Small SOG NL#5 600w HPS Hydro/250w MH Soil/110w CFL Aero

Hi All,

Long time lurker, first time poster. I thought I'd post this project I'm working on. Hopefully it can help others, and hopefully the people reading this can help me I've documented most everything so far, used cad-type software to build everything, and will try to elaborate on all the details. I am currently 7 days into flowering on my first cycle (I have 3 new plants every two weeks), so hopefully this will be fun for everyone If this works it should be very easy to emulate as I try to KISS (keep it simple stupid), and use standard stuff for lighting/exhaust like Homeboxes, Cool tubes, and have exhaust specs. I also plan to make threads to the DIY stuff, i.e. my aerocloner and hydro setup.

This project was largely inspired by Al B. Fuct's Two Pounds in Two Weeks Thread, my Aerocloner was inspired by StinkBud's Design, and my hydro setup was inspired by the two-liter bottle setups. I saw someone who made a two station setup with 2x 3.5 Gallon buckets. I just made three stations with 2 Gallon Buckets. I'll try and find the original link.

I am growing Sensi Seeds White Label NL#5 (I can post a pic of the packaging later) from Seedbay that I grew originally from seeds. After finding two potentially good mothers for this, I successful cloned one of each and grew them to mums (pics below).

My Setup is three Homeboxes. The first one is an XS (~23.5"x23.5") with a 110w CFL for cloning, and a 4" Carbon Filter connected to an external 4" 200 cfm Exhaust Fan (I can post pics of lighting later). Temp is 74F, no dome. The cloner is an 8 gallon fermentation bucket (I'll post plans later), with a 1/2" pvc manifold using a 320 GPH pump and four EZ-Cloner 360 degree misters (they are $1 a piece, I'll try and make a thread with plans and link it here). It has a rubber ring inside so it seals, no water leaks without the need for tape or weather stripping. Check StinkBud's Design.

I cut clones with a fresh razor every two weeks (next Sunday I make cuttings so I can take pics and document). I put in 4 gallons of 6.4 or so ph'd water. 1 tsp of Clonex, dip the clones in some rotting gel for good measure and put them in a neoprene disk. Plug in the air pump and stone and leave them running the entire time. I run an air stone line in through the fermentation grommet on the bucket.

I know people who have gotten 19 sites on their cloner with an 8 gallon bucket, mine has 11 lazily placed clone sites using a 1 3/4" bit for EzCloner Neoprene disks (I get 45 for like $15 or so from the hydro store). Here is a pick of my clones after 7 days (taken tonight 5/3/09). I only need three good ones for flowering, can use the others for potential mums. I love this method of cloning and it has been 100% successful the three attempt I've made so far. As you can see, there is zero loss of tugor pressure without the need for a humidty dome:




For mums, I use a Normal Homebox (~30"x30") with a 250w MH Cool tube with an external ballast (in another room, helps cut down on the heat) running 18/6. I run Carbon Filter -> Cool Tube -> External Fantech FR150 243 cfm 6" Exhaust (see pic). Temps stay at 74F like the cloning chamber. I use FoxFarm Soil (~75/25 - 2 bags of Ocean Forrest/1 bag of Light Warrior), with FoxFarm Liquid Ferts (Big Bloom/Grow Big) that I water with every other watering. I might try a DWC mother in the future. I take cuttings every two weeks. I have two mums atm and am growing two more so I can have four total, one every two weeks. I top em every now and then, I only need three clones every 8 weeks when all four are fully grown... Here is a picture of my mums (I have 3 smaller ones that were clones last week):



and a pic of my Mother Light and Carbon Filter (the fan hangs outside the box):



For my flowering chamber I use a Homebox Large (~39.5"x39.5") with a 6" Carbon Filter to a 600w hps Cool Tube running 12/12 (8pm-8am) with an external magnetic ballast, to a 6" 409 cfm Exhaust (see pic). I used to use a 400w and it would stay at 74F like the other boxes, but with a 600w it gets up to 78F tops and hangs around 76-77. I think it is worth if since with 600w I'm getting about 10k Lumens per sq. foot, whereas a 400w is half that.

For medium I use four, three-pot, DIY PVC ebb and flo stations (I'll post my layout) suspended on a pvc/2x6 rack and run by 396 gph eco pumps. Res are 18 gallon Rubbermaid Roughneck totes. I have a 100 gallon air pump outside on top of the homebox (you can see the air lines in the pics) and run air stones to each res.

I use Hydroton medium and General Hyodroponic nutes. I currently run the pump for 3 minutes 5x a day, starting an an hour before lights on, 7:00pm, 11:00pm, 3:00am, 7:00am, 1:00pm. Each timer control two pumps, so I plan on staggering the second timer by about 20-30 minutes to lower the amount of stress on the rack (only two sets of pots will be full at a time).

For this first run I mixed 2 parts each at 1.6 EC. Water is ~68F (pic). I mixed 15 gallons of water and think it was way too much, going to try either 10 or 12 gallons next time. I'll make threads with all the plans and layouts later. Clones go from two weeks in the cloner straight to the flowering chamber. Here is a pic of my first 3 clones to go into the flowering chamber at 1 week (pics taken 5/3/09, 7 days flowering):



Here is the lighting setup (exhaust is internal on this one):



Here is the medium I use:



Here are some pics of the hydro setup I built. It has twelve pots total, three every two weeks:



The overflow valve that controls flood water height:



Water Temp (~20C = ~68F):



I'll post more pics of tools I use and what not as we go!

Went and took some more pics to post, figured I'd start with the cloner. Here is the overview of the cloner:



The exhaust fan is outside for this one and the mother box. I used bungee chords to hang the fans. I found it a good way to muffle vibrations. I have three exhaust fans running (one in the flowering chamber) and none vibrate.



Here is how my lighting is set up for my cloner. I remove a couple pieces of wood after seven days and remove it all by the end (it probably isn't necessary):



Here is the ziptie with the light:



Here is a close up of the air stone grommet/line and the pump cable. I used an 8 gallon bucket but a 5 gallon from Home Depot would work too. The key is to have the rubber ring inside the lid, making the seal waterproof. My cloner doesn't leak any water at all.

I use EZ-Cloner Neoprene Disks for the clones and the pump line. They are available at any store that sells the hundrends of dollars EZ-Cloner for ~$15 for 45 or so, lol. I drilled a 1 3/4" hole for the disk, it is a nice, snug fit.



Here is what it looks like under the hood of the cloner. I don't use any net pots or anything, just the Neoprene disk. I used Stinkbud's basic design for my sprinklers, making a 1/2" PVC manifold with caps on the feet. I use tubing to hook the manifold to the pump, but if you use an eco 396 you can scew a 1/2" pvc fitting in if you'd like. I use another EZ-Cloner piece, the 360 degree sprayers. They are $1 a piece. I drilled an 11/64 hole and screwed them in:



Here are what the clones look like after seven days (I didn't use all the clone stations). At this point I put in 1 tsp of each of the three General Hydro nutes (grow/flower/micro, 1/4 tsp per gallon), and some ph up to get it to about 6.3-6.4. I am hoping this is good, seemed to work well the last time. I didn't add nutes the first time and didn't ph balance the water this last time, so we'll see...



Another seven days in the cloner and the three best go into the hydroton in the flowering room. They have nice long roots by then, I'll post pics

Thought I'd end the day with some last pics of the what matters, the plants!

Two of the new mothers. One is from one mom, one is from the other, so I guess you could say I have two phenotypes (I call them A and B).



The Clones at 7 Days:



Here is a closeup of the clones (mostly from B):



Here are the three plants I have flowering, numbered 1-2-3, I'll number through 12 to track each station







For this run Plants 1 and 2 and from one mom (A) and 3 from another (B). Next 3 plants will all plants will from plant 3 mom (B), and all the plants after that will all come from the same mom each time to better track ppm tolerance. This is my the first time growing in hydro (I used soil for all grow previous to this) so I wanted to try both moms and used a ppm I thought wouldn't be too rough for both.

Here are the ph meter and truncheon I use:

Ph Meter (~$110)



ppm meter (~$140)

I made a thread in the hydro section outlining my setup:

Link

here is a pic of the three flowering plants (8 days):

Here are my flowering plants at 11 days:



Here are my clones. I accidentally left the pump off for about five hours after I took the pics at seven days, oops. Ya, I'm retarded. Two were looking pretty bad after two days so I just axed them. Thankfully the rest recovered from it, and thankfully I only need three... I can see how it could have really fucked stuff up. A lesson learned in the smaller margin of error that comes with aero over rockwool cubes...



Here are the roots of two of them. The one of the right is more typical.



In three more days they go into the second station.

thought I'd post a quick update of the plants.

Batch 1 at 14 days and 17 days (today):




Here are some closeups:





I lollipopped the them tonight, thin them out a little so the new ones can get more light. I might even trim more off when it comes time on the next station:

Here are the new clones on their first day in the flowering box:





And 3 days (today):



Here is a comparison of the new clones on the first day with the clones that have been in there for two weeks:



Thanks for reading!

Thought I'd post some updated pics. Putting the third batch in this evening. Here are the clones that are going in. I put in 4 gallons of water, 1 tsp of Clonex, set it and didn't do anything for two weeks but let the pump run:



Day 14:


Comparison:



A couple pics of the flowering plants (Batch 1) at 28 days, they get their rez changed tonight and I'm going to add Liquid Koolbloom to their tank:

Here are some of the above clones roots (day 14). They were nice and white from not adding anything other than the initial tsp of clonex.





Here is another pic inside the cloner. This is after two weeks of plants growing in it, still looks pretty good imo.



Three of the clones are in the third station. I'll post pics later. I had an incident where I put ~50ml in the res instead of 12ml... there was one flood before I caught it and changed out the rez.

I ran some plain water through the pots, and I had to adjust the buckets after the flood because it wasn't flooding high enough.

I came down an hour later and the three new plants were dropping, most likely because the flood wasn't high enough to soak the roots. that is when I ran plain water through the buckets, and remixed the tank. They perked up, so we'll see how they are tomorrow. Hopefully everything will be alright.

New batch of clones in the cloner too:

Thought I'd post some pics at day 41, tomorrow night will be six weeks. Here are a couple comparisons between the current six week and four week plants:

Here is a pic of a 27 day old plant from the second batch:

Here are some pics of the three plants in the first batch at 41 days. Plants 1 and two are from the same mom, plant three is from a different mom and has a leafier phenotype and less staggered nodes.

Here is plant 1:

Plant 2:











And plant 3 with more leaf material and different nodes:

Took some pics of the trichomes using my magnifier and the micro settings on a cam. I usually fuck them up pretty bad with the bottom of the magnifier.

Took a bunch of pics.

11 more pics...

Me likey trichey.. Day 48

Calyx shots









Little Sister, two weeks behind at 5 weeks.

And some trichs: