I am currently building my first grow room and would like some advice from experienced indoor growers. Here are the specs of the room. My main room will be 3ft6 deep, 4ft6 wide, and 5ft6 high. I am planning on fitting six plants in there at a time. Room itself will be a wooden frame with refelctive plastic sheets for walls. I was also planning on adding a second smaller grow box for the initial growth periods. This box will have the following dimensions: 1ft4 deep, 2ft9 wide, and 2ft6 high. I'll be growing to start in soil, but may switch to a deep water culture after I get comfortable. I would like the setup to be as quiet as possible and not overly complicated. My questions are: Are these room sizes adequate? What are my best lighting options for each room? What kind of fans will I need? Are there any tips you may have to optimize my setup preformance (keeping in mind that I'm trying to start simple)?
I would say a 250 watt Hps cooled with a 4 inch duct blower. I would personally only grow 2 in that size of a box. If you do some Low stress or screen of green you will fill that space up with a nice even canopy. Soil will keep plants more manageable with that size imo. I would also suggest going straight to hydro. I find it 20 times easier and cleaner with better results. I assume your other box will be a clone/veg box. I would use 23 watt 6000 k or higher CFL bulbs. They kick ass for vegging and are nice and cheap. You can use some cheap pc fans to cool the box. Go to any custom computer shop and they will have hundreds in a bin for like a dollar. You might even have some old comps laying around you can tear apart. I could see people supporting a 400 watt hps. You might be able to pull it off. I never put one in that small of a space. But I know they throw off some serious heat. If you think about it your light and reflector will take up about a foot or more once mounted. If you use a bubble bucket thats about 2 feet or so. So you will only end up with like 2 feet of grow space once all is said and done. So considering all of that I think a 250 watt hps would be the weapon of choice.
I am a little worried about going hydro, there seems like more possibility for problems with all the water tanks. Can I really only fit two plants in that space?
I would suggest buying a grow tent of similar specs. I have built a few boxes in my day. Wood boxes get heavy. Also you think you will save money but once all is said and done it adds up. All the tools drill bits saws brackets glues spray paint and what not. Gas on trips to the store, and left over materials. Then you have to wait for paint and glue to dry. Not to mention mistakes in the process of building that set your back. The grow tents go up in like 8 mins. Nothing complicated.You can break the tent down, move it, already line with reflective material, and has all the vent holes and light mounts/ blower mounts built in. I will never build a box again!
I see alot more problems with the soil grows. In soil the problems are much harder to diagnose and seem to surface much earlier. Using the lucas formula in hydro the only problems I ever see is over ferting, and a cal mag deff. Cal mag deff is easy to spot and fix. Edit: pH can be an issue to new comers. Not hard just set it to 5.6-5.8. If the color on the pH solution is close your good. pH your water after you add your nutes. This takes a little practice, I personally don't like using alot of pH up and pH down. I would suggest practicing on a few gallons alone and see how much pH down you need to get the pH right for a gal. Then apply that ratio to however much water you use then recheck and make sure you get the same result. At this point I just eye out my pH down, I check it but its always on point. So I stopped checking every time. I just check if things start looking fishy, and still its not the pH.
I already have the frame for the room built, its a little flimsy cause its made out of 1x2s, but it is sturdy enough.
You could fit 6 in there if your going for variety or something. They will just need to be a lil smaller. I also would not suggest making a 6 site DWC unit. I would suggest giving every plant its own res. Because every plant has slightly different needs. But mostly for flushing. Because a lot of plants finish maturing at different rates. One might want to be flushed while another one still has 2 or 3 weeks left in its flowering cycle.
I agree and do bubbleponics! Im doing LST and its very effective at filling space. I have seen giant greenhouses that they only use 1-2 plants and then they just do training and fill the whole greenhouse. Could you use plastic on the frame your built because if you can just use plastic you would really cut down on weight. Also soil is not hard, bit of a learning curve but easy to do. I use organics and have never had a burn. Try Earth Juice its organic and usable in a bubbleponic setup or soil.
Ya 1x2's are good. Keep the thing from weighing 80 pounds when your done! You might want to look into some auto flowering strains. That way the plants don't stretch another 2 feet when flowering. I grew out some bomb ass auto strains. The potency was equal to any photo period strain. However the buds were a bit more leafy, but the leafs were covered in tricomes non the less.
Are autoflowering seeds widely available? Does that mean I can keep vegging and flowering plants in the same room? Despite your advice I think I'll start with soil. I've heard DWC gets great results, but it seems a little complicated for a first attempt.
Awwww man.... Its no more complicated then making mac n cheese. Yea autos are widely available. I get my from The Attitude Seedbank. If you google that name it will be the top hit. Yes you can keep vegging plants and flowering plants in the same room with autos because they flower based on maturity not photoperiod. ( no one knows for sure what makes them auto flower but we will go with maturity.)
I've a quick question, I've grown my 1st plant & I'm very happy with the results, so I'm going again, but I want more energy efficeint lighting. I know you start them at 6000k or higher, I've sourced 19000k bulbs, is that too high or the higher the better? (no pun intended) again at flowering, I use a 2200k hps, if I can get something in a lower wattage and a high lumen output, should I try to get them as far into the red spectrum as poss? 1000k maybe?