NEW Closet Set Up for L.E.D. Stealth Grow

Legit setup man! I am also looking at LED's off Ebay. I just orderd (4) 250 Led lights. I'm going to have 3 plants and 2 LEDs on the back wall and 2 ovr head. andfor flowering i have a 400 watt HPS light. There has been much talk about LEDs and how they are a waste of money, but i still cant wait to see how your plants do. I ordered AK-48 seeds off Nirvania/ Cheers@!

The name of the fan is "Feature Comforts" and was purchased at Lowes for about $10

o2ezz said:

Legit setup man! I am also looking at LED's off Ebay. I just orderd (4) 250 Led lights. I'm going to have 3 plants and 2 LEDs on the back wall and 2 ovr head. andfor flowering i have a 400 watt HPS light. There has been much talk about LEDs and how they are a waste of money, but i still cant wait to see how your plants do. I ordered AK-48 seeds off Nirvania/ Cheers@!

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I intend to use LED lighting for the entire grow and see what they can do.

Good luck with your grow.

does the fan make any noise? or is it moderately noisy?

My man, if it was moderately noisy would it be in my stealth grow closet?

Serapis said:

My man, if it was moderately noisy would it be in my stealth grow closet?

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iight i feel you

I've just joined this site and have spent the last few hrs reading this thread. I'm interested in your LED grow, cause I'm trying it myself. I like your mini set up and it sounds like you've done your homework. I do have a few ?? and comments.

I'm still concerned about your height limitation. Bending and trimming will keep them down but will increase your horz surface area. One thing I have noticed using the LED is that the light strength diminishes quickly as you get outside of the frame of the light housing. So I'd say to increase horz surface outside the fixture will weaken or slow bud formation. Also in an earlier set of post the discussion was on led wattage's and the 1 watt diode being more efficient than the 3 watt'ers. I have a 350w 6 spectrum combo 3 and 1 watt diode lamp. I've taken my cheap light intensity meter and compared my lamp to a comparable 300 all 1 watt lamp (actual diode wattage 320 & 288 from 12" down my lamp has twice the intensity and I can still place my hand on the lens. I've seen a 180w lamp with 30 6w diodes and the heat coming off of it was intense for a LED. So I'd say the 3w is an upgrade to the 1w but I'm not sold on the 6w. (I didn't get a chance for and intensity test before it sold from the grow store)

What are the physical dimensions of your 120w fixtures?

Another item I didn't see (maybe I missed it) any stench control.

Also I'm very interested in your side lighting being its in the veg lighting spectrum (mostly blue). And seeing if this helps during flowering. I've got floro tubes for side lighting with a mix of 6500 & 3000 k bulbs. Thinking of going to all 3000

Best of luck with your grow. I'd be happy to answer any LED questions I can. If you want to see my lamp in action I'll post some pics. I don't want to start a journal or thread. But I do want to hear about all your results.

The problem with the light meter is it is not measuring intensity of the blue and the red spectrums, it is measuring off the white and orange more than likely. Scrog growing is perfect for LED lights, as the LEDs do not penetrate like the HIDs do. That is why I have two overheads in a 9' sq grow to light up the canopy evenly while keeping the source close. As far as why a 1w is more efficient than a 3w, that is something I read while doing my homework. I didn't absorb the science behind the explanation, but it made sense to me at the time.

I'm concerned about height too, thats why I grow predominantly short strains, not straight sativa. It is also why I intend to scrog, which will provide a much bigger yield anyways.

Physical dimensions of the units are 17" x 12.5" x 3" I believe.

For odor control, I'm using two negative ion generators. The strain is also supposed to smell something between cat piss and bubblegum. If the ionic generators can't control the odors, I'll add some ona, but I'm not going to vent through charcoal.

The top chamber will act as a veg and flower room, depending on what I have going on. I can veg below as well in the nursery if needed. While the plant benefits more from red spectrums in flowering, it can still use the blue as well. Don't forget, most growing and stretching takes place in flowering and most experts recommend both spectrums for both stages. Blue for veg and Red for flower is a minimum, not an ideal.

I'm interested in ANY LED grows and the results. seems a lot of the threads end with breakins, burglary, insects, etc. It is rare to watch a thread from begining to end and get a dry harvest weight. I intend to finish this and post that, whether it is embarrassing or not. I can always make adjustments on the second grow, even if it means adding a hid lamp and reflector (400w) if I do.

Serapis said:

It's cool! LOL... It looked like you were setting me up for a follow up question that was going to bash LEDs.... If you have a few months before you start growing, sub this thread and kick back and let's see what the lights can do together.

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Haha alright sounds good. I would definitely like to know the 'do's and dont's' of growing GOOD marijuana.

Serapis said:

+REP for you too!

As for auto-flower, who said anything about auto-flower? If I did, I was referring to something else, not my girls. I've not tried auto-flower yet. I assume it is from seeds induced late in the flowering cycle? I know they show their sex within 2 weeks of veg. Thats all I kow about em. I like feminized seeds. I'm in no rush I may now have a scrog of 5! That seems like 2 too many for a 2' x 4.5'.

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There are three documented subspecies of Cannabis; sativa, indica, and ruderalis.

That last one, ruderalis is a plant that will flower independent of photoperiod, in the wild, when it gets a certain height the hormones for reproduction kicks in regardless of what season it is. It is a very hardy plant.

The ruderalis is actually shit weed. The latest advanced in the industry's genetics have birthed auto-flowering strains, the combined potency of the indicas and sativas and the auto-flowering genetics of the ruderalis.

Theres a market for these plants because they can literally be grown as window sill plants. little care is needed just the occasional watering and feeding.
a lil FYI for a Serapis

Oh and you mentioned that if your dry harvest weight isn't satisfactory you would look into getting an HID.
The combination of LED and Compact Fluorescent is a huge step up in your flowering chamber. just hang a couple of those vertically between your plants to supplement their spectrum.
hope this helps.

DUBS Doobious said:

There are three documented subspecies of Cannabis; sativa, indica, and ruderalis.

That last one, ruderalis is a plant that will flower independent of photoperiod, in the wild, when it gets a certain height the hormones for reproduction kicks in regardless of what season it is. It is a very hardy plant.

The ruderalis is actually shit weed. The latest advanced in the industry's genetics have birthed auto-flowering strains, the combined potency of the indicas and sativas and the auto-flowering genetics of the ruderalis.

Theres a market for these plants because they can literally be grown as window sill plants. little care is needed just the occasional watering and feeding.
a lil FYI for a Serapis

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Thanks! I certainly have no interest in growing window sill plants.

I'll look into making a CFL octopus type device for adding on the second grow. Thanks for that tip! I want to see what straight up LEDs do
I'll have a second batch of seeds going in a few weeks, so not to worry.

Just took the time to read the whole thread and I think the green christmas lights for the scrog is brilliant! I don't think I ever would have thought of that, how did it come to you?

Retris said:

Just took the time to read the whole thread and I think the green christmas lights for the scrog is brilliant! I don't think I ever would have thought of that, how did it come to you?

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I was trying to solve two problems at once; seeing in the "dark" and how to build a scrog net. The solution seemed to find itself.

Haha that is awesome. I am interested to see how that works out!

What nutrients do you plan on mixing with your water once you start that process?

Seedlings moved to LED area!

I decided today that since the plants were looking good and the stem is starting to thicken, I would move them to my LED area, after all, all that money is sitting by idly awaiting them. I'm going to go 24 hours on the lights for the next two weeks. One week before flower, I'll move to 18/6 and start adding Open Sesame to the water. They'll get their first shot of Big Grow at the next watering, probably Thursday, depending on how fast the soil dries out.

The two plants on the right, #'s 3 and 4 (I need to get tags on them) will get misting of seltzer water every day, twice a day. I want to see if we can see a difference. Right now, those seedlings are about 48 hours behind the two plants on the left that sprouted first. So we are going to test that theory as well. Universities have proven the theory that seltzer water with CO2 is good for plants, but let's document it here on this grow as well.

Lighting for Flowering

I've been thinking hard about this and since it is my only source of personal weed at the moment, I may drop some CFLs down from the ceiling to add some light. I'll only do this if flowers aren't dense. I do have the 3 additional nutes for flowering, Open Sesame, Cha Ching and Beastie Blooms.

I'll update with more pics this weekend.

Quick Update:

Almost screwed up. Checked on plants 4 hours into their first LED exposure (I waited too long, should have been two hours) and the very tips of the first true leaves were starting to turn upwards. It was 90 degrees in my otherwise 82 degree closet (so much for no heat LEDs).

This proves roots have some ways to go yet, may just place back in Flouro nursery as roots unable to supply water quick enough to leaves. Cups feel heavy and moisture indicator reads in middle, so not dry like I would like before next watering.

Remedies: I've turned exhaust fan on high and it now runs 24/7. Raised LED Panel to 12" above plants and misted with 6.5 PH water.

Temp has dropped to 84 and is steady. Leaves appear to have quit turning upwards. #1 shows slight browning on very tip, as you'll see in next pics if I don't kill these first.

I plan to keep an eye on plants every 2 hours for next 10 hours.

I contacted HTG supply and no one there knows how high to hang these Tri-bands that they "so extensively tested". At 12", further tip damage was observed and edge of all leaves was a lighter green, indicating wicking, or drying. I have moved the plants back to Flouro lighting. They may remain there the rest of vegetation, which is a shame. Today set them back a week at least.

I'm pissed at HTG for not knowing anything about a product they claim to have designed and tested exclusively. I'm going to have to learn to use these damn lights on my own it appears.... Almost $600 and I'm pissed. 12" above 2 week old plants should be fine I'm told, but it wasn't. At least it proves the lights have a high intensity.

damn man its gay how they kinda like false advertised that. i dont know much about LED's but i would say add another 6" maybe?

Plants are in the nursery, looking sun burnt I have them under Cool Whites, 12" from the tops. I'll give them six hours of dark tonight and re-evaluate in the morning. Meanwhile, I started to germ the other 5 seeds as a back up. If I have 10 plants by end of next week I'll be very surprised.

HTG still has not responded with a recommended height. He did reply back that it sounded like nutrient burns. I replied back and again asked what height the unit should sit over the plants and am still awaiting an answer. I did tell Allen at HTG that the plants haven't been feed in over a week, and the leaves were turned UP and browning from the tip. It is obviously heat stress. I'm thinking the lights should be about 24" above the canopy. Information I find in Google seconds that. Not sure why Allen thought 10" was OK....