Apartment Growing

Whats up IC maggers I currently live in an apartment which is sadly not the best choice for me to continue my favorite thing to do, grow my medicine. BUT, I do have the best apartment one could have to grow in.

I am on the very top floor and the corner unit. Only one neighbor on my side and they are far away from the room I will be using.

Its a two bedroom and I have a whole room to myself. I will measure soon but it is a nice space I'd say I have at least 8X10 feet to play with minimum BUT I do not want to do anything larger then 2000W, the room has a window and like I said I am on the top floor with no one above me and there is no roof access so I am thinking I can easy vent out the window? I dont know what would you guys do? I am open to getting a tent even. Should I? Only used them to veg stuff in before. Was looking at a 4 by 6 footer at the hydro shop. Looks perfect for one 1000W light.


If you wanted to set up a light or two in the room I just described and money was NOT to much of a concern (within reason of course) and wanted to maximum production, have amazing odor control and also ease of setting up as I am an outdoor grower as never done anything indoors except veg plants to be put outside which any idiot can do..

MY MAIN QUESTIONS ARE:

Would you get a grow tent?

I have been thinking about it just because it seems like the quickest and easiest way of starting up. I like how easy they go up and probably more important, come down. They keep the light in and seems like I could control the odor better with it.

What would you do for odor control?

I plan on doing soil, dare to talk an oldschool guy like me into hydro?

THANKS FOR YOUR HELP!

Oh, of course I forgot the most ipmortant thing on my mind.....

WHAT WOULD YOU DO TO KEEP TEMPS DOWN!? Should I set up the tent and use a cool tube? Seems like the easiest?

Id do a tent, cool tube and two carbon filter and two small small fans. One for the tent the other just in the room.

Have the second as a backup , smell is the most important and most overlooked.

If cost is not a concern and growing in an apartment, splurge on odor control and sound control. It's worth it to maintain your sanity and a semblance of safety.

Think about 1 50-60 pound filter for the grow itself, and then another smaller filter to sit in the apartment so you can turn it on as needed. I liked to keep one concealed in the living room so I could crank it up for a few minutes before people came over. Remember, you have all kinds of dust allergies and need the air filtration.

Run magnetic ballasts. Don't digital. If your cable on a digital isn't shielded correctly, it will throw off RF frequencies and sometimes mess with people's TVs.

Invest in a mid to high end ballast. They're built to isolate vibration and shed heat better than many basic ones.


Avoid extension cords where ever possible. you'll want to get more power from other plugs/circuits, but they can be a firehazard, as wellas a tip off to anyone who might come in your apartment.


Make sure you don't have to walk by the grow to get to the bathroom/sink. One day, while I was at work, my sink apparently leaked and maintenance came. My grow was through the bedroom and in the walk in closet. Still paranoid inducing though. Never changed the lock on my door, but I probably got lucky.

To keep temps down:
1)Make sure you're not just recycling air in one room all day by keeping all windows and doors shut. The hot air has to go somewhere.
2)Make sure intake is large enough not to stifle airflow. (passive intake should be 2x as big as exhaust by area.
3)This one is different for everybody, but what seems to work well is pulling air from the tent through a sealed hood, through a fan, and out the filter. It lets you get the lights pretty close to the buds and takes the hottest air directly out of the tent.

Consider growing in coco. Its easier to get those blocks of coco up to the apartment without people noticing in several grocery bags rather than hauling up 6-8+ 40 lb bags or 2 big bales.

Consider using pondliner and 2x6 sides instead of trays. 2x4 trays are not easy to disguise walking up several floors of an apartment building.

Veg using 4' 8 bulb t8s. Not much heat and plenty of power for a 4x2 space. more even coverage than a big light too.

Use insulated ducting, or better yet, 2 layers of it, and stretch your ducting as straight as possible to cut down on noise. Guessing you'll be using 8-10"flex ducting and not solid ducting.

Find a solid state fan speed controller and run a bigger fan than necessary to cut down on noise. Don't get a rheostat type one for $30 or whatever they cost, it will make a high pitched noise the neighbors will get annoyed with.

Don't forget to camo your ducting if venting out the window. Even if no one walks on that side, someone probably mows lawns. Silver ducting poppin out a window is kind of suspicious.

Spend money on a quality tent for sure. You could build something with poly and a frame in the apartment, but it won't tear down half as fast as a tent and be able to be packed out of there.

If you have space and cash, go with an over sized tent for easier plant access and more room volume to keep temps down.

cool tubes are last resort..the newer air cooled hoods have better light reflection and damn near as good airflow..that said I have a cool tube or 2 for special situations...yeehaw

Good call magnetic for sure!!

Ya sorry not cool tube air cooled hood for sure duh , I'm a small 250cmh hps uses so I get away with an open fixture.

Yes get top brand carbon filters I know mountain air and phresh are top quality. I'm sure there are others too.

Good luck and be smart

Extra Carbon and fans may be expensive but cheaper then a lawer

think about LEDs

also make sure your on a circuit that can handle the power. just 600w of leds + fan tripped my bedroom breakers.

woolybear said:

think about LEDs

also make sure your on a circuit that can handle the power. just 600w of leds + fan tripped my bedroom breakers.

Click to expand...

No interest in LED's brother. Rookie question but how do I know my circuit can handle the power? I have plugged in two 400W lights and fans into the room I am using with no issues?

THANKS FOR ALL THE HELP! Def using two filters and running magnetic ballasts

and I meant and air cooled hood, not a cool tube sorry. I think I am going to run a vertical 1K and do a "donut" style grow with 5 plants in 3gal buckets. Not using a tent. Think its a bad idea?

good idea wego with the donut. You can get a bit more than 5 around it, try 7-8. Carbon filters are the best but look into ozone - cheaper. Just hope you dont get a long power outage near harvest time. The 2 400w and fans should be fine on a typical 15 amp circuit - make sure nothing else is plugged into it. As long as you can maintain negative pressure, you can do without the tent. A magnetic 1000 watter could present some heat issues in the summertime so you'll probly need at least a big exhaust fan or else a cooltube or AC.

Yeah I am not SUPER worried about temps running just 1 1000W light for flowering. I have heard the donuts are real easy to keep cool. The room is perfect to vent out the window already have a nice exhaust van to get that hot air outside.

I am REALLY interested in Ozone. Heard it works great. Got any good links? Thanks!

Do not underestimate the heat a 1000 watter will put out!!! It will create a lot more heat than you would think. If I was you I wouldn't skimp on the fan size pulling air out of your room.

Where are you getting fresh air from? Just pulling it from another room in the apartment? Without co2, your gonna need a good source of fresh air. Not only to cool the light some, but for the plants to use as part of their food making process.

Is there another window that you can pull fresh air from outside and dump it into the grow. Also if your going to be doing it passively, you need to have 2x as much surface area of intake compared to your exhaust fan size.

Just trying to help ya, and plan for future senerio's. I've been in your shoes, and preventing the room from ever reaching undesirable temps is better than trying to deal with a room that's way to hot, especially if it's hot outside.

Oh I am not underestimating it brother. I plan on putting as powerful of a fan as I can blowing up at the vertical bulb and then have the exhaust fan sucking that rising hot air right out the window.

I could have an intake pulling air from outside with no issues as well. The room has two nice windows spaced perfectly apart one for exhaust and one sucking in nice fresh air from outside.

Maybe I will look into Co2 but this really is not for production. You think a personal grower with one light should get a Co2 tank? How expensive to run for a grow that I am planning roughly?

i would go with multiple 400s. you can also mix mh and hps this way.

also, fuck paying for a tent. a few screws, some wood and some black and white poly and you can make one just as good for prob 20% of the cost.

Grew in apartments for years. If I had to I'd go with black dog led's 750 waters and vortex 8" inch S-line fan wih a home made strait shooter carbon scrubber.

Find out what your power limits are, what sized breaker what all is on the circuit. They usually go cheap and do not leave much extra for growing.

Don't use a powerful fan blowing up on a vert bulb. A slow column of air rising actually lowers temps more. Cheap honeywell muffin-type fan, set on low provides better cooler than a massive garage fan set on high. Weird, but its true - set it on low and let temps stabilize... then set it on high..... temps will climb.

Use a tent. It contains the odors.... exhaust @ 2x per minute with a carbon filter.... then have another fan/filter exhausting your spare bedroom out the window. You shouldn't ever have any odor issues like that.

If you don't know how much each circuit can handle, find your breaker box and see how many amps are running to each circuit.
A 15A will typically handle about 1000w of lighting for me plus 200w of accessories like fans.
For example, 1 1000w light and 1 8inch fan
or
600w light +432w 4ft t8 + 8inch fan.

always want to keep the continuous load under 80% of the circuits capacity.
[edit:i'm no electrician, so do your own calculations too]

Pre-made tents are way easier for to-floor apartment growing. no good reason to be bringing all that wood up into your apartment building if trying to build a tent from scratch.

reason I dont want to use a tent is because I want to run vertical bare bulb which seems like it would be a hell of a lot easier to keep cool without the tent and also I won't be so limited by space. I am not to worried about getting supplies inside here. People actually regularly bring shopping carts full of building supplies in and up the elevators anyway. management is renovating the older units and people always are doing repairs and shit...but I plan on bringing my shit in during the day while everyone is working anyway just to avoid any questions. plus some shit that is grow specific obviously i cannot risk letting anyone see. I been living here for over a year without growing so I know the comings and goings of people in the building very well. I never see anyone in the elevator during peak work hours. It is a small building...

Thanks for your help on the circuit, gonna check it out soontimes.