Med room in progress(Help Needed)

[Guest]

I am planning on buying a ballast kit and building it myself, i always do this. Never had enough money to spend $300 on a grow light. However right now the budget is small so $50- 100 will be all i can afford until i get paid again.

I hooked up the back up MH ballast as a temp fix and had some T8's on the plants last night to keep them going. The second MH was working fine then i kinda shocked myself on the capacitor and now it won't fire up!

This is already taking to much pain and effort. I won't be deterred i will succeed!

It appears the ballast that almost caught on fire had a few drips of resin/oil on the hot part and thats what smoked the room out. To be safe it will be thrown away either way.

 

[PharmaCan]

bajasauce - if you spilled oil on your car's exhaust manifold and it started to smoke, would you throw the car away? If you put the ballast in the middle of the garage floor and plug it in and leave it running for a day or two, you can safely determine if it works or not. If it works but is just getting hot, you can probably figure out a way to cool it down some.

JMO

And if you have get a new ballast, check out this place,
http://www.htgsupply.com/viewproduct.asp?productID=47877 Their complete ballasts are about the same price as a kit.

PC

 

[Guest]

The problem is i can't be sure if it was oil or not and i don't have a garage. But i might do some testing i'd hate to miss out on 400w of light i need every little bit.

The problem with those ballasts is i can build a complete 400MH/HPS for $60 and the 600HPS ballast is 100+ kit or premade plus the cheapest you can find a bulb is $60 so min $160. Thats pretty much the price of three 400W lights.

Pictures! MH cooled down after shocking the shit out of my finger and is humming away pretty well.

This is one of the two hydro buckets. Don't worry they will be getting a HEALTHY scrub today!



Each bucket came with a water pump to dripper ring and a small air pump to air stone in the bottom. The hole in the bucket for the water dripper is at the wrong angle to allow the hard tubing pas through. Is it much of a difference to have this dripper and the air stone over the air stone alone? The water pumps might be harvested for a ebb&flow table.



Here are the girls just ending the stretch and starting the to long process of flowering in earnest.



Picture of the hooks, found a cheap chain for precise height adjustment.



Purple urkle, very bushy and squat. To short hoping i can stretch it out and grow it BIG.



The rest of the clones in veg. They don't look like much but this is there first real light. Two were under 80watts of T8 and the three smallest i got yesterday and just need some TLC from the MH

 

[Guest]

Okay, first off you can get a 400 watt HPS bulb at home depot for 21.95. Not the best but it'll work. Or were you talking of the price of a 1000? You can get those at 1000bulbs for like 26.

Second, here is a great thread everyone should read on fireproofing your growroom.

Third, don't get discouraged, it takes time, blood, sweat and tears and yes an electrical shock and a fire but its going to turn around. Tons of great help here.

 

[Guest]

You can get generic non grow 400 bulbs from e-conolight for $10 and 1000 watt bulbs are pricey but if all goes to plan i will have a working 1000 watt light with in a month.

I will not rest until i complete this room to perfection!

 

[Guest]

Just a little update to keep the thread alive. The flowering plants are doing there thing and just starting to show little buds, but still have a long way to go.

The veg plants are still vegging slow but sure. Picked up a timer to give the veg plants some dark time, and help the electricity bill. I've always seen increased growth with a 6 hour dark period so hoping to see some real growth soon! Took down my one hydro bucket do to some issues i'm having. Going to concentrate on the organic soil and perfect that first.

Flowering day 10




Veg with the urkle up front and the babies in the back. Beef master tomatoes in the bottom right. tomatoes love some earth juice!!



F-13 on the way in a few weeks!

 

[Guest]

didn't think i'd leave you hanging did ya?

Orange spice

Unknown clone "a"

DTC99 in center one gal pot

flower shot

 

[Guest]

Veg shots!!!!!!



white widow

The purple urkel

 

[Guest]

New strains added in the veg phase:
F-13
AK-47
Lollipop
honeydew purple
spank(don't ask cause i don't know)
and a "old school original blueberry

most except for spank and the blueberry are JUST rooted and not even worthy of pictures. But i will get some when i can.

 

[messn'n'gommin']

Looking good Baja!

BTW, I see you have things under control and LOTS of light, but for future reference you might want to take a look at the CMH thread, at least for the first few pages, and take a gander at the spectral graphs! It is my understanding that the only bulbs available right now is up to and including the 400W variety. They run on an HPS core and coil ballast and you could them through veg and flower. They are bit expensive at about $55-60 each, but it would be a push, imho, as you could eliminate having to buy MH bulbs along with HPS bulbs and you could sell the MH ballasts. Also the 600W and 1000W bulbs will be out sometime later this year if you wanted to go bigger. Just something to think about.

Namaste, mess

 

[Guest]

I'm intrested in CMH but for right now i'm thinking of using my two 400w hps and divide me room in two. Then construct a flip-flop with two mixed spectrum 800watt flower rooms and a decent veg room with a small hid and some t-5s or t-8s.


Off to research flip flops more!!

 

[messn'n'gommin']

ya...I could see you were already busy enuff with your current grow and wasn't trying to get u sidetracked just thot I'd put a bug in ur ear.

The man has got his sh!t together! heh

ya...I get the impression ya not just burnin the candle at both ends but broke it in half and burnin those ends too!

I know it may not mean much...but am pullin for man.

:respekt:

Namaste, mess

 

[Guest]

DTC99

Unknown Clone(albany)1gal pot

Orange spice

Unknown clone albany large pots.

spasm in the middle some flowering plants getting blue light on the sides.

Unknown clone flowering in blue light

Small clones in the middle

White widow topped to promote side growth.

Purple Shaman

new clones under the tubes

I made a bubble cloner to make quick healthy clones. I have a white widow, purple shaman, purple erkle, unknown all that should have roots in 7 days.

A big veg shot, you can see the foil i hung up to start separating rooms.

The big girls under the hps

 

[Guest]

Lots of work done and another two lights all on a shoe string budget.

Pictures tonight!

 

[Guest]

got two 250 MH ballasts on the cheap and one bulb. Will get the second one running soon but might be a few weeks.

Orange spice

Unknown

New 800Watt dual spectrum flower room

Veg area new 250MH air cooled hood

 

[messn'n'gommin']

Lookin' good Baja...I have seen some who accomplished less with more. Gotta love shoestring budget grows! BTW tried to pass along a little rep your way but don't have enough posts. C'est la vie.

 

[Guest]

way to go bro, sometimes the thrown together rooms work the best.

 

[darrinjefferson]

wow baja!! looking great. cant wait to see em in a few weeks. that orange spice looks awesome

late

 

[TheVetterMan]

Real Greenery Great pics g

 

[Guest]

well the worst has happened spider mites have found a foot hold in the flower room. I neemed and soaped all the plants veg and bloom and bombed the room last night. I didn't find alot of spider mites but one is to many. I'm very sure they came in on some clones i got and just now found out came from an infested garden!

Why give some one clones from a known infested spidermite hive?! anyway. I think i caught it really early so i'm going to keep my eyes open and work on getting some floramite or avid to finish this before i lose all this work and time.