Ahoy ahoy. First time grower (6/7 weeks) and am learning first hand how not paying attention to detail can cause a whole rake of problems - things i'll learn with patience i suppose. I want to share what I am doing and ask am I going too far with some things? I've no real sense of tradeoffs between cramming lights in and heat, that's something you more experienced folk have. I've read as much - sometimes conflicting advice - as I can, but I think I'm at the point to simply ask as I've done some trial and error, and it's not my first day with a seedling. I've got "the very basics". I figure being verbose is useful, so here goes....
What I want to be able to do is harvest a plant every few weeks, rather than a lot at one time. I'm going with autos for the moment, but will eventually keep a mother(s) plant when I figure out what I like and have space for em.
What I have:
- ~effectively 3.7 square feet (rectangular) wardrobe ~ 5.7ft(175cm),
- An LED with 206w (actual) output/usage with a mix of leds: blue, red, a-greeny-white, a-more-2700k-looking-one, and a few variations there of, no model/make on it, i only know it draws 206w, got it for free so and it's new and i'm smashed broke!,
- A Taotronics-GL21 90w(actual) (mostly reds, a few blues, and some orange ~ 610nm),
- 2 * 30w cfl (6700k) with reflectors
Total: 340w, ~ 95 watts per sq/ft.
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What I am doing/planning to do:
Planting a seed every 3-4 weeks in about 14Litre pots, no problems with germination so far. I can fit in 3 of the pots side by side and that seems to be reasonable looking around at other peoples' grows. Idea is for first few weeks a plant goes nearest to the 2 * 30w cfls (about 1-2" inch away, good growth so far doing this), then after 3 weeks or so nearer to under the 90w (output) led, and then after that nearer to under the 200w (output) led. For every plant harvested a new seed goes down, so things are on an assembly line so to speak.
In effect, about 250w of led are covering about 2/3 of the wardrobe, and 60w of cfl (and i'd guess 30w lighting from the led) covering the plant for it's first month.
Is this sensible what I am doing focusing light on certain stages like this and moving them along in an assembly line?
I don't know what I don't lol
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I am using auto fem seeds that list the plants as growing tall and into bigger plants (80-120cm).
Should I be trying to cram in more plants (smaller pots) into that space as a better tradeoff, or continue to try and grow bigger plants/bigger pots/bigger strains?
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I have the plants quite close to the led. about 10" from the 90w led, and about 16-20" from the 200w. I had some light burn but this distance seems ok enough now. I could feel the heat under the 200w with my hand.
The canopy temperature is about 31c (and temp inside the box about 29). I have passive intake, fans moves aair across canopy, and extractor with carbon filter. If I turn off the 90w led it goes down to 29c, if only turn off the 200w led temp goes to 26/27c.
I've tried many things to bring down the temp (more fans), but being realistic for this not to be noticeable to people in the house there's not much more I can do now except turn lights off.
Am I better loosing the 90w led to bring the temps down from 31c to 28/29c? Will that 2 or 3c make a difference?
-----
I've experimented with different nutrients and realised I needed to start using CalMag a early. it seemed to fix some issues that other people report with led. I started the NPK stuff slowly at week 2 (10%), then 20%, 30%, 40%, 50%... at about 60% now and i probably should go back to 50% as I notice some burn on the 5 week plant.
ph is usually in the 6.5 - 7 range.
---
Anyway, I've messed up plenty of parts of this grow with nutrients, "light" soil mixes that had little nutrients, calmag defiency (i believe), heat burn from lack of good air flow on canopy and led too close, ....
Here's a photo of the wardrobe. The bigger potted plant is northern lights auto from greenhosue seeds (first photo in left corner) and little under 4 weeks from seed today, started some light lst. The second most developed is NL from GS too, just under 5 weeks old - i sent this one ahead in time as a probe so i could test thigns like putting it closer to the led and use deficiency problems i see in it to more proactively watch similar problems in its sibling when it hits that age. It's the one in the second last picture. There are a few other smaller potted autos I put in for a similar reason, to use for testing for light burn and learn from before I plant some of their siblings in larger pots. In the first photo they are Ak49 auto's from vision (2nd and 3rd from left) and one free sample auto i was given for dutch passion..).
Let the adventure (and learning) begin!
-----
What I want to be able to do is harvest a plant every few weeks, rather than a lot at one time. I'm going with autos for the moment, but will eventually keep a mother(s) plant when I figure out what I like and have space for em.
What I have:
- ~effectively 3.7 square feet (rectangular) wardrobe ~ 5.7ft(175cm),
- An LED with 206w (actual) output/usage with a mix of leds: blue, red, a-greeny-white, a-more-2700k-looking-one, and a few variations there of, no model/make on it, i only know it draws 206w, got it for free so and it's new and i'm smashed broke!,
- A Taotronics-GL21 90w(actual) (mostly reds, a few blues, and some orange ~ 610nm),
- 2 * 30w cfl (6700k) with reflectors
Total: 340w, ~ 95 watts per sq/ft.
----
What I am doing/planning to do:
Planting a seed every 3-4 weeks in about 14Litre pots, no problems with germination so far. I can fit in 3 of the pots side by side and that seems to be reasonable looking around at other peoples' grows. Idea is for first few weeks a plant goes nearest to the 2 * 30w cfls (about 1-2" inch away, good growth so far doing this), then after 3 weeks or so nearer to under the 90w (output) led, and then after that nearer to under the 200w (output) led. For every plant harvested a new seed goes down, so things are on an assembly line so to speak.
In effect, about 250w of led are covering about 2/3 of the wardrobe, and 60w of cfl (and i'd guess 30w lighting from the led) covering the plant for it's first month.
Is this sensible what I am doing focusing light on certain stages like this and moving them along in an assembly line?
I don't know what I don't lol
-----
I am using auto fem seeds that list the plants as growing tall and into bigger plants (80-120cm).
Should I be trying to cram in more plants (smaller pots) into that space as a better tradeoff, or continue to try and grow bigger plants/bigger pots/bigger strains?
----
I have the plants quite close to the led. about 10" from the 90w led, and about 16-20" from the 200w. I had some light burn but this distance seems ok enough now. I could feel the heat under the 200w with my hand.
The canopy temperature is about 31c (and temp inside the box about 29). I have passive intake, fans moves aair across canopy, and extractor with carbon filter. If I turn off the 90w led it goes down to 29c, if only turn off the 200w led temp goes to 26/27c.
I've tried many things to bring down the temp (more fans), but being realistic for this not to be noticeable to people in the house there's not much more I can do now except turn lights off.
Am I better loosing the 90w led to bring the temps down from 31c to 28/29c? Will that 2 or 3c make a difference?
-----
I've experimented with different nutrients and realised I needed to start using CalMag a early. it seemed to fix some issues that other people report with led. I started the NPK stuff slowly at week 2 (10%), then 20%, 30%, 40%, 50%... at about 60% now and i probably should go back to 50% as I notice some burn on the 5 week plant.
ph is usually in the 6.5 - 7 range.
---
Anyway, I've messed up plenty of parts of this grow with nutrients, "light" soil mixes that had little nutrients, calmag defiency (i believe), heat burn from lack of good air flow on canopy and led too close, ....
Here's a photo of the wardrobe. The bigger potted plant is northern lights auto from greenhosue seeds (first photo in left corner) and little under 4 weeks from seed today, started some light lst. The second most developed is NL from GS too, just under 5 weeks old - i sent this one ahead in time as a probe so i could test thigns like putting it closer to the led and use deficiency problems i see in it to more proactively watch similar problems in its sibling when it hits that age. It's the one in the second last picture. There are a few other smaller potted autos I put in for a similar reason, to use for testing for light burn and learn from before I plant some of their siblings in larger pots. In the first photo they are Ak49 auto's from vision (2nd and 3rd from left) and one free sample auto i was given for dutch passion..).
Let the adventure (and learning) begin!
-----
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Looks like you got your grow thought through.
