magicflame
Well-Known Member
Thanks dude and welcome.
Magical mini-pyramid grow (lot's of pics)
- Thread starter magicflame
- Start date
magicflame
Well-Known Member
Guys, I've been barking up the wrong tree. Have been researching a bit and now know for sure what burned my plants like that. The moment I read about it, it struck me that I gave all the plants a light misting from my atomizer, but forgot that the bottle still had fish-emulsion in it from feeding the chillies in the garden outside. So that's the whole story I think. Water with nutes in it sprayed onto the leaves under a blazing MH lamp, definitely a no no.
magicflame
Well-Known Member
Neo, I managed to get hold of a thermometer today that will let me monitor the temps at canopy level w/o opening the box. I was shocked to discover my night-time temp to be a mere 54 deg F! No wonder the little things are looking so bedraggled. BTW, the ambient temp in the room is at 51 deg. I played around with some configurations and found that removing the glass panel below the lamps raised the temp (at plant-canopy level) to 66 deg. It is quite apparent also that the 3 fans blowing across the tops of the plant-canopy is creating a sort of "wind curtain" that partially isolates the plants from the heat of the lamps. Switching these off raised temps all the way to around 75 deg. However I'm loath to turn these off as the benefit from them blowing the trees around is already evident in the lateral growth visible in the stems of all plants. Switching them back on and the two large extractor fans off saw me pegged at around 68 deg. I believe that with the glass panel removed, top extractor fan and the extractor that sucks from the grow box and vents over the ballast, ignitor and power-supply, should be ample circulation. When this cold period is over, I can simply restart the two large extractors and then replace the glass panel as appropriate. What do you think? We golden now, or do we need still warmer?
magicflame
Well-Known Member
This has been a harrowing week with temperatures plummeting into the thirties and less. As can be seen in the pics below, my little guys were not happy and had all but stopped growing entirely. I looked around for a solution to the issue and ended up removing the glass in between the lamps and the plants. Temperatures were up, but now some plants were burning because of their proximity to the lamp. I had to replace the glass and find another way.
Coincidentally, I was early spring-cleaning and came across an old space-heater that I had discarded because the fan was so noisy that it was unbearable. On closer inspection I found that one of the blades were cracked and with a dash of epoxy it was good as new. Now I had to find a method for regulating the temperature and came across this site http://www.craig.copperleife.com/tech/thermo/ Now I'm a complete novice, but managed to build and get it up and running, so anyone should basically be able to do it. What the circuit does is switch the heater on until the temperature reaches 26.4C/79.5F and is then turned off (this takes about 55 seconds in that small space). The temperature then seems to continue rise to about 27.1C/80.8F, after which the temperature slowly begins to fall back down to 25.4C/77.7F when the heater kicks in again (takes about three minutes to cool down enough to activate the heater) The temperature then continues to fall to about 24C/75F before it quickly climbs back up and so on.
I will of course report any improvement to the plants with pics to boot.
Coincidentally, I was early spring-cleaning and came across an old space-heater that I had discarded because the fan was so noisy that it was unbearable. On closer inspection I found that one of the blades were cracked and with a dash of epoxy it was good as new. Now I had to find a method for regulating the temperature and came across this site http://www.craig.copperleife.com/tech/thermo/ Now I'm a complete novice, but managed to build and get it up and running, so anyone should basically be able to do it. What the circuit does is switch the heater on until the temperature reaches 26.4C/79.5F and is then turned off (this takes about 55 seconds in that small space). The temperature then seems to continue rise to about 27.1C/80.8F, after which the temperature slowly begins to fall back down to 25.4C/77.7F when the heater kicks in again (takes about three minutes to cool down enough to activate the heater) The temperature then continues to fall to about 24C/75F before it quickly climbs back up and so on.
I will of course report any improvement to the plants with pics to boot.
tahoe58
Well-Known Member
interesting solution (again ...) . Many thanks for the details. I'm curious, how long is the temp drawdown period .... u mention ~55s to heat but up before the fan kicks out. is the temp drop over a period of minutes hours? Just curious. Excellent work and details in describing it. Walk On!~
magicflame
Well-Known Member
Yes it takes about 55 secs to warm up with the heater on low setting. This is virtually unchanged regardless the ambient temp (fluctuates between about zero at midnight to around 75F at noon), due to the combination of size of the box, ventilation setup and power of the heater being unchanged. The draw down time before the heat kicks in again is around 3 minutes at midnight to around 30 minutes at midday. I'm also boiling a kettle inside (another cast off item: it leaks a little). Every time I think about it, I just flip the kettle on and it then pops back off when the water starts to boil. I can actually make it boil for longer if I leave the lid open, thus not actuating the shut off mechanism so quickly, but that feels a little dodgy to me. We don't want to have the fire-brigade and so on snooping around now, do we?. Come to think of it, there is a very real possibility of turning such a kettle into a handy, fully automatic humidifier. Mmmm, now how to interface a hygrometer-type output into a digital one? Time for some research methinks. Damn, how suddenly this new hobby has gotten all technical. I LOVE it! He he he.
magicflame
Well-Known Member
Oh by the way, regarding my earlier post with pics. That little mutant freak is not one of my grow box plants, but one of the youngsters toughing it out in the cold on my workshop roof. 20 / 21 survivors so far after one week!
tahoe58
Well-Known Member
cool....thanks for the thoughts. So you're humidifying .... is it really that dry? cuz I know the peeps that grow in more humid climes can tend towards have challenges the rest of us in the dry zone do not have to deal with. I am totally just thinking outloud .... but so for these plants they are experiencing a consistent fluctuation is temperature that is a ten degree range and over either a three or thiurty minute period. I wonder if that has any influence over the growth and achievement of potnetial when that is the case. It would se to be to be a rather unnatural and rather artificial circumstance - not saying its bad ....just saying I don't know what it might or might not do to the plant's productivity. Many thanks for your sharing his and I look forward to continued updates.
magicflame
Well-Known Member
Oh by the way, regarding my earlier post with pics. That little mutant freak is not one of my grow box plants, but one of the youngsters toughing it out in the cold on my workshop roof. 20 / 21 survivors so far after one week!
magicflame
Well-Known Member
Sorry, connection issues, lol.
magicflame
Well-Known Member
It is super dry here in Winter, but I'm also just playing it safe as I suspect the heater might dry out the air quite severely and what I have here are tropical sativas as I understand.
Regarding the temp fluctuations, they really are only 3 degree fluctuations, more or less consistent to a (very natural) fluctuation you might experience on a sunny late summers day with clouds drifting across the sun occasionally, also causing a temp fluctuation of sometimes more than four degrees depending on the wind-chill factor. Incidentally, the wind-chill factor inside of the grow-box is of course a very real factor as those three fans constantly blasting across the tops of the plants must cool them down significantly. Also the sensors for the temp guage and temp control are also cooled by those fans, making them overly sensitive to fluctuations while the air is in fact circulated through the box and probably quite stable in temperature overall. Particularly the roots would feel virtually nothing but pleasantly warm. Whatever the circumstance, it must beat the previous situation where my plants were at temps below 50F for hours each night. As they say the proof is in the pudding and I have seen renewed vigor of growth in all the plants, after they had been more or less dormant for a week and a half. I will keep a close eye though.
Incidently, I have found a component that might just be able to replace the thermal-resistor from my thermostat in another (slightly modified) circuit just like the one for the thermostat-circuit! Here we go again!
cbtwohundread
Well-Known Member
yor grow is coming along i will bee posted that is truly a wonderfully built cab,,,i almost feel jealous....you should get some good results from topping her,,,,ites
tahoe58
Well-Known Member
A lot of good points you have made. I did not think of the microclimate variations that obviously happen as you have stated. I be keep watching too .... walk on!~
magicflame
Well-Known Member
A happy camper I think.
grow space
Well-Known Member
yo man- i like your rad ass grow box-its like fucking rocket
anyway man-nice plants,but why the hell to U use them soil covers????
keep it up man...props 4 U
anyway man-nice plants,but why the hell to U use them soil covers????
keep it up man...props 4 U
magicflame
Well-Known Member
Yes those stupid covers! A (mostly) failed experiment. They do seem to stimulate growth very low down, but at the cost of keeping the roots too moist. Binned! Thanks for your visit and input. What're you growing?yo man- i like your rad ass grow box-its like fucking rocket
anyway man-nice plants,but why the hell to U use them soil covers????
keep it up man...props 4 U
Thundercat
Well-Known Member
Ah magic, glad you had the link over here. This is really cool project you've got man. Also, props on the craftsmanship, looks top notch!
magicflame
Well-Known Member
Thank you indeed. And welcome!