Help with new grow room?

Howdy!

Well, I started back in 2013 with a 4x4 tent, graduated to 2 4x4 tents in 2015 and recently upgraded to a complete 8ft by 12ft area.

Now I am graduating to something even better. Already fully insulated and wired building that is 8ft x 26ft. This is the first time I have ever ran anything indoor this large. I know it will be more upkeep and complicating to control environmental factors with a room this large and more labor intensive but I can handle all of that.

I plan on cooling it with a window AC unit and probably heating with either propane, kerosene or electric. Not sure on that yet.

My question is lighting and ventilation. In an area this large how much lighting do you recommend I use? I was thinking 4 to 6 1000 watters. The two hoods I own as of now are 6 inch air cooled, both block busters. I also have one 440cfm fan and one 400cfm fan.

Plan on getting it up and going within a couple weeks. Any recommendations?

Most of my cropping comes from outdoor guerilla growing, but as the eradication efforts are getting stronger and the heat is picking up more each year with the LEO swarming my grows, I hope to reduce my outdoor growing by about 30% and focus on some indoor growing as well. I have grown indoor for 6 years now going on 7 and harvest a couple pounds every 3 months or so. Honestly I would love to finally be able to setup something perpetual since I now have the room to do so. I'm very excited to get this started.

I would steer clear of a perpetual. Significantly easier to grow clean without the use of pesticides. Splitting things up into multiple flower rooms is as close to perpetual as you need, it's just difficult to stagger their start times. You'll constantly fight the urge to fill them all at once. lol

8' Wide doesn't leave much room for a walkway. Hrmmmmm.

Douglas.Curtis said:

I would steer clear of a perpetual. Significantly easier to grow clean without the use of pesticides. Splitting things up into multiple flower rooms is as close to perpetual as you need, it's just difficult to stagger their start times. You'll constantly fight the urge to fill them all at once. lol

8' Wide doesn't leave much room for a walkway. Hrmmmmm.

Click to expand...

Thanks Douglas.. I may end up doing multiple flower rooms, first run is going to be a complete fill up. Every inch will be filled and the canopy touching the walls. My first pull I need to be a large one.

I'm not so worried about a walkway, my current grow room does not have one. Makes it far more complicating to water and tend to plants as far as training, feeding, rearranging etc goes but I don't mind moving plants around a bit, making my way through.

Hmmm, wonder how many plants it would take to fill that mf'er up with a SOG, all 28 x 8 feet???

Just kidding, no way in hell i'd run those kinds of numbers.

Anyone else help me out here??

I don't know how big a flowering area you're planning on but you really want 50 watts a sq ft for this,its not as important in veg but if you're vegging big plants you want higher wattage there too.You need to me a little more specific with what you're trying to do,there are a lot of different grow styles from sog to trees and it matters when sizing equipment.50 watts a sq ft for flowering is pretty universal though

I'd say you're looking at 8 lights, maybe 10. You will want a minisplit I think over a window unit for AC. Probably 3 or 4 tons.
You gonna seal that room? You mentioned vent fans, but also AC and heating? I'd recommend sealing it up.

Floridian said:

I don't know how big a flowering area you're planning on but you really want 50 watts a sq ft for this,its not as important in veg but if you're vegging big plants you want higher wattage there too.You need to me a little more specific with what you're trying to do,there are a lot of different grow styles from sog to trees and it matters when sizing equipment.50 watts a sq ft for flowering is pretty universal though

Click to expand...

Flowering area will be 21ft by 8ft. I have a whole different location where I will be vegging. I will veg in my current room and flower in the new one that os 8ft by 24.

Plants will likely be vegged for one month and flowered in 7 to 10 gallon containers. Unless I end up shooting for a new grow style I have always vegged for a month and a week or so and flowered out in 5 gallon containers. Using soiless mix.

I don't usually do and not plan on doing and sea of green. I used to back in the day but too risky now. I usually do some light LST and that is about it.

BakedBandit said:

I'd say you're looking at 8 lights, maybe 10. You will want a minisplit I think over a window unit for AC. Probably 3 or 4 tons.
You gonna seal that room? You mentioned vent fans, but also AC and heating? I'd recommend sealing it up.

Click to expand...

Not sure on 10 for the sake of my pocket lol but yeah 6 or 8 may work out. Thought about converting from my HIDs to LEDs, just a thought. I know the HPS out performs the leds in yields but it is just a thought.

When you say "seal" are you talking about completely sealing it and using co2? Are you saying if I use AC or heat with vent fans that it isnt gonna work out? How else would you cool or heat it?

MountainBudz said:

Not sure on 10 for the sake of my pocket lol but yeah 6 or 8 may work out. Thought about converting from my HIDs to LEDs, just a thought. I know the HPS out performs the leds in yields but it is just a thought.

When you say "seal" are you talking about completely sealing it and using co2? Are you saying if I use AC or heat with vent fans that it isnt gonna work out? How else would you cool or heat it?

Click to expand...

Honestly but 6 lights isn't gonna cover 21x8. You need 8 for that.
Yes I mean seal it and use co2. You really have no control over heat or humidity when you are constantly venting your room. I would only use a vent fan for air cooling the hoods with air from outside the room pushed they the lights and back outside again.

sealed is more expensive but much more rewarding. I also feel like a sealed environment is easier to control.
You will want a mini split that will match up to your lights, such as 4,000 btu per 1000 watt light.
Ive noticed that I can get away with running higher temps with LED then with HID. Which in my case is good because its HOT! haha Good luck .

How tall are your ceilings? You could get by with 6 but you'd need hoods that throw a really wide spread. With 1000 DE in the wider oriented hoods you'd be at a daily light integral of about 24:

https://www.extension.purdue.edu/extmedia/ho/ho-238-w.pdf

See the map on pg 2 for comparison to outdoor sun.

With 2 more hoods you'd be close to 35 DLI.

With 6 regular HPS knock 20% off those numbers. You'd need a ton of LEDs to be effective in a space that big.

https://growershouse.com/images/PDFs/BUGBEEpub__6441190.pdf

DE is the most efficient way to go if you have the ceiling height.

I definitely would recommend a mini-split for your area. Like ExoticProphet 4,000 btu/1000watts. You may be able to get away with a little less than that depending on your temps outside and if you seal the room and have your light system venting outside and pulling air from outside. That would give you an isolated system where alot of the heat generated would be just swept outside. Regarding LED's, unless you're willing to lay down a lot of cash, HID are the most effective for the price at the moment. It would take a whole lot of LED's to light the space you're trying to fill-but if you did take that route you could bring your cooling costs down. Unfortunately, not many LED's have cooled hoods- so you couldn't isolate them. I'm on my first go around with some COB's, replacing my MH/HPS and I'm actually worried about it getting too cool in the winter as my area is not actively heated.