So its been a daily uphill battle controlling the temperature where I live with temps going above 30s daily.  If anyone has some experience with this , what are the pros and cons of using a portable aircon unit to cool these plants ?

3 hours ago, McB said:

any time, have just spent a few weeks with it in varying stages of repair and upgrade on my desk.
 regarding coverage, that's where the lense angle comes in , the 120 lense would give me a wider but less powerful grow area.

 i treat(and view) mine as i would a 250w hps, keep it roughly 40cm away from canopy, currently in a 1x1m tent.

 

happiness wise, its a mixed bag.

i experienced very short plants, cal mag defs and stunted growth

 that said i had a mindless obsession with Autos that may well also have been partially to blame for overly touchy plants and low yields. 

i foolishly opted to add 730nm  infra red to the spectrum trying to boost photosynthesis without properly understanding the emerson effect and i think i did yield a lot of damage.

those have been removed and replaced with blues, the warm whites i chose have also been binned for daylight 6500k diodes. so time will tell

Pics of spectrum changes attached

Top 4 updated bottom 4 old spectrum

 the panel will now serve as veg light (attached pic) and potentially late flower spectrum booster if i get power hungry enough.

looking at your plants the cheese seem to be perfectly happy under the leds, with the younger plants they look to be staying quite squat, something i noticed with my apollo

 

 

 

With the standard setup , I cannot put my lights at 40cm or the leaves burn. I tried it once and went back to normal height. At the moment I am 90 cms away from the tops on the cheese. and around 1 meter from the babies. 

8 minutes ago, McB said:

i ordered mine direct from cidly in china a few years ago, they make(made) up the panel to your spec, spectrum, lense etc.

standard is 90 and i insisted on 120's for more spread, not sure if it was the right call.

spectrum wise , i lost one 660nm red led on one spot , so had to open up to replace, so updated spectrum while i was at it.

there was a big fluff job done on wattage of leds initially with the HID equivalence claims, hence i ask actual draw.

the 8 spots use "3w" diodes, 15 per pod, 8 pods, max power if all diodes are driven at full 3w(700ma) is 360w.

however the 3w monacre only actually indicates its max ma rating being 700ma, that doest mean they are running at full tilt.

as i remember it the 360w were overrated, and the newer panels were rated at 260w or similar, but could be wrong, as my panel is easily 5 years old if not more 

 

 

19

You sound like the right person to talk to if i ever have issues with these lights, you clearly know them well.  Ive split my  200 x 120 x 240 tent into 2 halves. I have the babies on one side and the 2 x 5 week cheeses on the other side each with one grow light for each side. When I first made the purchase the guy tried to convince me to stick with the 2 x 1000w hps he said I needed 4 x apollo 8 to completely cover my tent , but I knew that I would have a massive heat problem due to climate so I opted not to go that route. I havent completed my first grow on this setup as yet , but so far I feel like I have enough with these 2 apollos. Out of interest, what is the distance from the top of the plants on your setup ? How many are you running and how large is your grow area? Are you happy with the apollo you have ? 

51 minutes ago, McB said:

If i may ask, what spectrum and lense angle are you running on the 8 spots.

my 8 spot apollo was recently updated spectrum wise and im wondering if my choice of 120' lense.

have you checked actual draw at the wall?

 

I have not done any testing to determine how strong the light is neither have I tested the draw at the wall. I have read that the old units draw 250 something watt (under spec but old articles/videos)  but I haven't found any recent articles. Mine run full spectrum all the time. I did not even know there was a choice of lense (or that you could adjust lens angle), mine is probably the default, whatever that is.

Week 5 Cheese XXL Auto

Super Silver Haze Veg Week 2 

Jacky's Girl Scout Cookies Veg Week1 (little reddish stems are just adorable) 

Cheese Week 4 - Started training (trying to get an even canopy ). Had some nute burn but managed to catch it early and flush the plants quick they seem to be recovering fine.

Jacky's seedling week 2 

Super Silver Haze seedling week 3

45 minutes ago, Justin Hemp said:

What light are we running here?

Sent from my ALE-L02 using Tapatalk
 

2 x Apollo 8 360w 

2 hours ago, Dr. Green said:

Jealous of that air-conditioner looking good 

Man I wish it was an aircon, its an air cooler/heater ( I use refrigerated water and ice packs in the water tank). 

Goldair GHC-803H

https://www.builders.co.za/Gas-%26-Appliances/Air-conditioners/Portable-Air-Conditioners/Goldair-GHC-803H-Air-Cooler-and-Heater/p/000000000000552857

week 4 Cheese XXL 

Greensmokeroom Jacky's Girl Scout Cookies Feminised seedling week 1 (Jack herer x GSC 28% thc)

Week 3 Cheese XXL Auto x 2 Dinafem Seeds

PachaMama's Super Silver Haze Feminised (The order that was supposed to be jack herer auto that somehow turned into SSH)- Seedling Week 2

22 hours ago, zeuzk2k said:

I have been looking at this for a while but don't know if its worth it https://www.futurama.co.za/grow-tent-combo-240-x-120-cm-2x-silent-600w-electronic-2x-air-cooled-reflectors?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIh-7x7bi13gIVmJ3VCh2VuA-bEAQYBiABEgKYv_D_BwE

Im using this setup. I requested that the standard lights in the combo be swapped out for LED panels 2 x (120w x3). They credited me for all the lighting components and I had to pay a small difference. So far I am really happy with my purchase but keep in mind I am a small personal grower who wont do more than around 4 plants at a time.  Their service was good I have no complaints.

10 hours ago, Breadinator said:

The sharp sand is what led me to Diatomeus earth(DE):

"

Diatomaceous earth kills bugs with the help of its razor-sharp particles. The diatoms that make up diatomaceous earth have microscopic razor-sharp edges. Although not harmful to large, strong surfaces, these tiny razor blades are detrimental to ants, bed bugs, fleas and other crawling insects.

"

 

It also is commonly used as filter agent in the beverage industry

 

Thanks, I'll try the perlite on one and the DE on the other.

 

Sent from my SM-N950F using Tapatalk

 

 

 

 

Wanted to add that my perlite is a bit finer , more like sand than little stones. This could be why my perlite works so well.

9 hours ago, Justin Hemp said:

Fungal gnats are more a pain in the ass then and actual problem. If you spraying weekly which you should be doing with a good IPM that should keep them under control.

If you have mites, that however is a nightmare to get rid of and could possibly really set your plant back. Hope I'm wrong. Growing outside you really need to have a good preventive maintenance plan going, hence a IPM pack or similar.

Im not sure if what I read was wrong , I read that knat larvae consume roots and plant sap which weaken ur plant and impact its yield. US growers will go through complete tent bleaching and restart their grows to start from scratch cos its the only way to get rid of them. I also did this and since bleaching my tent, using better quality soil/compost with perlite on my top soil, I have no bugs at all in my tent right now. My knat problems started with shitty culterra potting soil/compost which came infested with bugs.  

1 hour ago, Breadinator said:

Day 11 - Noticed spots on the leaves, SPIDER MITES and GNATS!

 

 

 

1

I had this problem with fungis knats , try this, place a 2-3cm layer of perlite over the top soil . Ive heard that Sharp sand also works (Builders sand) but I've tried the perlite and I know that worked for me.  

Just wanted to add , the seeds that did germinate did so very quickly 2-3 days from sowing them. I noticed a mixture of small light colored seeds and maybe 1 or 2 large dark seeds. The plants that sprang up fast are the bigger seeds.  Also between my experience with MCSB and pachamma , I will not recommend pachamama to anyone those guys cant even get an order right. Also they do not respond to emails , I am still waiting on a reply to why they sent me super silver haze instead of the jack herer I ordered.

I ordered 5 x Cheese XXL autos and 5 Purple Afghan. Both came in dinafem packaging. The purple afghan tin looked rather old compared to the new and shiny cheese package tin. I have 2 plants both cheese from all the seeds I germinated. I wrote to them asking for a few afghan seeds since i didnt get a single afghan plant. The guy was nice and wrote back saying he would replace the order (seeds that didnt germinate) , now waiting for the replacements. If he really does all my future purchases will be MCSB just on service alone. 

Didnt know what to put on the label.

6 hours ago, greenkush said:

I won't use them, they very sketchy with their lineage.

man these were JH autos that I ordered. Im going to germ 1 of them and see if maybe they have the wrong label on the package. Super Silver Haze has purplish leaves right ? Still no response to my email. 

So I ordered 3 x jack here auto and they sent me this. The guy does not seem to respond to email , is there any way of calling them ?

On 11/17/2017 at 1:23 PM, Deano86 said:

Hi Everyone , I have had experience with hydro but now looking to go organic. I know that you get freedom farms soil "have a bag already" but could u use normal lets say culturra or garden master potting soil add peat and perlite? 

Additional to that what would you feed weekly I know something similar to biobizz or organic fertilizers but what would work best.

I had a really bad experience with culterra products. I had to wipe my grow and bleach my entire tent and start from scratch. The culterra products (poting soil and compost) were full of bugs and after one night in my tent i found a ton of fungis knats flying all over. I have since switched to a premium potting soil. I am mixing it with pre buffered pure coco seedling mix in a 60/40 ratio along with some worm  castings amd perlite. I have mixed it so it has the same texture and feel to Freedom Farms soil. So far its been good using this mixture. I am covering the top soil with perlite now to make sure fungis knats dont get any chance to hatch eggs in my soil. My tent is completely bug free atm. 

Wow  , does it come with its own lambo ?

Thanks going to read it right now

Damn nice setup man !!!