My First SCROG Grow - 3rd DWC

Update #6

Grow Room is Complete!
Check the pictures out below. The first picture is the finished product. All ventilation/lighting/hydro issues have been cleared out and tested and everything's a go. The second picture is the grow tube before I attached the reflective hood. The third picture is my fuckin 40 pound ballast that I was forced to tuck under the grow room because I didn't have anything strong enough to mount it.

The last picture shows my exhaust carbon filter... you can see in the top right of the grow room I have the stanley blower-mod mounted. It intakes air from the grow tube and from the grow room and exhausts up through the back left corner into the carbon filter up top.

Everything from the carbon filter to the grow tube to the blower and the setup was hand-made based loosely on a handful of DIY tuts resurrected from OG.

2 of the bubble buckets have a single airline with a single 6'' air stone in the bottom... the other bucket has 1 line that gets split into 2 lines and runs down to two 1'' air stones that I mounted in a PVC T like Rump did in his bubble bucket.

Clones
Ok so the clones are 11 days from the day the cuttings were taken and they haven't rooted yet. I'm blaming this on the fact that the first few weeks the clones sat in rapid rooters that were sitting in a quarter inch of water and, other than the first 2 days, had the air vents open.

I think I was drowning them a bit and slowing growth so I dumped out the trays water and now just make sure the rapid rooters stay moist.

Additionally I'm keeping the vents closed to maintain a 100% humidity environment from now on until they root (I take the lid off 3-5 times a day and blow air over the clones)... the clones just recently started yellowing a bit but I'm hoping thats because they're spending their energy rooting.

The temperatures have been pretty low here too, the nursery is at a constant 75-82 degrees, but I'm sure the rapid rooters themselves are much cooler, so I'm sure thats slowed growth a bit too.

If they don't root by day 15 I'll take new cuttings. Remember, this was my first attempt at cloning so it was a learning experience. Next time I'm gonna fill the rapid rooter tray with perlite under the rooters instead of water to hold moisture and help maintain the 100% humidity.

Questions
Will the stress I've put on these clones affect their vegging? Is it worth it to scrap the clones and start over fresh or will these fellas be alright for transplant?

I'm using 6 cfl's inside the clone cabinet... some people have said this is too much, is it?

 

Also considering grabbing an MH Conversion bulb for vegging (the bulb there is a 400w HPS)... any thoughts on this?? FYI total setup costs: $970 but about $200 was spent on tools and $150 spent on screw-ups... I think I could have built this same setup for under $600 if re-done.

Oh well.. if I yield 10oz thats $97 an oz.... I pay $400-$500 now . (BTW I'm expecting more than 10oz based on previous DWC's without a scrog)

 

Ok so I took 4 of the clones that were unsexed out to see if they had rooted (curiosity, I don't need these clones they were just an experiment)... and 3 hadn't even sprouted a single root! the other one had a single millimeter long root so I put it back in the rapid rooter and back in the nursery. If I don't get any of these clones to root I'm going to purchase a heating pad and re-clone immediately. Thanks Grim

 

I found out distilled water is less than I thought it was. Buying 14 gallons of distilled every 10 days isn't as big an operational cost as I was expecting so I'm just gonna play it safe with that... thanks for the input!

 

Looks like I'll do that eventually. I didn't realize they were in the $100-$200 range I thought they were more.

 

On a worse note... all the clones are dead. I'm going to re-cut today, but now I'm cutting from a flowering plant so it's going to take even longer. Lessons learned from my failure:

1. Rapid Rooters don't need to sit in water, it will drown the clones.
2. Cloning area was a little too cold, going for a seedling heat mat this time around
3. Instead of sitting the RR in water I'm going to sit the tray on a bed of perlite to retain moisture.
4. I have zero patience --- FUCK!

 

Ok so in leu of my failed attempt at rapid rooters (my first attempt at cloning).. I've built a custom bubble-cloner for the next round of clones. Check out the pictures below.

I put this together in 20 minutes from parts I had in the house. The container is a styrofoam bait-bucket for fishing. I'm using extra airline to hold the clones in place, I slit them down the side so they expanded to fit in the buckets and I'll drop the clones right in them.

Any thoughts on this, anything I can do better? And once I drop the clones in what sort of light should I have on them? I'm thinking of mixing a tiny bit of Olivia's cloning gel into the water and giving them 2 cfl's.

Last pic is of the clones from last time after 12 days... not even a hint of a root.

 

I'm going at it with no root hormone for now, fuck it... (I couldn't find the olivia's when I was going to take the clones, I dunno where I put it)

Check out this pic with the clones in. I took the clones from Ice mother plants that were 2 days into flowering. Since it was ini flower for so short I'm hoping it wont slow down the clone process too much, but I expect it'll take longer than 7-10 days. I'm more confident about this batch then the last.

I took one of those cfl's out, there is only 1 in now.. do you think this is too close to the plants... is this okay?

 

Hmmm... not sure where I said my pH was that high, my test kit only goes down to 6.0 because its for aquariums so I get it down to 6 then add a drop or too for good measure so I'm estimating my pH at around 5.5-5.8. (I'm gonna get a better pH tester before I transplant to the grow room).

Is a humidity dome really necessary with the bubble cloner? I would think that the roots being submerged in the water would be enough, does the rest of the clone really require 100% humidity? They're looking great and healthy, really perking up.

The clones have actually started to stink pretty bad... a nice strong fresh ganja aroma, but I'm surprised that I can smell it so strongly already (the smell completely dominates by 20x19 bedroom, and the hallways outside, although my girl swears she can't smell it unless she gets close... I have always had a very sensitive sense of smell but still...). Any thoughts on clone odor? lol that sounds funny, or maybe its just the banana kush.

oh and thanks t33to and shadow, your help and guidance is much appreciated!

 

But they look great... the original limp and falling over is done and they're perky as shit, standing strait up. I would throw a dome on it but i don't have one to fit over the whole bucket. I've been misting the leaves a few times a day to compensate... i mean they look GREAT... dome 100% necessary?

Thanks again Shadow