Noob here needing help deciding if my growroom design is good enough

[Cell]

Hello,
This is my first post! Wooot! I need a little help with my growroom design. I grew one crop long ago with... brace yourself... an EMILY's GARDEN! LOL I know! Anyway this time around I have dedicated more space and hope to have a pretty good grow show. Here's my rough plan. My space measures 96"t x 53"w x 25"d. I plan to divide the room in half creating a flowering room and a vegetation room. I'm going to run a 6 inch duct fan attatched to a Y splitter to each room at the ceiling and have the air vent through a carbon filter in my attic. I will have fresh air vent at the bottome of each room. I plan to run my old 400 HPS light (that I used with the emilys garden, new bulb tho) in the flowering room and purchase a 250w MH light for my veg room. Going away from the sucky emilys garden I'd like to purchase two rainforest 318's. One for each room.

My questions are about the rainforests (pictured below). Will I be able to keep two healthy mothers in the veg room with this system as well as veg clones from the mothers. (all in the same rainforest) The rainforests have 18 grow sites, will I be able to flower a plant in every site? I plan to grow Purple Haze and White Widow for starters but I want to be able to maximize my yield. I also would like advice on what grow mediums to use. I hate grow rocks and I hear that rockwool and hydroton cause pH problems. Please help!!!?? I think I'm on the right path but I want to be sure before I invest in the rainforest systems. Thanks cannabis gurus!!

 

[Lazyman]

Ok, I'm gonna type somethin that's gonna catch me some flak, but I want to at least have you think about another option. You have roughly 4'X2' growing space, and if you're concerned about yield then this might interest you.

How are you starting, from seed or clones? If you live in a medical state and have your prescription you can buy clones and skip the veg room entirely. May not apply to you at all, but if so you'll have more room for flowering plants (more yield) and your initial setup will be much easier.

Yes you could probably use the same Rainforest for a mother and some clones, they might not mind the diffused (24X7) light, but I would suggest a 4' 4-8 buld T-5 fluorescent, it will make less heat and plants can grow closer to them. You'll need to maintain the mom to keep her fairly small. Use 18 hour light when you're not cloning to save power.

You could probably do 18 plants if they had zero veg time, or one day! They would have to be really small and you'd want to lollipop them. So, in that case, you still don't really need a veg room, use two for flowering instead and just grow short, fast harvests. I'd maybe use two 400's instead. You could even run two tiny flowering rooms, harvesting one each month. Basically a little flip flop flowering room, and probably about a half pound per room per harvest if you can get around a half-ounce per plant at each harvest. Might take you a few runs to get there though, there's a lot of perils to watch for. Hehe you could even do a tanked CO2 setup later if you want, typically increases yields 15-20%. Do that after you've finished 4 harvests so you can keep up with the new faster growth.

I might suggest coco coir for the medium, it's naturally pH of 6.0 and is environmentally friendly (renewable) and holds about 35% water, but diatomite grow rocks are also quite good. Soil in pots might not be a bad way to start, so you have more of a moisture buffer and some light nutes to start the babies off. That way you can save some money, learn how your light and heat/ventilation and odor control work and get them dialed in perfect.
Add your hydro system later and you will have a much easier first grow.

Make whatever changes are needed to fix problems once, so you don't have to mess with it again. For example, if your fan is too small, don't waste time and money with bandaids, get a bigger fan, and save your old one. You may need it someday.

Buy some Ona gel for smell emergencies. If you're gonna use soil I'd use 2 gallon pots and put 9 in each room, with a deep catch tray so they can store some extra water. Cheap and easy this way, add some bloom boosters at 4 weeks flowering and pump em up.

I'll recommend Canna Coco or House and Garden coco nutes, but you'll want to check out the coco forum a while if you want to go that route. You have to add all the nutes yourself which is less forgiving on newer growers.

That help any? I know many will disagree with these directions, but this would be very efficient, use a constant 400W draw (mostly 12/12 cycles except maybe a day veg lighting here and there,) and yield reliably.

 

[Lazyman]

Oh, here is a Satori vegged 3 days, but some of my Jack Herers hit 18" with the same time!

 

[Lazyman]

Wow sorry if that was kinda erratic guys, just finished a bowl OGK and a bowl of Cheese...

 

[Cell]

Thanks for the tips Lazyman. You don't sound that lazy btw! hehe. I must have a veg room to keep some mothers. I don't have access to clones so my first grow will be from seed. I'm only growing for my personal use so If I can get a half pound out of that flowering room that we hold me over for a couple of months. I hate soil (too messy) so hydro is definitely the way I want to go.

I don't think I have the room for flourescent lights. If they are 4' then they are longer than my veg room lol. Do you think a 250w MH and a 400w HPS would be too much heat with proper ventilation and good fans?

 

[Lazyman]

Nah that should be fine bro, but 250W of CFL's would probably fit the bill and make less heat too, you can even put them in a hood/reflector if you want! Yeah you're right about the t-5s, I forgot about the size thing.

Sounds like you'll only have room for one mom at a time, but if you grow from seed just make sure your biggest healthiest (female) plant is the one you keep! When she gets too big just replace her with one of your clones, and flower the mom if you have room. Grow on man!

 

[Jnugg]

Why not use the one fan minus the y-splitter.Just use louvered dark room vents to get the air from the passive intake of the veg to the dark room vent to the flowering cab through the light through the fan and into the carbon filter and finally the attic.


As far as flower and veg area's go....53" wide = about 4.416' so if we make the mother room 2' d x 3' w (6' squared) we will be left with 1.416' w x 2' d which = 2.832' squared for the veg room.Now we need to account for the space taken up to seperate the two sections which will more than likely be 3/4" thick MDF or wood so 1.416' w - 0.75" = 1.354' w so really our veg area would = 2.708' squared.

I'd get a 150w MH for the veg area as this will give you 64 wpsf and 4431 lpsf...this is ideal as cannabis in seedling and clone stage need about 375-600 lpsf for fast healthy vigorous growth.Vegetating cannabis wants 2500-5000 lpsf,and flowering cannabis wants 7000-10,000 lpsf.

A 250w would be overkill in that small of a veg area.I say get a 150w or a 175w MH.Keep the 400w HPS for the flowering section that measures 6' squared we'd get 66.66 wpsf and 8333 lpsf.

Now we could make the flower section smaller by like say 2' d x 2.5' w (5 feet squared) and that would give us 80 wpsf and 10,000 lpsf and leave us with a veg section that measures 3.708' squared I'd still go with a 150-175w MH.


Also as your exhuast fan goes,are we talking cheap crappy booster fan,axial/computer muffin fan,bathroom vent fan or are we talking about a real exhuast fan that is an inline centrifugal like vortex,elicent,can fan,eco plus etc.?

With a 400 and a 150-175w HID's you're going to want a nice 6" 392-449cfm inline centrifugal,especially if using a carbon filter and trying to exhuast two grow areas while keeping the lights cool.

 

[Cell]

Hey Jnugg. Thanks for the advice. I'm not sure I follow what you mean about venting both rooms without the y splitter. It seems the cheapest route yet still effective. I plan to purchase a real vent fan for around 70 80 dollars.

I still want two mothers in that veg room bonzai style if need be. I have two strains I'd like to produce so both mothers are needed.

Anybody think I'm crazy for using two rainforest units for this grow op?

I'll probably follow your advice and get a 150w or a 175w in place of the 250.

 

[stillsmokin843]

im so stoned right now so mabey im off but if it is basic 2 x 4 then why not build a shelf to seperate two 2x4 ebb and flow tables veg on bottom and flower on top?