A Start to a New Hobby

To be honest this is kind of out of the ordinary for me. In the past I've smoked some but not enough to have much any knowledge about bud. But I'm the type of person that tends to finds a project and does it to the best of my ability.
So I got a wild hair and see what I can accomplish. I've done quite a bit of research but it seems that everyone has there own scenario.
For me this will be a small grow, for now anyways.

So most important thing to me at the moment is to figure out the location and size of my grow box. I have some empty space in my closet about 5ft tall x 3ft x 2ft.. as for my research it sounded like the way to go is ScROG. I dont know if my space would be considered too small or not to do this. I'm open to suggestions on a build, I would like it to be some what stealthy as well.

The next question is smell. As far as carbon filters how much does this help. I dont want to smell up my whole room.

Any help would be very appreciated.

You have enough room for 1-2 plants. I don't know much about scrogs but it's my guess you don't have enough room for a good one.

The problems you face are that venting a closet (you'll need to for heat and odor) can be a challenge. Yes, odor will be a big concern at some point in your grow.....growing weed is a stinky endeavor.

I grow two-three auto's at a time spaced roughly 4 weeks apart in a steel cabinet. I have no odor control and so far haven't needed it. You can't smell it outside of the room I use. All I do is crack open the window for a few hours a day depending on how warm or cold it is outside. I turn on my ceiling fan to bring in the fresh air and that's the extent if my ventilation. I turn out good auto's with my last DinaFem producing around 60 grams dried and cured. If you don't have anybody living right up your ass I wouldn't worry too much about a carbon filter on a small grow. My neighbors have never suspected anything and some smoke.

I also use a BlackStar Chrome 270 and have no heat issues either. I leave the door on my cabinet cracked open about 4 inches most of the time with an oscillating fan in front on a timer. I run it 30 minutes an hour coinciding with my 20/4 light schedule. My set up works but it took me almost a year to get it dialed in perfectly. Had I known then what I know now, I'd have been able to save a lot of money. I bought a bunch of things that turned out not to be ideal for my op resulting in having to purchase more crap as I educated myself through trial and error.

skorch said:

To be honest this is kind of out of the ordinary for me. In the past I've smoked some but not enough to have much any knowledge about bud. But I'm the type of person that tends to finds a project and does it to the best of my ability.
So I got a wild hair and see what I can accomplish. I've done quite a bit of research but it seems that everyone has there own scenario.
For me this will be a small grow, for now anyways.

So most important thing to me at the moment is to figure out the location and size of my grow box. I have some empty space in my closet about 5ft tall x 3ft x 2ft.. as for my research it sounded like the way to go is ScROG. I dont know if my space would be considered too small or not to do this. I'm open to suggestions on a build, I would like it to be some what stealthy as well.

The next question is smell. As far as carbon filters how much does this help. I dont want to smell up my whole room.

Any help would be very appreciated.

Click to expand...

I'm not exactly a veteran, but for filter I can unequivocally tell you I didn't listen to the experienced growers and get a phresh filter or "Can"...fuck the cheap shit... for the cost I'm considering a ozone generator, but this room sin't occupied and it will be run on a timer (its mostly for backup) ... I'd also get a good odor removing furnace filter, ona buckets and ANYTHING that kills the smell .. (odor control is a major consideration) .... they make smaller/lighter Phresh filters for your sized area.... you might get away with a 240 CFM inline booster fan, cool tube, and 4" Phresh filter

I am however a very experience hydro grower/gardener, and I can tell you a LOT of weed based suggestions are sorta Bullshit.... if simple is your thing I'd recommend Hempy style over soil (again just for for simplicity) that is unless you buy into the organic thing (IMHO chemicals are chemicals eventually)..... you could fit about 3-4 hempys in that space.... personally I do RCDWC hydro or soil ...

Also weigh in the upfront cost of LED over HID ...with LED's the simplicity of lower ambient temps and not dealing with more robust air movement/ventilation equipment.... for your area, you might find that just spending the bucks on a LED might be the thing... check out a few LED threads...those Area 51's are intriguing me, as are Kessils and on the lower end the Blackstars...I have no experience with LED, but I think some of the posters here and their experiences are legit!!!

otherwise I'd suggest a 400-600W HID with cooltube/cooling reflector(cheapo from Amazon if LED's is in the near future, if quality: Lumatek or whatever if not)....

IMO ...CFL's are not as "cool" heat wise as people make them out....moreover upfront cost isn't as cheap (by the time you get all the bulbs, sockets et, you may as well have got a HID for 50 bucks more)..... that said, I use CFL's in a 2x3 space!!!!!

hopefully others will chime in with differing experiences

Some good advice Johnny but would you really go a 600w in a 3' x 2' space? To me a 400w is more than sufficient.
LEDs & CFLs are interesting. Bought two really good CFLs, one for mother & clones the other to assist next years bloom.

skorch, do your research to see what's best for you. Go to a hydro shop, they usually have displays to give you an idea & usually the staff are growers & should be of help with your choice.

Yes, all pot will smell at some point. Some strains you barely smell outside the grow room, others like the skunk varieties will fill your house with a strong smell. Some smell from veg & other's only in the last weeks of flower. I've only recently bought a decent fan & filter, brand new, half price for $250. If your only going small to start & growing a not too smelly plant, you can get away with a home made carbon filter & yes, they work. Make a filter out of 2 litre plastic coke bottles, duct-tape & de-activated carbon from a hardware store for $10 & a fan from the hydro shop for $20.

well yeah, OK, 600W might be a lil much..... he he

Some strains you barely smell outside the grow room, others like the skunk varieties will fill your house with a strong smell

Click to expand...

I had C99 & blue mystic...I thought the Blue Mystic was smellier than advertised, whereas the C99 smelled very good....I got one Skunk 11 plant that at only 2 weeks old stinks already.... bro pick your beans carefully....right now we are liking Blue OG for the height, vigor and how easy its growing; the skunk is acting like a lil bitch ////

Lots of great info guess some of it has gone over my head so it looks like I might have to do some more research.
So it sounds like I may not have the room for a ScROG, what kind of room do you need for one? When I was reading about them the growers made it sound like the way to go? But who knows maybe I should get the grow process down first. I could possible change locations with this grow and not put it in my closet if need be.

Your going to want to fill that space completely. Depends on how many plants you will have depends on the method. You can grow 10 - 20 small clones & throw them straight to 12/12. If you can only get a few, then I veg for a long time & train the branches [with string, whatever] so that all branches are growing as close to level as possible [theres a term for this, anyone?] once you've filled that area turn the lights to 12/12 & all the buds will turn up towards the light & your space will be filled.

And if you don't understand a point, then ask the question again. Don't be shy. We were all beginners at one point. Most here on Riu are happy to help you

SCROG should work fine. The best thing I did was get balls deep into it. All the research your gonna go and your still going to fuck up and waste money, lol. Advice that Jonny socko said is legit though, the smell can stop your hobby real quick. One plant has the possibility to stink up my 3 story house completely, and it has. Good luck man. its a great hobby!!

Well as for the smell I guess ill cross that bridge when I get there.
So next thing is a structure. I'm pretty handy so I could build something or possibly get a tent.
My concern is wood gets heavy and could take up valuable space. Then again I'm trying to do this cheaply. Maybe down the road ill expand.

what my best option seen any build you would suggest?

Amazon has grow tents around your specs for around 70-80 dollars. Easy to break down, easy to hang lights off of. and some ventilation access. What kind of lighting are you looking at?

Honestly havent got that far. I saw a few hid kits but I havent done that much research as far as lights ventilation and temps go in a small space.

Are there Any brand of tent that I should look for or stay away from?

Nice hobby, go for it skorch Based on experiences with my small/closet grow (2'x4'x5'), ~400W LED if you have the cash would be a good way to go. The LED's in a small closet like that will reduce a lot of complications associated w/HID/HPS. It will simplify your air intake/exhaust/heat control and provide lower overall cost of hydro (hydro costs are lights+intake+exhaust+fan). I'm running a 405W 7-band panel in my space and pleased with the results. As far as smell control for a small space like that, a half-decent HEPA air purifier with ionizer, maybe some ONA, depends on your acceptance level and strain you grow, stinky shit you may want to go with a filter but if your cabinet is sealed the air purifier/ONA combo works fine for my cabinet (it's sealed, no air/light leaks), I just exhaust the air outside and no smell to speak of. Typically you won't need to deal with significant smell until flowering but again, this is train dependent.

As far as the cabinet, if you're handy and have some of the materials you could build it. I built mine because I had a lot of the materials, wanted a 100% sealed environment, but it would have been cheaper and easier to buy a tent. I just bought a small 2'x2'x4' tent for clones/mom, don't know if I'd use one for flowering as they do have leaks (at least compared to my DIY sealed cabinet) and most strains stink during flowering. It's perfect for clones/mom though. In my case, I don't want any smell leaking into the house/living area, I love the smell but I don't want it throughout my house.

Won't get into brand recommendations as a) I don't have enough experience with multiple brands. b) it's a preference thing and you'll see many "discussions" here around brand name vs. knockoff's (chinese lights, specific filter brands etc.). I bought my lights, inline fans etc on eBay, researched the sellers/brands, went with the one's I was comfortable with, $300 400W LED chinese panel, into the second grow and I'm happy with it, no issues and it's more than paid for itself. Just a preference thing. My take is most components (brand name or generic) are chinese and for some of the price differences, particularly in LED panels, the chinese one's are cheap enough to have a backup if you're that concerned about quality.

Good luck, do some reading here before making up your mind on the final equipment/design, keep in mind that you will adjust/modify your environment and run into issues, that's part of the game and part of the challenge/fun as far as I'm concerned. Enjoy your new hobby

So ive been doing some more research and this is what I found.

http://www.htgsupply.com/Product-HTG--400w-Small-Bubble-Boy-Tent-kit#

I wanted to see what you guys thought of it. My concern is I dont want to buy any thing twice. Example I dont want to get a fan that wont push enough air if I wanted to add a filter and tubing to exhaust it out side.
What would you consider the weak point of this setup?
also as far as components go is anything missing in this kit that I should be getting as well?

The bad thing about a tent us they stick out like a sore thumb. Not sure if you're going for stealth or not though. I need to be able to go into stealth mode fast but I'm not in stealth mode much if that makes sense. On my cabinet I have one switch that shuts everything down. It's like a master switch that I wired to my cabinet but the switch itself is on the outside hidden in the rear. When somebody comes over for a few minutes I don't want to be all suspicious so I flip the switch off and lock my cabinet. Nobody has any idea what's actually in that nondescript cabinet and I don't have to hide the cabinet. Just shut if off, close the door and lock it. When nobody is around I flip it back on and crack the door for ventilation. I live alone so it works perfect for me and I turn out nice dense, potent bud without being obvious about it.

Skorch, that seems to be a good deal, set up & ready to go for under $500. I like the look of that tent. I could use one just like it for a veg or male room. The width of that tent makes it easy to disguise. My 1st set up was hidden by a wall of empty boxes. Nobody ever noticed a thing out of place.

I used square aluminium pipe, plastic connecters & zebra plastic to make my first growing space. My tent was much cheaper. I love the practicality of the tents, they're a great idea.


Bigeasy, that's why my tent is in my spare room & not in the general living space for all to see

I would like something stealth but It seems like the cabinets i tend find were too short or tall and wider.

The plan is that the tent would fill half of my closet so I can shut it if someone was to come over. It also has a crawl space so if a filter doesn't completely eliminate the odor ill exhaust it under the house.

The other thought was in the crawl space or attic but the cold is setting in and figured that the bugs in the crawl space could be a bad thing.