KBS, KFB or Freedom Bucket questions...

[BruceLeeroy]

it's more than ok any and all information is more than welcome! add to the vertical tube question this one. how much closer to the plants do you find you can hang your lights? does the tubing cause shadowed areas?

will locating the ballasts in one room, the reservoir in another room, and THE room be yet a third so all three are in seperate spaces help (obviously yes) and how much (not so obvious)?

 

[NPK]

I'm a dirt guy, so I've never tried the Krusty method, but I read about it with keen interest on OG and took the time to download the detailed pics he included in his thread. I'll include 'em here--seems like the best place for 'em!

Here we go, then.

 

[NPK]

And the rest:














I hope this is helpful to someone out there!

 

[BruceLeeroy]

thanx a bunch for those great pics, i'm glad someone had them hanging around still. i'm a little confused though, according to that picture the clear choice would be to hang the lights in the middle of the wall on a four plant 3400 watt setup and to have the plants in the corners. so this is definitely the better way to do it? the advantage i can see to that would be alot more space for the plant to spread out and all your lights are directly hitting something... but then there is a huge arc of the plants that aren't getting any direct light at all. does this not matter? SYK said plants in the corner, i believe deadhedfred said plants centered on the walls? does this mean it's mainly a matter of personal preference? lol i'm so confused!

 

[Guest]

No need to be confused Bruce............I dont have the pic stored from Krusty bout the proper light placement in a 10x10,but you can believe me when I say its plants in center of the wall,lights in the corner(not sure bout plant placement in bigger rooms).................I think SYK was B/Sin when he said the opposite to fuck with me(he ABOVE ALL knows or should know this info ) .......Its simple really,the light(1000mh) in the middle is further away from the plant if its(plant) placed in the corner,but exactly the same distance from plant as the 600`s if placed in the center of the wall(everything`s on 2 1/2 ft. centers ,5x5 area per plant).......I also said earlier that Ive never heard of anyone using a light meter to check for dark spots in a kbs room,but Ive heard numerous accounts of dark spots in the corners from Krusty,No-one,Acry4help,Bramski,etc(commercial growers for sure)......I believe Acry4help fixed up some type of mylar panels in the corners of 1 of his rooms to help with the lumenloss to the walls to reflect more back on plants(the obvious choice of course would be to surround each plant on 4 sides,just not very cost effective).....................As far as the cooltubes,theres a guy at PG that has some buckets in a circle with a fan on the floor blowin straight up on a bare hps bulb and its damn near touchin the plants!So with the tubes Im sure they could be dropped down as far into the canopy as wanted ,I mean the plants touch the cooltube(or damn close) in a coliseum grow dont they?The ultimate in my book would be to have horizontal cooltubes above each tree ,and surrounded on 4 sides by vertical cooltubes,with all lights as close to the plants as absolutely possible,again not very cost effective but it`d be bright!...........Cmon folks ,theres got to be some cooltube vets out there ........PEACE........DHF...........

 

[BruceLeeroy]

right on dedhed thanx for clearing that up lol! so much info and know how goes into this type of setup that when your not an old hand at commercial type stuff, it can easily get overwhelming lol.

 

[Guest]

Bruce..........the pics NPK posted of the 10 plant 10k grow with light and plant placement plainly shows the dead(dark spots)behind the plants on both ends of the room........But,the plants are out into the room and the lights are clearly behind and ON the walls..............Not like in a 10x10 room where the lights and plants are lined up with one another perfectly spaced 2 1/2 ft apart each way from plant to light to plant etc........Krusty commented that the 10x10 was probably one of the more efficient designs in a room cuz of the light,plant placement HAVING no dead(dark spots)..................It appears that 10k room needed lights in the corners ,but like I said earlier,no matter what the placement its hard to HAVE darkspots in a room with THAT much light............As far as ballasts and rez`s,chillers and such............As long as theyre outta the growroom it doesnt really matter bout the heat theyre puttin out,just keep it OUTTA the grow area(one of the original Krusty cardinal sins,shit in the growroom)..............PEACE...........DHF..........

 

[gregor_mendel]

I don't think Krusty would approve, but I would like to offer two modifications I never tried (switched to near zero maintanence giant bubbler, reusing all my expensive KBS gear), but think would be useful.

Flushing
Krusty: Run for 48 hours on water adjusted to whatever pH the GH nutes cause when using GH bottle directions. What we are really after is getting a full 24 hours running at no more than ppm of tapwater + 50.

Modificaton: Drain nutrients. Rather than refill with water, use a sump pump, hose and watering wand to hand flush each bucket. If the buckets drain freely back to the rez, one could achieve ppm of tap water + 50 in less than an hour, I think.

Feeding
Krusty: Bottle directions 15-10-5 G M B in veg and 5-10-15 G M B in bloom.
Modification: Lucas formula 0-8-16 G M B for the whole show.
these numbers are milliliter of nutrient per gallon of water
Theoretically, 8mL per gallon using Floranova bloom should work just was well as Lucas formula. But would the humic acid muck up the lava rocks?

Combo modification: Perhaps since we are using less nutes, we can flush every 10 or 15 days with no loss of quality or quantity.

This could be tested in any normal run by splitting the feed and drain system between two rezs, but otherwise running in the same room on the same air injection system.

GM

 

[BruceLeeroy]

so what do you guys think of additives? sillicone, bud boosters etc. if i remember correctly krusty said they were all a waste of money/ripoff and i'm curious to what others have experimented with.

also, how does the high humidity treat electrical connections? i notice that those pictures show proper outlets for lights to plug into, but if the ballasts are located externally and just lamp cords are run into the grow room, are any special safety precautions advised for any connections rather than just wire nut wrapped in electrical tape? electrical is definitely not my strong point. is there a distance limit that the lamp cord can run from ballast to bulb for 1000 watt MH and 600 HPS? the reason i ask is that the lights i have access to only have a 15 foot cord, and i'll need them to be about 20. is it safe just to add an extension of 5 feet this way, or is there something i need to know about how the high humidity would effect it(wire nuts, electrical tape etc)? i'm not a total electrical novice, and have experience wiring on military jets but have 0 experience in home electrical environs and i want to make sure there aren't special safety precautions i should be paying attention to! the plants are the ones that should be getting the 3400 watts, not me!

 

[foaf]

so what do you guys think of additives? sillicone, bud boosters etc. if i remember correctly krusty said they were all a waste of money/ripoff and i'm curious to what others have experimented with.

the most important additive for trees is to add p/k boosters in the second half of flower especially. kool bloom for example. Im just taking down my tree (6' 4" tall), started chopping today, and I am amazed at the amount of growth in the last 2 weeks of nutes, even some during final flush, and I attribute that difference, when compared to previous grows, to adding high p/k nutes at the end. One picture of a bud in my gallery from 3 weeks ago, not the biggest bud by far, but one I could get to to photograph, its more than twice as dense with 2 additional weeks nutes and almost 1 of flush.

another additive that is rarely "disses" is biologicals like botaincaires hydroguard. my roots look much better than my last tree, and I think thats due to adding probiotics.

 

[gregor_mendel]

>if i remember correctly krusty said they were all a waste of money/ripoff and i'm >curious to what others have experimented with

Krusty did say this, but also said use anything tha GH puts their name on. Someone once asked him about KoolBloom, and his reply was that if it is the same stuff as KaBloom, then it is good stuff. Apparently, during his heyday, the powers that be were giving GH a hard time about so-called plant specific products, so they dissappeared for a while, and reappeared with new names.

>is there a distance limit that the lamp cord can run from ballast to bulb for 1000 >watt MH and 600 HPS?

Krusty used all bare ballasts. 1000's sat on a shelf outside the room. I don't know the max cord distance. He hung the 600 watt ballasts from bungee cords in flowering room with a maximum 6 feet of cord. Though I have read requirements like this before, the horticultural ballasts have 12 foot cords, and seem to do fine.

GM

 

[Guest]

WTF,GREGOR.................LMAO..................Bruce,the silicon supplement saved my first grow from threat of snappin EVERY branch off the bottom 1/3 of my 4 plants.....SYK told me bout it,cuz I had already lost 3- 30 inch lower branch colas,even with being tied up(worked like a charm,strengthened the shit out of the branches within days ).......I cant see where pk boosters can hurt,as long as ph and ppms are constantly monitored,not sure bout all that hormone hype the vendors pitch bout makin buds swell..............If the ph is in proper balance,plants take in as much nutrient as they need and swell directly according to lumen exposure....I mean it aint like we`re stickin a needle in their arm and shootin em up with roids.lol...........GH nutrients are A-OK wit me dewd,I know advance nutrients does an aggressive ad campaign for pot-specific nutes,just not sure bout the cost effectiveness of followin trends and fads......Might be great stuff,too high for my budget....Wish there were more growshows usin their specialty shit that theyve got 942 different packages of......lol.....Anyways,Bruce somebody with elec. experience needs called cuz Im pretty sure that 15 ft length on lumatek DIGITAL ballasts is the longest lamp cord provided( not sure )somebody else got that answer?As far as resistance and distance sumthin bout the starter,blah,blah,blah...............20 ft. not a good thing ,I think.....Someoneyouknow?..............PEACE......DHF............

 

[Guest]

Gregor.........your above post was unreadable on my last screen,hence the wtf.......sorry.........Your info is right on the money.........as far as the improves.....Krusty always said you ve gotta make what works in YOUR environment......Yeah gh is my kinda shit,good enough for NASA good enough for me..............PEACE..............DHF..........

 

[BruceLeeroy]

yeah i've always used GH in all my hydro stuff and dont foresee that changing any time soon. thanx again for all your help guys

 

[Guest]

Just thought I'd interrupt for a quick second to say of all the "help" threads that I've seen on any site this thread has got to be the absolute best. Tons of great info, ideas, and suggestions... hat's off to you guys

 

[BruceLeeroy]

yeah i've found HPS ballasts that typically come with 12-15 foot cords, and i noticed while browsing that hydrofarm makes a socket/cord set that is 25' long. not that i would spend 75$ for it, but they did say it works for both 1000 mh and 600 hps. i just figured i'd see if anyone knew anything specific. keeping the ballasts out of the room is going to be semi-critical for me since the a/c i'll use is just barely good enough (12000 BTU). does anyone know if there is a specific reason K hung the 600 ballasts IN the room? i dont know about digital ballasts so i couldnt say what they run at, but check out this link for the 25' cords

http://www.plantlightinghydroponics.com/product_info.php?products_id=1579

i guess i should have refined my question to be "with high humidity, do i need to use environmental splices?" lol. i have a nasty habbit of complicating things unnecesarily!

i agree with gronut 100%. to all the folks taking time to answer these questions and give input, pictures, personal experiences and whatnot, YOU are the people that will allow us to overgrow fascist gov'ts!!!

 

[BlindDate]

Krusty Mods

Krusty Mods

I might add that Krusty used the GH nutes at full bottle strength which is about 1800 PPM. That combined with the amount of salt buildup that GH nutes produce meant that flushing was nessesary FOR HIM.

1/4" soaker hose is made for leaching water not blasting air, hence the high backpressure. Almost anything works better than that. Those high pressure Thomas pumps are LOUD draw major Amperage and pump a shitload of heat into the reservoir.

Get the 2" Lava rock not the typical 3/4" stuff. Much better flow and room for roots.

As far as having ballast, chillers, etc. in the grow room. Well, if thats the only place you have to put it and the AC can still keep temps down then its all good.

There are three keys to hitting those big yield numbers, Strain, Strain and Strain.

Regarding humidifiers: Always use RO water or a water softener else you will coat the entire room with cal/mag (Oh,,what a mess!)

 

[BruceLeeroy]

yeah dedhed i think the distance from ballast to lamp is entirely dependent on the ignitor/starter, it seems that some have very limited distance and some are capable of much greater distance. i've sent an email to the manufacturer to find out and i'll let you know what i find out.

blinddate, how much heat increase do you think a thomas compressor causes in a reservoir? obviously this would depend on the res size, but lets assume a res size of say 25 gallons for a 4 bucket system?

ghetto res chiller? anyone ever used the ice probe chiller? seems like res chillers are extremely expensive, couldnt a person just rig a homemade chiller for much less? i'm sure it wouldn't be nearly as energy efficient but just coil a bunch of copper tubing through a beer fridge, and use a small slow pump to pump water slowly through the coil, tie the pump into a water thermostat and wouldn't you have like a 120$ res chiller? lol. what can i say its late.

i've definitely heard the larger 2" rocks are much better

the strain part worries me as i dont have access to any clones from anything considered real high yielding :/

 

[BlindDate]

I can't tell you how much your temps will change in the res, but put your hand on the tube exiting the Thomas after it's been running for an hour under pressure. All that heat is going into your res.

The beer fridge will not work. Rig a computer fan on the res. The evaporative effect will lower temps.

Loose the Soaker hose for sure. Reduced back pressure = reduced temps.

 

[Guest]

Gronut......Jump in and keep us straight if you see somethin wrong...lol......Blind Date,I never had a lick of trouble with salt buildups,but I did flush regularly..........Btw,youve gotta push nutes up their toots to get those kinda yeilds if ya know what I mean also(lots of folks disagree)...............What kinda pump do you us BD?There was a dude that built a ghetto chiller at OG ,.guess thats gone forever........... As far as strain goes..........I`ll give it a 1/3, another 1/3 goes to vertical lighting dropped down in and amongst the plants,last 1/3 goin to delivery and recovery(the system itself)...get it in there fast(nute solution) ,outta there fast,create oxygen rich environment for the roots with the big rocks in the upper bucket and mega-air in the bottom bucket with the froth nft`n the roots (as krusty said) in as little amount of solution as could be made possible in the bottom bucket(1 1/2 in or less if possible)with everything constantly flowin 24/7..............Keep nutes at constant temps so no algae can form,constant 70%humidity till late flower .......There ya have it folks in a nutshell....................BD.......my first run was from bagseed and I brought in massive amounts of nugs under 3400 watts.............Krusty`s view of it was the strain needed to be 50/50 sat/ind hybrid(to the best of ANYONES knowledge like bcbb) to allow for the stretch and provide major node development(in other words,GROW TREES!).............I`ve got my eye on some RM`S Hashplant,a proven producer ......anyway`s ..........PEACE....DHF.................