Let’s Get Nuts: 1100w LED With UV & IR, 5x5x6fr, CO2, Build-Up

[Rexer]

Hey @ReservoirDog

A bit late to showing up- apologies and thanks for the tag Bill!

You have a setup that's beautiful and just wonderful, and I'm going to follow along if you don't mind!

I noticed you painted your lids white...question, is there a layer of black paint underneath? I'm just worried you'll still have some light bleeding through. I've used those lids and always found a layer of black is best to stop the light leaks.

Your setup is so up my alley, I just love it!

 

[ReservoirDog]

Wow, I found the “disco” setting…

Anybody else have a nightclub mode for their room/tent?

 

[ReservoirDog]

Welcome to the grow Rexer! You are certainly very welcome here. Thanks also for your concern via a vis my rez lids. I have indeed hit the underside with paint, using up a couple of half empty spray can that were gathering dust. One was yellow, the other green and my haphazard coating appears to have blocked light fully. I thought I might need black but turns out that just “more paint” was all I needed. My white coats are pretty thick as I prepared the surface aggressively with a wire brush on the end of my drill, melting as often as abraiding. I gave them all the full test under the lights and no visible light passed through. Here’s a pic of the yellow painted underside of the originally blue plastic lid. The lighter, yellow plastic lids (seen on the rez’ with net cups installed) I think benefitted from the darker green paint as they appeared to let more light through in their original state. Again, this is the blue,

 

[ReservoirDog]

Im trying to get a handle on how the different grow media/matrix impact plant morphology. Aside from overall growth measured by dry and wet weights I’m curious to hear of people’s anecdotal impressions of how , say, a 50psi aero system impacted the plants grow stages and the resulting physical profile, as it were. (WARNING! WARNING! TANGENTIAL [at best] DIATRIBE AHEAD…) It appears that most of the readily available peer reviewed data is focused on overall mass - which is understandable considering where most funding for research comes from, however it means that our science has to find its genesis in grower anecdote and that the field is ripe for discovery. Legalization has opened (…YOU WERE WARNED!) this deep potential, that, for me personally, as part of the previous counter-culture that had to keep everything weed related on the DL, has incredible appeal and novelty. I realize that nowhere near all or most of us are legally there yet but it seems there’s enough of us that we can begin to effect this transformation. In doing so I think that we, former iconoclasts of the dominant culture who now find ourselves in the mainstream, have a moral obligation to “do no harm” with our still oppressed family of 420s worldwide remaining front of mind. To me that means being conscious of the image we present, and an unending commitment to using and developing the still undreamt of next-gen sustainability practises that will virtually eliminate the negative impacts of cultivation no matter how large or small . Lastly, and just for the moment, we ought, when publicly ID’d as 420s, to be limiting our politics to cannabis legislation alone. Why? Well, short answer is the stakes are so incredibly high that they’re almost unknowable. Fellow 420s still oppressed and persecuted around the world look on in horror and great anxiety - desperately hoping we don’t end up screwing this for everyone else with our usual dumpster-fires like demanding the freedom to expose coworkers to deadly pathogens , or the right to grow 30ft cannabis trees in our front yard, and other whiny, pissy solophisms. Assuming for arguments sake we stick handle through and away from those kind of own goals, I believe that the highly informed and ethical grower will become part of a permanent stopper mechanism that certainly ought to be built to assure that as a society we fully reject the motivations behind prohibition as a harm reduction tool and to understand that it’s primary purpose was as a tool of domination. I also happen to think that information sharing will help to inoculate against the kinds of hype-oversight that can do damage to the public perception of cannabis use, users and culture. There are no doubt recommend uses for cannibis at this moment being embraced that will in time prove to have been more harmful than helpful. I have to go with history on this one and not the Pollyanna’s who prescribe cannabis as civilization’s cure-all. Doesn’t mean I don’t think it’s a “cure-many” or even “most”
, I do, but rampant enthusiasm combined with quick profits have a poor track record in our culture and the sooner we root out the truth as both invested growers and honest brokers, the sooner and more effectively we can clean up the larger mess that everyone knows will not wait indefinitely…. Man did that thought ever spike out of its grow box. I just want to honestly interrogate our experience, assumptions and appraisals and believe that agreed upon fact is the best starting place, if not final destination, for our big questions…. Dammit! Haha Here’s a random pic of stuff you can buy to re-anesthetize your brain.

 

[ReservoirDog]

So I found that as neat as the seal was that I struggled to make using simply and solely the stainless hardware clamps on each junction of this system, it proved to be too little. For newcomers sake I’ll explain: The problem is that the nature of the ducting itself - specifically it’s screw-type wire structure (not spaced concentric rings) makes impossible any clamping location that doesn’t require clamping around this wire structure. Not being crushable or collapsible this wire then creates small gaps where air escapes and the systems effectiveness is compromised. I was determined not to make a mess of things if possible for reasons that are entirely superficial, but with my current experience and ability, as important as a neat seal was this was about the best I could do. It now works much better, much less, and more quietly. All of those things having been stand out factors of the system before the tape job it’s impressive such improvement was possible. Currently I’m maintaining 2 temperature controlling mechs in the system with the AC infinity probe taped to the ceiling and triggered exclusively by high heat events over 87 degrees. This usually translates to roughly 75 degrees at canopy level, depending on relative humidity which I’m controlling ~50% (+\-5deg) with additions of moisture when low and a second, slightly above canopy level, fan when high just to smooth things out. This keeps moisture on target under the current conditions which, absent plants, are pretty easy to manage and not exactly representative, but I’m undertaking in order to become at least somewhat deft at the controls. I’ve also been running the wifi Govee probes in same locations so I can become aware of any calibration issues that may crop up. I like “piloting” things, it’s just part of my makeup resulting from so many Cdn Coast Guard oral exams and actual onboard situations and emergencies. It’s a perspective it seems I’ve settled into over the years.

 

[ReservoirDog]

Diammonim phosphate is one of the more common PK ferts worldwide. My purpose however is as a food source so I can keep a separate colony of beneficial bacillus thriving and available for continuous use in every new reservoir water change out. My original source is the lauded and expensive “Hydroguard” product. At 100$ litre I was curious about these tykes while also fearing root rot if I ran out I looked into keeping some around and alive like a sourdough starter. It turns out to be both possible and cheap with the only requirements being chlorine free water and a food source. Again the whine and sneermakers had the answer with this 12$ bag of powder that requires half a teaspoon per week in 3-4 gallons of 15-25degree Celsius off-gassed or filtered water to keep these guys in Olympic athlete level condition. It has a secondary use for me as a nutrition favoured by cubensis mushrooms that can be mixed in very sparingly to one’s fruiting substrate, much like how gypsum is used for rye grain mycelia inoculations. Guess I oughta get a bigger bag. I think I’ll look for some insect grass also. Any recommendations re: crickets or soldier flies? Apparently it makes excellent mushroom food as well particularly for dung loving mushrooms and it certainly stores better than a pile of horse shit delivered on my front yard.

 

[ReservoirDog]

These are Inkbird sensors. On left is the wifi temp controller and under tape and just out of frame on the right is the RH controller sensor. This is flowering canopy level, est. Below is the co2 controller sensor. Hopefully they all stay out of the way here and function well. So far so good, and IVe compared against other placements and other sensors and these really look like they’re gonna work here.

PS is anyone running software that they can upload with .crv files from wifi enviro devices like my gear here and then overlay on a VPD graph? Definitely what I’m looking for so as to provide the best context for my data.

 

[ReservoirDog]

I took a large part of my tent work apart to make some room mods that were held up by shartages/delivery chaos. Glad I didn’t wait, would’ve gone insane collecting all this gear and not setting up. So I was short a piece of this insulation board and one windows worth of the “frosted glass” adhesive I treated the glass on the other side of this board with. This is the street facing, front of the house. Unfortunately it also faces SW so gets pretty warm on the other side of those windows. In fact during the 3-4 day peak of the historic heat wave last summer my thermometer out there hit 50 degrees centigrade. Prev. I had never witnessed 40 deg, that’s how outrageous that event was. A ground cover spruce bush in the front, about .75 meter diameter and 8 inches high that I watered religiously in the days leading up, DIED in one day. Every single needle that was green-blue the day before and under no stress turned red in 24 hrs. It just boiled alive. I hesitate to tell the story because it sounds like a major exaggeration but I swear it is not. That properly terrified me. Whole towns burnt down in those few days because it was like waking up on Venus one morning. I live in fear of it still and thus the mega insulated windows. I’ll show a pic tomorrow of how well the glass frosting hides the ugly and suggestive insulation in the windows. You just can’t tell at all.

 

[ReservoirDog]

So these are my 17 gallon Bud Room reservoirs that, at the moment, I’m planning to run two plants at a time in. The product here is “Noico” a mid-priced automotive sound deadening adhesive panel. It has quite a thick aluminum layer on this visible size and a heavy, compressible almost roofing tar type middle layer that is very adhesive under the peel off. It insulates very well and easily moulds into complex shapes. Downside is weight. This rez is wrapped with combo incl. Mylar bubble wrap which solves the Noico downsides but suffers from all the problems Noico solves. Clear as mud? I’m trying, hope it helps.

I don’t feel confident about the rez size. Thing is, my application is extreme bc I can hit a 5x5 grid with well over 1000ppd everywhere, and run a 1500 ppm co2 enviro at stable, ideal VPD. So the suggestion by my guru Grow Doctor that this size is perfect for a bubble phonics setup worries me because he doesn’t use CO2. I just follow his awesome website, I don’t have contact with him.

Oh, and another seed order has fallen through. It’s because I’m limited in my payment type, essentially visa only because I’m not confident dealing with the bank in person to do a money order since I became functionally deaf. All communication courses I was signed up for got tanked during COVID so I’m feeling very isolated sometimes. Really it’s down to me but I have so much frustration communicating with people right now it’s really hurting me 24/7. I’ve had a 8/10 migraine for 3 days too so that’s kicked my ass pretty hard right now and is likely souring my mood. I just want to grow some weed gahdammit!! OK, I’m ok now. That helped a little.

 

[ReservoirDog]

A few more finishing touches to the room before I put up the second tent hopefully tomorrow. I scrubbed the entire place (again) with a second aggressive bleach solution (ammonia for the windows) because the porous surface offers so many hiding places for evil bacterium, virus and the like. Gonna do hydroponics seems to me you gotta play to your strengths and enviro control tops the list, it seems to me. Yeah, that’s my front door, or, it was. Legal weed is a trip man, I used to literally go 75 miles from nearest human and climb mountains to grow, now it’s in my front foyer. F:&) me gently.

 

[ReservoirDog]

More arrivals from brown Santa. I know it’s not hydroponics stuff but it is going to be part of my hybrid hydro-soil outdoor grow. Briefly, the idea is to create a reservoir in the bottom of a large 100liter tote with 4inch perforated drainpipe that is totally closed off but for the perfs and a 3/4 inch fill pipe and same overflow pipe. Lay the pipe, cover in a matrix of dirt/coir/perlite mix in my case. Fill reservoir with liquid nutes, organic in my case - product called “liquid dirt” - and transplant into “soil”. Plants will wick the nutes and you mulch on top but don’t really need to water, just keep rez filled, which is what overflow does, tell you when you have it full. This makes a great indoor grow and really utilizes the best of the two systems. Grows slower than DWC w/bubbles but way faster than normal soil grow and you don’t have to water or change rez or even ph much so long as your nute mix is in the range the soil irons out some of the dangers of ph drift etc.

Got this 55 liters perlite for 40$ CAD, vermic for 15$. I also have some soldier fly frass, fulvic acid, 66 liters coco coir and an awesome biological called “liquid dirt” on the way via Amazon and/or local grow shops. Gonna get set up to run some organic plants in that hybrid hydro-dirt system I described so I can have utmost variety and learning potential. We’ll run identical clones in same tent, one in DWC, the other in the wicking rez in ‘dirt’ with organic nutes all under same light and see what we learn.

 

[ReservoirDog]

Finally… I ordered these in early December! So, here’s my two new Nearpow short duration timers - programmable down to single second. The one on the right has 2, 1800w outlets, one on either side, and I really like that setup (keep in mind I’ve only superficial opinions at the moment as I’m yet to use either for growing). One on the left is also rated 1800w. They each cost between 40-50$ CAD, pretty expensive. When your one of only two brands serving an entire market segment you have strong pricing power.

I wanted 1 second granularity in my timers primarily so I can automate a DIY aero cloner that I have been working on. I mean to clone prized phenotypes that in future I’ll keep around as mother plants. Ive got all the parts and have been getting it built slowly in my spare time.

I also plan to clone a lot of specialty plants, horticultural, culturally significant plants and offer them for sale locally. I’ve been setting up a small bulk mushroom farm at the same time and the two really support each other well using each other’s waste/by product to increase yeilds significantly. I’ll share the deets and esp. how it works in concert with a perpetual weed gro, when I’ve got more than just my research project bedded in and I have some definitive information to pass along.

I think I might’ve forget to enter this product into this room build list. When I decided to spend $30 on a set of 15 Amazon bits instead of 30$ each for the sizes I needed I was pretty nervous that the product would fail me utterly. Nonetheless I knew I would have need of many sizes over next few years for mushroom farming projects, my hydroponics setup, and vermiposting.

I am pleasantly surprised with the set and while I wouldn’t use it, much, on hardwoods or metal, it is ideal otherwise. Def a recommendation.

For the sake of completeness I’m adding this pic of a mechanical timer I purchased and just forgot to mention. Fosman is a good brand, it cost 20$, Is weatherproof in the extreme and has two plugins.

 

[ReservoirDog]

This is another 30 day+ lost delivery that just showed up long after I’d given up hope and received a full refund. I contacted AC infinity and they just said, “keep it”. Thanks AC. So this 6 “ backdraft blocker fits my AC ductwork perfectly, was 30$ and came with no hardware. In my application it will be installed in tent pass through where it will allow me to maintain a closed environment required for CO2 injection but permit the exhaust of air if the system decides either heat or humidity is just to high, then revert to being a closed system. You only have to breathe on the thing to trigger an opening then it snaps shut on its spring and beds into a rubber grommet preventing air escape. It’s one of those “peace of mind” installs. Elegantly simple solution. I’ll let you know how effective as we progress.

 

[gwhunran]

My past experience may not apply but it's something to consider.
1. I had less expensive digital timers I wanted to use on the res. water pump because I wanted to set it to run for 7 minutes as that's how long it took for my pump's water to hit the tray's overflow tube, and the mechanical timers minimum was 15 minutes. Everyday when I did my grow checks the digital timers were in reset. I had more than one and they all did it. So I only use mechanical timers. I need dependable equipment in a automated system.

2. I wanted to have my old mobile AC exhaust hooked into my inline fan exhaust and wanted the "damper closer" to shut when the AC shut off. Without it the inline fan exhaust would exit the AC intake when the AC was off. Anyway the "damper closer would only work if mounted horizontally, and I needed it to work vertically. No joy. I now have two wall mounted AC units, one in each room and the mobile AC is in long term preservation.

 

[ReservoirDog]

Hey, hey, look who isn’t dead! Plenty of opportunity of course but the absence mainly has been due to my constant urge to belt out a harangue about my seed shopping experience. What’s that mean? Does it mean my seeds arrived? “No, fraud not.” Really, it simply means I can finally trust myself to publish online and not defame seed merchants, that’s all. I’ve never thought a single user experience justified the impact a terrible review can evince from the buying public and so in cases that aren’t about protecting minors or true criminal negligence I keep my powder dry at all times. Though I swear if Putin hadn’t invaded The Ukraine I’ve no doubt Tucker Carlson would’ve been tucking into me and the Spanish Prime Minister as his latest “squishy liberal twoesome disembowelling Christendom with drugs, drugs and more drugs!” On TV all last week. Thanks Vlad (you p%*>k). Like I said, no detail, sorry!

But, if you or someone you know is overspending on their veggie garden this year and the guilt is eating them up just have them gander these pics, and I’m sure some consolation will be had realizing that at least someone else out there worse then they. Least I can do…

Lastly, an old but a goody, me striking out from my 42ft. Ex-salmon troller in 1996, in the inflatable dingy, complete with pea coat, sou’easter and dreadlocks. For your entertainment….

Would that I might bend this boy’s ear for a moment or two about what he must soon confront…

 

[ReservoirDog]

Still kicking… So, recently I was at the grocery store and discovered that a head of lettuce was going for 10$. I stared at that lettuce slack jawed for at least a full minute. It was a crucible, it was the moment I decided to rip up my entire SW-facing front yard and turn as much of it as possible into a veggie garden. As a result my 420 project has been shifted into neutral- temporarily (still no seeds, sigh). Even though I’m doing much better than any time over the last ten years I’ve still had to spend 1/3 of my waking hours in bed. My vertigo happens much less now but it was 24/7 for years and I still get epic migraines lasting days, and days. So I still feel pretty damned vulnerable, most of the time. Most of the equipment I’ve purchased for my grow and listed on this thread has increased in price by over 50%, much of it has doubled. In 3 months. Not only that, it’s shrunk, check it out
The pump on the right I bought in November for 50$, 32v, 950gph
The pump on the left was listed in my Amazon “buy again” grouping, and is labeled as 32v, 950gph. I bought it because it seems prudent to have a backup and the price was skyrocketing, I paid 100$ for this one, and it’s 2/3 the size! Had to share this because it makes me feel a little crazy frankly.

 

[ReservoirDog]

I also decided to take on a bulk supply of soluble hydro nutrients because the fertilizer market is about to get crazy and I plan on having a steady requirement for mineral nutes for a good, long time. I couldn’t get the Jack’s 321 setup so I went with my second choice, basically the same thing, Mega Crop’s 2 part. The 25lb Calcium Nitrate is still in shipping but part A has arrived and I’m showing it off here with the GH powdered ferts I also have on hand. I worked out that an entire 5x5 tent grow for me will cost only 10$ in base nutes with the Mega Crop and a lot of people churn out some amazing results with that alone.

 

[ReservoirDog]

I’ll post a pic of the destruction I’ve wrought so far in my front yard later today when it’s light. I haven’t slept at all tonight and I need to spend the whole day working outside. Ugh. I really went full send on the veggie garden commitment; I’ve bought more than 12sq yards of soil and mulch, currently taking up multiple parking spots, I have laid cardboard everyplace there used to be grass, cut down two rhododendron, transplanted two shrubs, rudely chopped out 3 others and taken delivery of 3x300 ft of zinc dipped wire mesh. I’m not going to be able to eat properly with food prices going nuts like this combined with everything else getting so pricey, so a serious investment in food production is underway. I’ve also made some encouraging progress with my new mushroom grows of late, and when there’s fruit to show off you can bet I will do so. Indoors I’m into full on synthetic solubles and hydroguard, but outdoors I’ve a completely different approach. My food crop gardening plan takes after the Korean Natural Farming technique.. for which I have Bill to thank because he mentioned Bakashi (sp.) on this thread and it sent me down a research rabbit hole that led me to this farming technique. When I lived up on Read Island I knew a few people who were practicing methods of these types and subsequently learned this and that from them. I worked mostly in Aquaculture at the time, raising oysters on leased seascape from rafts, planting and harvesting clam beaches and working on fish farms and other peoples oyster operations for more income. I even got an associate degree in aquaculture. I lived on my boat for years and didn’t have the opportunity to grow more than the kind bud, but I always wanted to and cherished the time I spent working in friend’s gardens. So this year I’ve decided to bring the Read Island vibe to the Victoria suburbs, so screw the realtors and screw ,”curb appeal”. I even got me a straw hat and suspenders.
Truth be told I do have some select biologicals on hand for indoor use. I’m quite fond of both of these pictures products and use them regularly in houseplants and garden starts and will deploy into my hydro system at the sign of sick plants or trouble. I also plan to use them in the Octopot-copy system I’ve been working on and will deploy indoors and out this year. Check’ them out yourselves. The liquidity is amazing and doesn’t smell. The Humboldt I’ve used less but a close friend uses it, I’ve used it with him, and it has some serious mojo. Smelly mojo, but mojo.

 

[ReservoirDog]

Here’s a look at what I’ve put together as my pest spray this year. It’s designed to work on all of the bugs I confront outdoors and in, where I live, zone 8b-9, coastal BC, and will take out all layers of their lifecycle at once. It certainly does smell amazing. We’ll see how it works...

 

[ReservoirDog]

I'm really fighting secondary nute deficiencies in my indoor veggie starts this year so before I decided to buy bulk sizes I grabbed a few ounces of NPK RAW’s Calmag. I'm still struggling with my zucchini for some reason. I managed to get everyone else out of lockout but those damn courgette are still fighting me. Maybe another apology-flush will do it. Anyway, this NPK stuff appears well mixed, is simply calcium nitrate and mag sulphate. I always add a few more grains of Epsom Mag to bring it up level with the calcium and feed that mix alone after a flush for two feedings. Maybe the courgette is really just asking for potassium. Prolly....

I've a new source of calcium now, calcium nitrate-alone... my Mega Crop part B showed up. It's straight calcium nitrate. I'm really stoked to have such a good supply of quality base mineral nute. Prices are going to just keep going up and up on these, on all ferts for sure. I traded energy and ag futures for a US firm 2011-2018 and I understand the pricing pressures on these and related products and this current scenario is exceptionally grim. I really do recommend you stock up on your favourites now, for, at best the price will go up 50%, at worst it and most everything else will become unavailable and the remaining sickeningly expensive. It may well be an economic shock unlike anything people alive now have ever seen. The situation with organics is more nuanced but with same end result. Supply will drop and demand will skyrocket because all the people who can't get their mineral ferts will arrive in the market instantly and en masse, resulting in a virtually identical situation. You add to that a sudden food exports crash from the producer nations as result of fert shortages and security issues, it means food prices will continue to skyrocket driving new growers into the market (like me) who will want the scarce fertilizers as well. I really recommend a diverse plan of attack on this problem for individuals. If you can access a bulk supply of powerful ferts now, buy some. Now's not the time to get religious about dirt. However, at the same time take the time to study this Korean farming style which, with respect to fertilizers, instructs grower to add weak homemade ferts constantly. These methods are designed to free the farmer from corporate input products and seed that drive the cost so high that family farms just dont work. It is a remarkable achievement developed over two generations by one Korean family. It is a complete program including homemade pesticides and there's enough proper study of it now to confidently say that it really does work like a hot damn. Okay, I'm sorry, not sorry about these text walls. But no one is reading it so what's the diff? Anyway, can't sleep, bored. here's my 50lbs. I paid 180$ CAD on Amazon, delivered. Good price for a good nutrient system.