There's a Black Dog in my Jardin: mc130p's horticultural adventure

Socalrob

Socalrob

Well-Known Member
Already looking frosty, grows looking great. Please keep the pics coming, liberty haze and LSD are two of the strains I'm running next. I know you said liberty haze was a good strain so looking forward to what you think of LSD. Still getting mini heat waves here but by the time the cup comp is over my house temps should be good and I'll finally get them started.
 
mc130p

mc130p

Well-Known Member
Socalrob said:
Already looking frosty, grows looking great. Please keep the pics coming, liberty haze and LSD are two of the strains I'm running next. I know you said liberty haze was a good strain so looking forward to what you think of LSD. Still getting mini heat waves here but by the time the cup comp is over my house temps should be good and I'll finally get them started.
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Thanks man! I really liked the LH, and the LSD was recommend by a few people here on the forum, so I'm reeaally looking forward to it:) I'm doing LH, LSD, again next time, and I'm adding HSO Trainwreck...that one was pretty nice too. I'm really impressed with these lights-giving them record amounts of cal-mag, but they're doing well...I'm also surprised, since this is my first grow with the CXAs and I have no sense of reference for anything.... I've been blessed with some pretty nice weather around my parts, it was actually kind of cold a few nights lately. I hope you guys get some rain and some cooler weather out there! I'll be watchin your grow!!!
 
Socalrob

Socalrob

Well-Known Member
It is starting to get cooler at night so within the next month we should have better day temps too. Rains another story, we need it big time. I've been sitting on a five pack of LH and LSD for 2 months and when I get them going i'll be running them under 2 A 51 xgs 190's. The cool thing is being able to compare what I get with the 190's compared to your cob grow. Il be using fox farm ocean forest and dyna gro nutes again. I'll be posting and we'll see what happens.
 
MyLittleGrundle

MyLittleGrundle

Well-Known Member
Hey mc. Wanted to say WOW man. Awesome job. I have a question for ya. Right now I'm flowering in a 2'x4'x55" space. 4.5' vertical space. Would I be able to put a Black Dog in there and if so what size do you recommend. I'm thinking about changing from a t5 setup. I use a SCROG setup to control height I'm afraid the LED would be to close for last few weeks. Your input would be appreciative. Thanks in advance.
 
mc130p

mc130p

Well-Known Member
MyLittleGrundle said:
Hey mc. Wanted to say WOW man. Awesome job. I have a question for ya. Right now I'm flowering in a 2'x4'x55" space. 4.5' vertical space. Would I be able to put a Black Dog in there and if so what size do you recommend. I'm thinking about changing from a t5 setup. I use a SCROG setup to control height I'm afraid the LED would be to close for last few weeks. Your input would be appreciative. Thanks in advance.
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Hi man, thanks for stopping by. I'm glad you like my little garden:) I'm not using a BD light anymore...it's DIY CXA's from here on out for me. This whole grow has been with the whites. Been thinking about what I need to do for some 730nm flower initiators, but that's not coming until the party cup comp is over, at least. If I had to recommend anything, I'd go DIY. You can put together a light and do no soldering at all, and the price for components will be about the same as a panel of a far lesser value(not cost though, unfortunately). Just hook up + wires to + connectors, and likewise for the -, and you're g2g, hah. Even if you know nothing about DC electronics, you can easily learn basics with some googling or a few hours at the library, and it would be a time investment that will continually pay off.

The Black Dog lights do put out a lot of heat, as others have said, but I grew some nice buds with it and they honored the warranty no problem, so I don't have a problem with them at all. I didn't have anything to compare it to until I added a little over 200W of CXA's that barely heat the tent. If you have the money for a BD light(they're expensive, man), you might want to go ahead and save a little more for an apatche, or some other white based light. You'll probably like your results more. I used the BD240U for a 2x2 area though, so I hope that helps you gauge your needs if you're set on a BD light. Their website seems pretty accurate for coverages, but tbh, I think several small panels would be better than one large panel for better coverage and adjustability.
 
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MyLittleGrundle

MyLittleGrundle

Well-Known Member
mc130p said:
Hi man, thanks for stopping by. I'm glad you like my little garden:) I'm not using a BD light anymore...it's DIY CXA's from here on out for me. This whole grow has been with the whites. Been thinking about what I need to do for some 730nm flower initiators, but that's not coming until the party cup comp is over, at least. If I had to recommend anything, I'd go DIY. You can put together a light and do no soldering at all, and the price for components will be about the same as a panel of a far lesser value(not cost though, unfortunately). Just hook up + wires to + connectors, and likewise for the -, and you're g2g, hah. Even if you know nothing about DC electronics, you can easily learn basics with some googling or a few hours at the library, and it would be a time investment that will continually pay off.

The Black Dog lights do put out a lot of heat, as others have said, but I grew some nice buds with it and they honored the warranty no problem, so I don't have a problem with them at all. I didn't have anything to compare it to until I added a little over 200W of CXA's that barely heat the tent. If you have the money for a BD light(they're expensive, man), you might want to go ahead and save a little more for an apatche, or some other white based light. You'll probably like your results more. I used the BD240U for a 2x2 area though, so I hope that helps you gauge your needs if you're set on a BD light. Their website seems pretty accurate for coverages, but tbh, I think several small panels would be better than one large panel for better coverage and adjustability.
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Thanks mc. I appreciate the advice. Don't troll me to hard but WTH are CXA's. I'm not set on the BD's but there lights are worth them money from what i've read. Gonna stick with the T5's for awhile then re-evaluate my set-up. Thanks man.
 
mc130p

mc130p

Well-Known Member
You're welcome. CXA's are a type of light source made by CREE that they call a "high density LED array," or something to that effect. Just to avoid rehashing things (I'm being lazy, haha), I would have to refer you to a number of threads on this forum that describe their capabilities quite well; many are on the front page.
 
mc130p

mc130p

Well-Known Member
Positivity said:
Nice...every time I look at the thread title I see black dog. Like..I don't wanna see no black dog..

Then I remember..someone upgraded..lol.
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@MyLittleGrundle @cityworker415 , and Positivity:) Thanks guys. Haha, it is quite the upgrade! Instead of crowing the plants as close to the center of a panel as possible, I'm now using almost the entire grow space. And the buds seem super dense. I still haven't bought a scale, but I will soon for the party cup girl. Then I can start to work on increasing yields-though I'm always running a variety of strains from seed, so idk if I can ever really get top numbers like some of you guys. But, the number I really want to optimize is the bud mass to total plant mass ratio.

The best part is that I'm using ~200W of power for the LEDs, so the usage is about equivalent to the BD, maybe a little less-I never had a meter to measure its power usage:)
 
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mc130p

mc130p

Well-Known Member
Socalrob said:
Just keeps getting better and better-DANK!!! You're party cup ain't no slouch either. Very nice.
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Thanks man:) The party cup competition is a tough one this time around...lots of really nice cup girls. I hope everything in the tent will be finished up within three weeks so that I can start the next batch. I need a veg area, but I don't want to give up another closet, haha.
 
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