And he's funding it completely. I've only grown outdoors and am kind of stupid when it comes to indoors. My closet is 2x4 without a door. What kind of lights would be appropriate and what should I do about ventilation and what should I use as a makeshift door, or do I not need one? Is there anything else I should know about? Sorry if this is in the wrong section, I get so lost on this forum!
Well first things you'll need is to setup ventilation, and lighting. For lighting most people suggest either CFL or MH bulbs for veg, and HPS for Flowering. 100w for first plant, 50w for each after. For ventilation get 3 really strong fans, 2 for exhaust, and 1 for intake. (use ducting for light blocking) Next step is to decide if you want to go soil or hydro. You have experience outdoors so I would suggest soil. Use some organic soil with no added nutes. For nutrients just use whatever you used for your outdoor grow. Other than that, you might want to line the walls with flat white or mylar. Happy growing!
Everything ^^ he said, except you don't really need an intake fan, just probably a strong exhaust. If you remove air from a space more air has to come in from somewhere to take it's place. this is called a passive intake. the more ventilation will also help control temps/humidity. Deciding what kind of lights to use depends on your power consumption concerns. LED is great for low-heat, low power usage but some argue it doesn't have the flowering yield that HPS does. HID light setups(MH/HPS) use more power, and create more heat but are the most commonly used and are tried and true. CFL and Flourescent tubes will work during veg and flower but I don't have a whole lot of experience using them in flower so I don't know how many you should be using. If you decide to go with LED-look into blackstar's products as I have a 240W flowering panel and I love it. have fun, be safe and most of all grow some dank and take pics!
Thanks! So would I need to get a different light set up for veg and flowering, or just change out the bulbs? Sorry for sounding dumb, I just don't want to fuck anything up and everyone has to start somewhere. :]
Did my first grow this year under similar space and circumstances. Dude brought up led lighting and iv been very interested in that as well, not a cfl kind of person though. If he doesnt mind funding, you could get a 250 or 400w system, plenty of light for the area and to experiment and Learn I'm sure. I bought a 250w myself, which was convinient because mine used the same ballast and reflector for both spectrums. Trying to sound simple as I'm pretty novice as well. But I mean it's possible to have one ballast power source that runs both metalhalide for veg, and w/ the switch of a bulb can power highpressuresodium. To keep things simpler and manageable if you get the picture I'm trying to paint?
Check this out. HTG Supply - The Dirty Dozen Organic Starter Pack Has absolutely everything you would need to start your grow in your closet including: 400 watt Grow Light with Four Sided Horizontal Reflector High Output High Pressure Sodium Bulb High Output Metal Halide Conversion Bulb Heavy Duty Timer Pair of High Low Reflector Hangers Nutes and Soil of Your Choice 2 Seed Starter 6 Packs 12 THREE GALLON Grow Bags 50' Roll of Reflective Mylar Thermometer / Hygrometer
hey, i have a grow similer to what your about to do, going right now. i am a prop 215 patient. .... i am using a 6x3 open closet in my room i went with the plastic white/black paper for the walls works great cleans easy great for beginers and reflects just as well as mylar unless 2-3% is gona kill you .. you can get it at any hydro store. my setup at the moment is 1x 1000 watt mh/hp ballast and aircooled reflecter. using mh for veg then when i flower i will move to a 9x12 room and be using the setup in that room so ill be running 2000 watt hps in flower im doing pure organic ... for veging i use miracle grow growers choice they bloom very nice. of course most people encounter problems with self feeding soil but if u can time the watering perfectly and just increse feeding when necessary its very reliable. when i flower i will make my own flower soil mix but no idea where to start if any one has any help ide apreciate it . i will be using 5 gal pots for each of my 19 babies( i have 19 beacause you never know how many will make it ) . if any one is curious of the strains ill go ahead an give you a teaser because pictures are soon to come. blueberry julius , blue dream, gods gift, chem dawg, mendo skunk, blue venom and ak48. and space queen. this is my first indoor grow ive done a tone of research but i jumped right into organic because i wont settle for anyless .. so if any oen can help me i need to know how to make the best organic mix for say 20 - 5 gal pots measurements and product for the mix? will be very appreciated .
They aren't as strong, but fluorescent (t5's) use less power and create less heat that needs to be vented out. You can also get a small 2' ballast with a few bulbs that will cover your whole closet.
your probably right but i wanted to participate in this thread so i figured ide "shove it all in there" so to say.
Your dad sounds chill as fuck. Some of us only fantasized about our parents doin that kinda stuff for us as kids.... Anyway, just read up everything. Every question you have, google it and get multiple perspectives from many different sources. You def wanna be lookin at the advice given here on GC and also on RIU. There's also some other reputable forums too that I forget right now but you can sort of tell which forums have the experienced growers giving the good advice and which ones don't. Any questions you have that you can't find the answer to with a google search and need like an immediate answer post it up on indoor we're here to help. But don't forget to look around first. You need potting (container size determines plant size - it's usually 1gal/ft of plant), soil (ffof, happy frog, coco, etc etc), water source, nutes (ff, humboldt, advanced nutrients, botanicare, whatever), lighting (wanna get a mh/hps switchable light, preferably. 400w Should be more than enough for that space. Make sure you get an air cooled. Or if heat/ventilation is an issue do cfl's - look that up if you need to do them). You ARE gonna need ventilation if you're going to do HID lighting (that is, MH and HPS lighting) because it produces a lot of fuckin heat. Luckily tho, it also produces a lot of fuckin bud. So once you get the air-cooled MH/HPS 400w (hell you could even do 250 if you want but the more lumens the better), hook it up to some 6 inch or 4 inch ducting, whatever size the holes are in the fixture. Hook the ducting up to an inline fan - you can go pretty weak on a 400w, probably 200cfm, but if you wanna get a 400cfm for future grows with 1000 watters (which require more ventilation power, hence the higher cfm) be my guest. It'll be better anyway for more air flow with the 400 anyway. Then hook the inline fan up to another tube of ducting, which you run out into another room or a window (though windows can be sketch, and neighbors may hear the noise from the air being shot out the ducting). The other side can have ducting hooked up to it and run into any other room, just make sure its not the same room that you're dumping the heat into. This'll bring more fresh air into the closet for the plants to breathe. That's just a brief lil tutorial for the basics. But you're def gonna wanna hit up google for more info. You got any questions pm me. Best of luck.
First off, your situation sounds awesome. Like stated before, either paint the walls white if they aren't already, or buy reflective mylar that you will tack to your walls. There's also a lining that's white on the inside and black out the outside, its called panda plastic. For vegg (when your plants building up a structure and getting some roots in the dirt, your fine with cfl's (squiggly bulbs). Depending on how tall you want it depends on how long you vegg it. Typically, one month vegg and two months flower and your done. For soil you can either get normal potting mix and add perlite for soil ventilation, or pickup a good premixed fox farm soil. This isnt recomennded for vegg because theres already nutes in the fox farm soil. Either get a 3 gallon or 5 gallon pot, that will be plenty. poke holes in the bottom for excess water to run out, put something under the pot to keep the water from draining onto the floor. Pickup a timer that plugs into your outlet. For vegg your hours are 18 hours on, 6 hours off. You can vegg at 24 hours on, 0 off if you wish. When time to flower switch your lighting to 12 on, 12 off. Water when top 1in of soil is dry. You can add nutes once you start flowering, usually use nutes every other water, or every other two waters. If you use to much you will notice it burning the leaves. You can use cfls for flower to, just may not pull as much compared to hps but the temps will be lower. Make sure to get a thermometer, generally temps over 80 are bad for the plant.
Just wanna add to this nutes can also be useful during veg. Though veg generally doesn't take long nutes can cut the time down even further if used at the proper times.
Good point, but use to early or two much and your little vegger can take a big hit, either positive or negative so beware.
make sure the lights are kept close to the plants to prevent stretching, something i didnt know at the time of my first plant. Currently they are all in flowering now only 3 for now. Im using all cfls, changed them out for veg and flowering. Most info i got from doing my research on here at grasscity
I would use LED with different red and blue color spectrum. LED's are very energy efficient and you won't have a problem with heat. For odor control I'd buy activated carbon. You can hang it throughout your closed in pantyhose and also build your own vent filter system. As far as a door is concerned, I'd buy a dark room tent that fits your space. This way you won't have a problem with additional light getting to your plants during the flowering cycle. I'd also opt for the Air-Pot container. Have fun with your indoor grow!
Definitely get yourself one T5 2x4 8 bulb. This will supply enough light to veg and even flower under. You would use the cool white bulbs for vegging and then just swamp them out for the red bulbs and BAM! You could flower with the same light! Personally, I would stay away from LED lights I love T5's and of course HPS for flowering. Check out my link below you'll see the T5's in use in my veg room on the first page of my grow journal. They run efficently and create barely any heat! They're a perfect choice for a first time grower!