150w HPS Club and Resource Guide......

[Pipedream]

Jax, Mind if I throw my 2 cents in?

First off keep in mind that the larger your box is, the easier it will be to cool. Think of it this way....Stick your 150 in a breadbox and before long you can use it as an oven. Stick it in a closed garage, and you'll hardly feel any difference in temp at all. That being said, you may do fine with your computer fan. My box is one of the largest 150 based units out there and all I use is a single heavy-duty computer fan to both cool it and draw air thru my carbon filter. The fan came from an older "server" I found in a dumpster.

Here's a stealth method you might want to give a try. It only works in larger boxes. Place your filter inside the box, not outside. Picture this..... start with a plastic net basket, the type blueberries often come in. Cut sheets of carbon impregnated filter material and cover the entire framework on the outside of the basket. Make sure that the sheets are tight together at the seams and corners. Now mount it on the inside of your box directly over the muffin fan. Make sure its tight to the walls so no air goes in behind it. This method will provide 5 times the amount of area for your fan to draw thru, and only minimally reduce air-flow. And....... forget those aquarium filters, they'll bankrupt you. Go to Home Depot or Lowes and buy a huge sheet of the same material for under 10 bucks. Here's a link to what I'm referring to.

http://www.webproducts.com/products/furnace_ac/absorber.jsp

Check out the link in my signature for how I used my "muffin" type fan.

Good Luck & Grow Safe!

 

[sugabear_II]

Jaxom and user name - my SCROG advice is based on my experience scrogging with DWC. I know that SCROGGing with soil is a bit different - I think in that case flipping just when the plant hits the screen will work. However in my experience DWC creates so much growth at such a quick pace in stretch that this rule of thumb is not right.

To show my setup for scrog here we go.

This is a trainwreck seedling at 6 days of 12/12 - I don't have pics before that but you can imagine it was smaller.



Often times if I am growing some plants that I don't the sex of I start with these little 2.5 quart buckets. Here we have a profile shot of an oregon90 clone on the right that is a bit out of control. The other on the left is the trainwreck seedling. This was after 11 days of 12/12.



This next shot shows the plants from above after I moved the oregon90 into a 2 gallon bucket and attached a scrog screen to it.



Here's a pic of that little trainwreck seedling at 17 days fo 12/12. As you can see the screen is getting nice and full.




this pic is full cabinet around 33 days of 12/12. The plant on the left is the trainwreck which was soo tiny just a few weeks before. The Oregon90 on the right is also alot bigger. Here you can also see the height of my screens above - I use the super simple scrog method using metal skewers for support - these I attach to the lid of the DWC bucket - this way lid - screen - and plant all become one unit which makes for easy res changing - you can imagine what a mistake it would be to attach your screen to your bucket when it came time to change the nutrients



And finally heres that same Trainwreck plant after a total of 41 days of 12/12. I kinda got lazy and she's not completely even but this is my first run of this strain and I'm still getting it dailed.





OK so that's my experience in a pictorial form of scrogging with DWC - I don't think you'll find that anywhere else as the super simple scrog method has mainly been used with soil and soilless mixes.

Now Trainwreck is pretty stretchy from what I see in this first run - you'll have to be the judge of how your snowwhite will do - but nonetheless the growth will be similar because you're using DWC -

Have you grown her in DWC before? IF so did she produce lots of side shoots?

If she didn't produce side shoots in prior DWC runs you may want to consider topping. IF she did bush out in DWC runs before requiring pruning she's probably already set for the screen. See when you take the main stem and train it horizontal those side shoots get really big and become as productive as the main stem. This is especially true in DWC where the main limiting factor in my experience is space and genetics.

What pipedream said about muffin fans is an excellent idea - I've used that material to and it is better and cheaper than the fish filters. Also like he said if your box is big enough you may be able to get by with smaller ventilation requirements. To be honest you can never know until you get it setup and let it run for a few hours empty. Then I expect to add 5-10 degrees increase when the plants are big and filling the space they'll restrict airflow and things will get hotter.

-suga

p.s. - I think we're all very passionate about growing here. I would never pretend to say my setup is better than another or my method is. Each grower has their own techniques methods and motivations. I'm just sharing my experience as I see it is releveant.

 

[Guest]

yes suga you're right on. i didn't mention that my experience lies with soilless scrogs. now that i think about it, the little ghetto screen i threw on my last dwc did stretch way up. one plant basically took over the whole screen.

tons of good info here you guys! keep it up

 

[Jaxom]

Pipedream,

Now that is an excellent idea!!! Thanks a bunch!!!! Your comment about larger is easier to manger holds sooo true. I've grown at a rather modest medium scale for years, it seems that doing these micro grows can take more attention to detail to prevent mishaps. So that has that solved! fyi... I love blue berries! YUM!!!

Pipedream, Sugabear,

I'd like to nail down what size computer fan(s) I will require though. Atleast in cfms. I know I can buy fans locally any day I wish. But the highest volume fans I've seen so far are around 80cfm. As I mentioned before, I did find a website offering a high flow computer fan that rates 200cfm, but is rather loud at 65db! Honestly, since stealth is of upmost concernt, I think it would be better to go with 2 or more lower cfm fans if they are quieter then one "jet" sounding one. Experience has taught me that testing for 24-48 hours to make sure all is working as it should is a good policy. But still, I'd rather have it all toghter right from the get go. The more I read and research about lighting, I'll be doing like Pipedream does, 1 150hps with two warm cfls to augment with. (Later I can experiment with cfls for veg and swaping out hps during flowering) I'll have 16 cubic feet with that much power in there I'm gonna say 3 80cfm for a total of 240cfm would do the trick?

I'ld also like to hear about intake as well. Generally speaking I was going to rely mostly on passive intake. But I've now seen a few scrogs where the growers placed a fan between dwc bucket and screen blowing up, and/or another fan approximatly half way between the top of the screen and where the light will be at it's highest. I can see how the first one would be of benifit, but the second, I'm not so sure. What are your oppionions?


Jaxxx

 

[Pipedream]

Jax, You see, this is the problem when you ask an engineer a question...we love to babble on and go off on tangents that nobody cares about. Let me comment on two fronts, and keep in mind that these are just my opinions. First off is the use of an Ozone Generator...............

According to Consumers Reports®, many of the Ionizing air cleaners now on the market, produce an excessive amount of ozone as a by-product. This is likely why many growers feel ionizers work to eliminate odor.

Recent independent studies show that, unlike ozone in the upper atmosphere, which helps shield us from harmful ultraviolet rays, ozone near ground level is an irritant that can aggravate asthma and decrease lung function. Ozone in concentrations of greater than 80ppb for 8 hours can cause coughing, wheezing, chest pain, and deaden your sense of smell. Additionally, it raises sensitivity to pollen, mold, and other allergy triggers, and may cause permanent lung damage. Ozone also reacts with the terpenes in lemon and pine scented cleaning products and air fresheners, creating formaldehyde, a known carcinogen.

This info is from Consumers Union, Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, and Yale University’s school of Environmental Studies.

So am I saying that ozone should not be used? No, what I’m saying is, that if you choose to use it, be very conscious of the amount you are generating, your period of exposure, and where else in your home it may be migrating to.

OK, that being said, let me give you my feeling on multiple fans.... Using more that one fan is fine, even if the second one is just used within the box to assist in air movement and harden off your stems. The problem arises when you use a second fan to create an active intake. There are three problems that exist with active intakes. First off and most important is that they tend to pressurize your box. If you are trying to control odor, this is the last thing you want. Once the pressure increases, the sweet smell of skunk will find its way out of every crack and crevice in your box and bypass your scrubber. The second problem is that once air moved by an active intake fan enters the box, it will experience a sudden pressure drop. When it does, any particles carried in the airstream will drop out of suspension and deposit themselves all over your leaves and buds. This includes dust, pollen, mold spores, insect larva, and other things you really don't want in your controlled enviroment. This is the principle of dust-collectors used in factories and cleanrooms. Lastly, because of the pressure drop and air resistance within your box intake fans are not nearly as efficient as an exhaust fan of the same spec's. Its much easier to suck air out then it is to push air in.

Again, these are JMHO based on my own experience and basic engineering principles. In the real world anything goes. And lastly, I too have built ozone generators and use them. Just not within the living areas of my home.

 

[DurbanPoison]

<-OG Refugee! Nice to have a forum to check out thats doing just what I am. I'm just finishing up my stealth NGB style cab - just a matter of paint and light mounting now. Thanks for all the good info everyone and keep up the awesome grow work!

 

[sugabear_II]

jax - i've heard good things about radio shack computer fans. i use the slot type computer fans in my veg cab and one keeps 40 watts of cfl cool in 2 cubic feet.

i only use passive intakes and i think you'll find most micro growers do the same. i do however have 2 fans on the floor of the cab blowing up under the canopy. in the past i've mounted one in the top corner blowing down. basically you should use some kind of fan inside to provide a steady breeze on the plants. reason is in veg it strengthens stems and in flower it's important to keep air moving to avoid moisture buildup and mold. scrog increases the potential for this because the canopy is very tight.

 

[sugabear_II]

oh yeah and what pipedream said about active intakes causing positive pressure and smell problems is spot on. i forgot to mention that. you want negative pressure in your cab so that odor is always sucked out of through your filter.

 

[green_grow]

i have a nigerian nightmare 1 week into flower. i can let it grow to 3' (maybe 3 1/2' tops) in height, at which point it will be scrogged if necessary. the screen size will be 3 1/2 sq. ft. she is in 4 gallons of soil . the plant is a healthy, strong female . my question is this : do i have enough soil to take this plant to the finish or will i have to transplant again ? also, i have a nigerian which has been vegging under flourescents for just over a month, it's not very big (only about 5" tall) but it looks like it has pollen sacs. is it possible for a plant so small to be showing it's sex this early ? i am a new grower, in case it's not obvious.

 

[Jaxom]

I add to my notes...."NO OZONE!!!" point taken, and noted. LOL!!! Glad you all are concerned about my health, kinda gives me that warm fuzzy feeling I had over at OG.

I also add to my notes "No active intake!!!" Only makes sence once it was explained.

Think I'll stick to my guns and go with the three 80cfm fans. Most-likely over kill, but when local computer store sells them by the five pack for $30, I can use the other two for my mother/clone/breeding box. Or as mentioned, underneath the screen, helping to strengthen the trunks of the plants.

While I'm making out my final shopping list, I'd like to know if the I've got the right sized chicken wire for the screen. It's that kind with the 1/2" holes. Figure I'd skip every other hole for a bud site... Think I've got just about everything else!

Thanks for all your help and understanding folks, it's made my transition from a larger grow to a smaller that much less difficult!

Jaxxx

 

[DurbanPoison]

I have a little carbon filter diy you can check out here:
http://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?p=509470#post509470
I've never used ozone before, but I know from experience that carbon air scrubbers are effective - esp in a passive air exhaust system. My design is based on this one:
http://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=29593

Happy growin!

 

[sugabear_II]

a couple of pics

a couple of pics

buds grown under the 150 at day 43 of flower.

-suga

oregon90





TW





]

 

[green_grow]

i have a nigerian nightmare 1 week into flower. i can let it grow to 3' (maybe 3 1/2' tops) in height, at which point it will be scrogged if necessary. the screen size will be 3 1/2 sq. ft. she is in 4 gallons of soil . the plant is a healthy, strong female . my question is this : do i have enough soil to take this plant to the finish or will i have to transplant again ? also, i have a nigerian which has been vegging under flourescents for just over a month, it's not very big (only about 5" tall) but it looks like it has pollen sacs. is it possible for a plant so small to be showing it's sex this early ? i am a new grower, in case it's not obvious.

can anyone help me out, please ?

 

[Guest]

Nice shots suga how much longer are they gonna go?

 

[Guest]

sup suga?, always a pleasure!

greengrow, hi how's it? 4 gallons of soil will be plenty to flower in, just keep in mind that a huge bush needs more healthy roots than a smaller plant. normally a scrog screen is put on the plants before flowering so that the plants have time to be trained about the screen. if you must scrog, i would throw the screen on asap; it may be easier to just train the plants with strings, but that's a decision you'll have to make according to your growspace as far as the sex goes, is there any way you can get some good close-up pics of it?

durban, that DIY filter is kick-ass! i'm gonna rig something up within the next month

my v-scrog just switched to 12/12 today, so it only gets better from here. i pulled them out for some maintenance and pics just for all my internet homies



PEACE 150 club!

 

[green_grow]

username, thanks a lot for the info . i just got a dig. cam. so after i figure out how to use it and post pics on the net, i will.

 

[Guest]

Hey fellow greenthumbs...just wanted to throw up a few pics of third weeks progress.Changed the lights a little,put the 150's in and took one of the 65 cfl's out.Probly veg 2 or 3 more weeks then flower.I FIM'ed all of them about 2 days ago.









Lighting:



BTW...nice pics and nice buds ....sugabear!!!

 

[sugabear_II]

thanks everyone for the kind words.

Overdoze - The oregon90 will probably go another week from friday for a full 8 weeks - but may go up to 9. The trainwreck looks like it will need a full 9 weeks (63 days) to be completely mature, so she'll get another 2 weeks from Friday.

Username - that screen looks hella healthy and ready to flower - I'm sure you're going to have a great yield with that setup.

coffin - looking good!

green grow - sorry to leave you hanging, soil is not my forte' so I'm glad username could answer. Post some pics of the preflowers on the vegging plant and we'll see what it is. Yes it is possible for it to be showing male flowers in veg - especially since it is nigerian nightmere. The description reef gives says that if you veg at 24 or 18 hours the plant will immediately start to flower when put outside as it is very photo-period sensitive. Basically that strain autoflowers like lowrider. It's supposed to be an outdoor strain so I'm suprised your doing it indoors. good luck and can't wait to see those pictures.

 

[sugabear_II]

a couple of pics from under the 150

a couple of pics from under the 150

Ok well hope y'all don't mind me hammin' it up...

here we go full cab show - I kinda allow my plants to grow up above the scrog to form a stadium effect around the bulb. so i let some branches get tall and turn into collas well the rest is trained to the screen. basically i tie down shoots that get too close to the light or the fan otherwise i let it go..


kinda lazy but i've had good results with this kinda stadium effect before.

so here's a bunch of pics - just to let you know I use a cannon a410 powershot - the current version the a510 goes for around $115 USD - it's a really awesome camera - plus a $9 tripod and you get these pics...

-suga

 

[green_grow]

some gorgeous icing on those plants, suga !
as for the nigerian, i was assured by reef that it would be just fine indoors and the 1 female that i have going is, indeed, looking good . pics WILL be coming, i hope. bit of a technotard, i'm afraid.