Herb & Suds
Well-Known Member
Junk ! any questions ?
You might as well be using baking soda and a dripper
You might as well be using baking soda and a dripper
Exhale CO2 bags
- Thread starter harrychilds
- Start date
bk78
Well-Known Member
What times dinner?
bk78
Well-Known Member
Here’s my data for the last 12 hours. You can see it drop pretty much when I left for work this morning, then bump back up to around 700ppm when I get home from work.
I did this exact test with a XL bag in the room and it’s exact same numbers if I have a bag in there or I don’t.
@SSHZ can you show us your data you’ve compiled?
I did this exact test with a XL bag in the room and it’s exact same numbers if I have a bag in there or I don’t.
@SSHZ can you show us your data you’ve compiled?
Southernontariogrower
Well-Known Member
Once again your plant kung fu is dead on. The bottles die after a few days, not worth the money, bags are producing about same as ambient co2. Ill be saving 40 dollars or making own before buying ever again.
morgwar
Well-Known Member
The bags are hit or miss, this is from a veteran HVAC tech with a calibrated extech meter.
You also need a closed loop system with passive or active fresh air intake for cooling and pressure venting only from the top (c02 sinks hot air rises)
I would suggest getting into mushroom cultivation if you want real output. A 5 gallon bucket setup of loins mane mushrooms will generate half its weight in CO2 hourly.
Gotta agree with Mont@n@, your household ambient co2 could naturally run higher than your plants could ever hope to use. I have 3 adults and 3 German shepherds and average 1400 ppm with active cold air intake and occasional open windows.
Dont forget also that co2 is absolutely worthless unless EVERYTHING ELSE IS DIALED IN FIRST. I repeat, EVERYTHING.
If there is any lack of light, disease, or deficiency the plants won't benefit in the slightest.
You also need a closed loop system with passive or active fresh air intake for cooling and pressure venting only from the top (c02 sinks hot air rises)
I would suggest getting into mushroom cultivation if you want real output. A 5 gallon bucket setup of loins mane mushrooms will generate half its weight in CO2 hourly.
Gotta agree with Mont@n@, your household ambient co2 could naturally run higher than your plants could ever hope to use. I have 3 adults and 3 German shepherds and average 1400 ppm with active cold air intake and occasional open windows.
Dont forget also that co2 is absolutely worthless unless EVERYTHING ELSE IS DIALED IN FIRST. I repeat, EVERYTHING.
If there is any lack of light, disease, or deficiency the plants won't benefit in the slightest.
melaninTonic
Member
Hey, old thread, but wanted to share my very limited experience with co2, that seems to contradict that everything else needs to be perfectly dialled in for it to have any effect at all.
I didn't plan it this way, but a few years back I did a grow in a tent that was placed in the washroom, where there also happened to be a pilot light. The plants grew phenomenally well. This was perhaps my 6th grow, and the explosive growth was beyond anything I'd seen before.
At my 6th grow, I can't say that I knew enough to maximise all parameters. I still don't. And back then, I didn't even put 2 and 2 together and suspect the pilot light had something to do with my success. It is only now, 4 years later, that I suddenly thought back to the pilot light, and decided to look up how much co2 those push out.
The reason why I am fairly confident the co2 made the difference is that I later did grows in another room of the house. The sliding glass door from the kitchen to the washroom was almost always kept shut, with some passive ventilation to the outdoors... but none of the co2 would have made it to the other room I subsequently used. And, you guessed it, my results in the second room were much more in line with what I was accustomed to seeing. Nothing phenomenal, despite using the same earth, same worm castings, same light, same grow bags and same genetics.
I didn't control PH, or nutrients, in any kind of scientific way. If I maxed out all other parameters besides co2, it would have been by a complete fluke, and I'm confident I didn't because I know growers can achieve better yields than I was used to achieving, without using co2.
So I'm left with the sense that increasing co2 levels will help a grow even if all other parameters are not optimised?
xtsho
Well-Known Member
My tents out in the garage where the lady parks her car. I start the car and let it run for an hour or so while I'm standing there with a beer in my hand staring at my plants. There's a few leaks around the garage door but I'm not venting outside so it's a pretty well sealed system. The exhaust has more than just Co2. It has nitrogen, heavy metals, and CO which I consider an added bonus.
ComputerSaysNo
Well-Known Member
You need very intense light for CO2 addition to make a difference. Also, as others have stated, if your grow is in a space where people live, you will have naturally (significantly) elevated CO2 levels already. There is this one YouTuber who shows his automatic CO2 setup and then mentions that it barely ever runs because his household air already contains close to the maximum useful (elevated) levels of CO2 anyway.
I'd rather build a fully automated grow, with nutrient injectors and the jazz before even considering adding active CO2.
MidnightSun72
Well-Known Member
You think the cost and effort to install nutrient injector system is less than adding a CO2 tank, regulator and plug in controller? Nutrient injection system $3-5K and need reservoirs, mixing tanks, piping, fittings , pumps vs $~300-500 for a rocking CO2 tank setup. I just setup CO2 in my veg room for $250 CAD
sounds to me like you are completely clueless to the effort and setup cost of either item. And once again arm chair growing.
I think if you have lighting, cooling, good nutrients and ventilation/air movement then supplementing CO2 is a welcome addition to a grow. CO2 is a great cheap upgrade let's you get away with higher temps and humidity in exchange for greater growth. That being said the mushroom bags literally cost the same as an industrial sized fill of a CO2 tank. Dunno why people waste their time with the mushroom.
bk78
Well-Known Member
He grows a single auto on his balcony. Hasn’t the slightest clue
melaninTonic
Member
Thanks for the input @ComputerSaysNo, @MidnightSun72.
I think I have to trust my direct experience: those plants were in a small washroom with a pilot light putting out 2.5 pounds of co2 per day. I very much liked what I saw, and would like to try to replicate it. My guess is there was a lot more co2 concentrated in that room than the two humans in my household generate, plus it was directly with the plants. A closed glass sliding door separated that room from areas that would have benefitted from our exhaled co2.
In our current house, we don't spend much time in the vicinity of the grow: has to have some effect in terms of reduced concentrations.
From the sounds of things, two people might bring the concentration into the 800-900 ppm range. Boosting that even just by 100-200 could be worthwhile.
I think I might install a smart co2 meter and collect some data, then try a large yeast co2 generator setup and see if that provides anything useful. My tent is already venting from the top, so I might just see some benefit. I could also automate the ventilation to only kick in when a certain temperature is exceeded, or when co2 goes above 1000, so the concentrations of co2 get to increase a little bit more. Something to have a play with.
Another thing I'm thinking about is the fact that humans can exhale up to 8 times more co2 when exercising, compared to sedentary. Might be worth getting into a morning exercise routine in the room where the grow is, since apparently they benefit most from the co2 in the morning? Could be fun, and mutually beneficial!
If it all comes to nought, you can all tell me you told me so. I'll still have enjoyed the tinkering.
ComputerSaysNo
Well-Known Member
The tinkering is fine, who doesn't love that? I'd rather tinker with things that either (a) make my life easier, e.g. automatic watering so I don't have to do that myself and/or (b) definitely and significantly improve results and/or (c) save me money.
CO2 is probably one of the last things worth optimizing, after you have checked a whole bunch of other boxes.
There are so many things that are easier or more fun to improve than CO2 enhancement (plant genetics, lighting, nutrients, temperatures, humidity, pH level, watering, root health, ...). And each of those things probably will affect yield much more than CO2 enhancement would unless everything else is perfect already...
You definitely need a meter to be sure your CO2 measures work at all, and even then it will be difficult to get verified results (as far as yield goes). You would have to do at least two runs ruling out most other factors, i.e. having close to identical plants both times, same nutrients, lights, temps etc. etc. before you can even make a comparison. And then I would not accept anything less than a substantial improvement.
melaninTonic
Member
Don't worry, I'm tinkering with ALL of it.
calvin.m16
Well-Known Member
Waste of money in my experience. I tried using co2 bags in 2019 in a grow tent and it did nothing. You need to run a burner or tank.
I use a Titan Controls Atlas 4 that burns Liquid Propane from a standard bbq tank and it keeps my 1000 sq/ft flower room @ 1200-1300 ppm for $30/month. When I was using huge co2 tanks 1200 PPM would cost me $30 a week. I have a sealed grow space too, absolutely no vents in or out and I'm not having to swap co2 tanks every week that weigh a shit ton.
If you use a co2 burner purchase a couple Carbon Monoxide Detectors and place near sleeping area and in grow to warn if burner is putting off carbon monoxide. Silent killa.
I use a Titan Controls Atlas 4 that burns Liquid Propane from a standard bbq tank and it keeps my 1000 sq/ft flower room @ 1200-1300 ppm for $30/month. When I was using huge co2 tanks 1200 PPM would cost me $30 a week. I have a sealed grow space too, absolutely no vents in or out and I'm not having to swap co2 tanks every week that weigh a shit ton.
If you use a co2 burner purchase a couple Carbon Monoxide Detectors and place near sleeping area and in grow to warn if burner is putting off carbon monoxide. Silent killa.
Rufus T. Firefly
Well-Known Member
In my first grow I decided that I was going to take my home brewing experience and put it to use in the tent. So I loaded up a bunch of bottles with sugar water and yeast and put fermentation locks on them so I could monitor the manufacture of Co2.
Here is what I learned, sugar is expensive.
Here is what I learned, sugar is expensive.
xtsho
Well-Known Member
Sugars on sale at Chef's Store. $27.99 for 50 lbs.
Speedtriplebbc
Well-Known Member
As many others I was looking into these and I am already aware that ppm increased with people in the house and that the optimum is a sealed room etc. years ago I remember reading up on this alongside many other basics and that although a dialed in setup and an experienced grower will benefit from a professional co2 setup, it was actually more crucial to maintain the co2 didn’t drop below 400ppm. Most personal grows are in a home and this shouldn’t be a problem but I think for the cost it can’t be a bad thing to throw in and forget about? I’ve seen various information saying they increase or they don’t increase the ppm and the same amount of posts saying they had increased growth and no difference. To be fair, there’s way too many variables to take in account for a fair comparison. I don’t reject science of no change to ppm but you’d probably need to repeat it at least once to make it fair in case it’s a faulty bag. If so I’d use that to claim a refund or replacement anyway? if someone has a side by side with exactly the same conditions I’d be convinced one way or another especially if there’s any difference in growth rates, yield and quality alongside a ppm record. For the price I might just throw one in anyway, I have a tent as a kinda lung room before the veg room that exhausts into the flower room so if I put it in the lung room under the duct, whatever gets sucked out the veg room blows straight into the flower canopy anyway.
Rufus T. Firefly
Well-Known Member
What is this lung room you speak of?
