant in growth, flowers like an auto. I'm gunnin for a wide load harvest sometime round X-mas. 

In terms of autos that actually behave like an auto should the bella afrodita has displayed excellent node spacing and quick flowering while maintaining a small stature. Smells like a strong kush strain for medi purposes. It should be a solid 1 oz producer and a quick finisher. The super sativa has been giving me fits and doesn't like the nutes as can be expected from a sativa heavy plant. I love some good ol sativa but they're such a pain in the ass to grow inside. It's still healthy but growing it heatlhy has been a mile long hike in Sysephus' shoes (plus rep if you know who that is without using the google machine!). 

This journal has been super fun but I believe I've achieved what I set out to do and was only interested in documenting this little adventure as it pertained to new(ish), and from what I've experienced writing this journal, highly controversial grow technology. After my remaining 3 plants are finished I'll probably put a close to this journal as I don't really feel there is more I can prove/share/learn about the tech. The point was to get perspective from fellow led growers and document my own experience as a former HID grower which I've done. I'll continue to post pics of the remaining 3 until harvest. My personal thanks to all who have contributed to this effort! 

Without you guys it would have been pretty fucking boring.


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## PrezDickie (Nov 28, 2011)

I'll be subbed to the end. thanks for all your input and sharing your experiences with the community


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## PSUAGRO. (Nov 29, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> I had the 3 leaf mutant blackjack under the new spec 14 band, which ties in nicely with this part of the story. That plant is now so big that I had to make an executive decision on the caramel. I cut it down a bit early because the blackjack was so tall and wide that I ran out of space in my closet for 4 plants. I couldn't have the panel on top without bleaching so I now have two of the old spec 180s on 45 degree angles blasting the blackjack from either side. It's going on 3 feet tall which is absurd for an auto. I'll post some pics soon.
> I'd say if you can get a solid discount on the old spec ones they work great but unless its a heavy discount I'd say go ahead and cough up the dough for a new one. It draws more power (25w I think) and even though I've only run one plant with it, the difference I saw on that blackjack is pretty absurd.


Thanks for the reply and advice.........be safe and happy growing.


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## hoss12781 (Dec 2, 2011)

thanks guys, I may have backed the wrong horse with the blackjack. While abnormally large for an auto she's too far spread out at 3 ft tall and wide. She's not plumping up like I'd hoped. Also displaying some signs of what appears to be a N def, that or she could actually be rootbound in a 5 gallon pot which is pretty wild for an autoflower. I'll post some pics of where I'm at this weekend.


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## hoss12781 (Dec 2, 2011)

black jack looks like a photoperiod plant eh? The gallon jug and dressers in the background to give perspective. Seriously over 3ft in both directions. 

Anyone feel free to chime in on whats causing the yellowing. I believe its a combo of a N def and being rootbound. That and I was out of town for close to a week and put the mrs in charge of the garden. 

Super Sativa going well considering its a sativa which I usually have horrid luck with, especially inside. If you look closely you can see my kickass house slippers on the super sativa top pick which should give you an idea of its size. It's about as big if not bigger than the caramel. 

The bella as noted earlier is a very well behaved auto keeping a short stature, excellent node spacing and resin production. Even though it is more than a week behind the others in terms of age it has caught up with the blackjack and super sativa in terms of maturity. As always comments, criticisms, and musings welcome.


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## hoss12781 (Dec 3, 2011)

Also worth mentioning in the way of autoflower strain reviews. I had some friends in town from Colorado and Cali over the turkey day break. I keep at least 3g of the best nuggets from auto strain I grow preserved in jars. About 8 of us had our own "hoss' cannabis cup" party as my son was spending the night with his cousin. 

In terms of winners the general consensus from growers and smokers in medi states that pretty much know their shit is ...

1.) Smurfberry
2.) Auto-Assasin
3.) Blackbriar - yeah for home engineered strains (my friends voted not me - no bias)
4.) Caramel 
5.) Onyx - the sample was taken from a super sticky pheno. Its worth mentioning that all the onyx I've grown didn't live up to this sample. I suspect it isn't 100 percent stable in terms of its resin production and yield given other onyx I've grown.

So those were the top 5. No one really liked my blue diesel, but did give props to the top five saying they would have mistaken them for photoperiod nuggets which made my day (that and the several bottles of wine that were consumed). MI-5 came in 6th, followed by Russian Rocket Fuel, then some Diesel Ryder. Fast bud in 9th, Blue Diesel last.

If anyone living in a medi state out west sees a strain called blackbriar floating around in the next 6 months pick it up! I had over 100 seeds and wanted to spread this guy out (blackbrair is a cross between three strains - lemon g photoperiod, MI-5, and Auto-Assassin).


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## hoss12781 (Dec 8, 2011)

I've got my girl tied up in the basement. 

Seriously though I had to tie the blackjack branches up to the main stalk. A great solution any day for an overbushy plant with not so great node spacing. She was getting too bushy and the closeness to the panels was frying her big time. That and since she's finally putting on some weight the branches are starting to do the gangsta lean towards the ground. In retrospect I should have done this a while back but I've been pretty busy with other aspects of life. I'll get some pics of my blackjack bondage girl up soon. 

Its beginning to look a lot like Christmas in my basement closet.


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## hoss12781 (Dec 8, 2011)

in the way of supplimentals I just added some pineapple rush to the mix (traded a friend some cha-ching for it). While I suspect this additive is just marketing hype and the same thing could be accomplished by adding 1 tablespoon of blackstrap molasses per gal of purified water I'll go ahead and find out myself from first hand experience before I confirm.


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## hoss12781 (Dec 9, 2011)

Issues have continued to complicate on the blackjack, I'm pretty sure its just light burn/bleaching because its only affecting areas that were 6inches or less from the panels which is pretty much all the outer branches. It's pretty close so I'm not too worried and the buds seem largely unaffected so far.

The super sativa which has also suffered minor bleaching and some nutrient burn (same nutes, just have found every sativa I grow doesn't like them as much as 50/50 blends or more heavy indicas). 

Although I'm sure the blackjack and super sativa will yield and smoke well I grow more impressed with the Bella every day. Excellent node spacing and a well behaved posture for a stealthy area. She should come close to yielding as much as the other two as well. Instead of busing like crazy she just started growing some big 'ol sticks.

I think the blackjack and bella should be ready around x-mas the sativa as you would expect will probably grow into 2012.


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## Jogro (Dec 11, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> growing it heatlhy has been a mile long hike in Sysephus' shoes (plus rep if you know who that is without using the google machine!).


Off the top of my head, he's a character from Greek mythology who has been cursed in Hades (hell) with the task of pushing a heavy boulder up a steep hill (can't remember why).

Unfortunately, every time he's about "this" close to the top, the rock slips loose, and he has to start again from the bottom. 

Its usually spelled "Sisyphus", by the way.


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## hoss12781 (Dec 11, 2011)

you are correct sir! +rep


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## hoss12781 (Dec 11, 2011)

hoss12781 said:


> What hath god wrought? Seriously wtf? Check out this seedling. I've germmed my fair share of seeds, never seen anything like this. Have you?View attachment 1842583


56 days seed to somewhat early harvest due to the strange height and width of this pheno. I'm guessing somewhere around 1.5 oz, I had such high hopes but without bringing the plant out of the closet, mounting the panels to my roof and doing a whole mess of other work I really didn't feel like doing to gain a couple extra grams on the harvest she is now hanging upside down. It was impossible to keep her in the 'grow area' anymore even with the branches tied together. She was just too close to the lights and was bleaching out of control. Any longer and the buds would have started being affected instead of just the fan leaves


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## hoss12781 (Dec 11, 2011)

on a more pleasant note the bella is getting pretty close with over 50 percent of the hairs red and will easily give me an oz if not slightly more which is fairly amazing considering she sprouted on 10/20/11 and here we are on 12/11/11well less than 60 days from seed. While it's not a record breaking yield that was a pretty quick turn around for a one zip plus plant. I have her with the new 180 on top the PG 250 on its side, the super sativa is set up in a similar fashion with the other two old spec 180s. As noted earlier the sativa won't be ready until at least another two weeks. The bella should be fit for hanging sometime in the next week or so. Both have been flushed with sledgehammer twice now and are getting only pure water plus pineapple rush (sugar and carbs).


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## hoss12781 (Dec 13, 2011)

early smoke report on the blackjack - she turned out rather well despite being burned towards the end. Sweet and very spicy. A really good indy/sativa mix however I will probably never grow this strain again. Too many problems with the height/width. I hate to judge based on one grow with this strain but it was really out of control and too large for my grow area, wouldn't want to go through that again. That and given the ease of trying something new or re-visiting a classic via single seed centre, the blackjack from Sweet Seeds will be a one and done. 

Bella on the chopping block if I get around to it today.


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## hoss12781 (Dec 15, 2011)

pics detailing what is what below. Bella chopped and drying I'm guessing somewhere between 35-45g by the time all is said and done. The blackjack was over two oz, not exactly sure as I gave helpers some wet nugs for helping with the chopping process. 

The sativa is burnt but will get chopped soon enough. Only the fan leaves are affected so far - I'm blasting her with over 400w of led output right now which will cause a little bleaching. The good news - check the nuggets! This girl is the frostiest auto I've ever cranked out and the nuggets look prettier than a lot of the photo period I've grown. To all who have asked why I grow autos, here you go.


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## PSUAGRO. (Dec 15, 2011)

Nice job on the autos.....they look delicious.

Have you ever just considered 12/12 from seed.....more variety and cheaper...thoughts???


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## hoss12781 (Dec 15, 2011)

I have and was actually shopping for some shorter strains on single seed centre last week. I just have to make sure they don't get too big like that blackjack did or I won't have space in my closet. You really do have to keep the leds at least 10 inches away or your plants get bleached, its cool to move them closer when you know you're gonna chop in the next week or so just to blast them.

I am thinking about doing one photoperiod and two autos giving the autos one side of the closet the photo the other and doing a scrog with her. It just seems like a lot of work when I'm vary satisfied with most of the autos I grow and am easily averaging 1 and a half oz if not a tad more per plant in around 60 days per plant. 

It would be nice to cut my power bill in half though ...


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## hoss12781 (Dec 15, 2011)

That and while I grow indica for a friend who needs the meds I personally like sativa dom plants and there are several very good sativa autos out there these days. Growing a photo sativa inside is a pain in the arse.


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## hoss12781 (Dec 17, 2011)

So I went ahead and cut down most of the sativa today, the remainder is tiny buds on lower branches that wouldn't necessarily yield anything worth writing home about - this has a purpose.

I also ordered some Gibberellic acid today. This plant will be preserved and if I've done my homework the "father" in what will be my project to create my own feminized auto seeds. If this works the fem pollen collected will be crossed back with the other super sativa seed (hopefully it germs) or be mixed with blackbrair as bb is already a sativa heavy auto.


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## hoss12781 (Dec 20, 2011)

The Big Buddah Super Sativa wins. It is the best auto sativa I've grown hands down. Classy citrus taste and a great pull on the front of your head. Probably got about 50 or so grams. 

The remains also pictured. I haven't started treating her yet but hope I can make this girl give me some pollen.


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## The Dawg (Dec 20, 2011)

Hoss Your Led Grow's Has Changed My Mind About Led's.Im Currently Lookig At 4 Led's The Solar Storm,Mangum357,Lumigrow 330 And The Pro-Grow 550.All Are Impressive But I Keep Going Back To The Pro-Grow.What Are Your Thoughts.Peace And Hair Grease


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## hoss12781 (Dec 20, 2011)

Man the only ones on that list I've used are the PG's and the answer is gonna depend a lot on your area and how many you're growing but if you were only looking at getting one of the 550s, if you ask me I think I could grow better with my 3 PG 180s, and the 250. The cost is roughly the same and it is really nice to be able to manipulate the panel height to maximize your coverage (and harvest). I suppose if you have a completely uniform grow it wouldn't matter but a 3w diode only penetrates so far. I'd rather have easy moving options on all of mine in lieu of being held to one mega panel.

Also thanks for the compliment.


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## The Dawg (Dec 21, 2011)

Ive Been Doing Some Research On Led's(Of Limited Knoledge of Led's) And I Keep Comming Back To The Pro-Grow.You Seem To Be One Of The Few I Saw Running One And Was Wondering If You Had Did Any Research On Any Of These Other Lights??I Like Your Thinking On Using Multipel Led's.I was Going To Start Out With A 2.6x2.6x60 Tent With A Pro-Grow 550.The Reason Is If I Like The Led I Will Get A 5x5x7 Tent Another PG550 With 2 PG180 As Side Lighting.I Will Use The Other Small Tent As A Veg Tent With A PG180.Also I Saw On Another Forum Where A Dude Ran A Mangum357 And Got 3/4 Lb Off One Plant In A Small Tent.Peace And Hair Grease


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## hoss12781 (Dec 21, 2011)

Beyond looking at the magnum and seeing some decent grow journals I can't offer much first hand experience. I didn't buy the magnum because the cost per watt was way high compared to the PG. 

If you check back through this journal you'll see I've grown with lamps containing bridgelux, epistar, orsam, and cree diodes. Crees are number one for a reason. The output on some cree high output 3w diodes, used in the PGs, will leave others in the dust.

The lumigrows are also hyper expensive for what you get in terms of actual output. Also a marketing rep from monster gardens (people who sell lumigrow) decided to use this journal to spam people about how great their lights are. For that reason alone I will never buy one.


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## The Dawg (Dec 21, 2011)

Thanks For Confirming That My Research Was Correct On The Pro-Grow's.I Didnt Know About The Spamming Thats So Not Cool.It Was The Lumigrow That Pointed Back In The Direction Of Led's After Reading Some Not So Good Reviews.Ive Read Your Grow Journals A Couple Of Time's I Like Your Approach To Growing With Led's.I Will Be Updating My Grow Room This Summer So I Got Nothing But Time To Study And Learn.Peace And Hair Grease


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## The Dawg (Dec 24, 2011)

Merry Christmas Happy Holidays Peace And Joy


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## The Dawg (Jan 3, 2012)

Good Morning Hoss Any Updates??????Peace And Hair Grease


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## hoss12781 (Jan 3, 2012)

Sorry man I'm done with this journal, growing some Fem Santa, Pakistani Ryder, and Auto Jack right now along with a coin flip Blackbriar seed. I'm sure I'll wind up posting random picks somewhere on this and other boards.

Guess I got lazy, all I really wanted to do was see if quality led lights were up to par with my old HID set up. That was the purpose of this journal and from my experience any small home hobby grower currently using HID would be well served to make the switch. I may do some comparison journals in the future but am taking a break right now. Thanks for visiting!


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## Endur0xX (Jan 3, 2012)

nice grow Hoss
I am trying the 12/12 from seeds in my LED journal, .. it looks like the plants are going to stay very small. Chemo and conKushion


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## The Dawg (Jan 3, 2012)

hoss12781 said:


> Sorry man I'm done with this journal, growing some Fem Santa, Pakistani Ryder, and Auto Jack right now along with a coin flip Blackbriar seed. I'm sure I'll wind up posting random picks somewhere on this and other boards.
> 
> Guess I got lazy, all I really wanted to do was see if quality led lights were up to par with my old HID set up. That was the purpose of this journal and from my experience any small home hobby grower currently using HID would be well served to make the switch. I may do some comparison journals in the future but am taking a break right now. Thanks for visiting!


Right On Hoss I Will Keep An Eye Out For Your Next Journal.Peace And Hair Grease.


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## hoss12781 (Jan 3, 2012)

Endur0xX said:


> nice grow Hoss
> I am trying the 12/12 from seeds in my LED journal, .. it looks like the plants are going to stay very small. Chemo and conKushion


Yeah I've had people ask me why I don't try that and my answer is the outdoor freebies and blackbriars I gave to an outdoor grower. Unless they got a ton of light they were pretty puny. The ones that more or less got 12/12 from seed outside got an oz so not a total loss but I think dwarfs are on a death clock from the moment they sprout and if you blast them with as much light as possible (without burning) you'll be in much better shape on the 23.5/.5 schedule.

Also the 'fem' santa I planted turned out to be a dude. That was the second time in a batch of three fem seeds. Very disappointing.


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## Redoctober (Jan 14, 2012)

Great grow hoss! I am looking into several LED companies to try out and am pretty much going to go with the Pro Grow. I like the switchable spectrum control plus the IR and UV which a lot of LED's don't have. I've heard a lot of positive things about the white LED's. Cree are definitely second to none in terms of quality. Do you know if they are using true 3W diodes? There are many companies that use 3x 1W diodes but advertise as 3W. Magnum is one of these. Not that this makes the Magnums bad, in fact I will probably try out the new Magnum Plus, but they are stacking their diodes. Blackdog's look interesting too, but are very expensive and you have to choose a spectrum for your light (red/blue/or full) which I don't really like. 

Also, what insight might you have about switching spectrums? Everyone says something different. Some say they go blue for veg and red for flower, others say they go full spectrum all the way through, and all the various permutations of the three. Have you experimented with the various spectra during veg and flower? 

There was a rumor that LED lights caused flowering to take longer, have you found this to be the case? I can't figure out why it would; scientifically it doesn't make much sense.


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## hoss12781 (Jan 15, 2012)

To the best of my knowledge the new ones do. I was curious about that myself put some shades on and inspected. I think the old 2010 model PG 250 I have is a 3w cluster, the new 180 I have is definitely a single 3w diode. 

Since all I've grown with leds are autos I keep veg on one week, full illumination up till the last two then go flower only. I have no scientific basis to back it up but at least I'm saving power and don't lose weight compared to running it full blast all the time. 

Maybe a bit longer, nothing tragic. Using led seed to harvest I got over 1.5 oz of the Santa I grew bout 10 pages back, took less than 60 days. I think a lot of people have paid through the nose for less than reputable lamps and the result is a lot of fumes on forums.


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## Redoctober (Jan 15, 2012)

> To the best of my knowledge the new ones do. I was curious about that myself put some shades on and inspected. I think the old 2010 model PG 250 I have is a 3w cluster, the new 180 I have is definitely a single 3w diode.


 That's good to hear. It's funny because a stacked diode of 3x 1W will actually appear brighter to the eye than 1x 3W diode. But the light does not penetrate as far. This is probably why the new Magnum Plus LED's appear really bright. How much of a difference does it actually make? Who knows...probably some, but more than anything I wish that companies would just be honest about their builds and components so then at least you could pick something that's right for you. 



> Since all I've grown with leds are autos I keep veg on one week, full illumination up till the last two then go flower only. I have no scientific basis to back it up but at least I'm saving power and don't lose weight compared to running it full blast all the time.


 That makes sense. I guess if you have it on veg only or flower only you are using 1/2 the diodes, or maybe 1/3 of the diodes, I'm not sure how the light works. Reason I ask is that I've been playing around with T5 spectrums lately and found that you can influence the morphology of the plant by selecting certain bulbs i.e. certain spectra make the plant short and bushy with tight nodes, while others coax it to stretch more. I've never had a switchable LED but I'd imagine that the blue heavy weighting in veg would keep the plants tight while full spectrum would trigger more open growth? Is that right? I'd probably go full spectrum for most of veg and flower and maybe red only for the last few weeks of flower. But I guess it's all an experiment right  



> Maybe a bit longer, nothing tragic. Using led seed to harvest I got over 1.5 oz of the Santa I grew bout 10 pages back, took less than 60 days. I think a lot of people have paid through the nose for less than reputable lamps and the result is a lot of fumes on forums.


 Interesting. I wonder why LED takes longer? I think you are probably right that people reporting two week delays are probably using inferior quality lights.


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## PrezDickie (Jan 16, 2012)

hoss just wanted to say thanks for your threads and all your input with mine, think i'm closing out of RIU for good, got a really suspect PM from omar924 asking about my location etc... his guess was off but close enough for me to close out of this forum. good luck, keep growing! but watch your back,


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## PSUAGRO. (Jan 16, 2012)

Hey Hoss.....some good info on those pro-grows...............thanx..

@prez...........WTF is going on in here..elaborate please........


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## hoss12781 (Jan 17, 2012)

I read a thread yesterday where a user claimed to have told no one about his grow except all of us that could have read his journal. He claims he was raided. I have also had a PM from a "stranger" claiming they were from my neck of the woods and wanted to know exactly where I was located. Thankfully I'm not retarded but this, coupled with other sketchy reports has led me to believe its not worth it - even though I run a proxy and really enjoy interacting with everyone on here.


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## puffenuff (Jan 17, 2012)

They're watching...


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## PSUAGRO. (Jan 17, 2012)

hoss12781 said:


> I read a thread yesterday where a user claimed to have told no one about his grow except all of us that could have read his journal. He claims he was raided. I have also had a PM from a "stranger" claiming they were from my neck of the woods and wanted to know exactly where I was located. Thankfully I'm not retarded but this, coupled with other sketchy reports has led me to believe its not worth it - even though I run a proxy and really enjoy interacting with everyone on here.


Holy shit had no idea this was going on in here................well thanks for the heads up..
be safe ...


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## The Dawg (Jan 17, 2012)

hoss12781 said:


> I read a thread yesterday where a user claimed to have told no one about his grow except all of us that could have read his journal. He claims he was raided. I have also had a PM from a "stranger" claiming they were from my neck of the woods and wanted to know exactly where I was located. Thankfully I'm not retarded but this, coupled with other sketchy reports has led me to believe its not worth it - even though I run a proxy and really enjoy interacting with everyone on here.


Turned Out This Guy Had His Stepson Staying With Him.Long Story Short The Guy Belives His Piece Of Shit Stepson Turn Him In.


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## dkelly91 (Sep 7, 2012)

what do you think i could yield i have a pro grow 550 and im about to start with some auto ak-47? im going to have 3 going at a time in 5-gal pots


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## hoss12781 (Sep 7, 2012)

The 550 easily covers a 4x4 just keep it about 18 in above the canopy. Get ready for some rare dankness. Best of luck brother.


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## hoss12781 (Sep 10, 2012)

in terms of yield I've never put 4 plants under a 550 so won't speculate. I have however put one auto (vertigo from Paradise Seeds) under it and got about 5 oz dry in less than 90 days. I only grow four plants at a time and have at least 1 PG 180 and a UFO on each plant. I usually wind up with a clear "winner" of the group. That winner gets the 550 all to itself for the remainder of its cycle. This strategy has worked well for me. I have a total of 5 panels and 1 UFO from HH, also have a 50w bs ufo ( 1 550, 1 250, 3 180s, and the 2 ufos). I allocate them appropriately in terms of what I think each pheno has the potential to yield. I just pulled a massive one down over the weekend, a Bio Diesel from Advanced. It could be the best I've done to date. Will toss up a pick if I don't get too lazy after work.


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## The Dawg (Sep 10, 2012)

Hey Whats up Hoss.Glad To See Ya Again.You Planning On Doing Another Journal?I Learned So Much From Your Past Journals And Would like to See What Your Up To These Days.Yes I Did Pull The Trigger And Im Currently Growing With Leds.Come Check Out My Journal I Would Love Your Opinon.Peace and Hair Grease.


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## hoss12781 (Sep 11, 2012)

will probably start another journal soon. Just placed an order for next year's seeds including every auto from Sagamantha, more blueberry from Dutch passion cause its the tits, and a few of my favs from previous efforts. Just got lazy with this one. Glad to hear you've joined the LED army. Which did you get? Having tried most of the major players I'm pretty well convinced they all will give quality results but am partial to my PGs. I've never grown anything quite as dank with HPS, CFL, or anything else including the sun. I will toss up a couple pics of my Bio Diesel Auto from Advanced in this journal when my lazy ass gets around to it. It is easily my finest work.


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## The Dawg (Sep 11, 2012)

Right On Brother Hoss.You Need To Rock 1 Of Your Auto's In The Led Section.I Went With Area-51 Currently I Have 3 Models 1)AF-100 120 Degree Lens And 2) AF-135's 80 Degree Lens With Different Specturms


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## cypress green (Dec 10, 2013)

Hi mate read ur post about autos & biobizz,im not using sodium lights just one giant cfl with dual spectrum,only a 125w but only single plant wanted.I have biobizz veg & bloom & made small 25in tall box,insulated with passive intake,made filter system & good soil.I didnt want to use full strength of nutes,prob half of suggested dose but didnt want to make too much feed up but what do u suggest? I have feminised LR1 auto's,everythings ready,i was thinking which way to go..scrog or LST for extra yield or is it best to let it form cola? Any suggestions or if u want to send private message,great!


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