Grow Room Revamp ideas

Gardenator

Well-Known Member
Currently using an 8ft long x5ft wide x8ft tall room (in the basement lol old laundry room) growing in soil (thats not changing please keep this in mind for any brainstorming we do thank you) and using 2 diy quantum boards 96 diodes per strip 3 strips each run by 240w mw drivers total of 480w of quantum leds, also 1 600w hps and 1 600w mh bare bulb hanging with the leds, 6 inch canfan and carbon filter bringing air in at 440cfm and ac exhausting air at 800cfm (negative pressure :) ) not limited to what i can do inside the space i own my home but cannot change the size of the space... i currently flower 1 or 2 plants at a time after a nice long veg (2-4 months depending on whether i flower 1 or 2) ill take some pics of the room but im trying to fit a 4x3 tent to veg in and maximize my flower space and really fill it up so i can pull some poundage and im looking for what some knowledgeable people think about plant counts and maximising my efficacy in my space and what is honestly fesiable... pics will be available later when the lights come on lol... please dont pollute this by arguing please and thanks
 

Barristan Whitebeard

Well-Known Member
Currently using an 8ft long x5ft wide x8ft tall room (in the basement lol old laundry room) growing in soil (thats not changing please keep this in mind for any brainstorming we do thank you) and using 2 diy quantum boards 96 diodes per strip 3 strips each run by 240w mw drivers total of 480w of quantum leds, also 1 600w hps and 1 600w mh bare bulb hanging with the leds, 6 inch canfan and carbon filter bringing air in at 440cfm and ac exhausting air at 800cfm (negative pressure :) ) not limited to what i can do inside the space i own my home but cannot change the size of the space... i currently flower 1 or 2 plants at a time after a nice long veg (2-4 months depending on whether i flower 1 or 2) ill take some pics of the room but im trying to fit a 4x3 tent to veg in and maximize my flower space and really fill it up so i can pull some poundage and im looking for what some knowledgeable people think about plant counts and maximising my efficacy in my space and what is honestly fesiable... pics will be available later when the lights come on lol... please dont pollute this by arguing please and thanks
Are those DIY quantum boards the ones that say LM561C Sun Board and are available on EBay or Alibaba?

Each 240 watt driver is powering three strips for a total of 288 diodes per light?
If so, how long have you been running them(best guess if you don't have an exact period of time), and have you been overdriving the boards the whole time?
 

Gardenator

Well-Known Member
The stips are 301b's the v2's and they are each rated at 85w so technically im underpowering these this whole time by around 15w, each 3 strip pan is on a mw240H-24v driver (individual dimmer controls each driver seperately and directly wired in before the light not onto the drivers dimmer connections... i use my own PWM dimmer for these then relying on the internal one mw puts in there and both are pwm dimmers, these are each powered by 240v autopilot light controller, never used a heat sink ever and they never get hot, no not even a little passive cooling works really well and those alluminum pans transduce 90% of the heat up and out away from the lights.
 

Gardenator

Well-Known Member
Oh and i have been running them for over a year now since i built these bad chickens and yes i did get them on ebay, the reason you cant find these anymore or that guy on ebay is cause i bought every 301b v2 strip i could find on ebay so i could replace all my strips over time as i knew this wouldnt last lol now though there are plenty of copy cat boards and strips out there it doesnt matter, i knew i wouldnt be able to source them on ebay much longer so i used some rainy day money and ordered a ton of those strips. When i spoke with the guy making the strips about a future order he discussed his source with me as he wouldnt be continuing to sell them, so when i need strips again in 2099 lol ill have no choice but to upgrade to the hlg's or maybe another one of their close in comparison competitors copy catting their lights lol... the lm516c strips that are on there are rated at less max wattage (im not sure on the actual wattage of those boards but im almost certain its less)... the reason i chose the 240h-24b's is because the efficiency of the boards running between 94-97% power to the board is their best L/W (lumens per watt) and so 240w is 15w less then the 255w these can handle and puts us in at a perfect 94% wattage (approximately 239.7w total when the boards are fully powered)
 

Gardenator

Well-Known Member
Not really sure what you are asking us.
Neither am i lol... im really just looking for advice as far as to any improvements i could make in my space and any ideas how to make my space more efficient would be what i am after i guess lol constructive criticism
 

BobBitchen

Well-Known Member
Neither am i lol... im really just looking for advice as far as to any improvements i could make in my space and any ideas how to make my space more efficient would be what i am after i guess lol constructive criticism
I'd start with a broom & dust pan, then ramp up to a 10% bleach solution, bucket rag/brush & spray bottle.
Then maybe address your electrical safety issues, water/extension cords/duct tape/tie wraps/bulbs too close to visqueen......
Why vertically hung bulbs on a horizontal SCROG ?
 

Gardenator

Well-Known Member
I'd start with a broom & dust pan, then ramp up to a 10% bleach solution, bucket rag/brush & spray bottle.
Then maybe address your electrical safety issues, water/extension cords/duct tape/tie wraps/bulbs too close to visqueen......
Why vertically hung bulbs on a horizontal SCROG ?
I scrub the tarp and everything every run lol its just old has had lots of water spilled on it and those are trimmings right off that plant i let them dry out and i compost the pile when the plant finishes flower but i could pick em up lol they dry well on the floor though, bare bulbs work much more efficiently the hoods are just heat boxes bare bulbs are easier to cool rather then the hoods in my space, the ac runs much better cooling the room when the bulbs hang instead of the hoods, yeah electical is a mess but its not anywhere near the water unless i spray my ceiling (which i dont lol) but it needs to be organized and relocated to one designated area like maybe a 3 or 4 inch pvc conduit hung from the ceiling? That was my idea anyways try to localize all the bs cords up there to one area and ceiling is the best bet because i allow the water to DTW into a floor drain not visible in any of the pics and i dont spray my plants with anything in flower not even water, its watered with a soaker hose burried about 3 inches from the top of the pot on a hose timer, tie wraps on the mogule fixtures cords because they dont hang straight unless you do it from the cord in the center of the fixture (tiewraps offered an alternate solution to buying different fixtures or alterring the ones i had) oh and some of those extention cords up there are not actually live or hooked to anything, all the lights plug driectly into my light controller that is hardwired to my panel, if my basement floods to my first floor well then i feel like i have bigger problems lol because all of the electrical is properly installed and wired (any tape you see on wires is over a wire nut as further protection from the connection seperating and is also only over 24v dc power from the drivers, absolutely no 120v or 240v connection besides my light controller is hardwired and is plugged directly to my light controller or a hanging surge protector which only runs my canfan) and no where near the water unless my pipes burst (unlikely) or that staineless steel manifold with hose attatchment burst (unlikely) but i could use wego connectors and not wire nuts but its dc voltage protected by a water proof driver... i do want to try and fit a veg space and reduce my flower space a little in order to facilitate that but im having trouble with my orientation and i drew up a plan i thought might work i just hate to take the space wanting to get this veg tent in there though 15846305510421556020913084432847.jpg
 

Gardenator

Well-Known Member
Put the veg tent into the room, leaves me roughly a 5x5 space to flower in... Grabbed the dust pan ;) checked electrical (all good, the pics are of the new veg tent i put in the room last night, and of the electrical connections i think you may have been worried about i circled the connections in red (wire nutted connections on the dc power side of the drivers, only connections anywhere near the grow besides the boards themselves) the orange line is just the dc wiring back to the dimmers installed on every driver between driver and leds, the light controller is mounted to the wall to the left side of the tent and hardwired to a 240 line that runs directly up and out of this room to my panel. I just want you to know im not trying to have an electrical fire, there is no where water and electricity can be together anywhere in this room, all cords are hung from the track the lights are hung from above the plants, all the plastic you see is stapled with tape over every staple and seem to keep this room sealed from the house, any tape you are refferring to in the pics on an electrical wire is to keep the wires together they are wire nutted to make the connection not twisted and taped and the plug and play connectors i used for the boards is taped down on the board to stay in one easy plugable location also helps when moving lights around it keeps everything the way it should be together... i wasnt tryna be defensive i did take offense to what you said until i stepped back and realized i was asking for help but lots of time and change has been made to this room, it was stripped to bare concrete and stud walls and plastic was put up against all the wood, the walls the ceiling, totally air sealed the room even as far to sprayfoam every single seem in the wall and ceiling and floor before putting up the plastic and spray foamed from both sides of the walls and ceiling where i could access the other side of said locations, i work 5 days a week sometimes 6 or 7 and have very little time to do much past taking care of the plant, the enviroment in there is good and the air is clean and brought in from outside the house, that tarp is or wss rather messy (found the broom but no bleach while they ladies are in the sun lol) but it is old and i dtw the water right onto the tarp because it drains to a floor drain (beats having those stains on my concrete floor and keeps all the water where i want it instead of the rest of my basement) i really just wanted some ideas to look at about revamping the layout, i really didnt mean to be defensive and i do appreciate the advice honestly just caught me off gaurd with the electrical stuff and i got pretty stuck on making it clear that it was done correctly just not hung as neatly as some would be (also working on that so it doesnt look like an electrical fire happening) have to wait for this ladie to be done flowering but i am building an electrical channel in the ceiling and localizing all the wires to one channel (pvc conduit) and the ballast and drivers will all be localized to a (for lack of better terminology) "ballast board" ill be mounting on the wall to the left of the grow tent20200320_051950.jpg20200320_050143.jpg20200320_050345.jpg20200320_050148.jpg20200320_050154.jpg20200320_050203.jpg20200320_050225.jpg20200320_050301.jpg
 

Gardenator

Well-Known Member
you keep rollin' then....

good luck
Better? Tarp went away, took down loose cords not plugged in, reorganized the cords to the strapping the lights are hung on, rechecked all my connections, redid the layout with the new veg tent got a washing machine floor tray for under the ac, plant still dtw into the floor drain you cant see in the pics... thanks for making me clean up my act lol 20200322_050030.jpg20200322_050051.jpg20200322_050059.jpg20200322_050036.jpg20200322_050152.jpg
 

Gardenator

Well-Known Member
Oh yeah and i know its hard to see but that sodium is 2ft away from the panda film, sorry not uk here dont use visqueen ;)
 

Yesyes3000

Well-Known Member
I would clean up that pile of stuff on the floor. It’s a invite for pests !! Also I would suggest maybe doing two rows so you have a small bare strip in the middle (a walkway ) to tend to you plants ! Just an ide
 

Gardenator

Well-Known Member
I would clean up that pile of stuff on the floor. It’s a invite for pests !! Also I would suggest maybe doing two rows so you have a small bare strip in the middle (a walkway ) to tend to you plants ! Just an ide
That white mark on the floor is a stain in the concrete i really dont know anything safe to use to try and remove it from the floor that wont hurt my plants, i could take them out for a whole day when this lady finishes but im going to have to use something caustic or some form of solvent to attack that crete with. I could do 2 rows in there. i think i would trun the orientation of the flower layout 180° and turn the lights as well it would make my "walkway" easier to access and my storage room in the back as well and then i could do 2 seperate scrogs one over each row. I dont know how i might then orient the lights over the 2 sides, i would have one pan on each side but then i have a mh and a hps 600w to hang and the idea is to keep that mixture together equally over the ladies or i can just put up 2 wing reflectors and get another sodium bulb to switch out the mh so both sides will be the same.
 
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