New Grower DWC COBS Megacrop first grow ever

[Frenjamin Banklin]

First grow, first post. Just making sure I'm doing this right. Stay tuned for intro and description. Wanna try to post a picture

 

[Frenjamin Banklin]

Okay
Old guy, never grown before. Lurked for months absorbing the accumulated knowledge best I could. Finally decided to go with.
Cobs for light. Running three bars with four cobs each. Two 3000k and two 4000k each bar with Hlg2100 so I can run them to 300 if needed. Been running a lot lower.
Decided to go modified bubble buckets after realizing Rdwc was not ideal for mixed strain and perpetual auto flower grow. Also wanted the learning curve challenge to master something new.
Nutrients, being a cheap old SOB I figured Megacrop was right up my alley. Been doing well so far, I think. Running MC with sweet candy and Lots of cal/mag.
Now the important stuff, honestly struggled with germination and damp of or rotting at least ten seeds before I was able to get the current girls going.
Big girl DP glue berry she is a week younger than the two other larger plants next to her but she wasn't stunted by my over attention( noob mistake) she's about 7 weeks and yes I think they are behind schedule but I'm not super worried yet. My res is at 68 and the room is at 70 as well they are in 8 gallon buckets. And the first 2 weeks could have been better. The big girls are showing pistols and stretching 1 inch per day still. About 22" tall and 30" around for the GB. I'll give them a week or two but have moved lights to 16/8 to make sure they know it's time to flower.
The two medium plants are RQS diesel and Sour hound that are at 8 weeks and showing pistols and stretching but a little more concerned about the flipping but not crazy worried yet considering conditions and early stunting. Enough rambling for now, enjoy some pics and smoke em if ya got em.

 

[woody]

Looking great man. Just be prepared to reduce megacrop and add a pk booster in flower.
Megacrop is great but just a little N heavy for the flowering stage.
Nice job on the diy cobs too. Ive got a pack of citi 1212 3000k and 4000k and been thinking of doing this.
Any chanve you can take a pic of your lights for me mate?

 

[Frenjamin Banklin]

Thanks, added 1mg/gallon of koolbloom to the res this week to help supplement the MC.
I built the lights with the hopes of always having two plants close in size for light height. I realized they different spectrums would require a little rotating so the buckets are all on rollers to help with rotational coverage and grow room grooming. The Cobs are 6 inches apart so per pair do the spectrums for the most part overlap very well as I'm running no reflectors. I ran this entire run at 100w per rail (25w per cob) 50w per plant so far and absolutely compact plants. Just bumped the pre flower girls to 75w.

 

[Frenjamin Banklin]

Trying to figure out full size photos, think I got it. Grow room shot. 7feet by 7 feet. By 8 high.

 

[iampepe]

Looks like you hit one out of the park on your first grow. Looking great! Keep doing what your doing and you'll be rewarded nicely.

 

[Frenjamin Banklin]

Thank you both for looking in. I'd like to thank you both as well as all the others here who provide excellent information here daily. If I had not taken the time to read what everyone has spent many hours laying out for us noobs I would not be doing so well. I've been in many forums over the years (non canna) and have never seen such a community spirit of helping.
Love some feedback from anyone that wouldn't mind chiming in. Tried some more pictures this AM. Some with flash some without at the preflowers. The green pistols have been out for a few weeks but the white pistols have been out for a few days. The big Glueberry is at 8 weeks but I assume it's slow due to large res and cool temps.
Pics are after 16. Hours at 100w per plant. Mistake and went back to 75 which is where they have been happy.

Thoughts on whether it's healthy , anyone.

 

[midIN]

Man ur really hitting this off. Looking great bub keep it up. Be back to check out ur new stuff. Happy growing,love the cobs by the way. Really love those man great diy.

 

[Frenjamin Banklin]

Thanks,
Some updates. Slowly starting to flower more. Adding maxi bloom to the MC, I'll save the kool bloom till the end. Up skirt on the DP glueberry.
My EC with MC, sweet candy ca/mag and a base EC of .2 is now up over 4 with only slight tip burn. Does anyone know if the bacteria(hydro gaurd) affect the Ppm/EC feels high but looks healthy. Res is 65f.

 

[Frenjamin Banklin]

@sanguine
Sorry it took a bit, but here are some pics of the lights and a little explanation of what I was thinking. A lot of the thought process was inspired by the fantastic led/cob discussions here.
After reading that 3500 is enough to get through both life phases but hear many people supplementing I decided to do what you have done get some on both sides of the the spectrum and try to use the overlap to really get both ends better than just the 3500. So although it's four lights per rail I imagine it's just one dual spectrum cob
I wanted the power to not fall short so that's why I went with the 2100 driver with dimmer. I wasn't sure of strains or if I might run photos so I really wanted the ability to push 150w per plant if it came to it.
I picked up the parts from Rapid as it seemed to be the easiest way and the free shipping and discount worked out well. I also grabbed a 100w hobby kit with 4000k Veros and was very impressed with that.
To mount I literally just used .125inch wall 1" by 1" angle which was very stiff and held everything perfect. The pin heats inks provide a fantastic sturdy platform to mount to and come pre tapped to mount to. Couple wire ropes and ratchets and they are up.
So far I have been following height recommendations bard of people running the single 3500 and I think the 4000 I could probably drop the voltage a bit. I ran four plants the first four weeks of life under just one rail at about 60 watts (basically 15w each)at 30" and had no stretch. I then bumped to 100 per rail ( 50w each and 25w per cob) and they have grown as you see them. Bumped this week to 150 per rail and anything higher they get mad. All wattages are at the wall, with cheap kilowatt meter. I have a Northern lights and a FB GG4 behind these and even with the lights at 36" and less wattage they are shorter with super tight nodes do I am definitely going to have to manage overlap. Honestly at this ping in going to do the next run with lights off over the newest two plants to see if the extra light is enough to get them through four weeks healthy with good size.
Sorry for being so long winded, and that's straight. I try not to write stoned. Not enough bandwidth