JeramyPWNs
Member
So here is my first time setup and build.
Before starting out I downloaded a ton of videos and watched the many techniques involved and different setups.
I created my setup to (hopefully) be as cost efficient and as effective as possible.
I converted a metal shed into a grow room. Ripping everything inside out, pressure washing, stapling 6 mil plastic along the entire interior, then stapling blankets (for insulation), liquid nail to secure blankets to plastic along with staples, then finally some reflective insulation boards from Home Depot ($12 each). Afterwards I sealed everything with liquid nail and spray foam. The shed was split into 2 rooms - nursery and dry room.
I took photos of the entire build and occasionally as I make changes to the room.
I will admit that I spent $219 on an air compressor + 3 gun kit, $159 for an 18V power tool combo, and a Rotozip normally $80 clearanced at Sears for $14. Now these tools aren't required, but they make EVERY job so much faster.
I do realize the setup at first seemed odd because I didn't exactly have it all planned out. At first I made a 16x4 foot room with 7 ft clearance sealed with plastic. The plastic leaked even when sealing and hit an adult I was given terribly with mold. This is why it goes from bushy to flimsy in the pictures. However I felt losing some branches was better than losing the plant itself.
I found the room to be problematic so I instantly got started on the shed project. It is now in a room with combined 600 Watts on it, however I will be adding 300 more CFLs today. I believe the plant may be in survival mode because it went from outdoor to indoor on difference lighting even though I matched as best as I could, but I experienced multiple outages which gave the plant a 48 straight cycle and a 48 dark cycle. I'm unsure what this could have done to the plant. I began adding cutting edge solutions and finisher and noticed it started flowering better.
As for the mediums, I know they've been moved a lot but I have not seen a single plant wilt nor have I killed one in doing so. What happened was I got multiple ideas and tried many at once and got ahead of myself. Now I feel I have a stable system even though I've received plants in different mediums I felt it's best to leave them in them since they're almost to flowering stage.
I feel like I have a good rockwool seed/clone system setup and I will be ordering a better germination chamber which includes a heating mat. Temperature in both rooms remains 73-76 during the day and 60-67 at night.
From rockwool to 6 spot pots was easiest because i tried plantable mediums but realized it'd cause mold so I quickly pulled and put them BACK into the original 6 pots because I saw that it practically had the same volume of soil in each spot, and I could fit 60 plants where I was only able to fit 38. The plants are looking straight, very green, and growing exponentially. Every day seems to be a difference. I know I may need to transplant sooner, however I feel I've done effective at transplanting by looking at how my Blueberry and Mystery are shooting up now.
I did put the blue/myst in the 5 gallon too early yes I know. And I also found the Home Depot buckets to be the same size and cheaper than a garden 5 gallon bucket. I just drilled many many holes to allow effective drainage.
Another note - practically ALL of the lighting being used is CFL. I believe this may be why my adult isn't blooming as fast anymore and I'm adding 300W more today - unsure of the spectrum but should be the standard warm side.
Shed - 6 x 23W (100W) CFL. + 1 fluorescent
2 on top are uncovered to allow max reflection, along with 1 fluorescent and I will be adding 2 more bar fluorescent because my fan that I customized blocks light.
2 CFLs on bottom are Daylights which are 6500 in the blue spectrum and I believe this is why my original clones (blueberry #4 and mystery #13) are flourishing, or could be the Cutting Edge Solutions mix I'm using or being mixed with the lights I list below.
In front of these 2 lights are 2 more CFLs which are the normal kind. I modified the lamp with speed tape to allow maximum reflectiveness.
Total lighting 6 x 23W + 13W fluorescent equaling 151 watts.
The bottom four lights are cover blue, myst, and 3 purps that were given to me. So with 151 watts I m effectively growing all of these plants. I'm not sure if that's something to be proud about or not.
I have just built another room for vegging. It is 6x4 which I used the boards from the original grow room build, along with 2 additional boards. The leftovers from cuttings gave me a perfect chamber for an LED experimental grow that is 4 ft tall and 2x2 square.
I will be pulling the 4 lights from the bottom of my nursery to place in this room, along with a blue/blacklight I was given. I am unsure of the wattage because I have not checked.
I am also ordering a 45W Sunshine LED from Amazon which claims 250 HPS equivalent for $119. I am aware to be understanding and take results with a grain of salt. I have done a lot of reading and heard both good and bad on LED lighting. I am going my own route and doing it my way which will be all out.
What originally made me want to get LEDs was just hearing about it. So I bought a test $14 LED bulb I believe may have been 7-13 watts which from my math equals around 30 HPS or so. I placed it in a dark room with 6 sprouts that were looking wilty because I was testing daylighting vs CFLs in an open dusty room (Yeah, I know but its just a test). I placed the LED over the sprouts before bed. I woke up the next morning to see all sprouts standing straight up and intensely green (I feed the night before). So I began reading more and more.
The plan - order 1 LED panel every two weeks until my room is at most covered with LED lighting. And I will be able to tell every two weeks if I WANT another LED panel judging by the amount of growth difference between additions.
If Sunshine claims 45W equals 250 HPs and my room is 6x4. We could say cover the room with 7 panels equaling 315 total power, which rivals 1,750 watts of power. That's about 1/6 of price with less heat, better efficiency, and longer life.
I do realize people may be optimistic or pessimistic about it, but I feel everything I've done so far to make an improvement has marked a significant change in my babies growths. And I will be posting pictures of the grow if you guys would like to follow my project. I take one photo every day of every plant, just to mark growth and changes in the plants in case I need to worry about over feeding. It allows me to keep the dates so when I see maybe some burnt tips, then no burnt tips, then burnt tips, the dates will show me how long to feed before the tips will show and I need to back off, or maybe to mix a lesser solution.
Now please don't bash my math or ideas, I know everything is experimental and believe me I haven't had so MUCH FUN doing something with my time. I am enjoying reading and learning and see projects and I know people say don't show people but it's exciting and I constantly have to tell myself no.
I started my grow with 3 clones originally. Then I bought some weed from this dude an ounce for $60, it was mid grade weed that was old so it was kinda dry but not so bad it burns at all. In the first batch I found 60 seeds! I planted every seed and EVERY SINGLE SEED SPROUTED. I don't know if that's normally or not, but I read that a lot of people had problems germinating. I germinated them in soil under one CFL originally and they all made it. So I kept buying weed from this guy and keeping the seeds now I have probably 300 seeds, with 3-5 different strands. So maybe you guys can help me try and figure out what kind of plants they are?
Also, I took 2 things the most serious out of everything - which may be senseless but it's what I was focused most on.
Spider Mites - I sealed the shed up with a total of about 6 layers to prevent from infestation. I will be adding mantis and ladybugs soon.
Reflection - I have gone through about four rolls of reflective (foil, aluminum, speed) tape by covering up all gaps, fans, etc so everything reflects light. I need to add mylar to my nursery on one section and underneath where my clones are.
And yes you may notice some drip system parts, I am working on an auto feed system.
I'm sorry this post has gotten so long, I'll end now.
I am a newbie but hopefully my photos give me some credit that I'm not fake or lying and I'm legit. I want to visit this forum regularly and post since I've been reading it since December.
Before starting out I downloaded a ton of videos and watched the many techniques involved and different setups.
I created my setup to (hopefully) be as cost efficient and as effective as possible.
I converted a metal shed into a grow room. Ripping everything inside out, pressure washing, stapling 6 mil plastic along the entire interior, then stapling blankets (for insulation), liquid nail to secure blankets to plastic along with staples, then finally some reflective insulation boards from Home Depot ($12 each). Afterwards I sealed everything with liquid nail and spray foam. The shed was split into 2 rooms - nursery and dry room.
I took photos of the entire build and occasionally as I make changes to the room.
I will admit that I spent $219 on an air compressor + 3 gun kit, $159 for an 18V power tool combo, and a Rotozip normally $80 clearanced at Sears for $14. Now these tools aren't required, but they make EVERY job so much faster.
I do realize the setup at first seemed odd because I didn't exactly have it all planned out. At first I made a 16x4 foot room with 7 ft clearance sealed with plastic. The plastic leaked even when sealing and hit an adult I was given terribly with mold. This is why it goes from bushy to flimsy in the pictures. However I felt losing some branches was better than losing the plant itself.
I found the room to be problematic so I instantly got started on the shed project. It is now in a room with combined 600 Watts on it, however I will be adding 300 more CFLs today. I believe the plant may be in survival mode because it went from outdoor to indoor on difference lighting even though I matched as best as I could, but I experienced multiple outages which gave the plant a 48 straight cycle and a 48 dark cycle. I'm unsure what this could have done to the plant. I began adding cutting edge solutions and finisher and noticed it started flowering better.
As for the mediums, I know they've been moved a lot but I have not seen a single plant wilt nor have I killed one in doing so. What happened was I got multiple ideas and tried many at once and got ahead of myself. Now I feel I have a stable system even though I've received plants in different mediums I felt it's best to leave them in them since they're almost to flowering stage.
I feel like I have a good rockwool seed/clone system setup and I will be ordering a better germination chamber which includes a heating mat. Temperature in both rooms remains 73-76 during the day and 60-67 at night.
From rockwool to 6 spot pots was easiest because i tried plantable mediums but realized it'd cause mold so I quickly pulled and put them BACK into the original 6 pots because I saw that it practically had the same volume of soil in each spot, and I could fit 60 plants where I was only able to fit 38. The plants are looking straight, very green, and growing exponentially. Every day seems to be a difference. I know I may need to transplant sooner, however I feel I've done effective at transplanting by looking at how my Blueberry and Mystery are shooting up now.
I did put the blue/myst in the 5 gallon too early yes I know. And I also found the Home Depot buckets to be the same size and cheaper than a garden 5 gallon bucket. I just drilled many many holes to allow effective drainage.
Another note - practically ALL of the lighting being used is CFL. I believe this may be why my adult isn't blooming as fast anymore and I'm adding 300W more today - unsure of the spectrum but should be the standard warm side.
Shed - 6 x 23W (100W) CFL. + 1 fluorescent
2 on top are uncovered to allow max reflection, along with 1 fluorescent and I will be adding 2 more bar fluorescent because my fan that I customized blocks light.
2 CFLs on bottom are Daylights which are 6500 in the blue spectrum and I believe this is why my original clones (blueberry #4 and mystery #13) are flourishing, or could be the Cutting Edge Solutions mix I'm using or being mixed with the lights I list below.
In front of these 2 lights are 2 more CFLs which are the normal kind. I modified the lamp with speed tape to allow maximum reflectiveness.
Total lighting 6 x 23W + 13W fluorescent equaling 151 watts.
The bottom four lights are cover blue, myst, and 3 purps that were given to me. So with 151 watts I m effectively growing all of these plants. I'm not sure if that's something to be proud about or not.
I have just built another room for vegging. It is 6x4 which I used the boards from the original grow room build, along with 2 additional boards. The leftovers from cuttings gave me a perfect chamber for an LED experimental grow that is 4 ft tall and 2x2 square.
I will be pulling the 4 lights from the bottom of my nursery to place in this room, along with a blue/blacklight I was given. I am unsure of the wattage because I have not checked.
I am also ordering a 45W Sunshine LED from Amazon which claims 250 HPS equivalent for $119. I am aware to be understanding and take results with a grain of salt. I have done a lot of reading and heard both good and bad on LED lighting. I am going my own route and doing it my way which will be all out.
What originally made me want to get LEDs was just hearing about it. So I bought a test $14 LED bulb I believe may have been 7-13 watts which from my math equals around 30 HPS or so. I placed it in a dark room with 6 sprouts that were looking wilty because I was testing daylighting vs CFLs in an open dusty room (Yeah, I know but its just a test). I placed the LED over the sprouts before bed. I woke up the next morning to see all sprouts standing straight up and intensely green (I feed the night before). So I began reading more and more.
The plan - order 1 LED panel every two weeks until my room is at most covered with LED lighting. And I will be able to tell every two weeks if I WANT another LED panel judging by the amount of growth difference between additions.
If Sunshine claims 45W equals 250 HPs and my room is 6x4. We could say cover the room with 7 panels equaling 315 total power, which rivals 1,750 watts of power. That's about 1/6 of price with less heat, better efficiency, and longer life.
I do realize people may be optimistic or pessimistic about it, but I feel everything I've done so far to make an improvement has marked a significant change in my babies growths. And I will be posting pictures of the grow if you guys would like to follow my project. I take one photo every day of every plant, just to mark growth and changes in the plants in case I need to worry about over feeding. It allows me to keep the dates so when I see maybe some burnt tips, then no burnt tips, then burnt tips, the dates will show me how long to feed before the tips will show and I need to back off, or maybe to mix a lesser solution.
Now please don't bash my math or ideas, I know everything is experimental and believe me I haven't had so MUCH FUN doing something with my time. I am enjoying reading and learning and see projects and I know people say don't show people but it's exciting and I constantly have to tell myself no.
I started my grow with 3 clones originally. Then I bought some weed from this dude an ounce for $60, it was mid grade weed that was old so it was kinda dry but not so bad it burns at all. In the first batch I found 60 seeds! I planted every seed and EVERY SINGLE SEED SPROUTED. I don't know if that's normally or not, but I read that a lot of people had problems germinating. I germinated them in soil under one CFL originally and they all made it. So I kept buying weed from this guy and keeping the seeds now I have probably 300 seeds, with 3-5 different strands. So maybe you guys can help me try and figure out what kind of plants they are?
Also, I took 2 things the most serious out of everything - which may be senseless but it's what I was focused most on.
Spider Mites - I sealed the shed up with a total of about 6 layers to prevent from infestation. I will be adding mantis and ladybugs soon.
Reflection - I have gone through about four rolls of reflective (foil, aluminum, speed) tape by covering up all gaps, fans, etc so everything reflects light. I need to add mylar to my nursery on one section and underneath where my clones are.
And yes you may notice some drip system parts, I am working on an auto feed system.
I'm sorry this post has gotten so long, I'll end now.
I am a newbie but hopefully my photos give me some credit that I'm not fake or lying and I'm legit. I want to visit this forum regularly and post since I've been reading it since December.
Here's some +rep too!!
