# 120W LED + Rainforest 66 + Papaya



## 206 (Mar 10, 2009)

Hi,

I will be using this journal to document my 1st LED grow. I will be growing papaya in a rainforest 66 and using a 120W tri-band LED.

Light: 120W tri-band LED from HTGSupply. Instead of normal tri-band technology (orange) it uses full-spectrum white which is the latest tech.

Hydroponic/DWC: Rainforest 66 from General Hydroponics. They call it the 66 because it has six 6" pots. I will only be using 5 sites and doing maintenence work (filling, draining, ph testing, etc.) via site 6.

Seeds: Nirvana Papaya seeds. For some pics and info about papaya see kevin's papaya grow.

All comments and questions are welcome!


----------



## 206 (Mar 10, 2009)

I began germinating 5 papaya seeds 48 hours ago and only one has cracked. The other seeds looked like they were about to crack so I put them all in rapid rooters, gave them some water, and placed in rainforest.

I just flipped the switch on the LED about 20 minutes ago and WOW, it is much brighter than I expected. After exposure to the light for more than 15-30 seconds, my vision temporarily turns green when I leave the tent...which lasts for 1-2 minutes.

It is producing almost no heat and is extremely quiet, which were my main reasons for getting it so I'm very happy.

I will be growing them as-is for a couple of days before filling the res and activating the air stone and vortex sprayer.

Any feedback would be much appreciated.


----------



## 1982grower (Mar 10, 2009)

damn. that light is nice. i especially like the table. i am def looking into both. i may try a setup like this. never seen that table before. looks really clean and simple. I'll be watching. good luck man. seeya soon. oh and the tent fits everything perfectly. how would you say the heat compares to 120 watts flouro. 2 48"t5ho bulbs i guess? even cooler? well let me know. looks great


----------



## lurkmaster (Mar 10, 2009)

I was really thinking about growing some papaya, ended up going with blueberry and a few blueberry crosses in the end though, pick n' mix.

I'm also really curious about how these plants will grow under LEDs..


----------



## 206 (Mar 11, 2009)

1982grower said:


> how would you say the heat compares to 120 watts flouro. 2 48"t5ho bulbs i guess? even cooler?


The biggest CFL I've used is a 65W Fluorex and there is really no comparison even to that so far. This LED is putting out almost no heat, and the little that it does seems to be blown out of the top quickly by the fans. The glass bottom is only slightly warm to the touch...I would feel comfortable leaving plants pressed against it.

Thanks for checking it out


----------



## 1982grower (Mar 11, 2009)

nice so little to no downward heat. looking into the table to hold a variety of mothers. its perfect. havn't even thought about the leds yet. waiting on some money and then i'll def look closer. i figure theyre like computers. no sense even looking 2 months before you buy. I have 4 weeks left in my 2 little grows so we'll see after that. Somebody mentioned that the leds can be moved to dif angles? i didn't think so but not sure? does yours? it seems like once you get a little canopy top of leaves those leds will be hitting them with all its force and there will be little wasted light. keep posting. seeya looking good


----------



## AeroKing (Mar 11, 2009)

Hi 206,
I ran a rainforest for a while. It is a nice unit and produces very fast growth.

1982, the pictures don't tell the story that the spacing on this unit is pretty tight.

206, I hope you realize that you will not be able to veg 5 plants from seed to maturity and then flower them out in this system, it is too small.

I'm confused when you say you are going to be "growing them as-is for a couple days". Does that mean you are going to hand water the Rapid-Rooters?

Consider putting your mister on a timer. You could use a 2-3 / day cycle to water with the pump if you'd like to automate. There are other reasons to use a timer on the mister:


AeroKing said:


> Heat is the #1 reason people run the pump on a timer.
> 
> Theoretically aeroponics will provide enough o2 to the roots, that they should not need a "drying out" time, like as is required with soil or ebb and flow hydroponics.
> 
> ...


----------



## 1982grower (Mar 11, 2009)

yah it looks just a little small for mothers but doable if i took clones constantly and keep them small. I havn't seen it up close so i'd have to see the measurements. either way it looks high quality.


----------



## 206 (Mar 11, 2009)

AeroKing said:


> 206, I hope you realize that you will not be able to veg 5 plants from seed to maturity and then flower them out in this system, it is too small.


I'm not sure all five seeds are going to crack, so I might only do 3-4. We'll see though.



AeroKing said:


> I'm confused when you say you are going to be "growing them as-is for a couple days". Does that mean you are going to hand water the Rapid-Rooters?


Yeah that is what I meant to say 



AeroKing said:


> Consider putting your mister on a timer. You could use a 2-3 / day cycle to water with the pump if you'd like to automate. There are other reasons to use a timer on the mister:


Thanks for the suggestion I will do this. If you have any other tips for the rainforest let me know


----------



## Ungui (Mar 11, 2009)

Looking forward to seeing how this turns out, good luck.


----------



## 1982grower (Mar 11, 2009)

i have heard many times that papaya seeds are diff to germ. never tried them though


----------



## 206 (Mar 11, 2009)

1982grower said:


> i have heard many times that papaya seeds are diff to germ. never tried them though


I'm starting to get worried about the four that didn't crack during germ...but I've read many times that papaya seeds are difficult to germ and if you just plant the duds they will grow in a few days. I'm hoping this is the case as they haven't popped up yet. The one that did have a tap root is now poking its head above soil, which was a nice sight.

Anyway today I filled the res and added 3 caps of micro/gro/bloon. First test 20 mins after filling:

188ppm
6.82 ph
55 degrees res temp 
67 degrees ambient temp

Any suggestions? (This is my fist hydro grow but I have all the supplies like ph up/down)

ALSO: If anyone has experience with the rainforest 66 is reading this, can you please tell me how you ran the power cable from your vortex sprayer? I was expecting the sprayer to swivel back and forth, but mine just continues to swivel clockwise, eventually twisting up its own power cord??? I'm really not sure how to fix this? Can I secure the vortex sprayer in place or will that make it ineffective? Please help!


----------



## 206 (Mar 11, 2009)

Pic 1: Installed a 12" air stone and air pump.
Pic 2: Strong ripples and bubbles from air stone, very impressed.
Pic 3: First one to sprout!
Pic 4: New top-down pic of tent. EDIT: hahaha...just realized how funny the ties on the light must look! I didn't have any cord so I cut a standard USB cable in half and it was a snug and secure fit...just not pretty.

Also if anyone can help me with a Rainforest 66 problem (see previous post) I would really appreciate it! cheers


----------



## 1982grower (Mar 12, 2009)

man that light does look brighter than the pics can tell. if that makes sense. your seeds will sprout. i don't know from experience but i read a thread that sounded like yours and his sprouted within a week. they apperently have a hard shell and should be presoaked for 1 day but not positive. the guy who was growing them seemed reputable though. so they'll sprout. seeya soon


----------



## 206 (Mar 12, 2009)

1982grower said:


> man that light does look brighter than the pics can tell. if that makes sense.


You are totally right. If you look at the first pic in my last post where I am installing the airpump, you can clearly see the LED's reflecting off very industrial plastic at the bottom of the res. And that is with a crappy digital camera and the downscaling...you get the idea.

Thanks for the encouragement, I hope the rest of them sprout soon.


----------



## 1982grower (Mar 12, 2009)

hey man. i have a guy who grows papaya seeds like crazy. met him on his thread. sorry i don't know how to link you there. he is pming me to let me know exactly how he germs these seeds. everybody says they are difficult. so don't ditch them yet until he gives me a timeline. should be any moment. and he seems to know his stuff. i'll post soon but dont give up on those seeds.


----------



## 1982grower (Mar 12, 2009)

well the news is good. after getting his very general answer he did say that he germs them like any other with presoaking in water for 2 hours first. he says they take forever but when they do pop even late, it doesn't seem to affect growth. not much help but at least you know a guy that has success with these has the same prob so they should sprout any time. seeya.


----------



## AeroKing (Mar 12, 2009)

Your sprayer should engage into the grommet that it sits in.

The head of the sprayer should not move. It should be stationary and only the impeller should rotate.

I think I remember that happened to me when I was first setting this up. I think the little collar above the spray ports was getting caught in the grommet, which confused me. Push it down past and the head itself should fit snuggly into the grommet.

Hopefully, with your LED, you won't have the res temp problems that I did. I ended up installing a chiller, even after insulating the reservoir and the water lines. I was running it under an air cooled 400w MH.

I also found the res to be undersized for how fast this system grows. I'd fill it in the morning, and come back to it being below the minimum line for the sprayer to work. I added a float valve to auto fill off of my RO feed, but after adding all this plumbing, there was even less room in the res. I considered adding an external res, but in the end, I decided to just start custom building systems to fit my needs.


----------



## 206 (Mar 12, 2009)

Thanks very much guys, +rep. I was able to secure the sprayer. The sprayer is much louder than I thought and is causing some weird rattles from the trays and pots because of vibration. I'm going to see what I can do about dampening the sound as this is very close to where I sleep.

Still haven't seen any more sprouts but I'll be patient.


----------



## 206 (Mar 12, 2009)

After 8 hours with the sprayer activated, there was been substantial growth in the one seedling. It is also nice and humid in the tank now and just feels much better.

221 ppm
6.33 ph
65 degrees ambient temp
68 degrees res temp

Any advice on optimal ppm for 18 gallon tank + seedlings would be appreciated. I have GH micro/bloom/grow and fox farm grow big to work with. To date I have only been adding cap-full's of GH.

Thanks and more pics tomorrow. Peace.


----------



## 206 (Mar 13, 2009)

Today I added a remote controlled outlet to my power strip and plugged my sprayer into it. This has made doing doing maintenance a snap since I can turn the sprayer off with a click but leave the LED and air stone on.

Update:
209 ppm
6.73 ph (added 1/4 cap of ph down and reduced to 6.02)
66 degrees ambient temp
70 degrees res temp

Pic 1: New remote controlled outlet
Pic 2: Seedling
Pic 3: Partially unzipped top of the tent, shows how bright the inside is better than previous pics.
Pic 4: My favorite pic yet...using 109 watts of electricity...which is about $3.50/month here if I do 24/0


----------



## angelsbandit (Mar 14, 2009)

You should try to get your PH down to 5.3 - 5.8 for hydro. Also you should use *no nutes* on seedlings that size.


----------



## dirt clean (Mar 14, 2009)

angelsbandit said:


> You should try to get your PH down to 5.3 - 5.8 for hydro. Also you should use *no nutes* on seedlings that size.


 
I second that! 5.8 id ideal for all the nutrients to be available to the plant. It is very important. Also wait until the 3rd node to feed. Nothing but ro or ro + cal mag for now. 

Good job watching the ppms.


----------



## 206 (Mar 14, 2009)

Thank you both for the advice, I will get the PH down within that range right now. Luckily the rooters do not quite reach the water (and the roots have not poked out of the rooters) so the nutes and high ph shouldn't have caused many problems at this early point.

I also got a hygrometer today so I could get more accurate air temp readings and RH. Here is today's update:

230 ppm
6.34 ph (added ph down and reduced to 5.44 per advice)
71F ambient
73F res
68% RH

The lone seedling is coming along nicely, but still no sight of the others. I will start germing at least a couple new seeds if I don't see them by tomorrow morning. More pics tomorrow, have a great weekend!


----------



## 206 (Mar 15, 2009)

This morning I discovered something pretty weird. I lifted a small piece of rapid rooter material I had placed over a seed to check on it and discovered a tap root growing vertically into the piece I put over the hole. I gently separated the seed+root and re-planted with it facing down.

I also began germinating two new papaya seeds using cup of water method. Paper towel method only resulted in 1 out of 5 germing so this can't be any worse.

Today's update:
251 ppm
6.04 ph
71F ambient
72F res
62% RH

Pic 1: Turned the LED off to get a regular pic of seedling.
Pic 2: Seedling
Pic 3: Seedling
Pic 4: Updated wide shot.

Would appreciate any comments! thanks


----------



## dpjones (Mar 15, 2009)

cup of water technique has given me 100% germ rate so far, just remember to keep it warm.

I dont understand why you are using LED and then have all that other kit, seems like a bit of a waste. But good luck none the same, i hope you get some sick weed =D


----------



## kurz26 (Mar 16, 2009)

how much red nanometers does your led light produce? I have looked on the website you bought it from but you cant read the chart.(its too small) If it does not produce at least 700nm in the red spectrum you will have flower problems


----------



## kurz26 (Mar 16, 2009)

Oh I just found it on the website, there is only one led light that I have found that seems to work all the way through from start to finsh. THat is the LED supernova enhanced spectrum and it is a very pricey lamp.(1400 bucks) It is sold at hidhut. It takes the red nanometer to 740nm and it has a dial that can be adjusted to wherever it is needed.


----------



## AeroKing (Mar 16, 2009)

I would not suggest waiting until the third node to feed in this system.
Growth is too explosive. They will need nutrients sooner.

Though nute load and ideal PH are both strain specific, I'd suggest at this stage to add to 0ppm RO water - about 200ppm of Cal Mag and 100ppm of high nitrogen "grow" fertilizer. Keep the Cal Mag there, and up the grow fertilizer maybe 50ppm a week for a few weeks and see how they do. You may need to up it more quickly if they show any deficiencies.

Allow your PH to fluctuate between 5.0 and 6.0, but do not let it stay below 5.8 for very long during veg. The plants won't be able to take up the Cal-Mag if you keep it too low, and when they grow that fast, they use it ferociously. Try to stabilize at around 5.8-6.0 and let it drift down for a couple days, but then get it back up to 5.8. 

Once your plants are flowering and you notice they've stopped growing big fan leaves, then steady closer around 5.5.

I've been working on my germination technique as I've had some problems in this area.
So far, the only method that has gotten me good success is this:

Cut off a very small piece of capillary mat (this is a white felt-like sheet of fabric used for wick systems) about 1" sq. 
Dip this in a 200ppm solution of RO, Cal Mag and Superthrive (or equivalent vit B supplement).
Fold in half, insert seed and slide into baggy.
Squeeze out excess water (keep damp) and loosely wrap up bag.
Put this onto a heat mat and cover it with an opaque bowl or equivalent. 
This will stay 90`-95' F.
Check every 12 hours, open bag to allow fresh air in, and if necessary, add water solution to keep damp.
Most seeds pop at 24 hrs.
The radical (little root) will grow into the capillary mat. This is fine. I cut off most of the excess mat and plant the whole thing in either rockwool(for hydro) or seed starting soil.

I've had much better experience using the capillary mat than papertowels. It holds the perfect amount of air and water when you squeeze it out. You can find it online, worthy investment IMO. 
The temperature is also very important, as is complete darkness.

I hope you get your germination technique sorted out. I destroyed a lot of expensive seeds until I adopted this tek.


----------



## 1982grower (Mar 16, 2009)

I agree with aeroking i think? I have always used seedling or veg nutes from the moment he seed pops. I believe that this alone can shave weeks off a grow. I always start with a mild 20% dose and over the first 2 weeks get to full strength. In the very begining if you can double the size overnight with nutes for even 2 days it makes all the diff in the outcome. Every plant i grew handled the nutes right away as long as you start mild. Not sure if i just agreed? looking clean as always! def think the cup method is a good idea.


----------



## 206 (Mar 19, 2009)

Thanks for all the advice guys.

I'm happy to report that both seeds I germinated with cup of water method popped and have been in rapid rooters for 48 hours. After a week one of the original seeds popped too, so I ended up with a total of 4 out of 7.

I was beginning to have my doubts about growing 5 plants all the way to harvest in the rainforest, so I think 4 will be much better. Using 4 sites also allows me to lower the light down quite a bit since they are all in a rectangular area now.

Pic 1: Updated shot of res+light.
Pic 2: Res ph shot
Pic 3: First plant is coming along nicely after a week.
Pic 4: Seedling 2
Pic 5: Seedling 3
Pic 6: Seedling 4


----------



## 1982grower (Mar 19, 2009)

love it. still looking clean. it would be kinda interesting to try an autoflowering strain under there. cant wait for a month to go by


----------



## 206 (Mar 22, 2009)

Well I just finished flushing and cleaning the rainforest for the first time...it took me about an hour total. After flush I added grow+micro+bloom and boosted from 25ppm to 350ppm, which is where it was at pre-flush.

I also got a new 7-day digital timer and have begun running the vortex sprayer on the following (6 on 2 off) cycle:

12AM on
6AM off
8AM on
2PM off
4PM on
10PM off

Any advice or feedback on this sprayer schedule? The air stone and LED continue to operate 24/0.

Pic 1: Finishing up res flush
Pic 2: I'm lucky to have 25ppm tap water
Pic 3: Updated shot of plant 1
Pic 4: 2nd seedling
Pic 5: RH/Temp shot
Pic 6: New digital timer can be seen on the left.


----------



## 1982grower (Mar 22, 2009)

should have told ya. walmart sells a digital timer built into their powerbars. 15 bucks. the left plugs are on the timer and the right are always on. Also looking at this omega garden. 2000 dollars with tax. not really that bad. holds up to 320 plants with a 1000 watt hps. thinkin throw my t5hos in there and they will basically extend from 1 end to the other cuase it is 4 feet wide. seems perfect. just got this timer and funny i have the same 1 you have on my fish tank. same thing just thought the powerbar was kinda cool. what do you think of the omega garden? holds rockwool only


----------



## 206 (Mar 26, 2009)

Well the last few days have been good and bad:

The bad is that I killed the new seedlings as a result of over-watering. I made the mistake of hurrying them right into the rainforest instead of giving them more time in the humidity dome. This is my first hydro grow and first time using rapid rooters and in troubleshooting what went wrong with these I've learned quite a bit. (I now have two brand new seedlings 48 hours old with very healthy tap roots in the humidity dome)

The good is that my lone plant is thriving. About 48 hours ago the roots reached the reservoir and there has been an explosion of growth since.

Pic 1: Plant on 3/13
Pic 2: Plant on 3/19
Pic 3: Plant on 3/25
Pic 4: Shot of the roots 48 hours ago first reaching res.

@1982grower: Thanks for the info about the power strip. The omega garden looks pretty awesome, but I guess it should for that price. 

Any comments or questions are welcome, I would love to talk to more LED users also. Peace


----------



## 206 (Mar 26, 2009)

Just wanted to post some updated pics. I'm going to try and post at least a couple pics daily from now on so I can better document the growth. Also I just wanted to note that papaya is a very short indica strain, just to keep in mind.

Pic 1: Shot of humidity dome and res... check the reflection off the dome roof. The two new seedlings are visible in the middle of the humidity dome.
Pic 2: The longest root has almost doubled in length in 24 hours, blows me away.
Pic 3: Better root shot.
Pic 4: Updated shot with LED turned off for reference.


----------



## dman0042 (Mar 27, 2009)

206

Very cool grow room...I like the LED light's to. Pic # 4 looks real good there. Like that leaf pointing up, by perspective of pic looks really really good. Maybe those LED's are doing some magic.

Cause that leaf looks almost like an adult fan leaf and its barely that old. I think that certain plant in pic thumb 4 is going to be very healthy and produce a good amount of buds.


----------



## 1982grower (Mar 28, 2009)

hey man. decided if i go led i'm going to build my own. looked into the wiring of the luxeon stars. found them for under 3 dollars. prob gonna do 100 at 4 watts unless they can handle more. on their site they say 5 watts with a heatsink. i am going to go for all out lumens. dont know what will happen but i'll go with the 2700k. i'll use hid mh to veg. lol. and flower with the leds. really looking into this. my crop is going good and it shouldnt be a prob. gonna take the time to mount them to a nice sheetmetal frame and everything. i know i can get 40000 lumens out of 400 watts. thats minimum. i will post pics when i start. just a little more research i feel i should do. also gonna look at your table. its the nicest ive ever seen by far. the plants are coming along i see. obviously still looking clean. seeya.


----------



## 206 (Mar 28, 2009)

dman0042 said:


> 206
> 
> Very cool grow room...I like the LED light's to. Pic # 4 looks real good there. Like that leaf pointing up, by perspective of pic looks really really good. Maybe those LED's are doing some magic.
> 
> Cause that leaf looks almost like an adult fan leaf and its barely that old. I think that certain plant in pic thumb 4 is going to be very healthy and produce a good amount of buds.


Thanks bro! I just got home after being away for 24 hours and couldn't believe the amount of new growth...the leaves pointing upwards you referenced now look like big fan leaves themselves. I couldn't be more impressed with the LED as of right now, especially given all the "Can't start seeds with LED only" posts I've seen out there. IMO the full spectrum white LEDs are making a huge impact, but I have no prior experience with red/blue or red/blue/orange to base that off, just an impression. I've attached some more pics including one which really demonstrates the intensity of the bulbs. You can see the reflection of the bulbs bouncing off my plastic humidity dome and back on to the side of the light unit itself, with each light still clearly visible.


----------



## dman0042 (Mar 28, 2009)

*Can you take another photo of the big one with no led just regular. Just to see without the color of the lights. 

Also how old is the big one in thumbnail 1?
*


----------



## dman0042 (Mar 28, 2009)

Oh yea are you able to switch on the the LED's in separate order? Like just blue or red or white at one time?


----------



## 206 (Mar 28, 2009)

dman0042 said:


> *Can you take another photo of the big one with no led just regular. Just to see without the color of the lights.
> 
> Also how old is the big one in thumbnail 1?
> *


Below are some more pics with leds off. The big one is 16 days from seed breaking ground.



dman0042 said:


> Oh yea are you able to switch on the the LED's in separate order? Like just blue or red or white at one time?


No but that would be an interesting feature I suppose, especially if the color of each bulb could be changed on the fly.

I have also germinated one thai super-skunk freebie just to have another strain to experiment with.


----------



## 206 (Mar 29, 2009)

Day 17 pics added below. I plan on flushing the res within the next 48 hours and will switch from GH grow to fox farm grow big (hydro) at that time. I will still keep feeding GH micro as well and also plan to increase the feeding schedule.


----------



## 206 (Mar 30, 2009)

Day 18 pics added.

Pic 1: Papaya #1 (day 1
Pic 2: Papaya #1 roots (day 1
Pic 3: Papaya #2 (day 3)
Pic 4: 48 hours ago I germinated papaya #3 and thai super skunk #1
Pic 5: Super skunk 48 hours later (day 2)
Pic 6: Papaya #3 48 hours later (day 2)
Pic 7: I found about 20 bag seeds which I had lost a year earlier. I have no idea what strain or strains they came from but I began germinating 2 of them for experimental purposes.
Pic 8: Bag seeds in humidity dome


----------



## 206 (Mar 31, 2009)

Today I dumped the res and did a thorough cleaning before refilling. I also switched up my nutes to fox farm big grow + gh flora micro and raised to 600 ppm. I didn't want to go any higher right now because I have some younger seedlings in there.

Pic 1: Papaya #1 (day 19)
Pic 2: Papaya #1 roots (day 19)
Pic 3: Pic from shortly after res change.
Pic 4: Papaya #1 bottom growth (day 19)


----------



## 1982grower (Apr 1, 2009)

thought you might be interested. these are new and made by a single company. looking more into it.
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/04/luxim-plasma-lifi-light-bulb-led-cfl.php
the quality looks amazing. huge billet alluminum heatsinks. but pricey i think. havnt found the price yet. 
check out the lifi site for the pics. there looking healthy still. cant wait for a month or so to go by.


----------



## 206 (Apr 2, 2009)

The big plant responded well to the res change and new nutes. I had the res PH sneak up to 6.3 this morning but I caught it and lowered back to 5.8. I should have done the res change earlier in the day to make sure the PH was stable before I went to sleep...something to remember next time for sure.

I just have to say again that after 20 days I am amazed with the growth. To all the LED doubters saying they create stretchy plants and can't penetrate, just look closely at pic 1 and remember that is 20 days from seed and using 135~ watts of electricity for the whole setup.

Pic 1: Papaya #1 (day 20)
Pic 2: Papaya #1 (day 20)
Pic 3: Papaya #1 LED off (day 20)
Pic 4: Papaya #1 (20 days ago)

Any comments are welcome!


----------



## 206 (Apr 2, 2009)

Looks pretty interesting but IMO is years away from being affordable for us. Very cool stuff though and thanks for checking in on the grow.



1982grower said:


> thought you might be interested. these are new and made by a single company. looking more into it.
> http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/04/luxim-plasma-lifi-light-bulb-led-cfl.php
> the quality looks amazing. huge billet alluminum heatsinks. but pricey i think. havnt found the price yet.
> check out the lifi site for the pics. there looking healthy still. cant wait for a month or so to go by.


----------



## 1982grower (Apr 2, 2009)

just to let you know i looked closely at your growth. it looks to me that your light is keeping up fine. the plants look def a great size for 120 watts. i keep forgetting to account for that. mine were just slightly bigger at the same time frame and were under around 500 watts. i have 12 plants. if i had 5 and 120 watts of t5ho i dont think they would look like that. def watt for watt you are at least keeping up with hps. i actually had some doughts but the nodes are not stretching. they are short and stalky. I now totally believe in the leds for growing. def an efficient light. you prob dont need as much penetration when more of the light is being used by the plant. they def look like they enjoy it. cant wait till you start to flower but it def seems like you could easily get more than .5 grams per watt. looking forward to seeing. And those lights are crazy. they should be out any time. i'm looking into them seriously. The only rerason i want reg coloured leds is so they can go over my aquarium after.


----------



## repvip (Apr 2, 2009)

1982grower said:


> thought you might be interested. these are new and made by a single company. looking more into it.
> http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/04/luxim-plasma-lifi-light-bulb-led-cfl.php
> the quality looks amazing. huge billet alluminum heatsinks. but pricey i think. havnt found the price yet.
> check out the lifi site for the pics. there looking healthy still. cant wait for a month or so to go by.


hey 1982! I like your posts. Do you don't know the price for this bulb yet? It's impressive!

However, have you seen this?


I'm a little concerned about the large drops in blue and red radiation, as well as the very high green. The LIFI-02 is better for the red. Green light isn't good for seedlings/vegging as it causes dramatic stretching. Maybe for flowering though... I would love to try one out.

Also, the cnet video says they are using 250w, which is significantly brighter than the 400w light they compare it to. But why 250w? Is that the watt for their light? They said the plasma gets 6000K!! That's like... nuclear fission temps haha

*206*

As you know I've been following your progress  It looks real good. I'm curious how high you are trying to leep the LED above your plants, and how high you would like to, if it's different


----------



## 1982grower (Apr 2, 2009)

repvip said:


> hey 1982! I like your posts. Do you don't know the price for this bulb yet? It's impressive!
> 
> However, have you seen this?
> View attachment 373984
> ...


----------



## jollygreenleaf (Apr 11, 2009)

dont let this thread die!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I was very interested in that light. There is a lot of confusing info out there about leds.


----------



## 206 (Apr 12, 2009)

jollygreenleaf said:


> dont let this thread die!!!!!!!!!!!!!
> I was very interested in that light. There is a lot of confusing info out there about leds.


Sorry for the lack of updates, I actually had to leave the plants alone for 7 days. Before I left I raised the light 24" above the plant and set the ph to 5.2. I fed flora series to 500ppm. On day 4 a friend was able to balance the ph for me. He reduced it from 6.3 to 5.4. I just got back a couple hours ago and increased ppm to 650 (going to drain and refill again soon) and reduced ph from 6.1 to 5.8.

The growth in the last 7 days is nuts, I'll let the pics speak for themselves:


----------



## jollygreenleaf (Apr 12, 2009)

Thanks for posting again. I think im gonna get that light. It seems you are proving that new generation LEDs can grow bushy thick stalked plants. Do you feel like the light is living up to all the hype on the HTG website? Could your plants really grow right into it without burning? Thanks again.


----------



## 206 (Apr 12, 2009)

jollygreenleaf said:


> Thanks for posting again. I think im gonna get that light. It seems you are proving that new generation LEDs can grow bushy thick stalked plants. Do you feel like the light is living up to all the hype on the HTG website? Could your plants really grow right into it without burning? Thanks again.


For vegetative growth, the LED has lived up to the hype and surpassed my best expectations. I obviously can't comment about flowering yet but I am expecting big results (400w+ HPS equivalent) there as well.

I haven't pressed the light against the plants yet, but I would feel totally comfortable doing so. They have been as close as 2" so far with no problem, although I keep it about 18" above right now since I have other plants going.


----------



## 206 (Apr 12, 2009)

I also just wanted to note that the LED managed to grow those thick stalks without any help from fans. I have been ready for weeks to hook up a fan at the first sign of droopiness or thin stalks/stems but so far there has been no need. This will probably change during flowering but just FYI.


----------



## Stoneded (Apr 12, 2009)

You're gonna flower with that thing? Node distance is already pretty far, maybe it'll yield a touch above CFL's but nowhere near HID lighting. Anyhow, good luck.


----------



## repvip (Apr 12, 2009)

Stoneded said:


> You're gonna flower with that thing? Node distance is already pretty far, maybe it'll yield a touch above CFL's but nowhere near HID lighting. Anyhow, good luck.


awww... and the reason I haven't started an LED thread pokes it's evil head. Too many haters. I suspect there are more LED growers who are keeping their results to themselves... 

Great job 206 keep up the good work! 

I cannot wait to see how the flowering works out for you. I am flowering with a 350w LED panel, but my plants get that for 4 weeks and finish under a 1000w hps for another 4 weeks. Also have had great success with vegging under a tri-band UFO.

https://www.rollitup.org/attachments/hydroponics-aeroponics/381807d1239395619-harvest-pound-every-three-weeks-ufo.jpg


----------



## Stoneded (Apr 13, 2009)

Pssh, I'm not a hater just a realist, tho I'm just as curious to see how this grow turns out as anyone else. For 120 watts it is phenomenal, I just don't think it'll cut it for flowering, but we shall see. Whatever scale you grow on and with whatever lighting, it still beats paying street prices for inferior smoke. So we're all winners in the end.


----------



## 206 (Apr 13, 2009)

Thanks for the comments guys.

I took 3 cuttings from the big plant today and will probably take 1-2 more by mid-week. I also measured it for the first time and it is 14" tall and 23-25" wide depending on where its measured. For perspective the tent is 32"x32"x60".

I haven't done a very good job documenting the other 4 plants in the rainforest so I wanted to do a recap. Keep in mind that since Papaya #1 is so far along, the light has been 2-3 feet off the smaller plants for their entirety. 

Pic 1: Papaya #1 (day 31 from seed)
Pic 2: Papaya #1 cuttings
Pic 3: Papaya #1 cuttings
Pic 4: Thai super-skunk (day 13 from seed)
Pic 5: Papaya #2 (day 14 from seed)
Pic 6: Bag seed #1 (day 11 from seed)
Pic 7: Bag seed #2 (day 11 from seed)

Thai s-skunk looks very healthy so far and already has more odor than the papaya #1. For an outdoor sativa it really doesn't look much different than the indica papaya so far.

Papaya #2 has been a very slow grower compared to Papaya #1 in its first two weeks. It also has slightly deformed leaves, but I'm not giving up on it yet.

Both of the bag seed plants are completely covered by several layers of leaves from Papaya #1 so they get mostly reflected light. I will be transplanting these to a smaller hydro system in a few days.


----------



## 206 (Apr 14, 2009)

Today I ordered a bunch of new supplies:

55w tri-band LED panel (third band is orange on this one though, compared to full spectrum on my 120w).

Electrode cleaning & storage solutions, ph 7.01 calibration solution, and replacement batteries for ph/ec/tds meter.

Cheap and small hydro system with 6 3.75" sites and 4 gallon res. Came with a 6" air stone which I am upgrading to 12". Also got two extra 12" air stones and will add one to the rainforest (giving it 2) and keep one for backup.

My plan is to move both bag seed plants and papaya #2 into the new hydro system under the new 55w light. I will also move my humidity dome with the four cuttings from papaya #1 under the new light. As soon as thats done I will begin flowering papaya #1 and thai s-skunk in the rainforest.

If papaya #1 turns out to be male I will transplant the thai s-skunk to a waterfarm and start a new grow in the rainforest with feminized autoflowering seeds. I'm still hoping its a female but it won't be the end of the world if its not, because this grow has given me valuable LED + Hydro experience.


----------



## jollygreenleaf (Apr 14, 2009)

206,
what about penetration? I have heard one of the problems with LED's is light penetration below the top canopy. Could this be why you have one large palnt and many other smaller ones? It seems, so far, that if you had 1 or 2 plants this light would be great because you could put it so close to the canopy. Maybe it doesn't have the dispersion power of HID. Stoned-just wonderin.
I wish you had started this earlier. Im about ready to buy a light.


----------



## 206 (Apr 15, 2009)

jollygreenleaf said:


> 206,
> what about penetration? I have heard one of the problems with LED's is light penetration below the top canopy. Could this be why you have one large palnt and many other smaller ones? It seems, so far, that if you had 1 or 2 plants this light would be great because you could put it so close to the canopy. Maybe it doesn't have the dispersion power of HID. Stoned-just wonderin.
> I wish you had started this earlier. Im about ready to buy a light.


It has only been in the last few days (since the canopy grew in completely) that I have started to pay close attention to penetration. So far so good I guess... there has been a lot of lower growth and filling in, especially around the empty area I took cuttings from. Check back in a few days for an update on this. I also have some velcro plant ties on the way since the horizontal branching is getting out of control.

In regards to the other plants being smaller it is simply because they are 2-3 weeks younger. If you check the earlier pages you will see the big plant did not start the explosive growth until its roots hit the water, which the smaller ones did just a few days ago.

This afternoon I emptied and refilled the res and fed flora series to 525ppm (from 25ppm tap water). The root system of papaya #1 is so big I can't pull the net pot up and out anymore, I need to also remove its individual tray.

New plan is to begin flowering on 4/20! Hopefully the weed gods will reward me with a girl for being so thoughtful.

Peace. All comments and questions welcome.


----------



## ElephantRider (Apr 15, 2009)

Looks amazing, man. Tell me you're cloning. Also.. you did this with nothing but 120W LED?? Not for nothin', but they look gigantic.


----------



## 206 (Apr 15, 2009)

ElephantRider said:


> Looks amazing, man. Tell me you're cloning. Also.. you did this with nothing but 120W LED?? Not for nothin', but they look gigantic.


Thanks and yes they have been under 120w LED only from seed and will be until harvest 

I have taken 4 clones over the last few days (first time ever cloning) and hope to see roots shortly. Three of the four look like they are still on the mother with no wilting at all but one is a little droopy. I want to take a couple more but am scared of stressing the plant before I begin flowering on Monday, what do you guys think?


----------



## ElephantRider (Apr 15, 2009)

206 said:


> I have taken 4 clones over the last few days (first time ever cloning) and hope to see roots shortly. Three of the four look like they are still on the mother with no wilting at all but one is a little droopy. I want to take a couple more but am scared of stressing the plant before I begin flowering on Monday, what do you guys think?


I just took my first clone ever last night and it's droopy as sin. Of course, I used my top node as my clone, so the leaves are gigantic. Thinking of clipping the leaves down, as I've seen some others do. Did you do that?


----------



## s.mills (Apr 15, 2009)

Hey 206 the plants are looking good. I am using a 90w UFO and she veged like crazy! Now i can't wait to see how it goes during flowering. Good luck with yours and take a look at mine.


----------



## s.mills (Apr 15, 2009)

Hey 206 the plants are looking good. I am using a 90w UFO and she veged like crazy! Now i can't wait to see how it goes during flowering. Good luck with yours and take a look at mine.




https://www.rollitup.org/grow-journals/180361-blueberry-led.html


----------



## 206 (Apr 15, 2009)

ElephantRider said:


> I just took my first clone ever last night and it's droopy as sin. Of course, I used my top node as my clone, so the leaves are gigantic. Thinking of clipping the leaves down, as I've seen some others do. Did you do that?


Mine were pretty small and off from the sides but I did trim the leaves of one of them. Good luck with yours as well.



s.mills said:


> Hey 206 the plants are looking good. I am using a 90w UFO and she veged like crazy! Now i can't wait to see how it goes during flowering. Good luck with yours and take a look at mine.


Thanks. I plan on picking up a UFO in the next month so I will definitely check out your journal.

More pics tomorrow. Peace.


----------



## 206 (Apr 17, 2009)

I just wanted to share some updated pics. This is after taking four more cuttings (8 total now) which took away a lot of the bushiness around the edges.


----------



## 206 (Apr 18, 2009)

Tonight I added 4x26w 6500kCFLs to a power strip mounted on a small storage rack. This clone rack will house my new cheapo hydro system, which itself is housing 4 cuttings from papaya #1 and 2 small bag seed seedlings that I transplanted out of the RF66. Tomorrow I'm going to add mylar panels that mount to the sides of the clone rack.

I also used about a dozen velcro plant ties on papaya #1 and brought the outside branches up and in towards the center stalk quite a bit. This will give the super skunk and papaya #2 more direct exposure to the light as they were beginning to get seriously shaded in.

Its only about 48 hours now until I flip the tent LED to 12/12 and I'm getting pretty excited. My new plan is to add the 55w tri-band panel to the main tent during flowering. I will pull it out in a couple weeks and grow the new clones from my clone rack. I plan on getting a 90w UFO in the next month and hope to have three perpetual harvests going in 55w, 90w, and 120w chambers + the cfl clone rack.

Anyways here are the pics. Peace!

Edit: The last two pics are right before using the plant ties and right after using them.


----------



## 206 (Apr 19, 2009)

Pic 1: Papaya #1 day 36 from seed
Pic 2: Papaya #1 roots day 36 from seed. Root ball is the size of a basketball.
Pic 3: Clone rack with mylar now applied

ppm is still at a relatively low 625 at the conclusion of veg. I begin flowering in 24 hours.

Any comments or suggestions welcome!


----------



## 206 (Apr 19, 2009)

Calling all experienced growers I would appreciate your help here. I think my plant is already showing its sex prior to flower? Below is a high res pic of what I believe to be female flowers on papaya #1:



I'm using this picture for reference (specifically the bottom right): http://www.weedfarmer.com/g2.2/main.php/male-female/MALE_FEMALE.jpg.html

Please help me be sure of the sex as this is only my second grow! Thanks in advance for any replies.


----------



## 1982grower (Apr 19, 2009)

hey man. dont be fooled by preflowers. they commonly look like that and turn out to be female. anyone claiming to know 100% is lying. if ou had grown the strain many times and noticed patterns then maybe. but i would never judge a sex by preflowers. i recently learned my lesson after taking about 50 clones from what thought was a female based on the exact same thing you are looking at. after finding out it was a male i was pretty pissed. even though there really isnt any way of knowing the best way to guess is to look for stretching. usually the males by that age will have stretched alot more than the others. but even thats still guessing. the reason i cloned mine is because i saw what you saw and figured i could save 3 weeks by not flowering and then reveging the mother. i figured it looked female so i'll clone it. i read every preflower post on the net. my point is dont trust it!!!. but hope it is. good luck. and if you want just throw a paper bag over a small branch for 12 hours and dont flower the whole plant.


----------



## 1982grower (Apr 19, 2009)

sorry it was supposed to say that they commonly look like that and can be male. sorry man. lol


----------



## repvip (Apr 19, 2009)

206

Can you take another pic? It's kind of hard to tell on that one, but I'm leaning towards female. It's perfectly normal for the plant to show its sex in veg mode, but it typically takes about 6 weeks from seed (or the 8ish node if you didn't top)...

Have you considered bumping up your ppm now? Also curious what the ppm is of the water you are using (tap or reverse osmosis)?


----------



## 206 (Apr 19, 2009)

Thanks guys, I shared some more pics via PM and am 99% sure it is female now. Here is an updated post about it elsewhere: https://www.rollitup.org/2397940-post21.html

About a half hour ago the lights went dark for the first time and 12/12 began. Just a few minutes before I removed papaya #2 from the system as it was stunted and had several deformed branches and leaves. So this leaves only the papaya monster and super skunk.



repvip said:


> 206 Have you considered bumping up your ppm now? Also curious what the ppm is of the water you are using (tap or reverse osmosis)?


I'm very lucky to have 25ppm tap water here. I was at 625ppm at the end of veg and tonight I added bloom nutes just before switching to 12/12 and raised to 750ppm. I know the papaya can take more but I'm being cautious because of the smaller super skunk. I'll ramp up the feeding schedule if they respond well this week though.

If you enlarge and zoom in on these pictures you can see all kinds of high resolution papaya goodies


----------



## Actingbusy (Apr 20, 2009)

Impressive grow... I am a Rainforest User myself but was forced to place my ladies into DWC buckets due to over crowding in the Rainforest so I ended up ordering the 236 Lid Kit for the Rainforest and use it exclusively for rooting my clones and seedlings. Also had a Papaya as my first grow in it and it did show sex before I ever switched it to 12/12 which caught me by surprise. I wasnt expecting it but good thing I did because one ended up being a male and I wasnt aware but I pulled him out before his sacks spilled pollen on the lady. Good luck with the LED's


----------



## 206 (Apr 20, 2009)

Actingbusy said:


> Impressive grow... I am a Rainforest User myself but was forced to place my ladies into DWC buckets due to over crowding in the Rainforest so I ended up ordering the 236 Lid Kit for the Rainforest and use it exclusively for rooting my clones and seedlings. Also had a Papaya as my first grow in it and it did show sex before I ever switched it to 12/12 which caught me by surprise. I wasnt expecting it but good thing I did because one ended up being a male and I wasnt aware but I pulled him out before his sacks spilled pollen on the lady. Good luck with the LED's


Thats awesome, its pretty cool to talk with someone who grew the same strain in the same system. How do you like the 36 2" pots? Have you filled it to capacity? Also what has your success rate been so far? I might be interested in doing this in the future.

Anyways here are a couple pics from day 1 of flowering. Peace and hope you had a great 4/20!

Pic 1: Thai Super-Skunk
Pic 2: Papaya
Pic 3: Papaya main stem flower


----------



## 206 (Apr 21, 2009)

Below are pics of my new 55w tri-band LED. I'm very impressed with the brightness and overall quality of this unit so far, especially since I paid less than $100 for it. For at least the next 2-3 weeks it will be in the tent next to my 120w.

Pic 1: 120w only
Pic 2: 120w + 55w
Pic 3: 55w laid out on top of my tent for closeup.
Pic 4: 55w illuminating ceiling to demonstrate light output.

All comments and questions are welcome. Hope you had a great 4/20!


----------



## 206 (Apr 22, 2009)

Here are some more pics of the new light including the hangers I mounted on the back. You can see in the last pic that the light rolled off the assembly line this month...pretty cool.

I'm running out of things to tinker with on this grow since it has become low maintenance, so I'm trying to get a new veg chamber going ASAP. My current tent is 32x32x60. I plan on upgrading to a 40x40x70 or 48x48x70 and using that as the new flowering chamber. Then I can use my smaller existing tent for veg and get a perpetual harvest going on.


----------



## Jackster (Apr 22, 2009)

i am a first timer and am looking at working with exactly the same setup you have going on however i plan on running a second rainforest 66 for flowering under a 1k hps.

do you feel that the rainforest will get to cramped? i am hoping that if i get a good strain that grows up and not out it should work fine. maybe top 44...anyone have any recos?

I plan on vegging under the same 120w led you have going on as well.


----------



## 206 (Apr 22, 2009)

Jackster said:


> i am a first timer and am looking at working with exactly the same setup you have going on however i plan on running a second rainforest 66 for flowering under a 1k hps.
> 
> do you feel that the rainforest will get to cramped? i am hoping that if i get a good strain that grows up and not out it should work fine. maybe top 44...anyone have any recos?
> 
> I plan on vegging under the same 120w led you have going on as well.


Hi Jackster,

That is awesome news, I've been looking forward to seeing how the 120w works on other strains in the same or similar setup. I think with a pure indica there is a good chance of the rainforest getting cramped, so I would try a sativa/indica hybrid or pure sativa because I know I will next time around.

I think vegging with the 120w led and flowering with the 1000w hps will produce some epic buds man. However, if you don't plan on flowering under the 120w then you might want to try a different unit with more blue/white/orange. Remember that with this light being a tri-band there are only 8 individual blue lights and 8 individual white/full spectrum lights. That means you won't tap the full power of the 100 or so red lights...just saying. Best of luck with whatever you decide with and please let me know how it goes.

Here are some pics from day 4 of flowering. The thai s-skunk has responded well to the increased bloom nutes.


----------



## 206 (Apr 23, 2009)

Day 5 flowering pic update with LEDs off.


----------



## Jackster (Apr 23, 2009)

This is so cool, i am really excited to get this going. I agree, right now my research is leading me toward pure sativa or sativia/indica mix.

My closet is 4x8 and is 14 feet tall so height will not be too much a concern as long as light gets down there. Right now i have the following clones itching to get going: 2 northern lights, 2 super silver haze, 1 daydream, 1 Burmese Widow and 1 Hindu Kush 

I might just move them direct to flower in about two weeks and then get some strains going that i really want to grow. Looking at Malawi Gold or Mini and Malawi 99 from afropips as well as Jack Herer. I am also interest in finding some blackberry or black russian as I have never seen it anywhere. Looking at some other seeds as well such as white lightning and white rhino. We will see what i finally decide on. 

I actually just started medicating the natural way and need to find a very high yield strain to help with my anxiety disorder so i will be sampling some different strains around LA and see what works for me.

Your plants are looking great. One thing i plan on is vegging for a min of a month, i was just in the ba with a guy who was harvsting his plants which he grew indoor in hydro and veged for over three months (maybe it was six)...he told me on average he pulls 3-5 lbs per plant!


----------



## 206 (Apr 23, 2009)

4x8x14 sounds like a pretty awesome grow space, best of luck and be sure to start a journal for it! Those strains sound pretty nice already, but hey with more strains you are more likely to find something that works for you so right on.

I just unpacked my new 18w blue LED panel which will replace the CFLs in my clone rack. I'm also picking up an aeroponic clone machine next week which I hope will reduce cloning times and increase success %.

Peace



Jackster said:


> This is so cool, i am really excited to get this going. I agree, right now my research is leading me toward pure sativa or sativia/indica mix.
> 
> My closet is 4x8 and is 14 feet tall so height will not be too much a concern as long as light gets down there. Right now i have the following clones itching to get going: 2 northern lights, 2 super silver haze, 1 daydream, 1 Burmese Widow and 1 Hindu Kush
> 
> ...


----------



## Jackster (Apr 23, 2009)

Where are you purchasing your LED? HTGSupply?


----------



## 206 (Apr 23, 2009)

Jackster said:


> Where are you purchasing your LED? HTGSupply?


My 120w is from HTG and was $499 (Expensive but it was the only one available with full spectrum which I badly wanted)

My 55w tri-band ($95) and 18w blue ($29) are both from reputable ebay shops.

Here are some pics I took tonight of the clone rack after installing the 18w blue led. You can also see the two bag seed plants which have been almost completely stunted since leaving the rainforest. I expect to see some new growth now as this panel feels like a big improvement over 3x26 watt cfl's.


----------



## Actingbusy (Apr 24, 2009)

I switched out only one of the 6" sites for the 2" clone sites and so far so good. I started using with rockwool cubes but ended up buying 2" neoprene inserts to hold the clones in place. So along with that and Clonex, my success rate is now at about 80% as opposed to 50% rate I had with the rockwool cubes. The only thing I use in res for clones is Olivias cloning solution and it works better than just pure water.


----------



## 206 (Apr 24, 2009)

Actingbusy said:


> I switched out only one of the 6" sites for the 2" clone sites and so far so good. I started using with rockwool cubes but ended up buying 2" neoprene inserts to hold the clones in place. So along with that and Clonex, my success rate is now at about 80% as opposed to 50% rate I had with the rockwool cubes. The only thing I use in res for clones is Olivias cloning solution and it works better than just pure water.


Interesting...so you are vegging + cloning in the rainforest at the same time? My main concern about doing that was ppm levels for the clones and possibly having too much light even if they were shaded a bit. If you could send me a pic or post one to my journal I would really like to see it in action!

Here are a few pics since I'm going for daily updates. You will notice I rotated the plant a bit, this side usually does not face the camera. ppm is currently at 712 and ph 5.68.


----------



## mattso101 (Apr 24, 2009)

Good work man this is the first LED only grow that has truly impressed me. Keep proving everyone wrong! Flowering soon??


----------



## 206 (Apr 24, 2009)

mattso101 said:


> Good work man this is the first LED only grow that has truly impressed me. Keep proving everyone wrong! Flowering soon??


Thanks mattso! This grow has already been a great learning experience for me and I'm thrilled its going so well. I'm currently on day 6 of flowering with lights on at 7am and off at 7pm.

Oh and I ordered 10 mango beans and 10 double bubble beans yesterday. The double bubble is supposed to be like bubblicious or bubblegum and just sounded like a fun strain to grow. Papaya was _supposedly_ derived from Mango but I've never read anything that states this as fact, so I just wanted to see for myself how the Mango compares.


----------



## 206 (Apr 26, 2009)

Here are some pic updates of papaya #1 after a week of flowering.


----------



## grassified (Apr 26, 2009)

How bad/good is the heat coming off of those LEDS? IS it as hot as a CFL or what?


----------



## 206 (Apr 26, 2009)

grassified said:


> How bad/good is the heat coming off of those LEDS? IS it as hot as a CFL or what?


The 55w panel puts out no detectable heat and does not even have a fan. The 120w panel puts out a very small amount of heat, but less than even one of my 26w CFLs by comparison. Even the individual LED's themselves get only slightly warm to the touch during operation and I am comfortable letting the plants grow right against them.

Besides not having to buy ducting and blowers and everything else, the biggest benefit I've realized out of this is incredibly low transpiration rates. Since there is no excess heat my plants consume less nutrient solution and less of it evaporates, so less is needed overall.


----------



## bleedintears (Apr 26, 2009)

lovin the leds i am currently planning on ordering some i cant wait.


----------



## 206 (Apr 27, 2009)

Earlier tonight I drained and cleaned the rainforest. I had to bunch up the plant with some more ties just to get it out of the tent, but after that everything went smoothly. I don't know how many people on here use rainforest's or are considering buying them but I thought it would be helpful if I share my personal cleaning method and checklist.

2-3 hours before cleaning I add about 20 gallons of cold water to a 40-gallon rubbermaid tub and ph it to 5.8. After a few hours the water reaches a good temp and I'm ready to get to work.

Turn off the power strip
Unplug the vortex sprayer
Detatch the airline tubing from the air pump (which I mount at the top of the tent)
Remove all net pots and lids not currently in use.
Carry (with help) or drag (alone) the rainforest to the bathroom where the 40-gallon tub is waiting.
Carefully remove the main lid from the rainforest (w/ plants still mounted) and place it over the 40-gallon. This submerges about half the roots in water while I work.
Dump the rainforest into bathtub and clean thuroughly.
Clean the vortex sprayer thuroughly, especially the rubber sleeve it mounts in.
Place the empty rainforest back in the tent.
Place the air stone back in the res.
Drag or carry the 40-gallon over to the tent.
Swap the main lid back on to the rainforest and put all net pots and lids back in.
Use a 1 gallon pitcher to scoop the already ph'd water from the 40-gallon and fill the rainforest.
Reattach the airline tubing to the air pump.
Reattach the vortex sprayer and activate system

I used to mess around with the drain tube and ferrying pitchers back and forth and all kinds of other crap that seemed to make sense at the time. I can tell you that maintaining the rainforest went from being a real pain in the ass to being completely painless once I added the 40-gal to the equation. Hopefully this made sense and can help somebody!

Peace 

P.S. Notice that I positioned the super skunk up front now with papaya at the back. Adding the additional plant ties really helped tighten up the papaya and give the super skunk some growing room.


----------



## 206 (Apr 27, 2009)

New pics added. Tomorrow I'm hooking up the aero cloner and taking some cuttings from papaya and thai s-skunk. I also germinated the other 4 thai s-skunk seeds and all popped and should sprout in the next 24 hours. I heard a lot of bad things about G13 labs but I must say all 5 popped and the one I've grown out is a confirmed female with high ppm tolerance and great node structure...I couldn't be more impressed with G13 labs at this point.

The two bag seed plants have recovered nicely since being put under the 18w blue led and have also grown a few inches. I'm donating these to a friend soon as I never planned to grow them to maturity, but I'll still be sad to see them go.

Pic 1: Wide angle shot of tent and clone rack
Pic 2: Rainforest
Pic 3: Future home of papaya bud 
Pic 4: Thai s-skunk closeup
Pic 5: Bad seed plants recovered


----------



## brutalbuds (Apr 28, 2009)

Love the LED, just read a sick article about LED in high times. The UFO and Satellite system looks sooo hot.


----------



## 206 (Apr 28, 2009)

Yesterday I had a stoner moment and manually turned off the lights and forgot to cycle them back to timer mode, so the plants got 16 hours of light. I compensated by giving them 12 hours of darkness from that point on and will gradually pull them back to the previous time over the next week. As of today it did not seem to effect either plant, so I'm not worried about them going hermie or anything like that.

The good news is that I got the aero cloner all set up this afternoon and took some fresh cuttings from papaya. I also put 4 new super skunk seeds in the small hydro system next to the bag seed plants.


----------



## brutalbuds (Apr 29, 2009)

You have a phat setup my man. I'm so interested in seeing what happens in here. Im hooked man.


----------



## mattso101 (Apr 29, 2009)

Keep up the good work. TRULEY IMPRESSIVE! Dont worry about the light time mess up at all. if you do that ounce a week then your gonna run into problems, but after only one mishap there is no worry!!


----------



## dirt clean (Apr 29, 2009)

Nice grow. Hey, my tri band UFO just got here. I have placed it over some rooting clones. I thought about putting it over the veg tent later for one of my trees to use along with the 400. 

IDK, but, lol, that thing is bright. I plugged it in pointed right at my face. I nearly dropped it. I am still seeing spots. I had no idea. Nice surprise. The UFO is a few feet over my rooting clones, I dont want to burn them. 

Thanks for the grow to follow along in. I gro organic soil, UFO/400 watt HID.


----------



## brutalbuds (Apr 29, 2009)

dirt clean said:


> Nice grow. Hey, my tri band UFO just got here. I have placed it over some rooting clones. I thought about putting it over the veg tent later for one of my trees to use along with the 400.
> 
> IDK, but, lol, that thing is bright. I plugged it in pointed right at my face. I nearly dropped it. I am still seeing spots. I had no idea. Nice surprise. The UFO is a few feet over my rooting clones, I dont want to burn them.
> 
> Thanks for the grow to follow along in. I gro organic soil, UFO/400 watt HID.


You got a journal???


----------



## meangreen45 (Apr 29, 2009)

Great post man! I will definatley be watching.


----------



## 206 (Apr 29, 2009)

Wow, thanks for all the kind words guys. Next week I will be starting a new soil sog grow with white label double gum and kc mango, as well as putting papaya and s-skunk clones in autopots. I have not decided on a medium for the autopots...I might try coco coir...these will be my future mother plants.

Anyways here are some new pics. You can see the main stem and the side stem towards the back are almost touching the 120w, its 35" tall now! It has been growing about 1.5" a day for the last week. The bud sites are really opening up now, feel like I will see nice little bud starts in the next couple days.

Also you can see the bag seeds plants are completely rejuvinated after swapping the CFLs for the 18w all-blue. They have almost doubled in size after one week under 18w blue LED whereas they showed no noticable growth in over a week under 3x26w 6500K cfls.


----------



## 206 (Apr 29, 2009)

Just picked up 3 quarts of flora series for $35 and a liter of advanced nutrients big bud liquid for $34. I also got 4oz of superthrive for $10...damn this hobby is getting expensive! Luckily I put away some money every couple weeks for the last two years just for this grow 

I've gotten this far with flora series alone and at very low ppm's (currently 805) so I'm going to try and really push it with the big bud liquid once it gets here...probably to 1100ppm right off the bat.

If anyone has used AN big bud liquid let me know how it worked out for you! Thanks for reading my journal.


----------



## PhoenixFox (Apr 30, 2009)

206 said:


> The 55w panel puts out no detectable heat and does not even have a fan. The 120w panel puts out a very small amount of heat, but less than even one of my 26w CFLs by comparison. Even the individual LED's themselves get only slightly warm to the touch during operation and I am comfortable letting the plants grow right against them.
> 
> Besides not having to buy ducting and blowers and everything else, the biggest benefit I've realized out of this is incredibly low transpiration rates. Since there is no excess heat my plants consume less nutrient solution and less of it evaporates, so less is needed overall.


LEDs wont put out any heat themselves because its all given off in light basically.

Oh and also what are you doing for CO2 now that you're into flowering?


----------



## 206 (Apr 30, 2009)

PhoenixFox said:


> Oh and also what are you doing for CO2 now that you're into flowering?


I'm planning on using CO2 in my next grow but not this one. Being my first hydro and LED grow I want to get a good baseline for yield and then experiment with increasing yield in future grows. One thing I've heard about CO2 is that lights must be on and you need temps of almost 90 to fully utilise it, which would be a problem in my current setup where ambient temp stays around 70 with lights on.

Hey I need to give a fellow LED grower a shout out. underdok is only using a 90w unit that is similar to mine in appearance and has posted some awesome bud shots. People always say show me the bud when it comes to LED and since I can't yet look at his instead: https://www.rollitup.org/2415813-post7.html


----------



## 206 (Apr 30, 2009)

Well I think my wave of good luck finally ran out today. After doing my daily inspection of all the nodes (god there are a lot of nodes) this morning I found what I think is a ball. The other 99.9% of the plant is 100% female though. If it really is a ball I won't be too bent out of shape because getting feminized seeds from this papaya monster and possibly papaya x thai s-skunk cross seeds sounds pretty good. My rationale is that this lone male flower on a side branch would only pollinate a few female flowers around its vacinity.

Does anybody think I'm crazy and should just pick it off? I'm trying to get some clear pics of the ball right now, I'll edit my post in a minute with them.

Thanks and 

EDIT: Pic 1 shows the ball, or what I think is a ball. This was the closest I could go without losing focus, even on macro mode. The other pics show some of the different flowering sites, you can even see 4 or 5 in pic 1 of the ball sack.


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (Apr 30, 2009)

yea i have had plants do that before they make me nervous tho .....i have had alot of battles with hermaphrodites and i have seen how they carry that hermy condition into the offspring....

i have used big bud powder and liquid before .....very very good stuff ...i seen amazing results with it ...although it always made my rez stink like dirty socks and cloud up for like half a week right after i put it in .....

o as far as the male pollen sac goes ...i have in fact also seen it not carried on to the offspring ...i think this was due to it being pollenated by another plant instead of itself ...possibly


----------



## 206 (May 1, 2009)

Thanks doktorgreenthumb, that is good news on the AN big bud. I guess I'll just keep checking on that possible ball, who knows maybe it will turn out to be nothing.

Tonight I raised the 120w LED from the cross bars to the highest middle support bar, which gave me about 5 more inches of space. I'm really hoping the vertical growth slows down soon before I have to start bending. Later I added more plant ties to help bring some side branches in towards the center, notably the ones on the left side of the picture.

I also pulled the plug on my mini hydro system and transplanted both bag seed plants from it into soil. As I said a few pages back these are going to a friend of mine with medical problems in a couple days and he will really appreciate them. Transplanting from hydro to soil was interesting and I think I did a good job spreading the roots out and filling the cups in but we'll see. They have smallish stems so I placed them about an inch lower than usual in the cups and covered the tops with hydroton for support.

Pic 1: Before raising 120w
Pic 2: After raising 120w
Pic 3: Shot of the roots right before I transplanted
Pic 4: Looking happy, hope it stays that way.


----------



## ElephantRider (May 1, 2009)

I'm so jazzed to see nugs on these and how LED does for flowering. If I can eek more wattage into a pc with this method and worry less about cooling, I'm all for it!


----------



## 1982grower (May 1, 2009)

man thats big. wsnt expecting that much growth so far. they look healthy to. lush green and nice budding sites.
about the pc grow. regardless of lightsource the heat will be the same either more radiated or densly contained. 400 watts being used always equaltes to 1365 btu's. lower the watts and the same applies in proportion. but they def wouldnt burn the tops of your plants as easily. but if you flly contain 120 watts leds or hps they will both heat the same. 
With this led light i will be very impressed if 3 ounces is produced. that would be amazing for a first grow with 120 watts.
looks great man i'll keep checking in. my lowryders under t5ho are flowering nicely and will be finished anytime. 3 days maybe. good luck man. with all the lights out there now to look at i really havnt even been able to think about what i would get. whether built o homemade.


----------



## 206 (May 2, 2009)

1982grower said:


> man thats big. wasnt expecting that much growth so far. they look healthy to. lush green and nice budding sites. With this led light i will be very impressed if 3 ounces is produced. that would be amazing for a first grow with 120 watts. looks great man i'll keep checking in. my lowryders under t5ho are flowering nicely and will be finished anytime. 3 days maybe. good luck man. with all the lights out there now to look at i really havnt even been able to think about what i would get. whether built o homemade.


Thanks bro. I've heard its bad mojo to predict yield before harvest but honestly I am hoping for 3 zips like you said. Anything more and I'll do backflips and anything less will be disappointing. Only time will tell but I predict a great summer in 2009 

Today was my day...a friend stopped by in the afternoon with some fat nugs of real deal G13 and a special present...a G13 seed from the same smoke. Sure enough the high was almost narcotic and I was just on cloud nine for hours. I'm going to wait a couple days until I get my double gum and mango beans and then start the G13 along with them. Sick!

Then tonight I added 4 drops of superthrive to my aero cloner which supposedly guarantees a 100% success rate if you believe the aero mist 25 marketers. We'll see...but I'm expecting 7-10 days total for roots to show since the cuttings were already 8 days into 12/12.

That is great news about your lowryders too bro. Can't wait to see the harvest pics and smoke report!

More pics tomorrow


----------



## 1982grower (May 2, 2009)

206- its strange hearing someone say that they can get you a seed. lol. there are ABSOLUTELY no seeds in canada outside the store. no bagseeds. nothing. also what sucks for me is that the smoke here is all exactly the same price and its all amazing white strains. my prob is that ive never grown anything close to what i can buy. Actually ive harvested 2 small plants of the lowryder 2s. honest to god the smoke is actually very strong as apposed to what ive heard. but mine took about 80 days. the first 2 that i picked had 80% milky 20 amber trics. and it def produces a medium couchlock. def some more amber and this stuff will be strong!! it is a very nice light green and smells just like citrus, specifically grapefruit and lemon. it also has much more resin than expected. looks nearly like white widow. but not quite. lol. but def worth growing. 
even 2 ounces would be ok. dont look at it as time wasted. look at it like you barely used any power. you could have over 8 of your lights just to produce 1000 watts. a couple ounces or 3 would def prove that they are equal to hid watt for watt. plus you havnt perfected it yet. def next grow youll know a little extra and so on. seeya. the hempstar is all gone now. i sold 20 bucks here and there and smoked the rest. dried the 3 plants produced about 7 dry ounces. it was ok smoke and worth it for just flowering some old mothers. i also kept about 500 seeds of my custom cross. prob crap but couldnt throw them out. id always wonder. lol


----------



## spliffbazz (May 2, 2009)

hey 206 nice grow how many lumens is the led given off looking forward to hearing the yield keep up the good work.


----------



## 1982grower (May 2, 2009)

doktor- chances are that you never have gotten a hermie. they are extremely rare. almost impossible to get. i forget what it is called but what you have is something different. if the plant grows male pollen sacks and buds in different sites from eachother thats commonly mistaken to be hermie. actually a hermie is when a plant produces pollen sacks and flowers together. somebody pointed out the difference on here once and ive always checked pics and descriptions since and have never seen a pic on here of a real hermie yet. but the other kind suck too. lol. but forget the name.


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (May 2, 2009)

yea i think they are like asexual or somethin crazy like that ...when i refer to a hermi i just mean a female that ususalyy produces a male pollen sac or two in about weeek 5 of flower ...

you are right tho i read that somewhere before too ....

i have however growin for over 2 years and had to start a couple of times from seed stock ...we are talkin i have sprouted over 1000 seeds that made it to bloom week one in that time ....of course males die at this stage ....and i have seen how hermies will seed themselves and produce hermie offspring ....

the hermaphroditic condition seems to almost always show at around week 5 ..that is when you will \notice seed formation .and if you look hard enough you will eventually find the little pollen sac that is usually all hidden up inside a swollen bud 

and this information is from first hand experience not somethin i have read from another post or read in a book .....real life learnin beats book learnin anyday of the week


if i used any other term than hermie who would know what i was talkin about


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (May 2, 2009)

o also ther is an indicator that you might have hermies before you actually get seeded in week 5 .....if your population of seeds is like 90 percent or higher female ....look out 

unless of course they are feminised from a seedbank or known source


----------



## 206 (May 2, 2009)

Don't have much time to write or reply tonight just wanted to post some quick pics. Will update later or tomorrow.

Last pic shows the lone ball among all the bud sites


----------



## haikubutthead (May 2, 2009)

206 what are the lumens on the 120W light? I tried to find out by looking on the internet but they only said vague advertising garble. How much square footage you figure the light covers? Thanks and good work.


----------



## 206 (May 3, 2009)

haikubutthead said:


> 206 what are the lumens on the 120W light? I tried to find out by looking on the internet but they only said vague advertising garble. How much square footage you figure the light covers? Thanks and good work.


I have no idea about the lumen output. I suppose you could find what a 1w bridgelux puts out and 120x it for a ballpark. It has a very wide coverage area, enough for a 48x48 tent or larger.

Forgot to mention earlier that I got the AN big bud and raised ppm to 950. This stuff looks pretty awesome.


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (May 3, 2009)

thats looks good that was all done under led lighting ...with a rainforest? lol that is good shit


----------



## 206 (May 3, 2009)

doktorgreenthumb420 said:


> thats looks good that was all done under led lighting ...with a rainforest? lol that is good shit


Thanks and yeah 100% LED & Rainforest since seed.

Unfortunately I noticed another ball on papaya this morning so I carefully cut them both off with a razor and stored in a zip lock for future use.

The good news is that all the bud sites really opened up overnight and showed a lot of new growth. I don't know if this was from the AN big bud or was just bound to happen soon but either way I'm happy.


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (May 3, 2009)

yea that is pretty cool how the pics come out with those leds on ...lol space weed


----------



## 1982grower (May 3, 2009)

doktor- weird you said unless they turn out mostly female. not many know that. and yah def they would be crappy prob if most turned female. but maybe youd get lucky and get fem seeds. you can make them yourself but it takes luck and several generations. not that ive done it. but apperently they use a mild acid on a vigorous female to stress it into producing male flowers then return it to acid free res and the seeds can be fem. but difficult. 
206- i was looking at my plants and started thinking they would be great for your setup. actually my 2 largest plants would fit in your round table and grow to full size perfectly. average size of my plants is about 10 inches height and 7 or so diameter. the quality of the smoke is actually amazing. i was expecting little resin and for it to look like dirty outdoor. i was surprised by the resin and looks and smell. and funny i'm thinking about papaya but am a little scared about the germ rate. plus you can let me know how it is after. but dont let anyone say lowryder 2 is a weak strain. excellent strain.


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (May 3, 2009)

here is my rainforest i use it to get veg plants ready to go straight to bloom room either in buckets when i use the 6 inch net pots or i have just gotten a new insert set that allows 6 site of 2 inch net pots that i plan to veg tall enough to go straight to a coir pot and go right to bloom ...until i can build me an aeroponic bloom system anyways here is the stuff o and ther is a pic of one of my mother plants in a bucket system


----------



## 206 (May 4, 2009)

doktorgreenthumb420 said:


> here is my rainforest i use it to get veg plants ready to go straight to bloom room either in buckets when i use the 6 inch net pots or i have just gotten a new insert set that allows 6 site of 2 inch net pots that i plan to veg tall enough to go straight to a coir pot and go right to bloom ...until i can build me an aeroponic bloom system anyways here is the stuff o and ther is a pic of one of my mother plants in a bucket system


Nice looking setup! I really like the 6x2" sites on a single lid that is a great idea. Have you considered adding an airstone to the RF?



1982grower said:


> the quality of the smoke is actually amazing. i was expecting little resin and for it to look like dirty outdoor. i was surprised by the resin and looks and smell. and funny i'm thinking about papaya but am a little scared about the germ rate. plus you can let me know how it is after. but dont let anyone say lowryder 2 is a weak strain. excellent strain.


That is great about your lowryder, I will have to consider growing some of that in the near future.

Here are some updated pics, currently 15 days into 12/12. (I turned them on 4/20 so even when I'm stoned its easy to remember)


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (May 4, 2009)

yea definetely airstone i dont use one till mother plants in ther get a little bigger and roots start to really hang in water i am tryin the new method of using my rainforest to get plants ready for bloom ...i have all kinds of trouble tryin to get clones to start growin right after they get roots ...but in rainforest it is like all i have to do is put em in ther and turn it on ....i root my clones in rockwool and seems to transplant to rainforest np 

and the 6inch net pots work great to transplant right into a bucket system and start bloom cycle i have had much success with that 

so i am taking out plants from rainforest before they get too big so i really dont use an airstone ...but would if i had blooming plants in ther


----------



## 206 (May 5, 2009)

I've got clones...all 5 cuttings in the aerocloner had visible roots this morning! These are my first clones ever so its pretty cool. For some reason one of the papaya clones has 5x the root development of the other 4 clones (2 papaya & 2 thai s-skunk).

The main stem/cola on papaya just keeps growing during the night. Today I had to re-mount the 120w to project nearly sideways because of the growth.


----------



## PhoenixFox (May 5, 2009)

really quick...but I thought i'd ask what kind of tds meter you use and if it works pretty well for you. i dont want to copy, but I'm gonna end up using your journal as a somewhat guideline later when I can legally have my own.


----------



## 206 (May 5, 2009)

I use a hanna 98129 here is the link: http://www.hannainst.com/USA/prods2.cfm?id=002003

So far it has been great, its only off by 0.02-0.03 when I calibrate every couple weeks. That is cool you are considering a similar setup, be sure to let me know how it turns out.


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (May 6, 2009)

yea rainforest is sick unit i really like it and would suggest to anyone .....kinda like a set it and forget it type of thing


----------



## 206 (May 6, 2009)

Today I cut down the thai s-skunk, leaving only the papaya monster in the rainforest. It was a perfectly healthy plant but the genetics just didn't match my current setup or future plans so it had to go.


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (May 6, 2009)

yea does that mean you have more room in ther now ?


----------



## HydroClosetGrower (May 6, 2009)

hey 206, really nice setup. i really like the idea of leds and would get a unit if i had the $$ and the setup for it. i like the lights bein more efficient and not wasting electricity on all that heat output. ill be watchin this grow. i was really interested in your first grow b/c its pretty much what i'm doin now (cfl's and y-splitters!!). i wanted to see what kinda crop u got from that, but i guess u put em outside. keep up the good grow


----------



## brutalbuds (May 7, 2009)

lookin sexay!


----------



## 206 (May 7, 2009)

Thanks guys. I took some new pics of the bud sites this morning, the pistils have really shot out as you can see in pic 1. Each pic shows a different area all are either side branch or main stem.

This is currently day 17 of flowering.


----------



## s.mills (May 7, 2009)

Hey brew she's looking real nice. Keep up the good work. Do you think flowering with LED's will change the flowering time at all? ya know longer or shorter? 

keep up the good work


----------



## 206 (May 8, 2009)

s.mills said:


> Hey brew she's looking real nice. Keep up the good work. Do you think flowering with LED's will change the flowering time at all? ya know longer or shorter?
> 
> keep up the good work


Thanks bro. I don't have any experience with HPS/MH growing and have only harvested outdoors so its hard for me to say RE: different flowering time. It would not surprise me if the flowering schedule is accelerated slightly, based solely on my plant's development compared to several 250-400w+hydro plants at the same stage I've seen in other journals. Again this is more of a feeling than anything though. I do know that LEDs promote more vigorous root growth according to the NASA studies and tests on other plants. I also know that the bigger the root mass before flowering the bigger and better the bud...just sayin.

Today I shut down the clone machine and transplanted the 3 papaya clones to soil. They will be under a 55w tri-band (the one I used to have in the tent) during the veg phase. The plan is to select the best clone as my new mother, then take new clones from that mother by the time I finish this harvest. I'm guesstimating I have 6 weeks of flowering left and that I can veg the new mom in 4-5 weeks and root the clones in 1-2 weeks...so it should work out.

 and any comments or questions are always welcome.


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (May 8, 2009)

does your cloner have misters could you show a pic of that unit ...i use to have units with neoprene collars and just airstone bars in water and they worked for a while ...


----------



## ElephantRider (May 8, 2009)

OK.. you know how many days that papaya is in flowering?

Great work, man. I'm inspired.


----------



## 206 (May 8, 2009)

doktorgreenthumb420 said:


> does your cloner have misters could you show a pic of that unit ...i use to have units with neoprene collars and just airstone bars in water and they worked for a while ...


I'll try to get a pic up later, but yeah it has 13 misters and is just like the botanicare one. Try putting a few drops of superthrive in the water it did the trick for me.



ElephantRider said:


> OK.. you know how many days that papaya is in flowering?


Today is day 18 of 12/12, I made the switch on 4/20 so it would be easy to remember. The only thing I did unconventional with the lights was go directly from 24/0 to 12/12 with no training period or extended dark period beforehand.


----------



## 206 (May 8, 2009)

Day 18 flowering pics. The first from last pic shows "popcorn" buds that are on the bottom 1/3rd of plant and the last pic shows the inside of my aerocloner for doktor420.


----------



## 1982grower (May 8, 2009)

damn. 18 days and theyre showing nice growth. and that strain looks like it really sativa? which takes even longer. actually looks alot like the kalimist pics ive been seeing. long branches with little leaves and very slim leaves. prob going to be a nice buzz. ive never grown a sativa befor but the leaves look amazing. its well on its way. cant wait for 2 more weeks. once you see the developement rate for a couple more weeks you can estimate the yield if youve grown before. but my guess now is 71 dry grams. lol. make sure you post the results. its always been good luck for me to guess so dont worry.


----------



## 206 (May 9, 2009)

1982grower said:


> damn. 18 days and theyre showing nice growth. and that strain looks like it really sativa? which takes even longer. actually looks alot like the kalimist pics ive been seeing. long branches with little leaves and very slim leaves. prob going to be a nice buzz. ive never grown a sativa befor but the leaves look amazing. its well on its way. cant wait for 2 more weeks. once you see the developement rate for a couple more weeks you can estimate the yield if youve grown before. but my guess now is 71 dry grams. lol. make sure you post the results. its always been good luck for me to guess so dont worry.


Nah man papaya is a pure indica strain. I do know what you're saying about the recent pics looking like a sativa though, but that is a trait I only notice around new growth areas. Eventually the leaves fill out to be very bushy and indica looking like the old pics show. I may have hit the phenotype jackpot with this plant overall though.

71 grams sounds pretty good! My dream is to pull 120g dry for a 1g:1w ratio. So far I'm impressed with the results, but at the same time I have played it incredibly safe with the nutes. 900ppm is the highest the plant has seen, so when I clean out the res in a couple days I'm going to bump the new solution to 1200ppm. Its time I stop babying this girl and put her to work and see what she can really do.

Oh and here is a pic of the g13 haze I mentioned a few pages back. This was some seriously powerful smoke so I'm really looking forward to seeing how it grows.


----------



## brick20 (May 9, 2009)

first time i seen this thread 206 and im bout to get tha same set up with out da hydro dont know what medium ill be using thuogh


----------



## 206 (May 10, 2009)

brick20 said:


> first time i seen this thread 206 and im bout to get tha same set up with out da hydro dont know what medium ill be using thuogh


That sounds cool man! This week I started growing some future mothers in soil using 70/30 ocean forest to perlite under a 55w tri-band. Let me know what you decide on for a medium and how it ends up working out for you.

Here is random day 19 flower pic before I go to sleep.


----------



## Megax29 (May 10, 2009)

suscribed will be instresting to see the results


----------



## 1982grower (May 10, 2009)

i see what you mean by indica now. the older leaves are def more what im used to. i notice now what you mean about the new growth. maybe if your height stays within reason ill try them. mine are finished and i need to start the next. and want 2 strains. its a good idea for mothers to be in soil. keeps them smaller. i assume most dont need 50 clones a month. lol. i did mine in hydro and had to cut them every week. didnt matter but they grew way too fast for the clones i needed


----------



## 206 (May 10, 2009)

Added day 20 flowering pics.

Today I drained and replaced the nutrient solution. I think there was too much nitrogen in the res which was causing some upper leaves to claw, so I added micro sparingly and went heavy on bloom and big bud this time. I rotated the plant 180 degrees and wow...its really weird to see it from this side now.


----------



## 206 (May 11, 2009)

Today I got bored (and blazed) and decided to mount the 18w blue and 55w tri-band together in an array. It just didn't make sense to let the 18w go to waste during times that I'm not cloning, so I added it to the mix over my future mother plants. I wired each light to remote control outlets for easy operation and mounted them to the baseboard with heavy duty velcro. There is enough velco so that I don't have to worry about the panels detaching, but not so much that it could become a struggle to pull the lights off the board.

If you go back 5-6 pages you can see where I had the 18w over some damaged plants and they completely rejuvinated and grew rapidly before I had to use the light for cloning.

Pic 1: Finished array
Pic 2: Close-up of panels
Pic 3: 18w turned on
Pic 4: Both units turned on
Pic 5: Shining against the outside of my tent
Pic 6: Mounted over the "mother box". This is where I'm growing a few clones & seeds in soil and selecting the best as new mother plants.


----------



## 206 (May 11, 2009)

Day 21 flowering pics.


----------



## dirt clean (May 11, 2009)

hey man, you need to try an experiment. 

I had the 18 watt. I out it right over the plants. Like an inch. I put a cfl a half foot away. The plant bent over sideways to get to the cfl. Those are half watt leds. I was pissed.

I just bought the triband UFO. I love it. I am no bashing leds. But if you are gettting good results I got to find my 18 watt again lol. I was a crappy grower then. 

Cool grow.


----------



## 206 (May 11, 2009)

dirt clean said:


> hey man, you need to try an experiment.
> 
> I had the 18 watt. I out it right over the plants. Like an inch. I put a cfl a half foot away. The plant bent over sideways to get to the cfl. Those are half watt leds. I was pissed.
> 
> ...


Thanks man.

What was the wattage on that CFL? That is an important factor because I actually have experimented with both already, you can see it around page 6 or 7 of this journal. I had 4x26w 6500K CFL's in an array over two plants in a small dwc system. The plants were already a few weeks old and were previously under the 120w LED in the rainforest. They showed no growth during 1 week of veg under CFLs, however exploded in one week after switching to 18w LED. The 18w also produced explosive root growth in all of my clones, which were taken after 2 weeks of 12/12 and are now vegging in soil no problem. Just giving my honest assessment of this panel so far, but I hope to know more after this current experiment.

Distance might have also been an issue for you. When I started with my LEDs I thought 1-2" away was optimal, but after a lot of experimenting I now prefer 12-18".

Best of luck with your UFO! You should consider starting a journal.


----------



## ElephantRider (May 12, 2009)

You got plants touching the top! Have you considered super-cropping? Since you have so much time left, it's not a bad option..


----------



## Ap0c0leS (May 13, 2009)

Alright dude.

I have been catching up on your grow here and I must say NICE F*KING WORK. I get the feeling that people are angry about L.E.D's for some reason. Maybe they are angry that they are wasteing 90% of the energy burned in HID lighting systems. Keep up the great work and prove the haters wrong, you know how people react to changes. This journal has inspired me to not even buy any HID lighting systems like i had origionaly planned. If i do get any HID lighting system i may try a 250W and overlap it with a L.E.D I bet that would be BOMB, but only if necessary.

I have a few questions about your setup. Please dont feel I am trying to steal your setup, I just want to replicate your results. Can you tell me where you got your grow tent , from the sock port it looks like a 4hydroponics darkroom. What are you useing to circulate air, if anything so the plant gets fresh air? Do you have any type of carbon filter for smell? 

I honestly cannot wait to see your plants when they are fully budded and ready for harvest. I am VERY excited about useing an L.E.D grow system. Just the savings in energy is enough to get me hooked. Great grow dude, keep up the good work.


----------



## 206 (May 13, 2009)

ElephantRider said:


> You got plants touching the top! Have you considered super-cropping? Since you have so much time left, it's not a bad option..


Haha, yeah it is getting very very close to the top. I still haven't decided what I'm going to do, but super cropping is in the cards if I don't buy a taller tent.



Ap0c0leS said:


> Alright dude.
> 
> I have been catching up on your grow here and I must say NICE F*KING WORK. I get the feeling that people are angry about L.E.D's for some reason. Maybe they are angry that they are wasteing 90% of the energy burned in HID lighting systems. Keep up the great work and prove the haters wrong, you know how people react to changes. This journal has inspired me to not even buy any HID lighting systems like i had origionaly planned. If i do get any HID lighting system i may try a 250W and overlap it with a L.E.D I bet that would be BOMB, but only if necessary.
> 
> ...


Thanks bro! Feel free to copy 1% or 100% of my setup, but don't feel like you're stealing.

Tent: I have a secret jardin DR80 and yes I think 4hydro has it. If I could do it over I would have bought a DR100 for the additional height and space, just FYI.

Ventilation: I haven't talked about this yet, because I don't want to get flamed, but I'm not venting the tent in any way other than opening the roll-up windows during lights on. This is a terrible practice according to 99.9% of things I've read, but it couldn't be working out better for me. If the plant had a transpiration problem I would have seen it by now IMO.

Regarding MH/HPS + Rainforest: Take a look at this guy's journal from last year: https://www.rollitup.org/427662-post22.html

This is the closest setup I can find to my own with the obvious exception of lights. He had three plants in there compared to my one, but during veg they all bushed together and looked similar to my papaya. Our veg times were also almost identical with mine vegging 1-2 extra days. He was using a 400w MH + 600w HPS and running almost double the ppm I am, and I still feel like I'm neck and neck with his grow @ 23 days flowering. I'm not trying to start another LED vs. HPS argument mind you, just comparing two similar setups with the biggest difference being lighting.

Carbon filter: I don't have one yet because papaya just doesn't smell, its weird. One of the big reasons I went with this strain: https://www.rollitup.org/general-marijuana-growing/14097-smell-end.html

 and pic updates soon.


----------



## ElephantRider (May 13, 2009)

Dude. Smart choice on the smell! I hear that original G13 doesn't smell, either. I'm huge into taste and smell, but that might make growing easier. Hmmm. Anyways, I'm psyched about your G13 Haze, as I've been thinking about trying that one in the PC case. I hear it's a VERY small sativa, compared to most.

Awesome work, man. I'm so excited to see yield, but more so, just to see final pics. I still need to find an array that would fit in the case. Either that or wait until legalization happens, so I can just get a "normal" grow up and still run LED.


----------



## 206 (May 13, 2009)

Day 22 & 23 flowering pics.


----------



## 206 (May 14, 2009)

Here are some updated shots of my 3 papaya clones. I cut them on 4/28 (already 8 days into flowering) and planted them in soil on 5/7. They have been under an 18W blue but catch a lot of mylar reflection from a 55w tri-band.

Pics 1-3: Papaya clones today.
Pic 4: Right after cutting them and putting them in the aero cloner on 4/28.
Pic 5: Planting one of them in soil in 5/7.


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (May 14, 2009)

thats awesome they are actively growin already ..good job on that clone run ....those gonna be soil ?


----------



## 206 (May 14, 2009)

doktorgreenthumb420 said:


> thats awesome they are actively growin already ..good job on that clone run ....those gonna be soil ?


Yeah I'm using about a 70/30 mix of ocean forest to perlite. These are going to be my future mothers.


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (May 14, 2009)

o yea ocean forest rocks i really like that kinda soil ....i dont have a whole lot of soil experience but i know that the best i have seen is foxfarms and this soil called black gold


----------



## Ap0c0leS (May 14, 2009)

Dang,!! that link you gave me to the light was awesome. I almost got the light for 350 bucks but i had to go do something at work and someone out bid me by 25 bucks. ... Oh well, hopefully they put another one up for auction. Im going to wait to see the results of your project before i decide how to proceede. How long do you have before harvest?


----------



## 206 (May 15, 2009)

Ap0c0leS said:


> Dang,!! that link you gave me to the light was awesome. I almost got the light for 350 bucks but i had to go do something at work and someone out bid me by 25 bucks. ... Oh well, hopefully they put another one up for auction. Im going to wait to see the results of your project before i decide how to proceede. How long do you have before harvest?


I'm guessing 35-40 more days for about 60-65 total. My goal is to pull 2-3 zips minimum for good summer smoke supply.


----------



## Ap0c0leS (May 15, 2009)

HA! Thats so much dude... Because you linked me to that light and i was close to winning the auction ( second place) i decided to call the company. I asked them to give me the light at the price that the auction ended on. I ended up getting the light for 375 plus shipping and they are throwing in the light pullies. You saved me a ton of cash dude, im very grateful. To top it off my seeds arrived today!!!! woohoo!!! i got 2x dutch passion blueberry, 2x Barneys farm G13 HAZE , 2x Barneys farm the church, 1x Lowryder#2 x AK47 , and two freebies.. Blue venom and Pure gold.. Im really excited for the G13 haze.. Do you have any experience on any of these strains?


----------



## Ap0c0leS (May 15, 2009)

**Thanks so much**** sorry


----------



## 206 (May 15, 2009)

Ap0c0leS said:


> HA! Thats so much dude... Because you linked me to that light and i was close to winning the auction ( second place) i decided to call the company. I asked them to give me the light at the price that the auction ended on. I ended up getting the light for 375 plus shipping and they are throwing in the light pullies. You saved me a ton of cash dude, im very grateful. To top it off my seeds arrived today!!!! woohoo!!! i got 2x dutch passion blueberry, 2x Barneys farm G13 HAZE , 2x Barneys farm the church, 1x Lowryder#2 x AK47 , and two freebies.. Blue venom and Pure gold.. Im really excited for the G13 haze.. Do you have any experience on any of these strains?


Thats awesome about the light, congrats. Its funny you mention G13 haze because my buddy gave me a single seed of it that I just planted last week. I also got to sample some of the finished product and wow it was heavy duty smoke, one of the best highs of my life. Looks like you made nice choices all around, I'm interested in all of those strains.

 I'm off to smoke a blunt and play frisbee golf lol. Happy weekend everybody.


----------



## 206 (May 16, 2009)

Day 25 flowering pics.


----------



## Cuttings2Colas (May 16, 2009)

Nice looking setup there, I'm subscribed. I also liked the link to the other grower that didn't even use nutrients... crazy! 

On most LED grows I've seen on YouTube and such, the growers have the plants really far away from the plant, and you can see that it's causing the plants to stretch. I think this is where the stretching stereotype comes from.

You've found that you like them 12" away, huh? What benefits have you seen from that? I've always been under the impression that the light source should be as close as possible to the plants without causing damage, especially when heat is no longer an issue. Is it a cross-lighting thing? With a narrow light angle, I can see how that could play a role. I still don't imagine myself putting them any further than 6". Double the light distance, 1/4 the light intensity (see pic 1, light intensity vs. distance).

You mentioned that your LED setup has some "full spectrum" LEDs. I'd be wary of that claim. LEDs, by nature, are very narrow in the color spectrums they emit. Bright White LEDs are almost always a combination of two colors that ends up looking white to us, when it's really a mixture of something like blue & yellow. (see pic 2, color spectrum of a common high-powered 1W White LED)

There are a couple of nice things about the white LEDs, though. They make it just a little easier to see in there, and they do level out a little bit of the center colors by having that yellow/green accent. The panel at least has some light in all the colors, so I guess you could technically call it "full spectrum." 

It definitely looks tough to compensate plants that germinated at different times, came from different strains, etc, etc. I bet you're looking forward to a grow with your clones where you can start one type of plant from one mother at the same time, multiple clones, all on-track with each other, not strangling each other out. I look forward to seeing your LEDs on that, too.

Whoever was asking about Lumens, they don't really matter, especially on LED setups. Lumens are a measure of how bright the light looks to us, which is entirely irrelevant to plants. We see green the strongest, they see very little green. That's actually why the plants appear green... the plant reflects the light it doesn't use, so that's what we see.

I've been working on creating a custom LED setup, and a big focus has been on having LED colors across the spectrum. It involves 1654 LEDs. I'm excited. Here's the link, if you're interested: https://www.rollitup.org/indoor-growing/186051-my-lighting-project-will-custom.html

I'm glad you decided to pluck the male nodes... I was really looking forward to seeing this grow through to the end. 

Dr Greenthumb was talking about not needing an airstone because his clones weren't touching the res water. The way I visualize it, pumping air into the water means you're also pumping new air through the airspace in the res... new oxygen for the roots? Perhaps the difference is negligible, but air pumps are cheap, and it couldn't hurt. Any thoughts?

You started off with some great updates on pH, ppm, etc, etc... that's a great way to post your updates, can we get that again? Several of the leaves looked like they were showing slight nutrient burn a couple pages back when you were at about 900ppm. Curled tips, light browning on the edge of the leaves. Have you bumped it up to 1200 yet like you mentioned? As before, I could be wrong, I'd just watch it very closely when you do decide to bump it up. (see pics 3 & 4, examples of nutrient burn - 3 is light/ok, 4 is medium/damaging) I've heard some say a tiny bit of nut burn is a good indicator that you're using just enough nutrients that the plants are taking in their full potential.

You know what might be a cool experiment? You could put the 18W blue shining horizontally on one side of the plant & the 55W on the other side... you can compare how each light affects the yield on that side of the plant. It's an idea, anyway. I'm the experimenting type, and it looks like you are as well, with all those different types of grow systems & lights. Also, the extra light may boost water & nutrient intake potential, making it easier to bump the nutes up to 1200.

Overall, an excellent example of a successful LED grow from start to finish. I look forward to seeing the finish.


----------



## ElephantRider (May 16, 2009)

It's a fuckin' JUNGLE in there!!! SU-PER-CROP! SU-PER-CROP!



Great work, bro. I cannot wait to see the finished product.

Also.. GREAT avatar! It never fails to make me happy.


----------



## Cuttings2Colas (May 16, 2009)

ElephantRider said:


> Also.. GREAT avatar! It never fails to make me happy.


That's what I forgot to mention... smokin' hot. I definitely know when I'm reading your posts.


----------



## 206 (May 17, 2009)

Thanks for dropping by my journal! I'm pretty baked right now but I'll try my best to reply. 



Cuttings2Colas said:


> You've found that you like them 12" away, huh? What benefits have you seen from that? I've always been under the impression that the light source should be as close as possible to the plants without causing damage, especially when heat is no longer an issue. Is it a cross-lighting thing? With a narrow light angle, I can see how that could play a role. I still don't imagine myself putting them any further than 6". Double the light distance, 1/4 the light intensity (see pic 1, light intensity vs. distance).


I settled on 12" based solely on growth rates I observed during veg. The small mylar interior of the tent might be playing a big role in my findings imo. At 6" I was blasting most of the canopy with very intense light, but the tradeoff was that I had less light being reflected all around the tent. I'm very interested to see how your experiments with this go, I'm always looking to optimize things.



Cuttings2Colas said:


> You mentioned that your LED setup has some "full spectrum" LEDs. I'd be wary of that claim. LEDs, by nature, are very narrow in the color spectrums they emit. Bright White LEDs are almost always a combination of two colors that ends up looking white to us, when it's really a mixture of something like blue & yellow. (see pic 2, color spectrum of a common high-powered 1W White LED)


I have no reason to doubt HTG's claim that the third band is full spectrum. I've seen the ebay UFO's passing various flavors of white off as full spectrum, but I don't think thats the case here. Cree has sold 1w full spectrum (465-635nm) xlamps since 2005, its just that they are more expensive and thus less companies are willing to spring for them when they can use white (cheapest) instead.



Cuttings2Colas said:


> It definitely looks tough to compensate plants that germinated at different times, came from different strains, etc, etc. I bet you're looking forward to a grow with your clones where you can start one type of plant from one mother at the same time, multiple clones, all on-track with each other, not strangling each other out. I look forward to seeing your LEDs on that, too.


I'm really, really, really looking forward to growing from clone next time around.



Cuttings2Colas said:


> I've been working on creating a custom LED setup, and a big focus has been on having LED colors across the spectrum. It involves 1654 LEDs. I'm excited. Here's the link, if you're interested: https://www.rollitup.org/indoor-growing/186051-my-lighting-project-will-custom.html


I will be following. I don't forsee myself doing any DIY LED stuff because I just don't have enough time anymore, but if it turns out well for you I might consider it.



Cuttings2Colas said:


> I'm glad you decided to pluck the male nodes... I was really looking forward to seeing this grow through to the end.


I have a feeling they were stress related and not genetic since this was my first hydro grow and no new ones have showed up.



Cuttings2Colas said:


> Dr Greenthumb was talking about not needing an airstone because his clones weren't touching the res water. The way I visualize it, pumping air into the water means you're also pumping new air through the airspace in the res... new oxygen for the roots? Perhaps the difference is negligible, but air pumps are cheap, and it couldn't hurt. Any thoughts?


I think the 12" airstone has made a huge difference for me. I plan on adding at least one more to the rainforest next grow.



Cuttings2Colas said:


> You started off with some great updates on pH, ppm, etc, etc... that's a great way to post your updates, can we get that again? Several of the leaves looked like they were showing slight nutrient burn a couple pages back when you were at about 900ppm. Curled tips, light browning on the edge of the leaves. Have you bumped it up to 1200 yet like you mentioned? As before, I could be wrong, I'd just watch it very closely when you do decide to bump it up. (see pics 3 & 4, examples of nutrient burn - 3 is light/ok, 4 is medium/damaging) I've heard some say a tiny bit of nut burn is a good indicator that you're using just enough nutrients that the plants are taking in their full potential.


I'll try to start posting the additional info in updates again. I did bump ppm to 1150 last flush and I agree the plant shows very minimal nute burn but it is present. It did not get any worse however with the recent bump.


----------



## project fuoro (May 17, 2009)

206.

Glad someone took the leap and bought the Tri-Band I have been looking at for a few months now. It seems far superior to the 55W panel from a different website I have used on one of those herb kits. The results were good, but not as good as I can see yours doing. 

Keeping a keen eye on this thread....only clicks away from getting one of those tri-bands.

Good luck! Looks great! Keep us all posted, followers shall come!


----------



## igrowwithleds (May 17, 2009)

I am well versed with leds and growing with them.
You do not need the leds close to the plants.....
I keep mine form 18 inches to 3 feet.

Ill be posting pics of my current grow with 300 watt s of led and uvb.
Word
60+ foto's


----------



## k20civic (May 17, 2009)

Just wondering where u got your lights from and what brand they are thanks much


----------



## dirt clean (May 17, 2009)

Dudes I like what I am hearing on the led distance. Makes me happy about my pene worries. I have the tri ufo on my 4 clones in 1 gallons. It is hard for someone just getting their perpetual set up to test so I got the lights a few inchs above. I tried a foot away and not so great. Maybe they were haveing that kind of day! Man do I want that 600 watt led. I got my tri ufo for 200 on auction. The trick is be the last bidder in the middle of day while every one is away at work. I take mondays off, I might have a 2nd job lol.


----------



## 206 (May 19, 2009)

Thanks for all the comments guys.

Tonight I noticed several light leaks in the tent around the vent hole stitching. Some were pinhole sized but many were significant, which makes me wonder how I didn't notice them before. I don't know what impact the leaks have had if any, but just knowing they've been there is a real downer. There is not much else to report...ppm is at 1146 and PH 5.88. Here are some pics from days 26-28 of flowering.


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (May 19, 2009)

so how many watts are you using total for your rainforest 66 unit ?


----------



## 206 (May 19, 2009)

doktorgreenthumb420 said:


> so how many watts are you using total for your rainforest 66 unit ?


My kill-a-watt reads 110-115 watts when the light is on. That includes about 100 for the light, 10 for the sprayer, and 5 for the air pump. It is costing me about $2.25/month during 12/12


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (May 19, 2009)

lol dam that is efficient


----------



## 206 (May 19, 2009)

Day 29 flowering pics added.

Ever since I moved the light to project down diagonally instead of hanging right over the plant the upper branches have been growing towards the front of the tent where the light is. Today I rotated the plant 180 degrees so that its leaning towards the back and will have to grow back towards the front. From this view it easier to see how the colas are filling in although you can't see as much bud in the pics.

P.S. The damage to the giant leaf in pic 2 was from it touching the glass lens on my light a while back for 24-48 hours, so it is possible to burn with LED's afterall.


----------



## dirt clean (May 20, 2009)

206 I got to hand it to you for sticking out your led grows. I am trying to use a 4th gen triband to veg four plants right now in 1 gallons. I am getting discourage by what I am thnking is some pretty slow growth. I have just fed and they are topped and a little confusing being from some un-uniform clones. Still, my 600 watt lumatek gets here soon (flower tent) and I am finding it hard to resist throwing my 400 lumatek (current flower) over the 1 gallons, use the 600 for flower, and use the UFO as a supplement. 

I ahve tried 3 feet over 2 foot over and a few inchs over. Disturbingly I think I saw the most growth at 2 feet or so over. I think that might be stretching though. Not very leggy stretch but I only gave it one day. So reps. I am going to try some more things. 


Man I want that 600 watt if I can get this damn UFO to work.


----------



## repvip (May 20, 2009)

12-15" has been the sweet spot for me, both with the UFO and tri-band 350w. 

Forget the 600w; go for the upgraded 700w with deep red!

Excellent work 206, as usual!!


----------



## 206 (May 21, 2009)

dirt clean said:


> I ahve tried 3 feet over 2 foot over and a few inchs over. Disturbingly I think I saw the most growth at 2 feet or so over. I think that might be stretching though. Not very leggy stretch but I only gave it one day. So reps. I am going to try some more things.


Like repvip said 12-15" seems optimal. I'm vegging a few clones and seeds about 18" away from a 55w & 18w and the internodes are staying tight so far. They are in soil also fwiw. 

I finally added an exhaust fan to the tent today. Its a really quiet 4" and fits snugly in the sleeve of the tent. To block the light I cut up a pair of my girlfriend's black nylons and duct taped 3 layers over the exhaust exit, it worked perfectly lol.


----------



## Ap0c0leS (May 21, 2009)

Got my light today, woohoo. unfortuantly im ordering everything peice by peice so it will be a long time before i am ready to rock and roll. Do you think the 120W triband will be enough to seal the deal from seed to very nice buds.. Do you think their comparison of the 120W to a 600W HID is correct through veg and flower? i know you cant completly answer yet but give it an educated guess.


----------



## Ap0c0leS (May 21, 2009)

Forgot to ask, Can you private message or link me to the smaller LED panels that you got for seed and cloans? I want to get a smaller LED for Clones/Seedlings and use the 120W for Veg and flower..


----------



## Ap0c0leS (May 21, 2009)

Sorry i thought of one more thing. How much of an advantage do you think adding a small 150W HID will make?


----------



## 206 (May 21, 2009)

Ap0c0leS said:


> Sorry i thought of one more thing. How much of an advantage do you think adding a small 150W HID will make?


I think a HID+LED would probably make a big difference. I think the 120w compares well to 600w HID grows I've seen on here during veg, but I expect it will be closer to 300-400w HID for flowering, just my best early guess.

The 55w tri-band and 18w blue were both from ebay, can't recall the exact shops but they should be easy to find. The internodes are super tight on the 55w soil plants so far, way way tighter than the rainforest grow during early veg. I was using 3:1 floragrow:floramicro during veg and skipping the florabloom, so I think I just nitrogened the shit out of that papaya which made it so stretchy.


----------



## Ap0c0leS (May 22, 2009)

What would you say to two 120W Tribands and a red highpower panel from htg for flower? Would that kick ass as a super all LED? 

is blue or white led better for clone/seedling/germination?


----------



## Ap0c0leS (May 22, 2009)

Or would it be more about the other spectrums the 150W HID would bring then the lack of the same light from another LED?


----------



## 206 (May 22, 2009)

I'm going camping in the morning so no updates until Tuesday.  and have a great weekend everybody.



Ap0c0leS said:


> What would you say to two 120W Tribands and a red highpower panel from htg for flower? Would that kick ass as a super all LED?


That would be a sick setup, I'm hoping to have two 120w's in the future myself.



Ap0c0leS said:


> is blue or white led better for clone/seedling/germination?


Blue.


----------



## ElephantRider (May 23, 2009)

Have fun! I'll be drooling in the meantime.


----------



## 206 (May 26, 2009)

Day 36 flowering pics added.


----------



## Cuttings2Colas (May 26, 2009)

You know what you may want to try? A tiny 15W incandescent on when the LEDs are on... will help "spray" the plants with the infra-red signals of day and night.


----------



## dpjones (May 27, 2009)

Cuttings2Colas said:


> You know what you may want to try? A tiny 15W incandescent on when the LEDs are on... will help "spray" the plants with the infra-red signals of day and night.


made me lol


----------



## dirt clean (May 27, 2009)

actually one of those 10.0 uvb lights for reptile is exactly what you want. It will stim resin prodiction as the plant trys to protect itself. They are normal for gardens now and their are ven veg and flower specific grades and also hid uv models! Cool , huh, that is science. Hope not to hijack. 

P.s. I abandoned the led like an idiot. I was having slow clones and I know it was nothing but I am HID man and I had an extra lumatek, LUMATEK!!!, so I could not resist moving to that, 400 watt Lumatek for veg. Still watching tho.


----------



## 206 (May 27, 2009)

dirt clean said:


> actually one of those 10.0 uvb lights for reptile is exactly what you want. It will stim resin prodiction as the plant trys to protect itself. They are normal for gardens now and their are ven veg and flower specific grades and also hid uv models! Cool , huh, that is science. Hope not to hijack.
> 
> P.s. I abandoned the led like an idiot. I was having slow clones and I know it was nothing but I am HID man and I had an extra lumatek, LUMATEK!!!, so I could not resist moving to that, 400 watt Lumatek for veg. Still watching tho.


Thanks for suggesting a uvb light, I did not know about these so I'll have to read up. This grow kind of spiraled out of control in regards to free space in the tent, but I will probably add uvb to the next grow.

I actually have a 400w lumatek, I bought it a couple weeks before my LED. Instead of selling it I waited to see what 100% LED could do and now I have a pretty good idea. My next grow will be LED+HPS, which is neither an indictment of LED or endorsement of HPS, just common sense since I already have the HID and they compliment eachother well. I will still finish this grow out 100% LED though fwiw.


----------



## dpjones (May 28, 2009)

no offence man but LEDs are shite. Just look at the pics.....


----------



## Cuttings2Colas (May 28, 2009)

dpjones said:


> made me lol


Be careful not to knock it unless you know what you're talking about... here are a couple of articles on UVB light & IR light that may be helpful:

https://www.rollitup.org/indoor-growing/186647-experiments-cutting-edge.html
https://www.rollitup.org/general-marijuana-growing/193815-experiments-cutting-edge-part-2-a.html


----------



## 206 (May 28, 2009)

dpjones said:


> no offence man but LEDs are shite. Just look at the pics.....


FWIW: I will easily pull 2-3 zips from 100~ watts actual consumption, so I'll go ahead and disagree with your vague blanket statement. That is with no top/fim/scrog/c02 or any other methods and on my first hydro grow, having made tons of mistakes along the way. Comments like this add absolutely no value to this journal or anyone reading it, so post them in general discussion or anywhere but here in the future.

In other news...I selected the best double gum & mango phenotypes and killed off the others. Here are some pics of one of them today while I was transplanting.


----------



## dpjones (May 28, 2009)

Cuttings2Colas said:


> Be careful not to knock it unless you know what you're talking about... here are a couple of articles on UVB light & IR light that may be helpful:
> 
> https://www.rollitup.org/indoor-growing/186647-experiments-cutting-edge.html
> https://www.rollitup.org/general-marijuana-growing/193815-experiments-cutting-edge-part-2-a.html


I can not say I know exactly what im talking about as I'm sure the science behind it all is very complicated. But I have the jist of it.

Sun gives UV, marijuana 'developed' thc to protect it from UV, therefore more UV = more bud. Or so it goes.

The first article by Ed Rosenthal has many spelling mistakes which make me doubt it to start with. I know its probably been copied but still. On top of that the only comment about UV increasing yeilds is this quote:

"UVB light also affects marijuana potency. The potency of high quality marijuana increases in direct ratio to the amount of UVB light it receives. This is very significant. In California, where the medical dispensaries operate in an unrestricted market, many dispensaries reject fall-harvested outdoor material, deeming it as inferior. They have found it lacks the potency of indoor crops and is a harsh smoke."

All he does is make a statement with no proof or explanation at all. Later he mentions testing with different light spectrums and says he this:

"Try using between 20 and 40 watts of mixed blue light per 1000 watts of regular light. *I have done only initial experimentation with this so test this in a limited way of increasing total yield*."

Which is again very vague and tbh pritty stupid. 40 watts of blue ain't going do shit with 1000w of HPS there.

The second article is just him saying they are experimenting with different lights. Again that doesnt mean shit.

And the key point, how much do those lights cost? How many harvests do you need to break even on buying one of those, including the savings in electricity. Compare this to a HPS and bingo you have a very obvious solution.

To 206, sorry that was a pritty lame statement i made but ive been watching this for a while out of curiosity and i see all these people talking in here with their false hope for this magical new technology which creates wonder buds.

Not to be a complete douche but have you actually harvested 2-3 zips from this 100w light?

How big is the plant which produces 2-3 ounce of buds?

How long did it take from start to flowering with one of those?


----------



## ElephantRider (May 28, 2009)

I dunno, man.. I've been following this thread from the beginning. I'm very impressed with its vegetative growth, at the very least. The buds do seem very popcorny, at this stage, but they're sizeable and they seem to be fusing a bit more over time. I'm confident, personally. The one thing that too many people fail to see is that people will design their grow around their environment. Someone who doesn't have a spare closet or any space to put up a "legit" grow box will choose a PC case. Someone who is very concerned about the environment might choose an LED or CFL. Me, personally, I doubt I'd go HPS any time soon. Would I like to? Sure. I just don't want to deal with the intense heat and I don't feel like spending all that money on it when CFL's work very well these days. I think a combination of CFL and LED would be really winning, which is exactly why I've tuned into this thread for so long.

Also.. all of the answers to your questions are in this journal. Maybe start at the beginning and read the whole thing before passing judgement on a new technology? And the money on LED's isn't too bad anymore. Growl LED is affordable and decent, from what I hear and the UFO is supposed to be the absolute bomb. I dunno.. to me, a $300 LED, if it can be close to viable, is so much cooler than HPS, if nothing else, for the environmental factor. All that wattage for HPS!! Do you get QP top colas? Sure. For those of us who don't require an assload of pot for personal use, though.. LED, CFL.. both very viable, in my book. I bet these Papaya nugs smoke great, too. I hope 206 kicks back thinkin' about all the fossil fuels he saved by going LED while he blazes that first pipe.


----------



## dpjones (May 28, 2009)

This thread has been going since November. I have been here since nearly the start but I'm also subscribed to many others threads. The point is I don't have perfect recall and will be fucked if I'm going to sift through 21 pages to try and find answers to questions I probably already know the answers to.

But of course none of this matters if we are going to melt the poler ice caps and drown in a flood of our own stupidity.


----------



## ElephantRider (May 28, 2009)

HAHAHAH!!! Funny stuff, man.  +rep.


----------



## 206 (May 29, 2009)

Thanks for "getting it" ElephantRider. With all that HID yield, I'm suprised this guy can't smoke enough weed to not be a complete downer.

Anyways, I'm going to follow repvip's lead and stop feeding the trolls now. If anyone wants to see updated pics going forward just send me a PM.


----------



## ElephantRider (May 29, 2009)

Wait.. you're shutting the thread down? Ugh!

I gotta see harvest pics still!


----------



## Ap0c0leS (May 29, 2009)

Woah Woah, hold up there brotha.. You need to continue this thread. First of all you got me interested enough to even begin learning about this technology. Prior to LED's growing was'nt even close to being an option for me becides CFLS. This retard has no idea what he is talking about.. Kindly follow this link to see new LED tech and real experiments to test it www.greenpinelane.com .LED's are the furture.. but not even that they are NOW.. the slower these morons are to get on the ship the more money they waste on 90% Heat loss, and venting that peice of shit light out of their room.. Dude your plant looks great and the retards that stop by and talk crap are just angry.. LED tech is already amazing and it is slowing upgrading. Within 4 years HPS lights will be laughed at because they are completly impractical. Keep your thread up dude, your not alone. Soon i will be starting my journal with the same 120W Triband LED, a 90W Led , 50W panel , UVB CFL Light, and an infared light to use right after *lights out*.. Did you read that article 206? Its freeking crazy shit,,, this retard is too ignorent to see past grammer when we are talking about ground breaking technology.


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (May 29, 2009)

i agree i am a 2 x 1000watt in my bloom ...so i am hid all the way ...but 206 you have gotten me interested in led also 


i see the veg application of led is immense 

the only time i do get efficienctcy is in winter when i can vent my hoods inside and actually heat the house while growin with lights 

other than that tho i waste alot of energy in the form of heat ....energy is in many diff forms and with no venting ...well it makes some sense ..... ....wouldnt that be sick if they made like huge ass led bulbs .....maybe taht is what is next ....

i know this led flashlights are so much better with energy and light ..so i know that is an incadacent bulb but ...i mean cmon i think we should give led a chance ..

206 +rep if it will let me give you some


----------



## KaliKitsune (May 29, 2009)

Ap0c0leS said:


> Woah Woah, hold up there brotha.. You need to continue this thread. First of all you got me interested enough to even begin learning about this technology. Prior to LED's growing was'nt even close to being an option for me becides CFLS. This retard has no idea what he is talking about.. Kindly follow this link to see new LED tech and real experiments to test it www.greenpinelane.com .LED's are the furture.. but not even that they are NOW.. the slower these morons are to get on the ship the more money they waste on 90% Heat loss, and venting that peice of shit light out of their room.. Dude your plant looks great and the retards that stop by and talk crap are just angry.. LED tech is already amazing and it is slowing upgrading. Within 4 years HPS lights will be laughed at because they are completly impractical. Keep your thread up dude, your not alone. Soon i will be starting my journal with the same 120W Triband LED, a 90W Led , 50W panel , UVB CFL Light, and an infared light to use right after *lights out*.. Did you read that article 206? Its freeking crazy shit,,, this retard is too ignorent to see past grammer when we are talking about ground breaking technology.


Sorry, I frequent green pine lane, and no, LEDs are not even CLOSE. Not when we have T5HO bulbs that are pure red and pure blue, now! 

See, LEDs are very focused. In order to hit EVERY photosynthetic peak, you need six different wavelengths of LED. A single red and a single blue T5HO lamp will cover those ranges, and they output mad light, plus have more canopy penetration thanks to the intensity.

I do agree with not shutting this journal down, people need to see the pictures, final harvest, all that good stuff. I rarely see any complete LED grow journals (and those that never finish should be deleted, IMHO, to save on server resources.)


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (May 29, 2009)

i love t5 HO lights .....i use to think they were crap till i started usin a regular set of flouros for vegg purposes and notice way good results .....even better than the 400 watt metal halide i had ....because sometimes my plants just dint need that much light at that particular phase of their life ......

so i decided to get a t5 HO light ....they are so cool 

u use a rainforest like me too right 206 so that means this thread will be even more beneficial for me 

o and i tell you what 206 my plants never took to bloomin good in the rainforest for some odd reason 

it is a monster veg machine tho


----------



## KaliKitsune (May 30, 2009)

I love whomever gave me the positive rep but stated "Outdated LED info--get current or stop posting about it." I know it was meant to be negative rep.

My information is quite current, possibly moreso than whomever gave me this rep. I got to see Primary Color T5HO in action, and I've seen plenty 3rd gen UFOs as well, all at the same hydro shop. I've seen custom-built LUMILED panels using 10w LED bulbs, they STILL don't beat out the T5HO Primary color tubes.


----------



## Ap0c0leS (May 30, 2009)

This is just a first time LED grow to test the strength of the LED's and its clear they are powerful for veg and its also clear they need some help during flowering. Who knows how LED's would work with c02, more ventilation , different nuets.. i mean there a 1000 possiblities and not many grows to show success compared to the shear mass of people using HID's .. Also this grow isnt over yet.. im interested to see how much is yeilded and what it looks like at finish time. Atleast keep posting a weekly few pics if you would 206


----------



## Ap0c0leS (May 30, 2009)

These tubes you are talking about.. Not that lumens matter in LED lighting but what kind of Lumens are you getting on your tubes.. i guess these are flourescent tubes your talking about? .. Have you tested a UVB bulb or this apparent spraying of UV light to activate the flowering fase quicker?

Who knows how good LED may actually be with a bit of tweaking, remember it is relativly new for growing in this manner, for this plant.


----------



## Ap0c0leS (May 30, 2009)

Sorry not spraying UV light... Infared light i mean


----------



## KaliKitsune (May 30, 2009)

The fluorescent tubes vary depending on length but the T5HO GREEN 4 ft ones pump 4400 lumens, no filters, just special phosphors to emit green light. Not much in the way of IR emissions but there are some UV emissions that are just due to the nature of the bulb.


----------



## Ap0c0leS (May 30, 2009)

KaliKitsune said:


> The fluorescent tubes vary depending on length but the T5HO GREEN 4 ft ones pump 4400 lumens, no filters, just special phosphors to emit green light. Not much in the way of IR emissions but there are some UV emissions that are just due to the nature of the bulb.


Wait green light? What the heck is that usefull for becides looking at your plants at night. And by the way LED greens are much simplier and more pure. They have Green LED light Hats to check on your crop during the dark cycle lol


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (May 30, 2009)

i myself never used flouros for bloomin but my t5 HO i think is suppose to have like 5000 .....i may be wrong i dont even feel like lookin ...lol i know it is alot higher lumens than normal flouros 

o and i never used for bloom like i said ...but for veg purposes i have found flouros to be the key ......

see i use to try to use my 400 watt to get clones just rooted and such to get started ....i found that usin flouros i actually made more space available for veggin ...

mainly flouros i think are great for vegg purposes ..

but light penetration of HID is a nice thing to see 

i think led might be the next thing tho .....at tthe very least for vegg purpose ...they are just so efficient 

soon they will prlly perfect somethin new ............

hey let this bake your brain ....what if they came up with a way to blast the plants with lasers ......super intense light right ........never know whats gonna happen with tech 

"the only true knowledge is knowing you know nothing at all"


----------



## repvip (May 30, 2009)

Been using a 350w LED for awhile... stopped posting due to rude posts.

206.. sorry to see your thread got shit on... maybe this will shut them up. everything was grown from clone to flower using LEDs. Flowered under 350w LED for 5 weeks, then threw under a 1000w hps to finish them off (haven't had the 350w led long enough to finish an entire crop under it--but plan on soon because of promising results).

In fact, I couldn't be more pleased. Dried bud was flowered under LED for 4 weeks, then under 1000w HPS for 4 weeks. Just as good as HPS alone. 5 weeks at LED looks great. Have tried 4 week LED followed by 4 week HPS--results good. Currently trying 3 and 5 weeks at LED now finishing under HPS. Cycle under LED now will finish entirely under LED.

I use CO2. Both lights are in the same room, but don't really overlap.

edit:
pics 2 and 3 are plants flowered under led for 5 weeks, been under HPS for 3 days now.
pic 5 is the plants (pics 2+3) when they were under LED (week before they were transferred to HPS)
pic 4 is the bud flowered 4 weeks under LED and 4 under HPS. Yiled was slightly smaller than HPS alone (but it has to do with not being used to how LEDs work.... usually only flower 10 plants under HPS, with LED I can up it to 16 to get the same yield)
pic 1 is a current pic of the led light with a fresh crop put in couple days ago


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (May 30, 2009)

that is too cool for school repvip ....u usin a stinkbud system right ...i just built one ....gonna run it for first tonight ........so they use led first ..what 4 weeks ...then finish with a HID ......i bet you are gettin a good efficiency with that 

that is what i would think ....cause first ...well at least 3 weeks of bloom its all growth and then they finally start to popcorn up ....at which point a HID would rock .....this website is awesome +rep if it will let me give you some


----------



## repvip (May 30, 2009)

Also, genetics will be playing a huge role as usual.

Have you ever grown that strain before, 206?

Perhaps... that particular plant is a dud. It happens all the time. Unless you know exactly how your plant behaves under normal circumstances you cant judge how they are acting under LED....

Light movers make a big difference. Somebody needs to invent a UFO spinner  I'd buy it for real. Any little movement like that helps.

Thanks doc! What the hell, I unlocked my LED album--check it out while you can.

Now be nice to us LED people! We have spent a lot of money and time doing this... you are *lucky* we are showing you anything.

Sorry to hijack, 206. It just makes me so angry.


----------



## KaliKitsune (May 30, 2009)

Ap0c0leS said:


> Wait green light? What the heck is that usefull for becides looking at your plants at night. And by the way LED greens are much simplier and more pure. They have Green LED light Hats to check on your crop during the dark cycle lol


That's just the green ones, on which a lumens rating is reliable, and the green ones are for working amongst your crop during the dark cycle.  The red and blue ones can't be given an accurate lumen rating but they are pretty intense. Though I am loathe to say it, I'd say they're about 4700-4800 'lumens', almost as bright as my 6500K T5HOs. 

Seriously, when I first saw them I thought it was a massive LED grow, because I could only see inside the tent, I couldn't see the top of the tent. Once I stuck my head in and looked up, ouch!!!!!!!!


----------



## KaliKitsune (May 30, 2009)

And I won't dive on LEDs. I've always had great results using them for vegetative herbs like basil, rosemary, thyme, even small pepper bushes. I've seen one full LED grow, and the results were impressive only because of the method of dense clones put immediately into flowering as soon as they had enough of a root system, which made it pretty much a bud stick. I still see that "finished with 1000w HPS" and I'd like to see "pure 350w from clone to veg to flower to harvest" and I'd allow the addition of as many UVB LEDs you can throw in there for flowering because I *REALLY* want to see the maximum potential, not in just yield but in potency.


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (May 30, 2009)

yea that would be interesting to know ...what they can do start to finish .....if anybody has the ability what leds can do its repvip with his NFT/Aero setup

o and repvip i use to have a cat like that in your pic his name was bobby ....good markings too had perfect white boots and markings were perfect on his face


----------



## 206 (May 31, 2009)

Thanks repvip, those are great pics. To everyone who commented about it, I will still post harvest pics + dry weight and a smoke report and even do some occasional updates, but I just need to spend less time on here for a bit, it is summer afterall. 



repvip said:


> Also, genetics will be playing a huge role as usual.
> 
> Have you ever grown that strain before, 206?
> 
> Perhaps... that particular plant is a dud. It happens all the time. Unless you know exactly how your plant behaves under normal circumstances you cant judge how they are acting under LED....


I do think the phenotype was really strange and possibly the cause. I've been vegging mango, double gum and G13 from seed in soil while at the same time vegging 3 papaya clones and a thai s-skunk clone in soil. They have all been under the same lights and conditions but the papayas look like SHIT compared to all the other plants, which are super bushy even the s-skunk which is sativa. See pics below.

Pic 1: Original papaya @ day 18 veg (from seed)
Pic 2: Papaya clone @ day 21 veg (wtf?)
Pic 3: Mangos & Double Gums @ day 21 veg (from seed)
Pic 4: Double Gum closeup @ day 21 veg

Despite the papaya being in aero w/ 120w and the clones and new seeds being in soil w/ 55w the growth rate is in the same ballpark. The 55w plants are much bushier and just healthier looking than the papaya was, which is why I think the genetics just screwed me here. I will probably kill off the papaya clones and be done with this strain after harvest and use mango next aero grow instead.


----------



## Merlin11 (May 31, 2009)

Great thread! LEDs seem to be getting better all the time so sooner or later they will get to the point where more of us will be using them. Getting ahead of the game is a good thing! Keep up the good work and let us see how it comes out (got to see some LED bud bro). Thanks for the good work!! Reps


----------



## 206 (May 31, 2009)

This LED grow is worth bookmarking: http://forums.cannabisculture.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=1535752&page=7


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (May 31, 2009)

llol its funny you should say that about it being summer and gettin outside 

i am a kinda strange individual myself i have a type of rolling bedtime .....for some reason i dont work well with a 24 hour day .......if i stay up till say 4 in the morning i will sleep regularly ....wake up and next day i will go to sleep around 6 or 7 in the morning ........and it keeps on rolling forward a few hours each day ...i think maybe im from a diff planet with a diff eliptical cycle 

anyways i thought it was funny about sunlight ..cause my whole house is blacked up so i dont even see sunlight unless i go outside ...which is not very often at all ....this is not healthy tho ....i think sunlight gives you some kind of vitamins ......

i am home literally like all the time .....i figure its like i am training for growing medicine ...hardcore style

soon i will be released from my cage as a Mean-Green-Growing-Machine

till then .....despite all my rage i am still just a rat in a cage ......cept i have some budddds lol take it easy 206


----------



## Ap0c0leS (Jun 3, 2009)

doktorgreenthumb420 said:


> till then .....despite all my rage i am still just a rat in a cage ......cept i have some budddds lol take it easy 206


 
Nice one Doktor...

The new plants are looking nice 206.


----------



## iloveit (Jun 3, 2009)

I have a question for you growers who have grown with LEDs from start to finish.
Would you say the buds are dense compared to growing with HPS bulbs?


----------



## Cuttings2Colas (Jun 4, 2009)

doktorgreenthumb420 said:


> anyways i thought it was funny about sunlight ..cause my whole house is blacked up so i dont even see sunlight unless i go outside ...which is not very often at all ....this is not healthy tho ....i think sunlight gives you some kind of vitamins ......
> 
> i am home literally like all the time .....


That's not healthy at all, man... go get some sunlight!

Nice looking new plants, 206. That's weird the Papaya is growing differently than it did the first time; it should be the same genetic makeup. Let's all hope it was just a "dud" papaya and these other babies will treat you right.

I just built my custom LED aero/hydro mix setup for my new mothers, and I'm stoked! I'll have my first ladies next week!

C2C


----------



## BigHig (Jun 6, 2009)

Thanks for sticking with LED all the way through.
We are all learning from this.
Would you say your biggest "dissapointment" is the lack of big buds ??
please take pix of the biggest buds, please !!
F the Haters, what you are doing is scientifically experimenting and if you changed things up mid-way through then this experiment would lose much of its value !!!
When Harvested, Let us know approx. how much you will have spent on materials (including tent/rainforest 66/lights, which are re-usable) and electricity vs. weed output.

Thanks Again !!


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (Jun 6, 2009)

just thought yall should see my new dumbo rat ....its a professional rat ...heeh she is sittin on top of huge kush plant 


im not into sprinkles and kitties and puppies ....but i thought this would be a nice little change of scenery 


o i got my stinksystem up and runnin using gh nutes and its been 3 days ....just now got the timer for on 1 min off 5 ......this system i can tell has some major advantages ...

..i need to build the veg system and change nutes so i can really emulate Professor Stinkbud


----------



## 206 (Jun 8, 2009)

Hey guys, just wanted to post some updated pics real quick. If I sounded a little insecure about my LED + Papaya the last few posts its because I probably was. The papaya has become an afterthought in the last few weeks while I've worked with the new strains, but I'm trying to do a better job now and salvage the best harvest possible. The bottom line is I know the light was not at fault here and that my next rainforest grow will be in a whole new league.

To answer the question someone asked, yes the lack of big buds has been the biggest disappointment. Not pruning any lower growth during veg or even early in flowering was a huge mistake, there are seriously 100 or more bud sites on this plant so I don't think the top colas ever had a chance when it comes to size. If you look at pic 1 below, there is actually about 2 feet of plant further down I just can't fit everything in these shots anymore.

To the other person who asked, yes it is still under 120w led only. It is still mounted diagonally instead of overhead, which killed a ton of reflectivity and is another big factor here.

Pic 1: Wide shot w/ LED on
Pic 2: Closer shot w/ LED off


----------



## jollygreenleaf (Jun 8, 2009)

206,
I think you are right about the light. Your growth seems very good, more than adequate for a LED/First time grow. I definitly think that with some tweaks to your process your harvest will get bigger and bigger. Fuck the haters. You are growing herb not performing surgery.


----------



## 206 (Jun 10, 2009)

Just wanted to do a quick update on the soil plants for those that might be interested. This is mainly an R&D grow to isolate the best phenotypes and also see how LEDs work w/ a soil medium.

Back row: Mango, Mango, Mango
Front row: Double Gum, G13 Haze, Double Gum

The left and center mangos are getting chopped soon since I'm looking for short + bushy attributes. I have a feeling they are males anyways. The right mango is a keeper for now.

Both of the double gums are awesome, I really like this strain so far. I think the right one might turn out to be male but I will use it for breeding if thats the case.

The G13 had the most prolific lower growth but I took 4 clones from it yesterday. Here is a pic of those as well.


----------



## Cuttings2Colas (Jun 10, 2009)

Very healthy looking plants, my friend... good work. Looking forward to the results!


----------



## proman (Jun 10, 2009)

LED best for SOG? not enough punch in that light for such a large plant. The veg looked great but when it came time to flower the papaya.... what happened?


----------



## 206 (Jun 10, 2009)

proman said:


> LED best for SOG? not enough punch in that light for such a large plant. The veg looked great but when it came time to flower the papaya.... what happened?


Read my last 5-7 posts if you want to know what happened.


----------



## 206 (Jun 15, 2009)

Well, 100% LED just wasn't meant to be. I picked up a sunlight supply 150w HPS today. I'm going to begin flowering 4 soil plants tomorrow under the 150w HPS + 55w LED + 50w LED. The plants have been vegging for just over a month under the LEDs.

I'm expecting big things, stay tuned for pics.

The papaya is coming along ok I guess. I need to get my G13 clones in the rainforest soon, so I'm going to start the flush tomorrow and will harvest within 2 weeks.


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (Jun 16, 2009)

i think you are on the right track with hps for bloom ..thats what i always used ...but for sure those led have alot of potential for vegg 

o and bro we got the same system right ....rainforests 66 unit .....i never had a good bloom with those ...but it is the best veg machine i have ever used ....

....check this out ...and ive been doin it ......u get a nice fat vegged plant from rainforest and then you can transfer the whole 6inch net cup with hydroton ...i take off the little coir top that sits on top of the pebbles and i basically plant that right into a normal pot ....soil would work ....i use coir and basically the idea here is using that rainforest to boost plants veg cycle so they have an awesome bloom 

here is a pic of one such transplant ...and some that went to buckets (those are nice cause it also uses pebbles ) and i dont have to dig out pebbles ....not that it is hard ...they all stay together


----------



## 206 (Jun 16, 2009)

Nice looking plants, that is a really good idea about using the rainforest for veg only. Do you transplant just prior to flowering?

Also forgot to mention that rat of yours is pretty cool


----------



## 206 (Jun 16, 2009)

I went directly from 24/0 to 12/12 today, day 1 of flowering. These are all from seed so sexes are uncertain.

1 x G13 Haze (Smallest plant, most sativa looking)
1 x Mango (Largest plant w/ very bushy canopy)
2 x Double Gum

Pic 1: HPS on
Pic 2: LED panels on
Pic 3: Everything on


----------



## Cuttings2Colas (Jun 17, 2009)

Wow, very healthy looking plants going into flower. I think you're going to be pleasantly surprised at your yield. This takes care of the IR signals we were talking about, and probably some of the UV as well. Keep on truckin'! +rep (if it lets me)

My new mothers are now under my custom LED panel w/ a couple soft white CFLs to fill out the spectrum just added yesterday. The big experiments won't start until these mothers produce babies, though.

C2C


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (Jun 18, 2009)

yea i transplant basically the day i put em into flower ........i found this to be best cause ..well then of course the rainforest can always stay in veg lighting area

i am currently using the 2inch netcup inserts on the rainforest to supply vegged plants for a new (stinkbud system i am building) it is basically an NFT system .....ummm it is workin nice tho and i still keep a couple inserts for 6 inch starts that go to bucket ....the buckets are really what is my best kung fu 

so far that is ......the new NFT system is rockin the stock ...so i think i stumbled onto a new thing ....

but my patients are very dependant on me so i need to keep up a certain supply of medicine and that is why i have like 3 diff systems workin now (ebb and flo , NFT , buckets) so i only phase one out if it dont work ...and basically my main producer (ebb and flo ) is goin by way of dinosaur 

ill keep you updated fo sure bro ....and ill tell you what with your setup already i can show you how to expand if you ever feel the need 

i think this new system solves so many hassles tho ...its a very set it and forget it machine like the rainforest 

anyways im rambling lol take it easy


----------



## 206 (Jun 21, 2009)

Thanks for the feedback and suggestions guys.

The HPS + LED combo seems to be kicking ass so far. Today I spotted female flowers on the G13 haze and small bumps I believe will become male flowers on the Mango. I don't want to bother growing more Mango seeds to find a female, so I might cross this male with G13 or double gum. Here are some more pics...I'm very proud of these plants so far, definitely my best work to date.

Pic 1: The 2 double gums up front.
Pic 2: Higher shot showing G13 in the back left and Mango in the back right.
Pic 3: Mango...such a dense greasy indica...how could I not breed this?
Pic 4: G13...all credit to the genetics here.
Pic 5:


----------



## 206 (Jun 21, 2009)

I'm finally joining to perpetual harvest club too


----------



## Syriuslydelyrius (Jun 21, 2009)

Subscribe.

No time to read this right now but it looks interesting. Will look at it tomorrow.


----------



## doktorgreenthumb420 (Jun 21, 2009)

lookin good bro those are nice and healthy


----------



## Megax29 (Jun 22, 2009)

Mango looks realy dense and bushy the G13 looks nice also if your mango is male try crossing with fastest growin strain


----------



## 206 (Jun 23, 2009)

Check out this pic of the G13 with the LED and HPS spectrums colliding.

Pic 2 shows the mango, which is now a confirmed male. I'm trying to decide wether to breed now or wait, because I do have a rooted clone from this that I could easily cross with a G13 clone. The G13 is a confirmed female.

Pic 3 shows the double gums which have still not shown sex.


----------



## Treeth (Jun 23, 2009)

But 206,!

I thought leds were the shit111!!!

And that HTG panel was teh best!

Damn, 

I'm sorry to hear your disappointment.

It's time for you to join the more watts for more yield camp.


----------



## 206 (Jun 23, 2009)

I'll be starting a G13 grow with the 120w soon enough. I'm not convinced the light was the problem, but this upcoming grow will tell.

Things really couldn't be going any better right now, loving these dank little plants.


----------



## Ap0c0leS (Jun 26, 2009)

206 you traiter!!! you went HPS on us.... I have been following this thread from start to finish and Treeth we cant say 100% that the 120W panel was the problem with the papaya. It could have been anything from genetics to the fact that no ventilation was used. Stagnant air proabably sat under the leaves for most of the time slowing growth in both veg and flower. The 120W panel made some NICE looking plants in VEG but maybe there jsut wasnnt enough air to produce more yeild. I know it would not have been much more from the strength used with all of his LEDS.



206.. I was just kidding about the tratior comment, i myself have almost everything the same as you and you cant argue with what works. My current lighting combo contains a 120W Triband LED two 50W Triband LED's a 90W Triband UFO Two 2700K 100W CFL's for flowering , A UVB 10.0 CFL , and a Infared bulb And yes... a 250W "Air Sealed" HPS light. I expect to have BEAUTIFUL babies going soon, I have not started yet,.

Sorry treeth Couldnt afford to go the all LED way but as you can see from my setup i do heavly lean the way of LEDS..althougth they are low power peices of shit like we mentioned LOL... For now the 250W HPS is the best way to get what i need to get done. Great work 206 the new girls are looking MORE THEN GREAT.. fine work and i will be following closely because oursetups are very close to the same.. May i suggest a small exaust fan at the top of your tent could increase your results by 50% who knows.. .. even if its only 300 CFM, and maybe even .. Also get a small oscilating fan to blow around inside.. not to tell you what to do im no expert.. i just know what i read. Treeth is the real expert around here lol

Fine work


----------



## Ap0c0leS (Jun 26, 2009)

*EDITORS NOTE*
Treeth i was refering to the HTG LEDS not the ones you make yourself as those are works of art and extreamly effective


----------



## 206 (Jun 26, 2009)

I cut the papaya down yesterday, its fan drying now. I've found almost 20 seeds so far just on the floor of the tent and I'm expecting many more are tucked away in the buds. This sucks since I have no interest in planting any of them, but its another explanation for the small bud production. I knew it was a hermie but thought I found and cut all the balls in time...oh well.

Good news is I transplanted all my G13 and double gum clones to soil under the 120w today. Round 2 of the 120w trial has officially begun. The Rainforest 66 is going to take the rest of the summer off. I'm out and about fucking around too much to be bothered with all that maintenance, not to mention battling summer res temps or adding a chiller.


----------



## 206 (Jun 26, 2009)

@Ap0c0leS: Sounds like a great setup you have going with all those varieties of light. I did actually add an exhaust about half-way into flowering, but yeah I think it caused a lot of problems earlier on that just were not apparent to me at the time.


----------



## Megax29 (Jun 30, 2009)

just wondering if we can see some pics of the buds on papaya 
and a smoke report would be nice


----------



## Ap0c0leS (Jul 4, 2009)

dang i would love those papaya seeds crappy genetics or not. I only have a few types of seed and i fucked up all my practice middie seeds .. they stretched like 3 inches and didnt grow any true leaves.. just the cytodon or whatever its called.. LOL talk about FAILURE.. I didnt think they needed light untill the true leaves grew.. i am now blasting them 18/6 but i think its too late


----------



## Ap0c0leS (Jul 7, 2009)

Not to mention i kept the humidity dome on seedlings.. JEEZE i better read that freeking book again im like retarded.. its ok second wave is on the way


----------



## yourboylex (Jul 19, 2009)

Ap0c0leS said:


> Not to mention i kept the humidity dome on seedlings.. JEEZE i better read that freeking book again im like retarded.. its ok second wave is on the way



Hey bro, looking into buyin a few of these 120 w leds, currently using the 90w x 4
what do you think about it ever tried the 90w anyways did it come from htgsupply.com or another distributor? Where are you now in terms of flower weeks?


----------



## lrg (Aug 5, 2009)

I am enjoying this grow allot that leaf structure is amazing.
glad too see you mixed power with spectrum i personally think its the best of both worlds why choose one they both ahve purpose.
cant wait to see up dates goood look


----------



## ElephantRider (Aug 6, 2009)

Ap0c0leS said:


> Not to mention i kept the humidity dome on seedlings.. JEEZE i better read that freeking book again im like retarded.. its ok second wave is on the way


GO D-JAX!!! Add Maclin and Avant looks AMAZING in training camp..


----------



## igrowwithleds (Oct 22, 2009)

Excellent!! I stopped posting too because of idiots.


----------



## dpjones (Oct 23, 2009)

LEDs still suck for time spent vs yield


----------



## Kongbuds (Dec 31, 2009)

dpjones said:


> LEDs still suck for time spent vs yield


 AGREED! Some people are just winey babies.


----------



## thatonetime (Jan 25, 2010)

how did your grow go?


----------



## StlSoldier531 (Mar 5, 2010)

doktorgreenthumb420 said:


> i think you are on the right track with hps for bloom ..thats what i always used ...but for sure those led have alot of potential for vegg
> 
> o and bro we got the same system right ....rainforests 66 unit .....i never had a good bloom with those ...but it is the best veg machine i have ever used ....
> 
> ...


Wassup Greenthumb420. Nice looking plants you have.

How often do you change the reservoir in the waterfarms?


----------



## LegalizeItNow!!!! (Sep 10, 2010)

I found an online shop aeroponicwaterworks.com. I was looking for the rainforest by G.H. and I found it there. I got it for 235 and 12 for shipping and it was here in 2 days. this thing is awesome. than you all for recommending it. I got a Free sample of Bloombastic with it anyone used this? Check out aeroponicwaterworks


----------

