Noob Questions

1. Do you have a fan circulating air within the grow space? Helps equalise humidity and strengthen stems.
Do you have an exhaust fan? Or is it a closed system?
2. A week should be plenty of time.
3 & 4) I dont have enough experience to comment.
5) Id say the limiting factor is your light before space. 3 plants suited to the light based on real wattage draw of 180w and 60w per plant. With unlimited light you could fit 12 in there very tightly or anything up to that.
6) Thats a good question Id also like to know. I keep mine in the same position of the tent but spin them as the centre of the tent gets more light than the edges.
7) preflowers can help indicate sex after about 3/4 weeks but it can be tough to tell them apart so early. If its male it ll affect yield because you ll want to kill it or it can pollinate the ladies.

 

Yes, a picture would help. But get creative. You may try some insulation. Reflectix may be something to look into, some cut plywood with insulation in between, 6-mil plastic sheeting. Anything to better insulate and make your space more air tight--these are just materials to consider, everyone's build is different.

I would wait longer than a week after transplant. For me, I use my eye like I'm searing a steak. I just know when it's done. I want to see some new growth take place after transplant. This is where the art of it comes in. Hard to give an exact time to wait, but you're not God, so creation of the entire world will take you longer than one week.

I actually like Walmart bag soil. It retains water well, it's consistent. Only problem I have with it is that non-organic soil, such as Walmart brand or Miracle Gro are loaded with nutrients. When you add nutrients throughout your grow you then run the risk of overfertilization and all of the associated problems. If you're game, the best option is to make your own soil. I can give you more advice about this if you want. I use a really basic recipe with excellent results. I have many stables nearby and 50% of my recipe uses aged horse manure. I have used this mix indoors as well--the only trick to bringing what's outdoors inside is to pasteurize. Again, another fairly simple procedure--my method involves 5 gallon buckets and a hot car. Not very scientific, but here in SoCal my car gets the perfect 180f. That said, lets say you want to stick with bag soil. My advice: don't buy anything fancy. Big brand soil that is organic. The reason I say this is because I have found that the bigger brands have better consistency and better overall water retention to drainage ratio. If you want to just dabble with mixing up your own soil, here is a recipe. (60% organic potting soil, 20% cactus mix, 20% aged horse manure --pasteurize horse manure in turkey bags in oven at 180.) I have tried many brands of bag soil. People swear by Fox Farms. It's good soil. It is expensive and I don't find results any better than regular soil.

Your nutes are good. All nutes are good. It's important to really understand how plants absorb nutrients. Understand how fertilizer works. In short, you're growing in good soil. How much fertilizer do you need to add to that soil and when? It has taken me twenty years to fully understand this and still learning. I guess I'm a slow learner. The best advice that I can give is to add as little nutrients as possible if you're new. I could go on about why, but to try to shorten this already long response, chances are that problems will arise from adding too much and less chance of adding too little. My recommendation for nutes is a basic liquid organic fertilizer from, lets just say, Walmart. Again, all fertilizer is good (because in theory all fertilizer is the same, NPK), organics are preferred because they are gentler and somewhat more error proof. As an experiment, whatever you're using for nutes now, reduce your concentrate by half and observe results. Slowly build back up. It will teach you how much your plants need for the future and because you are starting with good soil, the only deficiency likely to occur is maybe a little nitrogen, which you can quickly remedy.

Space issues, you will have to experiment with. Depends on how you train your plants and achieve air flow. Biggest problems for you will be height. Your space is small, but you can manage it. My advice, start with two. Yes, only two. My suggestion is to try to maximize those two and experiment with training techniques that do so. Less is more if you get creative with training (SOG, supercropping, LST). Instead of shooting for the moon as a new grower, try to go smaller with the best quality product. Then do it again and again.

Turning your plants to improve air flow is the only reason I can think of, but probably not necessary. Based on your small set up I don't really understand why this is necessary.

It is not generally not advised to put your plants into a 12/12 lighting schedule before they are sexually mature. Why would you? Size restrictions? Have you considered trying autos? They are quick and stay short and flower automatically (as the name suggests).

Good luck.

 

The 180 true watts drawn comes from the Amazon page info of the light you mentioned. Everyone gets caught by the 1000w "comparison" figure, myself included, so dont feel bad. Its a blurple light so I think 50w or 60w is considered the minimum per plant for that type. Thats only a rough estimate because the real benchmark is PPFD. With quantum boards it goes down to about 30w minimum as theyre about 50% more efficient.

You ll handily enough get 3/4 plants matured with the light. The science behind it is a little beyond me. Im just recounting things Ive read/heard.

 

I dont know anything about closed systems other than you may need to provide a source of co2 to prevent it being your limiting factor. But maybe the air exchange when you go in and out is enough for a small grow? Somebody with more closed system experience might chime in.