Rocky Mountain Ring of Fire

CaptainCAVEMAN

CaptainCAVEMAN

Well-Known Member
ttystikk said:
You're asking the same questions I have, lol

Good looking plants, nice to see what you've been up to, @CaptainCAVEMAN

Having done the vertical thing myself for a minute or two now, maybe I can help you. And then you can help me figure out ROLS!
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Sure I'll help if I can! Really I have just started some worm pots and bins and followed the ROLS thread. Let me know if you have any questions.:bigjoint::peace:
 
calliandra

calliandra

Well-Known Member
CaptainCAVEMAN said:
The light rail is a 5.0 commercial mover so it has an 8' long cross bar. The bar is attatched perpindicular to the rail in the middle of the bar and moves the whole 8' bar back and forth along the rail. The lights hang from the bar about 6' apart right now. I have the bar set to move only about 2'. Pics in first post might help. I'll take some better ones when the room is on.

The plants sit in a ring around the bulbs. Actually 2 rings, 1 around each bulb. 2 plants get the prime middle spot and have a 1000 watt bulb on either side of them moving back and forth. I guess its more of an oval of plants than a ring, but oval of fire didn't sound as cool!

Hope this helps. I'll post better pis later.
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Ah absolutely, thank you! Really excited to see it too!
Have you been using this setup for longer?
 
calliandra

calliandra

Well-Known Member
CaptainCAVEMAN said:
I have been running this setup for 7 months now. This is my favorite way to grow, I never see going back to my horizontal hoods.
Here's a few more pics of the light rail and cross bar. It's hard to get far enough back to take good pictures.
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Ahhh I get it now, thank you very much, must've been hard enough to get these!
So actually we're talking TWO rings of fire here :P
The middle row then only needs quarter turns instead of 180°, since it's getting light from both sides?
And how often does the rail go back and forth?
Sorry for all the questions, new world for me! :bigjoint:
 
CaptainCAVEMAN

CaptainCAVEMAN

Well-Known Member
calliandra said:
Ahhh I get it now, thank you very much, must've been hard enough to get these!
So actually we're talking TWO rings of fire here :P
The middle row then only needs quarter turns instead of 180°, since it's getting light from both sides?
And how often does the rail go back and forth?
Sorry for all the questions, new world for me! :bigjoint:
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No worries, I want to share!
You catch on quick, the middle plants get 1/3 turn. The light pauses for about 30 seconds on each end and is otherwise always slowly moving. It only moves about 2 feet so even the plants on the ends are never more than about 3' from the bulb, usually closer.
Yes 2 rings, though I'm transitioning from more smaller plants to fewer larger plants since that is law here now. So the second ring is becoming tomato, bell pepper and cantolope ring!
 
calliandra

calliandra

Well-Known Member
CaptainCAVEMAN said:
No worries, I want to share!
You catch on quick, the middle plants get 1/3 turn. The light pauses for about 30 seconds on each end and is otherwise always slowly moving. It only moves about 2 feet so even the plants on the ends are never more than about 3' from the bulb, usually closer.
Yes 2 rings, though I'm transitioning from more smaller plants to fewer larger plants since that is law here now. So the second ring is becoming tomato, bell pepper and cantolope ring!
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Ah good thing I'm jumping in just now then, I looove it when gardens diversify!! :D Yum!

And yes, I do think I get the light system and the utility of having the bulbs moving like that now! Have you speculated how much that saves you in electricity? Since the plants are better lighted, the effect is probably more than just having 1000W hanging in place, even split into smaller bulbs spread out?
 
CaptainCAVEMAN

CaptainCAVEMAN

Well-Known Member
calliandra said:
Ah good thing I'm jumping in just now then, I looove it when gardens diversify!! :D Yum!

And yes, I do think I get the light system and the utility of having the bulbs moving like that now! Have you speculated how much that saves you in electricity? Since the plants are better lighted, the effect is probably more than just having 1000W hanging in place, even split into smaller bulbs spread out?
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I used to run 3000 watts in 3 hoods in a row on that mover in another room, I still cant believe it never fell lol.

In that setup I put 3x3 screens on top of the vegging plants and tried to veg them as big as I could, then slide them over to flower. So 6 plants made the max canopy 54 squaere feet with a light depth penetration of about 2 to 3 feet deep. It worked pretty well, a good plant was 9 ounces a not so good was 3 or 4. I couldn't get them any bigger because even if I could spread the light more, I couldn't get any screen bigger than 3' wide through the doors.

Wow typed all that, re-read the question, answer had nothing to do with question, lol. I'm a slow articulator and typer and editor, but I do try to get it right.:eyesmoke:

Yes electric bill has gone down, 33% less light yet larger optimal canopy area. Since the lights move that reduces shading as well as moving the hot spot which allows canopy to be closer to the bulbs which allows light energy to be effective all the way throuhg the plant and not just on the side currently facing the bulb. Defenitely better than a stationary 1000!:hump:
 
CaptainCAVEMAN

CaptainCAVEMAN

Well-Known Member
Here's another Critical Jack Herrer in 3g of ROLS. This is my favorite strain, the high is perfectly balanced between head and body, and it keeps hitting hard no matter how much I puff. Also grows great in veg and flower.

I'm kind of proud of this one. That's a lot of plant for 3g! I'm stil dialing in this room's parameters that's why there's some leaf burn and over water. Glad I'm not trying to harvest perfect green leaves!:oops:

I love these tall growing stretchy strains. My goal with each plant now is to try to grow a 4' tall column of plant as thick as I can get it. Since they stretch, the spacing which seems to far before flowering ends up being perfect for big buds yet they still have great airflow and light penetration. Seems to work great!

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:peace:
 

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calliandra

calliandra

Well-Known Member
CaptainCAVEMAN said:
I used to run 3000 watts in 3 hoods in a row on that mover in another room, I still cant believe it never fell lol.

In that setup I put 3x3 screens on top of the vegging plants and tried to veg them as big as I could, then slide them over to flower. So 6 plants made the max canopy 54 squaere feet with a light depth penetration of about 2 to 3 feet deep. It worked pretty well, a good plant was 9 ounces a not so good was 3 or 4. I couldn't get them any bigger because even if I could spread the light more, I couldn't get any screen bigger than 3' wide through the doors.

Wow typed all that, re-read the question, answer had nothing to do with question, lol. I'm a slow articulator and typer and editor, but I do try to get it right.:eyesmoke:

Yes electric bill has gone down, 33% less light yet larger optimal canopy area. Since the lights move that reduces shading as well as moving the hot spot which allows canopy to be closer to the bulbs which allows light energy to be effective all the way throuhg the plant and not just on the side currently facing the bulb. Defenitely better than a stationary 1000!:hump:
Click to expand...
I didn't notice you going off topic :razz: Actually everything you wrote there is totally relevant and expands on my rather shallow question in an intelligent way haha

I think it's really cool that you have a "before" comparison with the lights moving already. So it clearly wasn't the lights being non-static, but flipping the canopy to vertical that allowed you to remove that 3rd 1k bulb.
And you're still getting similar yields? Unless you're downsizing, I assume they've risen, just from the fact that you're beginning to grow veggies in there too :D

Gosh and thanks for making me realize how systemically idiotic it is of me to grow horizontally in a tiny space that is way higher than it's wide :P Sheez here'S me outdoors ever thinking of how to make best use of the garden space by stacking and going vertical, and indoors,. where it's needed most...:rolleyes:

Too bad I just got myself COBs? lol
OTOH I'm moving next month and will be building myself a new grow space... if I dimension it right, maybe I could then hang the COBs at an adequate distance (the space is still going to be 4ft wide max, so a mover would be overkill in there..) and trellis larger plants up the back wall... or have cobs shining at one trellised plant (think C99 haha, I feel I'm going to end up growing her next year, after the blue dream grow-off with my DWC friends lol) from both sides? hm! :bigjoint:
 
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ttystikk

ttystikk

Well-Known Member
calliandra said:
I didn't notice you going off topic :razz: Actually everything you wrote there is totally relevant and expands on my rather shallow question in an intelligent way haha

I think it's really cool that you have a "before" comparison with the lights moving already. So it clearly wasn't the lights being non-static, but flipping the canopy to vertical that allowed you to remove that 3rd 1k bulb.
And you're still getting similar yields? Unless you're downsizing, I assume they've risen, just from the fact that you're beginning to grow veggies in there too :D

Gosh and thanks for making me realize how systemically idiotic it is of me to grow horizontally in a tiny space that is way higher than it's wide :P Sheez here'S me outdoors ever thinking of how to make best use of the garden space by stacking and going vertical, and indoors,. where it's needed most...:rolleyes:

Too bad I just got myself COBs? lol
OTOH I'm moving next month and will be building myself a new grow space... if I dimension it right, maybe I could then hang the COBs at an adequate distance (the space is still going to be 4ft wide max, so a mover would be overkill in there..) and trellis larger plants up the back wall... or have cobs shining at one trellised plant (think C99 haha, I feel I'm going to end up growing her next year, after the blue dream grow-off with my DWC friends lol) from both sides? hm! :bigjoint:
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Um, you do know I use COB LED to grow vertically, right?
 
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