My stealth intake system. Four 1" holes drilled on the outside of the chamber painted black. See next pic for more explanation . . . PIC 21 - Outside grow box stealth vent holes
Here is the inside before the holes are covered. Painted the area black wherever light may reflect or any places you may be able to see inside the four vent holes. This area will be covered with a square piece made out of molding that creates an in out system you cannot see in from the outside. See next pic . . . PIC 22 - Vent holes inside grow box
Last pic of inlet vent assembled. I hope you can tell what I've done kind of hard to explain. The vent holes *outside* are on the top and the *inside* vent holes are on the bottom. Using the 90 degree corner molding I was able to make a small duct system that lets air in but no light out and is virtually unnoticeable from the outside. PIC 23 - Stealth inlet vent assembled
Here is a closeup of the bathroom vent fan. Draws directly from the top of the grow chanber and vents immediately outisde. Wiring is still in the works and will be cleaned up but well on its way . . . PIC 24 - Closeup of vent out fan
As you can see the grow chamber has been fully enclosed, caulked ($2 home store) and painted white to make it brighter, eliminate any light emission and close the system completely. I'm leaving the floor unfinished as I may raise the height on this adding a 12" bottom piece or so. All wiring is hidden behind sliding door on the top right. PIC 25 - Inside grow box mostly finished
This is the door enclosure for the front of the grow box. I added molding ($3 home store) vertically along the inside of the front to hold the door in place with cabinet latches ($3 home store). Four cabinet latches along the top as well (pictured here) hold it in place very well at the moment. Covered the inside with the posterbaord from before ( as I ran out of white paint ; D lol ) so the entire inside chamber is white when closed up. No light leaks and almost eliminates the internal cooling fan noise. PIC 26 - Grow box removable door
Here is the grow box with the door in place. Need to paint/stain it to mask it a little but it does the job, is quick and easy to remove/replace. Has come a long way but still needs some tweaking. PIC 27 - Grow box closed up
My babies inside the grow box. Keeping the light as close as possible and monitoring heat all the time. I need more ventilation as it is barely adequate at the moment. When I add an hps to this system the temp will skyrocket I'm sure. Female is on the left and male on the right. They are both bushing out well so far and looking fairly healthy. Need to tie them down soon and start some horizontal growing for SOG/SCROG. If you look closely you can see the blue tube furthest away from the camera and the full spectrum red nearest. PIC 28 - Babies in the grow box
Just another gratuitous picture of the babies lol. The fan pictured is on 24/7 for plant strength/cooling and lighting is on 24/7 at the moment as well. Bathroom vent fan is timed to vent 30 minutes of every hour and is keeping temp from 83 to 90 F. Still having terrible troubles getting germinated seeds to root in soil. Made them moister, made them drier, kept out of light, put under light, tried peat pellets, rockwool and regular soil, made sure temp was not too high or low, adjusted pH and flushed mediums before transferring sprouts . . . all in a scientific manner as well to isolate what my problem may be . . . ARGGG I'm a seed killer. Am running out of seed stock and hope someone may have a solution, but I will keep trying and keep all posted about the plants now growing and my germinating experiment. Hope you all enjoy or maybe learn something from my chronicles and thank you much in advance for viewing and adding comments. Peace out and more to come soon . . . PIC 29 - Babies in grow box
Very very nice. Do you have clones? Otherwise, how do you know what sex your plants are? Your grow box is great, do you use extraction and pull in fans for ventilation? I only seen holes. What's your soil mix's? Did you use any compost creations or blood/bone or bat guano mix that seems so popular? What strain are your seeds? You might have said, if you did sorry I missed that :/. Your plants are looking very good though, you are deffinitely gonna have to add the extra 12" of space though if you want decent sized plants, unless you do some heavy training. Other then looking very good. Very good indeed, keep up the good work.
Thanks tons for the post Swaenk really appreciate it. To answer your questions . . . No I have not taken clones, but may attempt it some in the future. I sexed them early (about 3 weeks old ) by giving them 12/12 of direct sunlight and they showed their sex. Then I swithched them back to 24/7 under the lights in the grow box. I have a bathroom vent fan that sucks air out of the grow chamber and blows it out of the whole enclosure. It's also wired to a switch that allows me to set the fan at 3 speeds for less noise or air flow. I used Expert brand Perfect Mix potting soil from Wal-Mart. I have only used Super-Thrive so far no other ferts yet but I *will* be using them I'm sure after reading what everyone said about blood/bone/kelp meal etc. in your grow journal. The soil has fed them fairly well until now. I had some small deficiencies yes, but it was due to high soil pH lockup, that's fixed now. My seed stock is from friends who are stoners so they are a surprise mixture really lol. No one remembered exactly where the seeds came from 8 ). Am planning on purchasing from a seed bank once I get the hang of germination. I think my pH is also having an effect on that as well. Am planning on starting to train the female as well, she will outgro the box it is tiny yes (heightwise at least). Thanks again mate, will keep you all posted and keep an eye on your journal also Swaenk best of luck. GG
And to answer my own retarded question LOL. I RE-read some grow information I had seen previously and got the whole story on seeds etc. The female also is the seed producer but needs to be pollenated by the male. Well that puts me in kind of a bad position. I need seeds badly for more experimantation, so that leaves me the option of trying to pollenate one branch of the female or buying all my new seeds from a seed bank. I'm also entertaining the thought of cutting clones from the mother I have but I'm a newb and don't want to hack her apart and kill the clones too LOL. Oh well, decisions, decisions. Thanks again in advance for reading all, will keep this updated often. GG
Cloning is easier then you think. If I were you I would just get some e-books. Or buy some from your local shop. I have two e-books and they are both top quality, I can email them to you if you want. They go over absolutely everything it's amazing. To cover the basics of cloning, first you are going to need rockwhool cubes, sterilized cutting tools, rooting formula, and a mother plant From there you take 45 degree angel cuts on tip ends 2 inches down from initial leaf growth at an end. Don't cut off the fan leaves, this is bad. This will also increase the bushyness of your plant . From there you take the cuttings, and slightly cut off the outside skin at the bottom of the stem. Then place the stem in some rooting formula and place it into your rockwhool cube a bit down. From there treet it like a seedling, there will be a slight recovery period for the plant. But like I said, this is much better covered in the e-books I have. Just PM with your email and I will see if I can attach them. If that won't work we can DCC over irc.
This is my first grow, and i am curious to see someone else trying the jiffy cube method. From all the research i have done (hours and hours), i have only seen 2 mentions of the jiffy cubes besides your own. They both said stay away from the jiffy! But, possibly that was the reason u were havin problems getting them to root? Have you tried any other methods? Such as puttin em in lil cups when the seed opens up? Or all jiffy? Plus i wanna see what someone has to say who has gotten plants to grow from the jiffy cubes. Pro's/con's etc. Hit me up, I WANT TO LEARN! lol Thanks- Toke
Actually, the person at the hydro store hooked me up with some to try as I told them I was having problems. I started with peat pellets, then tried regular soil, now jiffy cubes. I tried sprouting directly in the planting medium as well with no luck. Will let you know how my latest try goes. From all I have been reading here as of late though, I may be aiming too high for amy all around pH. Am monitoring this quite a bit now and hoping that is the problem, burning up my root tips. More later . . Gg
Two decisions tonight. Male goes outside and female gets some LST (low stress training - correct me if I'm wrong please. I had my info all wrong on males so he is going outside soonish. Won't be growing for pollen as he is a different strain from the female I'm almost positive. Gonna make butter if he lives ; D. The female had too many grow sites under her canopy so after rereading Dread's journal I gave it a go. I was nervous LOL, her stem is tough! She did bend over fairly nicely for me after I gently worked it a minute. Did not want to prune as this is my first grow and I will be taking clone cuttings later, wanted to minimize stress. We will see . . . Gg
Ah well, had some pics of the girl before and after training. Will try tomorrow. Later all and thanks again for the help. Gg
If it worked for you, then it can work for me! Viva la jiffy cube! lol Ill let u know how my grow goes, gonna start my own journal soon, been keepin one on my comp, just not enough happenin to post on here yet. GL with the lst, i bet your gonna get a nice harvest this time around ;-) Thanks for the reply -Toke
Ok I'm stoned lmao . . . was trying to post pics I had not cropped or compressed /bonk self. Here goes . . . PIC 30 - Female before low stress training
Here is the female after I tied her top down. Like I said, her stem was tough and I was very nervous about breaking it but be gentle and take your time it will work. You can see how many new bud sites it exposed to the light that were previously hidden by the canopy. WOOHOO! PIC 31 - Female after low stress train, my first attempt at it