5KW indoor medi grow

Hey guys so heres the setup.. i have 12 plants in #10 and #15 pots. plants that i "felt" they wanted the larger pots got them. im using piddie pools as water sausers since they dont sell a size locally that fits my needs o.0 or atleast not for a reasonable price. for 20$ these work amazing and no spills.

i have a 11 x 9 ft room i am using 6 x 10 ft of with a 8 plant SCRoG and a 5x5 section of 4 plants in the room. the remaining 1/4th is the doorway and a sheet of panda cuts the diagonal to help make a walk in after the door.

the lighting is 3 hoods with 1KW hps each over the SCroG directing light down, and a free hanging MH bulb, and a free hanging HPS bulb. the 2 free hanging bulbs spread light at canapy level in a 360. the 5x5 also has its own hood and a 1KW hps pointed at it.

so the total room can really pump the watts, room for 7200KW but my 12,000 btu A/C can only maintain 4600. the remaining lights are on timers to switch on for 30 min at a time for a boost of lumens.

the veg time was about 2 months. soil is FFOF, nutes are a bit of a mix though and im using a mix of fox farm, roots orgainics, and big bug, bud candy, overdrive, and molasses. the nutes are a bit of a weak point since its not a lineup i can repeat, just what i have on hand.

i just flipped them to flower these are week 1 pics, im mid week 2 now. any request for new pics/bud shots will be filled when lights come on =)

feedback encuraged

Nice plants, they're gonna be quite large lol.

a random screen name said:

Nice plants, they're gonna be quite large lol.

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thanks random, im hoping the screen keeps that sideo out of the lights but the 5x5 area that is free to grow will require a lot of lst style bending. the plants were mostly 4-5 ft tall exept the one you see i used a crate to even the canopy.

looks great. get yourself a nice AC so you can run those lights all the time, i dont think those bulbs coming on every so often is going to be efficient as far yield/electricity. happy growing

patrickkawi37 said:

looks great. get yourself a nice AC so you can run those lights all the time, i dont think those bulbs coming on every so often is going to be efficient as far yield/electricity. happy growing

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i just bought a 250$ 12,000 btu window unit. it was the most powerful costco sold. that was to replace the best one i could find at walmart. im considering cutting a hole in the door and using a portable a/c to allow even more cold air; however, i dont feel like doing room construction during flower. next cycle i can just put in one less plant and ill have room to put in 2 window units and save myself troubles.

at this point im not worried about g/watt ratios, those "on/off" lights are positioned for quality reasons (bud density and trich production) and the "on" lights are focused on making a good footprint. maybe the plants will gain from the bursts more then not having them at all is all

some shots of the room and how i have it set up. the buds are nearly 3 weeks old with 5-7 left depending on the plant. the hood with 2 bulbs is nice for added penetration and i think the plants like it when i have both on.

the tube is a 9mil a friend made for me recently

wwww.minisplitwarehouse.com

patrickkawi37 said:

wwww.minisplitwarehouse.com

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cheapest upgrade is 950$ like i said, what i have burning is plenty. i have 47 watts/sq ft on all the time. the other is simply EXTRA on on top of that taking it up to 84 watts/ sqft, and its doing great temp wise how i have it. a investment like that is not even logical if it isent needed.

I ended up not gettin the mini split only because I found a window unit for cheap cheap, and I'll be caulking up the inside to make it as airtight as possible. I also saw that the way it work is just like the mini split. Just compact.

the wall units just dont run efficiently for electric is what i meant, and having lights come on and off isnt using it efficiently because i think they use most electricity when firing up, not positive on that though. i saved over a hundred a month with my electric bill because the mini split works as a dehumidifier as well so i was able to cut out one of my dehumidifiers. and my co2 bottles last longer. the savings stack up quick, and you would get more weight from running the 5 lights all the time. just throwin you some advise, no need to bite my head off, very "logical" investment. i gave my 14.5k btu wall unit away for free as soon as my mini split was hooked up, there is no comparison.

saw that your not venting your lights, did you take the glass out? how does the reflection on a hood without glass compare to one of the adjusta wings? i have raptors and i was always curious if it would be worth it to take the glass out and just crank the ac

patrickkawi37 said:

saw that your not venting your lights, did you take the glass out? how does the reflection on a hood without glass compare to one of the adjusta wings? i have raptors and i was always curious if it would be worth it to take the glass out and just crank the ac

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yep i decided it would be best for me to not vent my hoods this time around, i took out the glass to test something i read about that clean glass blocks 10% useable light, and dirty glass is worse. numbers like that turned into me wanting to test it. i dont know exactly how it would compair to an adjust-a-wing. i was going to get parabolics but i had these hoods so why not.

i have eco-air wall mount fans blowing on the crop and around the bulbs making a even airflow and no hotspots so i cant complain. the 2 free hanging bulbs seem to provide tons of light to the whole room as well.



im not trying to bite your head off, its just that our goals are different. if it helps you, assume all my lights are on all the time, that i run 47 watts per sq ft and then you would be saying its all looking fine =) also, i have 5 lights on already, its the last 3 lights (1000 and two 600 watt) that come on for the bonus thats why its a 5k grow.

its just im doing more then that because i want to. it surely cant be said that it will be hurting my plants to have the lighting this way. its not going to be my gameplan for growing life long, just this run while im already flowering.

thats good to know about the glass and dirt shading that much light. my hoods were dirty as fuck after my last run, but i have national forest behind my house and the air cooling the hoods is coming from outside in the dirt. maybe ill try a filter of some sort.

what are you hoping to yield out of there this run?

I'm shooting for 3 lbs, that should make it well worth it to me. But in the back of my mind, that little voice is saying I'm really "hoping" its closer to 5. I'm used to doing much smaller cycles, so even 3 would be a big personal best. really more then weight I want to do my best to not get seeds, I'm testing new strains and I fear the chance of a herm hiding in back somewhere

if I were you want to filer your air the dust shroom duct covers work well for cheap or a hepa if ya have like 150. I bought a hepa 8 inch but have yet to use it in the grow room for one reason or another, its a perfect tool imo to have around the house. Iv used it to make temp flow hoods and clean zones for mushroom inocculations and plan to use it like that again when I make home made mead (honey alcohol)

its been a few days since i last updated so that the new pics could show some growth. this is 3 and a half weeks into flower. watering frequency is picking up but so far its not hard to maintain.

also due to things patrickkawi37 said i played around with my lighting and the full run of lights is on a lot more. i found i can keep them on for 50 min and allow a/c to catch up for 20 min as opposed to the nearly half and half i had before.

so thanks for the imput patrick even if i wasent receptive to all of it =)

Hey your room looks good. About your lights, though.
It takes a while for a ballast/bulb to fire up to full temp. And ballasts draw more power than they're running output while firing up.

So only turning them on for 30minutes at a time is really counter productive, because for the beginning of that short period you're drawing more than the rated power and getting less than the rated lumen output. You should be running them for longer than that if you're going to be cycling your lights like that.

Just something you might want to consider.

hey man, congrats on the setup. couple pointers though.

i'd change out the hanging HPS for an MH. you are looking for a 3-1 (HPS to MH) ratio for a more balanced light spectrum in flower. 2-1 is fine as well. i run hanging MH bulbs as well but i run them a lot lower in the canopy. actually just below the tops of the plants. how you have them hanging right now isn't as efficient as getting them lower so that you can promote growth on the bottom nodes. i use 400w MH lights so that i can get the plants closer together and not lose that much space. i imagine you have to keep those hanging 1000's pretty far from the plants.

using air cooled hoods that aren't air cooled is not the best idea...even if you take out the glass. they become heat traps and that heat sits on your canopy and around the bulb reducing the bulb's life. i'd switch over to adjust-a-wings if you don't want to vent your hoods. with that much lighting that isn't vented you should have just gotten a minisplit. would be a lot more efficient. a good window unit should do the job. not 12,000btu though. they sell 24,000 and 36,000btu units online. would help not having 3 different a/c units hooked up in there i'm sure.

running your lights on/off like that really kills the bulb and ballast. plus it probably costs more in electricity than just running them nonstop. i'd find a way to vent your hoods or get the adjust-a-wing ones and see how that helps. then; if it still doesn't work i'd look into a better a/c setup. you want max yield from your plants so why continually cut lighting from them during their most important time. this is why i ALWAYS tell people that light movers are pointless in flower.

good luck bro.

if you got parabolic hoods i would look into vertical bulbs. i understand you think your maximizing your room and that every grower thinks they know everything so im not going to give any more input. but everytime someone says something you rebuttal like were bashing you. your the one posting and saying feedback encouraged, all our feedback has been to help you have a more efficient room, but it seems like you like it just the way it is. so why post? i got 4 times the amount of bud your hoping for with less watts. scooby schools a gram per watt everytime, i wouldnt take our advise either. have a nice day

patrickkawi37 said:

if you got parabolic hoods i would look into vertical bulbs. i understand you think your maximizing your room and that every grower thinks they know everything so im not going to give any more input. but everytime someone says something you rebuttal like were bashing you. your the one posting and saying feedback encouraged, all our feedback has been to help you have a more efficient room, but it seems like you like it just the way it is. so why post? i got 4 times the amount of bud your hoping for with less watts. scooby schools a gram per watt everytime, i wouldnt take our advise either. have a nice day

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i'm with patrick on this one. sounds like you just want to argue with everyone. no offense bro but i try to be as helpful as i can and not shit on people's rooms in a thread. to be honest your setup is a complete cluster fuck in my opinion.

you stated in the first post that you have 4 horizontal HPS lamps, 1 hanging HPS lamp, and 1 hanging MH lamp. i'm just trying to tell you that running a more mixed spectrum will help. running vertical bulbs above the canopy like that is pointless when you have that much horizontal lighting unless you are using MH light for a mixed spectrum. the fact that you are running lights on and off like that through the flower cycle just goes to show that you are headed down the wrong path and you don't even know it. some of the guys on this thread are trying to be helpful but you just want to act like you have everything figured out. it's an MJ forum bro. we don't care if you are a newb. you don't even have to be a grower to hang out here. just don't be know-it-all douche.

your room is fucked from an efficiency standpoint. maybe it works...and if it does then that's great. but i bet you are using twice as much power as you need to be using. and there is no way in hell you can place your hands on those hoods if you weren't shutting them off every 40 minutes. not with some oscillating fans pushing air around the room. in all the pics your fans are pointed down at the plants anyway. how are you moving hot air off the bulbs like that? good luck dude. you're gonna need it.