New Warehouse Growrooms

[JG's Ghost]

Hey Folks:

Been a while since I did any growing, but I'm slowly getting back into it. I rented a warehouse that has two floors. 500 sq feet per floor, and am building the grow area on the second floor.It will have two 8' x 8' Veg/Flowering rooms, a 6' x 8' seedling/clone/control room, a 3' x 8' equipment/storage room. Below the equip/store room will be a 10' x 5' room for a 1 hp water chiller, and a blower to move the hot air out into the main garage area.

The top Floor will look like this..

As you can see the doors to the Veg/Flower rooms open into the control room. So no need to worry about light leakage. The reason I left space at the right end is because the garage door rolls up into a box there, and I needed to leave enough space to get to it in case it needs work.

I've got the whole place framed out now, and thought you might like to see the progress.



This is a pic standing next to the 3x8 room looking down the hallway.



The 3 x 8 room



The ceiling nailers in the 3 x 8 room, and the beginnings of the frame for a 2' x 4' fluorescent light which is now installed. I'll have a 55 gallon drum fed from the 1 hp chiller below to cool the lights with 6" H.I. Icebox's at the end of the cool tubes, and work as mini A/C units in each grow room using 360 cfm fans to recirculate the air in the grow rooms. As yoou can kinda see the A/C ducting got in the way, and I had to lower the cieling to 7', but the side facing the hallway will be 8 foot, and covered with drywall.



A look a one of the grow rooms, and the equip room from the control room.



The other grow room from the control room.



A look at the whole thing from the end of the right hand grow room.

I plan on dry walling the entire outside, and the control room, but inside the grow rooms I'll be installing R-13 15" insulation held in place by firring strips that will also be used to staple reflective film from floor to ceiling, and I plan on putting the film on the ceiling as well.

So. That's it so far. Whadda think?

JG

 

[Securityfirst]

Hi

I really like the "with 6" H.I. Icebox's at the end of the cool tubes" aspect of it. You say 2 8 by 8 flower rooms,, how many watts in each room? How much electrical do you have to mess with? 100 amps?

Looks good so far

SF

 

[Critter]

Sub'd

 

[JG's Ghost]

Hi

I really like the "with 6" H.I. Icebox's at the end of the cool tubes" aspect of it. You say 2 8 by 8 flower rooms,, how many watts in each room? How much electrical do you have to mess with? 100 amps?

Looks good so far

SF

Gonna have a 60 amp breaker in the main panel split to a sub panel wit two 20 amp 240 circuits for the lights (1 1k per room, but with 99% reflective film that should be enough for 9 plants), and 2 20 amp 110 circuits for the chiller, and blower. The rest of the stuff (fans, pumps etc) can be handled by the existing wiring.

JG

 

[budleydoright]

Nice work. Anxious to get a report on the Iceboxes.

 

[JG's Ghost]

They work great! Like I said above I made a chiller out of a small A/C unit, and had to turn it on, and off manually, but it kept the 5' x 7' room in the mid to high 70's depending on the temps outside the room.

When you first see an Icebox you'll say "awwww. I could make one of these myself, and you could. It's nothing but a little radiator with a plastic housing, and a couple of allen screws to tighten it around the light. I've done just about every type of DIY I can think of, and I'd rather just buy these. I do recommend just buying the iceboxes. H.I. charges a fortune for the addons which you can make yourself for a lot less $.

JG

 

[RomulusUSA]

Def want to see this one. Good call on what you're setting up for the power, that'll allow you to put 3 1k's into each room if need be. Gosh I wish I had that much room.

 

[budleydoright]

I have an Icebox but don't use it. I'm using the fresca sol water jackets. The Ice box just couldn't overcome the intense heat that my space is in. In cooler months yes, but not in the summer. I am however considering building one big ice box to cool my next build.
I've been watercooled for about 3 years now and am pretty sure I'm going to keep running it.

 

[JG's Ghost]

H.I. makes a wall mount for the icebox so you can use it just as a mini A/C. You might want to look at that. Do those fresca water jackets cut down on the light getting to the plants?

I've always been leery of having electricity that close to water. Ever had a leak?

JG

 

[JG's Ghost]

I've always wanted to do a real SCROG, but have always vegged in one room, and flowered in another so it wasn't possible. With these new ballasts that can handle both MH, and HPS I'll finally get the chance. I'm hoping for better than 1 gram per watt.

JG

 

[budleydoright]

Been chasing that one for a while myself. Hit about .75 last round. Low ceiling, short veg. Scrog would be great but it would get too tight in my setup.

 

[JG's Ghost]

I've hit it before. Damn near doubled it, but that was with 4000 watts covering an 11' x 13' room with all the walls covered with reflective film, and vertizontal reflectors.

JG

 

[JG's Ghost]

Well. I've gotten a couple florescent light fixtures installed for general lighting proposes, and spent all day yesterday drilling holes in concrete to mount drywall mounting strips for room #1. I actually ran 2 DeWalt 18volt batteries dead doing it. I've also gotten most of the ceiling nailers installed around the perimeters of each room. Still have growroom #2 to do, and I have to figure out exactly where I'm going to mount the fans, and reinforce those areas. Mounting the fluros took care of any cross bracing I'd need for the ceiling in the equip room, and the control room, but I'll need to do something for the two 8' x 8' rooms, and I'll need to put in a ceiling for the hallway, and small spaces outside the grow areas.

Things are moving along, but it's slow going doing it all by myself. Gotta think of some novel ideas when I want to mount, an 8' piece of wood, and hold it in place while I'm mounting it.

JG

 

[budleydoright]

Do those fresca water jackets cut down on the light getting to the plants?

I've always been leery of having electricity that close to water. Ever had a leak?

JG

Yes, there is a reduction due to the glass/water but that is easily made up for by reducing the distance between the bulb and canopy, even an inch or two is enough.

Yes, I have had a leak, but the design of the fixture really isolates the bulb. You have to be very thorough when running water cooled. I have had my share of wc related failures.

My system has a water flow switch and a high temp cutoff, I will soon have a high temp cutoff based on water temp as well. I test my no flo weekly. Once you get it dialed in though it rocks.

My system now runs with almost no AC with the dehumidifier water cooled and now that the temps are getting cooler. In the heat of the summer, it takes 8000 btu of AC on 80 % of the time in addition to the frescas.

 

[JG's Ghost]

Sounds nice. I may try one some day, but with LEDs coming down in price they may beat out the whole cooling thing.

I'm beat. Every muscle in my body is stiff/sore from this construction. This setup is meant to last 5 years. I have the perfect location, non nosy neighbors, and a landlord who does not give a shit what I do. It's a condo warehouse, and he owns 14 of the 22 units so he pretty much can do as he wants. I took today off, but back at it again tomorrow. More concrete drilling in room #2, and then I'm almost done with 2 x 4s. Then it's on to 1 x 2s. I'm actually looking forward to that. Can't wait to get to the plumbing, and electrical. That will mean I'm almost finished.

JG

Almost forgot I have to rerun the A/C ducting as well. One will go into the equip room which will have a 55 gallon drum of water for the iceboxes, and though its being cooled by a 1 hp chiller a little extra never hurts. Another will go into the control room, and the rest (4 more) will go to spaces outside the grow areas. It was nice of the last tenant to leave me about 100 feet of insulated 6" ducting.

 

[SoloIsHungry]

very cool man,its really fun to see you construct the space.cant wait to see you fill it up...
so what will the grow style be?nutrients,medium,strains?
or are we not that far just yet?

 

[ThcInfused]

sounds like quite a project! best of luck

 

[Granger2]

JG,
If your interested in LEDs, Here's what I've been drooling over lately. Good luck. -granger

http://www.prosourceworldwide.com/I...-Grow-Lights-p/illuminator jumbo ufo 180w.htm
Video testimonial-commercial grower
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kxPvN9ke2Xg

 

[budleydoright]

JG,
If your interested in LEDs, Here's what I've been drooling over lately. Good luck. -granger

http://www.prosourceworldwide.com/I...-Grow-Lights-p/illuminator jumbo ufo 180w.htm
Video testimonial-commercial grower
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kxPvN9ke2Xg

I'm not anti LED, but I have heard nothing but bad things about the UFO type lights. Plus much like AN their ad reads like one for credit repair or penis enlargement. Always a red flag for me!!!

 

[JG's Ghost]

very cool man,its really fun to see you construct the space.cant wait to see you fill it up...
so what will the grow style be?nutrients,medium,strains?
or are we not that far just yet?

I'll be using NFT systems very similar to these....

They have produced real well in the past when I had to move plants from veg room to Flower room. I'm excited about how well they will do with SCROG.....



The system was my own design, and I've added a few things since then. I have a hybrid aero/NFT system that should do very well for young plants under aero, and switch to NFT as they get big enough.

For nutes I'm using Rez's formula, but with AN nutes instead of GH

Medium will be another of my inventions. Pool Noodles cut to fit 3" holes with a 1/2" lip to keep them from falling in the hole



They work pretty well..

Don't you think?


Strains.... Well that's a tough one. I'm gonna start with some feminized Ice from Nirvana because I don't want to wait to see how many males I get, Next will be Sweet Cindy, and then I have seeds I've picked up in my travels through Jamaica, and the Caribbean. I also have Durban Poison from Nirvana, and several other strains I've bought from Dutch Grown. She does make good seeds.

JG