CFLs and ventilation

D

dank man

Member
Hey, im going to the hydro and hardware store today to get all of my supplies for my set up. Ill be growing in my closet and i want to grow hydroponically but i want to do everything right. Ive been researching alot about temps, nutes, ph, ventilation, cfls... and ive decided to grow using bubble buckets with cfl lights. Im going to buy 4 buckets and set them up tonight but i need advice on lighting and ventilation.
How many soft white cfls do i need for veg and how many daylight cfls for flowering? I would buy an HPS for flowering but i have a limit on how much i can spend. I want to buy a couple of Y adapters for the cfls so i can i have 4 to 6 lights on at a time, what else do i need to pick up at the hardware store for cfls?
As for ventilation, i still dont know what kind of fan to get. I was thinking of getting a few computer fans but would that be enough for 4 to 6 plants? I dont want to install an exhaust fan or put any holes in the walls but what kind of fan would i need?
sry im kind of a noob to growing but i really want to do this the right way so i have my own :leaf:dank:leaf: to smoke.
 
Blntsmk3

Blntsmk3

Member
for a closet....I would have like 4 42 watt daylight cfls...at walmart they are in the yellow/red box with the light showing through a hole. its a pretty good size. 4 of those is right around 12,000 lumens and that is pretty damn good for vegging. remember to look for the color temperature...2700K is the reddish tinted bulbs( soft white...flowering) and 6500k are the blueish ones( vegging). I have 3 plants vegging under 4 23watt cfls(daylight 6500k) and they are doing really well, getting bushy and hasnt stretched since i had to start it with only one 42watt soft white bulb..(bad idea, stretched more than 2 inches in a day...)

you should have 70/30 blue to red for vegging and 70/30 red to blue for flowering

I'd say make your minimum 4 cfls, and more is better...I would go with a lot of little cfls on the y pieces you were talking about...just hang a power strip and plug direct sockets into that...like 4 or 5... and then put the Y's on the direct sockets and hang your bulbs...uniform, and if you twist the Y's so theyre like all diagonal from eachother, you will have a lot of good light directed at your plants...CFL lights do better when they are angled down, you're wasting light if you hang them horizontally.

and for fans, I just have a regular oscilating fan and it does my plants just fine, I've never had any plants with weak stems and I've never had any atmospheric problems with my babies...I think it was like 10 bucks at walmart as well...the computer fans would do you good if you had somewhere to push and pull, i would suggest just a regular old fan you can put to blow air pretty quickly past the trees around the wall or something. that will help them grow stronger and keep transpiration at a good level...( i think that was the word I was looking for lol)

If you need any more help man, just PM me, I was in your same boat probably 6 months ago, and I've got a damn dictionary of info i have written down and saved for future reference...if you have a computer at home... I'd suggest getting the HIGHGRO software that someone made from here...I use t and its great, you can track all your shit for your plants and save valubal info... great tool, I'll try and find the link for it

Hope my little novel here gives you some info to use!

and dont be afraid to put those babies about 4 inches from the plants! cfl's dont penetrate light like the hps's and MH's do....if they did, I think damn near everybody would use cfls lol

Light up the darkness...
 
D

dank man

Member
Hey thanks for the info man, i understand alot more now. Ill be picking up the lights and nutes tomorow and im going to grow with soil instead. I think ill get 4 daylights and 4 soft whites. So for vegging; i use 4 daylights, 1 soft white and other way around for flowering?
I have an oscilating fan i bought a couple months ago, but i think my fan would be too strong for the plants if it was blowing directly on them. What kind of ocsilating fan should i look for?
Thats all i really need to know as for lighting and ventilation, ill pm you if i need any help or run into any problem, thanks again.
 
jesus of Cannabis

jesus of Cannabis

:-)
soil is easier to grow in thats for sure but you can also get more yield and better taste with hydro, IMO.
Any oscillating fan will do just have it run across the tops or on the very bottom of the plants.
 
D

dank man

Member
Doesnt bud taste better when grown in soil? thats one of the reasons why i want to grow in soil instead of hydro, I just want the best out of my buds. I know i can get more yield with hydro but is there any difference in quality?
 
K

KandyKlanMan

Member
Blntsmk3 said:
for a closet....I would have like 4 42 watt daylight cfls...at walmart they are in the yellow/red box with the light showing through a hole. its a pretty good size. 4 of those is right around 12,000 lumens and that is pretty damn good for vegging. remember to look for the color temperature...2700K is the reddish tinted bulbs( soft white...flowering) and 6500k are the blueish ones( vegging). I have 3 plants vegging under 4 23watt cfls(daylight 6500k) and they are doing really well, getting bushy and hasnt stretched since i had to start it with only one 42watt soft white bulb..(bad idea, stretched more than 2 inches in a day...)

you should have 70/30 blue to red for vegging and 70/30 red to blue for flowering

I'd say make your minimum 4 cfls, and more is better...I would go with a lot of little cfls on the y pieces you were talking about...just hang a power strip and plug direct sockets into that...like 4 or 5... and then put the Y's on the direct sockets and hang your bulbs...uniform, and if you twist the Y's so theyre like all diagonal from eachother, you will have a lot of good light directed at your plants...CFL lights do better when they are angled down, you're wasting light if you hang them horizontally.

and for fans, I just have a regular oscilating fan and it does my plants just fine, I've never had any plants with weak stems and I've never had any atmospheric problems with my babies...I think it was like 10 bucks at walmart as well...the computer fans would do you good if you had somewhere to push and pull, i would suggest just a regular old fan you can put to blow air pretty quickly past the trees around the wall or something. that will help them grow stronger and keep transpiration at a good level...( i think that was the word I was looking for lol)

If you need any more help man, just PM me, I was in your same boat probably 6 months ago, and I've got a damn dictionary of info i have written down and saved for future reference...if you have a computer at home... I'd suggest getting the HIGHGRO software that someone made from here...I use t and its great, you can track all your shit for your plants and save valubal info... great tool, I'll try and find the link for it

Hope my little novel here gives you some info to use!

and dont be afraid to put those babies about 4 inches from the plants! cfl's dont penetrate light like the hps's and MH's do....if they did, I think damn near everybody would use cfls lol

Light up the darkness...
Click to expand...
I know this is a really late time to ask. But what your saying is that it is fine to just put a fan inside the grow box (mine is 1'x2'x3'). I have no options to poke a hole in my grow box to ventilate the air but i do have enough room to place a fan inside the box. Would this be enough? or would this be very unsafe due to no "push and pull" ventilation. I am growing with cfl so im not worried about the heat.
 
plantz

plantz

Well-Known Member
KandyKlanMan said:
I know this is a really late time to ask. But what your saying is that it is fine to just put a fan inside the grow box (mine is 1'x2'x3'). I have no options to poke a hole in my grow box to ventilate the air but i do have enough room to place a fan inside the box. Would this be enough? or would this be very unsafe due to no "push and pull" ventilation. I am growing with cfl so im not worried about the heat.
Click to expand...
That is not ok. Ventilation is not just about putting a fan in there to move air around or remove heat. Its also to get fresh air in. Plants need Co2 like we need oxygen.If they have no fresh co2 coming in they will not grow, they might even die, im not sure. Would you want to be in a seal tight box with just a stupid fan blowing on you? That wont keep you from dying lol.
 
Blntsmk3

Blntsmk3

Member
KandyKlanMan said:
I know this is a really late time to ask. But what your saying is that it is fine to just put a fan inside the grow box (mine is 1'x2'x3'). I have no options to poke a hole in my grow box to ventilate the air but i do have enough room to place a fan inside the box. Would this be enough? or would this be very unsafe due to no "push and pull" ventilation. I am growing with cfl so im not worried about the heat.
Click to expand...

yeah man, it's pretty difficult to get too big or too strong of a fan. For me to say it's too strong would be the fan basically blowing the trees over. The perfect median would be the plants swaying in the breeze of the fan and the leaves still being able to stay somewhat stationary. If they are whiping around and twisting real hard, that's probably a bit too much. Not sure how it would hurt the plant, but I'm sure it's not too great to have them hammering the plants all day long. And yeah, a regular old fan is just fine, I would suggest at least finding a place to make a hole BEHIND the fan somewhere so it can suck in fresh air. but if you can't, then so be it. Any air is better than no air. Your goal should be about 70 to 80 degrees, and a nice breeze to keep the stems getting stronger. I am a believer that the plant knows how much it's arms can hold and it loads them with flowers accordingly.

having an intake fan and another fan to pull out would be ideal, but it's not absolutely necessary, air will find it's way in a box that's not sealed...

They key to all this growing stuff is to simply be logical. At the end of the day it is just a weed, it needs, light, water, and food. You cover those three bases even minimally and you'll get something worth growing.
 
Blntsmk3

Blntsmk3

Member
I would say do your best with what you got...I used to germinate seeds in my fish tank filter intake and then grow them in straight up backyard soil outside...fed the miracle grow and whatever else I could find..lol Just remember to keep it simple and don't think TOO much into it. You'll learn the little tips and tricks along the way...They don't do you any good if you don't learn them first hand because when someone tells you the tips and tricks, you'll just end up putting them in the "things to worry about" file in your brain. haha
 
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