Greetings, and welcome to the CGE thread. I am going to discuss CGE and how to be the new mother nature. Better than Mother Nature. I plan to go over a past build including the pics, why i did what, and how i did it. I personally believe that CGE, or closed growing environment, is the optimal way to grow, whether it be hydro or soil, but in this thread you know its about the dirt. Some things have changed in my style while most remain the same. Im into organics and perpetual harvest, namely SOG. Cge works on almost any scale but better in larger areas as the equipment needed is more than can fit in your closet. Please feel free to ask questions about CGE here and i will do my best to answer all you can throw at me. Lets get started, shall we? PROS: CGE or closed grow environment is a way to grow without ventilation, making it ideal for high security grows because there will be no heat signature and absolutely no smell getting out. Co2 levels can be easily maintained. Temperature is very easily controlled. Humidity is very easily controlled. In other words...it makes for the easiest optimization of the environment in a grow room. CONS: Unless you are handy, or have a bunch of extra money, cge may not be for you. There are lots of little things that need to be done that will require you to either make something to substitute for something expensive or buy something expensive that a lot of growers just dont need, typically. Also it will require you to completely build a room from scratch, or severely modify an existing space. Those living at home with mom and dad and apartment blades, this isnt for you. Still with me? A typical list of items you may not find in a typical vented grow are: 70 pint Dehumidifier. Big is better. CO2. I prefer tanked Co2 ppm controller (i built mine) Split air conditioner (a good wall/window unit will work in some special cases) Large-extra large carbon filter Other than that it is pretty much the same old stuff but with a really nicely built room. we went from the room on the left to the room on the right. since i would have a hard time getting an entire layout shot this will give you the idea of what i had so the following pics will be easier explained. I used a room that was a typical bedroom that had a closet. It was ideal to be able to have it divided into 3 sections. tFirst part was a storage room for shoes and clothing that are grow room only, nutrients and supplies, etc. This was right inside the bedroom door. I needed to build a wall to separate the three areas. To the right was a closet with no door (i had to add one) and the new wall allowed access to the closet (a home for my moms n clones) without disturbing the flowering plants. The wall i built had its own door for the flowering area. Mom closet and flower area exchanged air to keep both rooms at the same temps with just a little higher humidity in the mom/clone closet. Light traps are a must. I left carpet in place in the "entry/storage" room so during the build i left all the carpet in place up to a certain point. I installed the light trap between the mom room and the flower room and installed a door to the mom room after building a subfloor in the closet, as i wanted to leave the carpet in place in there too. Ran the power and the fan outlet to the mom area and sealed all that up with elastomeric caulk. Next was painting the mom room with elastomeric roofing compound. I prefer this for my grow room paint as it is a rubber coating. No worries of humidity creeping into walls, its like flat white paint, and its easier to clean than flat paint. I used bleach and water on it just fine without degradation. I had to be careful about hauling sheets of plywood and such into my house because I had a guy that worked for the city inspectors living across the street so things needed to be kept as small as possible as to not be noticed. Bad enough I had to bring a new door in. did that shit at 3am. After installing the door and putting in a nice rubber threshold and kerf seal to seal that up I got some cheap tongue and groove boards (thin decorative) to cover the wall after running all my new power and insulating it. starting on the exterior of the flower room/inside of the storage area of the new wall. I then went over every seam with elastomeric caulk to seal it up tight....thats the idea, remember? i had a window to cover up. I used blinds in the windows and a board that i covered in fabric on the inside to cover and seal the window and make it appear normal from the exterior. I put the intake in place just in case things got to a point where I needed it as it would have been too late to crack the window after the board was up. I also installed a window AC unit on the opposite window (was a double window). It is not pictured. That also meant once the carpet was removed from the flower area Id need to go over the boards on the subfloor and seal those knots and seams after a couple coats of good kilz primer. House was built in the 50s and they had no idea what plywood was back then I guess. Fun times. Primer the whole room so its ready for elastomeric coating. In the mean time.... maybe thats enough for one post. will continue later or tomorrow.
Ok so here is the next portion of the setup. Sealed up the interior of the room with Elastomeric roofing compound. I love that shit. here you see the other side of the light trap coming from the mom closet. This is the intake for the closet and the air is pulled out the top by a small dayton blower and blown into the flowering room. This way I can keep temps pretty even through both room and allow for co2 into the mom area.. necessary since we are sealed. During this build I had plants all over my house (my old house) . I had a bathroom in the basement where I was using a nice large shower for my flowering plants and a nice little closet where I was keeping genetic stock. I also had a small cabinet in the attic flowering test plants out in 24oz mountain dew bottles. pics of that to follow...its not letting me upload them at the moment.
Fuck it. I give up. See ya later Grass City. My patience is gone. I have lost a very long post, my pics wont upload, and I am just getting cranky in my old age. Peace out and good luck to all.