Hi Ladies and Gents,
Must admit, seems hard to find a place to start. Forums like this one are absolutely fantastic don't get me wrong, but the amount of information out there is overwhelming and has downright scrambled my already clouded mind!
This isn't exactly my first grow, grew some bag seeds at my last apartment where a 5'h x 3' w x 3'd tent was appropriate. Love growing all sorts of plants, and love smoking, so seemed rather silly to not start up an indoor grow. With the basic nutes I had from Bunnings (im based in Australia), which there seems to be no blooming options, I managed to grew 3 sickly sativas which yielded me a surprising 5oz in total. Such a great feeling to smoke some of your homegrown!! Ive been hooked ever since!! Yet it hasn't quite materialised yet since I moved apartment.
Unfortunately, I am a little on the paranoid side, and having a grow tent in my study just doesn't seem like an option, theres no way im taking it up and down everytime I have a house visit from the estate agents. Luckily for me, im rather crafty, in the creative sense and love building things. So I set to work on building myself a grow cabinet which would blend into my study furniture (to a degree). After doing plenty of research, scrog seemed like the best route for me, so I built my cabinet to the dimensions of 40" w x 24"d x 42" h hoping to be able to grow two plants.
With regard to my gear....
CFL Lights 130 watt... 2 x 6400k + 14000k for veg
2 x dual spectrum + 24000k for flower
plus two led panels I got with the lamps
Soil grow with CANNA BIO nutes
Ventilation 2 x 120mm Sunon and two small desktop fans
3 packs of NL auto fems on their way.... 00 seeds, Vision seeds, Royal queen.
Ive been running the whole system with a couple of small plants from bag seeds to see what temps it would be running at and wow, its hot, pushing over 86F. Turning off one of the lamps brings it down to between 77-82 which is great. Only thing is we're about to go into summer here in Sydney, and its only gonna get hotter.... much hotter, and I would love to be able to use all three lamps.
I played around with the fan setup so many times. As I said before, stealth is of importance to me, and even though these are only 'computer' fans, dang they make some noise. Would not be happy if my pc sounded half as loud as these guys. Originally had one as an intake working half speed and the other as output. Only problem was light, poured out into the room lighting it up all night long (as I run my lights during the night and off during the day to try and keep it as cool as possible). Also figured out that mounting them directly to the wall of the cabinet made some incredible vibrational noise. So cut the holes a little bigger and suspended the fans with the ducting running loose through the whole with a bit of tape to seal her up. Seemed to help.
Did some more reading, and saw some interesting ways to dampen the sound of your fans. Building double insualted external housing looked like a good idea (as I still have my 4' inline fan from the tent setup and would love to use it as it really MOVES air), so I built one, but jesus... the inline fan sounds like a flippin helicopter landed in my study.
So I put one of the sunon fans in the boxing and one in the cab both working to pull air out on the same length of ducting (hope that makes sense). Its still noisy though, and anyone coming into the room is immediately drawn to the noise without hesitation. Seen fan silencers (foamed ducting) which looks like my next best bet. Just more money to spend
I guess that's my major concern... heat coupled with noise from fans. Seems like theres no answer.. its either or.
Secondly.... As I said before... the range of nutes available at garden stores is totally dismal here. And as importing nutes from overseas is more expensive then the actual nutes seems crazy. So after shopping around I bought Canna Bio Vega, Flores and boost. Wanted to go for something relatively organic so this seemed like a good choice. Just haven't been able to find many reviews on it. Would love some feedback if anyone has used em.
With regards to the photos..
1. The CAB
2.The external fan housing (box inside a box with insulation)
3.4.5.6 Inside cab pics
Any advice you guys can give is massively appreciated!!
Thanks for taking the time to have a look
Must admit, seems hard to find a place to start. Forums like this one are absolutely fantastic don't get me wrong, but the amount of information out there is overwhelming and has downright scrambled my already clouded mind!
This isn't exactly my first grow, grew some bag seeds at my last apartment where a 5'h x 3' w x 3'd tent was appropriate. Love growing all sorts of plants, and love smoking, so seemed rather silly to not start up an indoor grow. With the basic nutes I had from Bunnings (im based in Australia), which there seems to be no blooming options, I managed to grew 3 sickly sativas which yielded me a surprising 5oz in total. Such a great feeling to smoke some of your homegrown!! Ive been hooked ever since!! Yet it hasn't quite materialised yet since I moved apartment.
Unfortunately, I am a little on the paranoid side, and having a grow tent in my study just doesn't seem like an option, theres no way im taking it up and down everytime I have a house visit from the estate agents. Luckily for me, im rather crafty, in the creative sense and love building things. So I set to work on building myself a grow cabinet which would blend into my study furniture (to a degree). After doing plenty of research, scrog seemed like the best route for me, so I built my cabinet to the dimensions of 40" w x 24"d x 42" h hoping to be able to grow two plants.
With regard to my gear....
CFL Lights 130 watt... 2 x 6400k + 14000k for veg
2 x dual spectrum + 24000k for flower
plus two led panels I got with the lamps
Soil grow with CANNA BIO nutes
Ventilation 2 x 120mm Sunon and two small desktop fans
3 packs of NL auto fems on their way.... 00 seeds, Vision seeds, Royal queen.
Ive been running the whole system with a couple of small plants from bag seeds to see what temps it would be running at and wow, its hot, pushing over 86F. Turning off one of the lamps brings it down to between 77-82 which is great. Only thing is we're about to go into summer here in Sydney, and its only gonna get hotter.... much hotter, and I would love to be able to use all three lamps.
I played around with the fan setup so many times. As I said before, stealth is of importance to me, and even though these are only 'computer' fans, dang they make some noise. Would not be happy if my pc sounded half as loud as these guys. Originally had one as an intake working half speed and the other as output. Only problem was light, poured out into the room lighting it up all night long (as I run my lights during the night and off during the day to try and keep it as cool as possible). Also figured out that mounting them directly to the wall of the cabinet made some incredible vibrational noise. So cut the holes a little bigger and suspended the fans with the ducting running loose through the whole with a bit of tape to seal her up. Seemed to help.
Did some more reading, and saw some interesting ways to dampen the sound of your fans. Building double insualted external housing looked like a good idea (as I still have my 4' inline fan from the tent setup and would love to use it as it really MOVES air), so I built one, but jesus... the inline fan sounds like a flippin helicopter landed in my study.
So I put one of the sunon fans in the boxing and one in the cab both working to pull air out on the same length of ducting (hope that makes sense). Its still noisy though, and anyone coming into the room is immediately drawn to the noise without hesitation. Seen fan silencers (foamed ducting) which looks like my next best bet. Just more money to spend
I guess that's my major concern... heat coupled with noise from fans. Seems like theres no answer.. its either or.
Secondly.... As I said before... the range of nutes available at garden stores is totally dismal here. And as importing nutes from overseas is more expensive then the actual nutes seems crazy. So after shopping around I bought Canna Bio Vega, Flores and boost. Wanted to go for something relatively organic so this seemed like a good choice. Just haven't been able to find many reviews on it. Would love some feedback if anyone has used em.
With regards to the photos..
1. The CAB
2.The external fan housing (box inside a box with insulation)
3.4.5.6 Inside cab pics
Any advice you guys can give is massively appreciated!!
Thanks for taking the time to have a look