LSWM's 3k Vert Donut's @ 7000ft!

[LSWM]

Okay guys, I've decided to start a thread here and am going to try and keep it updated regularly. I've got 7 harvests under my belt in the last two years, each one more successful than the last.

My best run has been ~.7 GPW, and I know I could be doing better, hoping this thread will help keep me on the path to success!

The rundown:

3k flower. Each on 4x4 trays.
Drip to waste in brick coco/growstones @ 50/50 mix
Using Maxibloom + Koolbloom for flower
Jack's Hydro for Veg
3 separate spaces - Early Veg - Main Veg - Flower
1 Lung room constantly ventilated with an 8 inch max fan and carbon scrubbber, currently no active intake.
Lights on at night - Lights on temps usually 75-82, lights off is usually about the same.
Humidity - Stays between 30-40% all the time.
Currently no AC or CO2. Have a deheuy on hand but that doesn't help me much right now.

Here are some pics of the setup from a few weeks ago.



In the first two pics you can see down either side of the flower room. Starting from the first tray, you can see trays 1, 2 and 3.

Since then my property manager ran off with all her clients $$, and the homeowner took over property management. This meant that I had to do a complete tear down so she could come do a walk through with 3 trays @ 5 weeks, and 1 tray @ 8 weeks.

I managed to get it all torn down, put into a Uhaul, walk through done, then everything back up just in time for me to leave on a 5 day vacation. Returned to beautiful plants that didn't seem to mind being thrown into a Uhaul, or left alone at all. Guess I can attribute that to a well thought out plan.

I just pulled the first tray down a week ago, and I yielded just over 14 oz from a 600 on a 4x4 tray. ~.66 GPW.

 

[LSWM]

I'm going to try and get some pics tonight when lights turn on. All three trays are within a couple days of one another and all the strains go ~9.5-11 weeks. Hopefully they finish on time after all the shenanigans I've put them through.

My biggest concern at the moment is trying to increase my humidity. I keep trying to break 1 GPW, but keep coming up short between .5-.7. I think increasing veg time just a bit would increase my yields, but the plants just don't explode like I've seen other sealed rooms do.

Running sealed is simply not in the budget over the summer. I have a small 6.5k BTU window AC, but I don't think it will do enough to let me seal up completely, so I figure venting is my only option currently. When outdoor temps drop this winter I definitely plan on closing up the vents and running with CO2 + dehueys, but in the meantime does anyone have any suggestions?

I've been looking into building some DIY foggers but I just don't know if they will make any difference with fresh dry mountain air constantly being brought in. Outdoor temps here will be hitting 75-85*F in the coming months, and nightime temps won't be going about 50*F. Biggest problem is the air is SO DRY. So low that outside the grow space, most of my hygrometers won't even show a reading.

Would foggers help my situation? Any idea on sizing/# needed?

 

[DunHav`nFun]

Fogger FTW bro.....Google VPD .....maybe you already have if you know there`a a problem with RH already......

70% RH till end of stretch , and as low below 50% as possible till end of cycle , but don`t let it bottom out or the plants will shut down on yas and not transpire with too low an ambient RH....anyways...

Welcome and good luck....Plenty of info on foggers round here......DIY works if you`re handy......Arminius has foggage in his thread as we speak I`m fairly sure.....go check some threads.....

Peace....DHF.........

 

[LSWM]

Glad to see you back around DHF. Much of what I've learned has come from you and the elders around these parts.

I'm very much aware that VPD is a large issue I'm having. I even am starting to think that nutrient issues I've had in the past, especially during stretch, had nothing to do with the nutrients at all, and was simply VPD related.

I've skimmed Arminus thread, and read Dabs thread all the way through. I can't seem to remember if either of their rooms are vented or sealed. I've got like 6 tabs with different threads on foggers open atm, and I started going through Dabs thread the other day looking at the pages where he was having nutrient/VPD problems. I will have to look again.

Right now, I'm wondering if a DIY evaporative cooler could work. Wondering if I setup a duct booster for my intake, and ran that air through a swamp cooler pad how much humidity/cooling I could get out of it.

I guess there is no clear cut answer here. I'm probably just going to have to come up with whatever I think is going to create the most humidity for the least cost. I have damn near everything to build a small DIY swamp cooler, but I'm thinking dropping a few bills on some ultrasonic foggers would probably be a good bet as well.

 

[LSWM]

Here are some Veg shots. In the third pic you can see I have an empty socket. I had a ballast go out on me last week. Gonna replace the 600 I currently am using in flower with a new 1k, and swap that over here for veg. I really wanna get those clones transplanted and under some HPS, but it's gonna have to wait until the new ballast arrives in a few days.



This is a strain I thought I had lost, but then found flowering in the corner of a room. I cloned a fully formed bud, it revegged, then I decided I was going to flower it, but then changed my mind 2 weeks later, and decided I wanted more clones than it was going to give me if I let her flower all the way... Monstrosity!



And here is my ghetto sub panel. I ran ~80' of 8/4 wire to this sub panel from a 40 amp 240 breaker in my main. It's to code all the way from the main to this sub panel, then things get a little messier. Still way safer than running 1k's off the existing wiring. This panel runs the basically everything, and all at once if I want it to.

 

[LSWM]

Main veg room shot that got missed. I just transplanted these into 2 gal from party cups ~5 days ago. Currently getting hand watered every other, soon to be every, day. In a week or so I will get the drippers going on them.

 

[LSWM]

Some flower shots!

First tray is a 1k. Running 5 trainwreck, and 1 Dutch Treat x Blueberry #1 (Gifted seeds from a buddies garden this is the first of two phenos I'm running.) The dutch treat has exploded, with much better structure than the trainwreck, the smell is almost a wd40/antifreeze smell. Very off putting in flower, but once in the bag she smells like popcorn I think... The TW is foxtailing more than I would like, but I still love how she looks/smells. Very appealing.



Next tray is 4 supposed "tahoe OG" next to another 1k. It's certainly not OG. Has a more sour/chem smell. Almost cat piss like. This one gets crazy foxtailed, but yeilds well with decent sized nugs all over the plant, top to bottom. Not very dense however. The smell in the bag after it's all said and done makes up for the larfyness. Easily the one that people pick the most when simply nosing the bag.

There is also a single DTB #2 on this tray and she is looking decent. She has a very strange growth profile in Veg, literally grows straight up, then the flowers set fairly early. Not the best pairing for this table, but we will see how she finishes next to the "OG" which has gone 11-12 weeks the last runs.

 

[LSWM]

Finally I have this third tray with a 600 which I just pulled my 14 zip run from ~2 weeks ago. I had these guys under a hood in a horizontal scrog, but after the landlord had the walkthrough, and my harvesting this tray, I decided the hood/that flower space would be better put to use as a veg space. So here is a hodgepodge of the strains mentioned above. there are 14 plants in total I believe. 12 in 1 gallons, and 2 in 2 gallons. They are in a getto'd together stadium setup, and for some reason the buds are overly stretched and long. Not much structure to them. I think the pH may have been off somehow. I'm still working with the drops, and have yet to purchase a decent meter. I have a cheap EC meter, but still no pH.

 

[LSWM]

So on top of this humidity dilemma, I'm trying to plan out my stay at this location. Now that my walkthrough is complete, the landlord loves me btw, and my girlfriend/partner in crime is moving to AZ for grad school, I'm trying to plan blowing up the main house!

You see, the place I rent has a detached garage, with a studio apartment directly behind/above. Currently I am only using the apartment to grow. I originally planned to use the garage, but I feel that much of the stealth factor would be compromised. I would certainly need to insulate around the garage door, as well as tent everything in tight. The door to the apartment is hidden in a causeway between the main house and the detached building. The door to the garage is wide open out in the front yard. Making moving plants in and out a larger concern.

Long story short, I've decided that the 1000 sq ft house I'm staying in will be much better put to use if the entire second story was dedicated to growing. I plan to keep what I have going in the apartment 100%, and ADD another 3-6k on the second floor of the main house. The second story of this house is basically a loft. The only visable/physical access is the stairs. It has 3 usable areas: 14' x 16', 8' x 5-6', and 10'x14'. There is also a bathroom upstairs making my life that much more convenient.

This gives me 412 sq ft to work with. I plan to use the 14 x 16 space for flower. I haven't yet decided if I want to go with donuts or trees. It seems to me that I could run more wattage with trees than with donuts simply due to plant count. I am looking to stay under 100, and at 6 plants per tray, a total of 9 trays puts me at 54... That's over 100 without some solid Veg cycles and staggering. If I could keep the veg down to 4-5 weeks including taking cuts, I could definitely keep #'s around 75-90. This is something I am contemplating, but growing trees has always been an end goal for me. Not sure my skills are quite up to snuff for that task just yet though. Don't want to put too many eggs in one basket...

I should have a ~$2-3k budget and won't be purchasing any AC due to cold winter temperatures, and running my lights at night. I need to price everything out, but I'm thinking after ballasts, and the new sub panel to run everything I'll be at ~$1300-1500. Should leave me to put the rest into a tankless water heater for CO2, pumps, reservoirs, pots, media, trays, fans, dehuey. I'm thinking under 3k is definitely viable. I'm sure my electric bill will probably double as well.

Well I'm done rambling. I've got lots to figure out, and I'm planning on making most of my purchases in ~2 weeks. The build will begin there, and hopefully I'll have my plant counts figured out by then as well with some clones ready to go... Should be fun!

 

[Mister_D]

Make sure your plan is solid before purchasing equipment . That aside I'm subbed for the show

 

[LSWM]

So I managed to get in there with a CFL after lights went out this AM.

Here are some flower shots without the HPS.

These first two shots are of the DTB#1. Rest of the plants on that tray are TW.

 

[LSWM]

Some more shots...

First 2 are of the supposed "OG" (Sour/Chem something)



Next is the DTB#2. I don't really like this strain, and will be phasing it out of my garden in the next two harvests.



Finally the far tray which I was unable to get a good amount of the CFL light to... So here's some shitty dark pics of my multistrain ghetto stadium.

 

[LSWM]

Make sure your plan is solid before purchasing equipment . That aside I'm subbed for the show

Thanks for dropping in D. I'm definitely going to have everything planned out, and I'll be posting up my spreadsheets and sketch up layouts in the coming days. Hopefully if I miss something someone will catch it for me! Definitely going to have the clone/veg/flower all planned out for the next 6-12 months. Don't wanna be caught with my pants down...

 

[LSWM]

So I'm trying desperately to wrap my head around a schedule which would keep the most amount of tables running at a time, and I can't seem to figure out if have more tables than are running at any one time is better than just trying to keep a few less tables constantly populated with ZERO downtime...

For a 6 plant per 1k setup, I would assume I could get away with 1-2 weeks for clones to root, and another 4 weeks of Veg.

My brain is just not seeing how to overlap this schedule, it may be a task I have to come back to. Here's what I came up with so far...



Here is my layout for 7 tables. The Green is all usable Veg/Flower/Lung space. The red area in between is lung space as well, but will be reserved as a walkway. The tables are the black circles at the top, and I plan on using the green space at the bottom for Veg + prep/lung room. I just threw a window banger into a window in the green area on the left today. Keeping my ass at 68 up in this uninsulated loft! The Blue is a half bath to be used for drainage/ro/prep/etc.

 

[LSWM]

Well here's my equipment pricing. I'm approaching $4k, for a 6k setup. I may have to drop it down to 4k to keep the budget intact... I may be able to cut some $$ in the extraction fan/circulation fan section, as well as with the reservoirs and timers, simply because I have items laying around...

That still doesn't cut much out. The humidifier is going to be a big one, and I'm sure I will need it during stretch and/or in Veg. I plan on running sealed this winter, so we will see what I can get away without... All the bills will be paid so it's unlikely that this build out, no matter how bad the GPW ends up, will be a failure.

More info/planning to come!

 

[LSWM]

So my new 1000 ballast arrived, and my GF somehow managed to grab the only one on the shelf that was MH... With the nearest hydro store nearly 50 miles away, and me being cheap trying to save $...

The new ballast will have to wait until I get back to the hydro store and exchange the ballast this week. Gonna be heading down to the flat lands, handling business and going to a wedding.

Trying to secure my investment for the upcoming build is getting harder and harder than I though. I may have to just move the current room into the main house and add a few more donuts, in order to keep extra gear to a minimum.

Then again I could drop another 1k into the mix in my current flower room and run a Colosseum instead of the donuts.... Too many options! I just finished transplanting all my plants for the next round, and I'm harvesting in 7-14 days. With this tight schedule I think I will begin flowering what I have in the current room and start building out in the meantime.

Picture updates to come. Stay tuned!

 

[LSWM]

Picture Update! Next round of Veg, crowded under a single 600...

Couple of fresh genetics in here. 1 bean of WiFi (White Fire OG), and 3 unknown bagseeds.

 

[LSWM]

Flower shots! Tray #2 with supposed Tahoe OG! Getting crazy with the foxtailing!

 

[LSWM]

Tray #1 with TrainWreck and a single DTB#1. DTB #1 is looking good! TW didn't plump out like I wanted. Still frosty as hell!

 

[LSWM]

Just pulled 5 plants from the first Tray. TrainWreck @ 67 days.