1st time doing this, considering a t5 setup or a 400w hps, have four clones that will be ready this weekend. Need advice on what lighting to use, closet setup, bout 25 sq feet to work with but will section it off. Using soil and nutes, two oscillating fans two computer intake outtake fans, just need answers about proper lighting for max yield. Any help is greatly appreciated. Will answer any questions to the best of my knowledge.
Well the HPS will be good for flowering and T5 good for veg. But those computer fans may not be. You have to find out when it's setup. Either lighting system is fine for veg as long as you have them on a 18/6 light cycle. Also make sure your soil has some garden safe vermiculite. Too many ppl are overwatering. With vermiculite you may have to water it sooner. But better then overwatering.
the 400watt light that is plenty for that space you can up the light to a 600watt which will need a better air system rather than computer fan.. even a 400watt may need a bit more of a fan. good air flow good venting and strong light = high yield, and once you keep it stable with temp and air flow its better resistance to bugs and mildew and disease. So to answer your question more yes a 400 watt light is plenty (if strains grow tall use a trellis or netting system to hold them down at young age) *** i suggest to use little better exhaust system or fan) *** and t-5 lights are excelent for veg..** ig you wanna spen more money a 400 watt with a blue spectrum light like a digilux veg bulb is amazing. *** *** and nutes for veg i just use cns17 cheap industrial veg nute. *** *** bloom i use advanced nutes with bud candy for best results.*** **** and or organic brewed home tea***
Ok so more than likely I need a stronger set of fans for ventilation? I get my clones next week so I'm trying to get everything set up for then, and I feel I should just go with the hps, then I can use that or both cycles of growth? Veg n flowering? I heard hps will give you greater yield also? Is this true? Thanks for the help ps. I don't wanna spend money on something that won't benefit me or my babies..
You can use either or for veg and flower. However you have to have to separate rooms for veg and for flower. By your question mark it seems you don't realize that.
But if you use HPS you will prolly need better fans. Also either one will produce the same yield. CFLs take longer to do so.
If you use HPS you'll want a inline fan. Carbon filters can be attached to it as well. A HPS can get so hot it can burn you when you touch it. Running one without is not recommended it'll burn your plants if you can't cool it. Max yield has a billion variables with a lot of it being centered on you.
Ok. So I stopped at the hydro store near me after work today and picked up a floralux 400w hps kit that included Safety glass and the lamp, also a quantum 600w Digital elec. ballast. That is dimmable, can run at 100%, 75% or 50%. I had to get the 600w one bc they were out of the 400w. But I'm hoping that won't make much of a difference. I have a normal rectangle window fan bout 2.5 feetlong, and 3 little clip oscillating fans that are ment for a car but I wired em to old lamp chords and they run fine in an outlet, the closet I'm growing in is in the basement (my bedroom is also down here) and the closet is about 10 degrees cooler than my room. I found myself an old fan in the garage that seems to have been some type of exhaust fan for something at one point in time, it's about a a foot in diameter, I cut a hole in the bottom of the door where I'm gonna put the window fan to bring cool air into the room, and I'm gonna try and use this exhaust fan I found to make an outtake exhaust at the top of the closet to get the hot air out.. I don't have money for a filter yet, but I am not worried about smell, I'm pretty secluded in the basement and my older roommate that lives upstairs smokes as well and I doubt hel ever know. Now I've been able to pick up an old incubator off my buddy that he used for a mother plant, I plan on using it for the same thing.... Now as for clones.. I turned my dresser into a little stealth grow project... I just took the drawer faces off, screwed em to a frame out of wood from the drawers and turned it into one big door on hinges. This dresser is about 3.5 feet tall, 2' 8" wide and a foot n a half deep... I was told i could get away with cheep cfl lights in a cloning room so I plan on getting 8-12 of them, and plugging them into four power strips 2 - 3 bulbs per strip. One p strip on each side of the dresser and one on the top. I picked up these bulb to outlet adapters pretty cheap. Now I've also been told clones need to be like covered and it needs to stay humid in there... I was thinking a heating pad below them and placing them all in a big Tupperware container with a lid or like a tall clear drawer with plastic wrap on top, so light will still be let in and I can keep a cup of water or something in the "container" to keep the humidity up... All of this was told to me by someone who I believe knows what they are talking about but I took it upon myself to sign up to this site and get info from more people, experienced people, a site dedicated to everything I'm looking for pretty much. I will post pictures soon of what how I build everything but I wanted to give anyone reading this the setup in planning on so hopefully if anyone sees any flaws they can inform me before I screw up. I'm stoked to do this. Can't wait to start. Just want everything to be right. And again Im thankful for all the advice I've already been given.. You guys are great
Once you get everything set up do a dry run and see what your temps are before you put the plants in if you can. That way you can work on getting the temps dialed in around 77 degrees during lights on and no less then 65 when lights are off. Those are about the ideal indoor growing temps. To help keep it within a good temp range you want to vent hot air out up high while pulling cooler air in down low. Have you looked up anything on how to maintain your plants PH yet?
No research yet on ph, Or nutrients.. Was gonna start with soil like miracle grow or something and I've read a little on bud boosting nutes but that's it. And haven't seen much on ph testing.. Any tips?
Yes mainly don't use miracle gro. It has time released nutes. Best option is to make your own soil mix with organic soil IMO.
All that really does is it lets the chlorine evaporate. PH is very important for a healthy plant. Nutes will lower the PH. For soil grows a PH range of 6.2-6.8 is reccomended. At one end of the PH scale the plant will abosrb certain nutes better then others and at the other end it will absorb different nutes better. Sooner or later if you run into a problem checking your plants PH run off reading is the first step in figuring out what the problem may be. To high of PH and it will be getting to many of certain nutes and other nutes the plants need will be getting locked out and vice versa if its to low.
I was just saying that it worked for my last grow. It might not be recommended but I felt safer not giving them anything then to kill them. I haven't bothered reading more than 2 hrs in nutes but know they benefit the growth in all stages.
Dry run with my hps and fans running I'm getting a temp of 79 degrees after 6 hours... Is this an ok temp or should I try cooling it down more?
I would do the test run for the same number of hours you are going to be vegging for. 79 degrees is good, what are the lights off temps?
Lights have been off for about four hours now with the door open and I'm getting 68-69. I'm gonna close the door and check again in a few hours to see if there's a big diff when the door is shut. That's how I'll be growing. Now this room is just gonna be for flowering, I have a separate place that I'll be veging in, starting from clones not seeds. This space wont produce a lot of heat, pretty confined space with cfl and fluorescent tube lighting all around. I had to go cheap on that room bc I spent so much on setting up the flower room. I have 4 days till I start and I'm starting to feel better about this now that I have extra advice coming in from you guys.