Budwizer

I duct the ac waste to an outside box. My carbon filter and exhaust fan sit inside that box. I have a separate air filter box and another duct fan pushing in fresh air.

The aircon runs permanently, either heating or cooling, depending on the outside temperature. 

Only problem I have, is that the combination of ac fan and exhaust duct fan, overcomes the ability of the intake fan to keep the pressure more or less even, so my tent sucks in a lot. I use fan speed controllers on both the intake and exhaust duct fans,  but even when I’m running the exhaust at low speed, the aircon still overpowers the intake. I’m going to work on heavily modifying the AC for my next run, so I can have it outside my tent. I’m losing a third of my grow space with the aircon inside the tent. 

The Ac will become part of the intake system, with its waste air out of the grow environment circuit. So, intake air will flow from my filter, to the aircon, be warmed or cooled, and on to the tent. All I have to do is build a plenum for the aircon intake, and extend the temperature sensor into the tent ( and find a place to put the damn thing).

This way, I’ll have more control over the inlet pressure, and can balance it out better with the exhaust speed controller.

Interested to see how you rigged the intake and exhaust. Any chance of a picture?

Thanks for posting this. Always good to have a reference.

Yup, two holes in the door, but by necessity, the other way around. You build a box, of which the door is one side. Hole in the door let’s air into the box. Buy a neat grill for outside the door. The box stays stationary, the door moves. So every time you open the door,  you open the box. This box is your intake. Put a filter in the box. Duct from the box to the back of the room, use a duct fan. Mount the box as high as possible, so you can move around underneath.

Exhaust is a simple hole in the door, low down. Buy a neat grill.

Thats airflow sorted.

This can be done, but you’re gonna need tools and some know how. I have a good idea how I would do it, but if you’re not up to the task, and don’t have some serious skillz, I can’t help. 

Its also not gonna be the cheapest build. 

Whats your budget?

8 hours ago, S420 said:

I hear u about the RH thing. In dry climate it takes both a humidifier and aircooler running in humid mode to keep it at 40-50 / waiting for the aircon to arrive then ill deal with the RH issues. I bought a backup pond ultrasonic fogger to add more humidity that I can try. With regards to the temps, If i run my lights during the day the temp will go over 32 degrees. hopefully the AC is going to be the answer to that then I can switch my light cycle.  I will give 45cm a try on my lights ( i ended up going into the grow tent at like 2 am and raising them back to the 90 cm they were set to , just so afraid of burning them or stressing them). 

You sound like a first time grower. Nothing wrong with that, we were all first timers. The common thing amongst first timers though, is that they all ( me included) make way too much of everything. I guess pretty much like first time parents do. 

90cm is quite far, unless you’re running very powerful lights. If you’re worried about it, try 60cm. For the wattage you stated, I’m comfortable recommending 45cm.

Perfect recovery

7 hours ago, S420 said:

Looks really good nice and frosty. It looks like I am mostly worried for nothing , my day night temps are almost the same as yours just a bit higher 32 degrees or so atm during the day with the lights off (the new ac arrives this weekend so that should help bring it down during the day). Would u recommend i set the AC to 29 degrees to regulate it at that temp ? Also would you mind please posting some pics that show ur light distance from your plant tops , I am busy trying to figure out the sweet spot and Im not seeing many led setups that show the actual light distance. Love the results I see on your picture though. 

When I say day temps, I mean lights on. Doesn’t matter whether that’s real nighttime or daytime. Your system will run more efficiently if you run lights on during the daytime. Use the heat of the day while the lights are on, set the aircon to 30, cooling.

At night drop the aircon to 25, still cooling.

On cold days, set the aircon to heating.

During the winter months, my aircon will run heating permanently. 

Don’t ignore my advice regarding RH. In veg and early flower, you need to be above 50%.

I have a PAR meter, to set the distance for my lights. They’re at approximately 30cm, and I have multiple overlapping. Your lights are different to mine. You can’t run the same distance I am. I’d recommend 45cm for yours, without knowing your setup.

There is a lot of info on the net regarding growing this plant. Much of that info is outdated, but regurgitated as gospel.

You could run 30 deg with HPS and not have major issues. Trick is balancing the most important factors- heat, humidity, light intensity, substrate EC, substrate moisure level, substrate pH.

LEDs don’t radiate much infrared, which HPS ( and the sun) does. That infrared energy (heat) is one of the drivers of photosynthetic processes, used by the plant to manufacture sugars. You need to achieve a LST (leaf surface temperature) of 27 deg plus or minus. If your cab is running at 28 ambient with led, your probably only hitting 24 deg LST. Your plants aren’t performing at their best. 

I’m still getting my head around a lot of this myself, but my results are proving this new info correct. I have pretty good control of RH, which is an important factor. 

I have lowered my daytime ambient temps from 31 to 29 for the last two weeks of flower, nighttime ambient temp from 25 to 24. RH from 60 to 40 day and night. My system runs +-5 points from those goals.

I’d say it’s working.

Foliar Epsom with Fulvic

5 grams Epsom to 1ltr, 3ml GTH Fulvic to 1 ltr.

Spray the underside of the leaves.

Do one ASAP, then again 3/4 days later.

But what has caused this? What you’re seeing is a symptom. You need to get to the root of the real problem. If it’s a problem now, then it’s gonna be a problem through the whole grow. Mg def means one of two things: too much Ca or Na or P in the mix, or pH out of whack. You need to sort the problem, then the symptoms will go away.

Get LED lights 

You have to run 30+ degrees for optimal growth, and transpiration.

Much easier and cheaper to control humidity than fighting hot temps.

Seriously, these are the same plants as my SOTM entry. Record flowering time, and looking to be my best yield ever.

2 x 3KVA double conversion online UPS, and 3KVA genie for the win. 

Heres where LED scores BIG points. Keep the lights on, don’t worry about heat. 

Better get get used to it dudes. It’s not going away, and it’s gonna get worse. Think carefully where you wanna spend your next R10k for upgrades.

Thanks Tote!

Sure, covering cost of transport is the least we could do.

Agreed. But logistics will be an issue. Plus, someone will have to donate/ supply enough cuttings for those who want to participate.

If we can get over those hurdles, let’s do it.

Makes sense to all grow the same thing. Maybe even from the same breeder. One guy could grow a kickass Sativa, but it’ll look like shit. Another grows an Indica, and everyone thinks it looks better. Not a fair fight. 

I think we should also agree on what training is allowed. But your choice of style, ie soil, soilless or hydro. We could subcategorise grow style.

So, same strain, limited training options. It’ll make for an interesting comparison.

I’m running all LED, and organic soil. No pesticides, not even Neem. I’d love to see how my growing compares to someone running HPS, with the same genetics and also no pesticides. 

I love the idea. But I’d need to know you guys are committed. If we do this, we do it properly.

What is the criteria for winning? Biggest plant? Prettiest plant? Heaviest yield? Best product? How will that be judged and verified?

Jozi 

Thanks for the votes guys!

I’m doing my first run with all LED, seed to harvest. Day 26 of 12/12.

On 5/23/2018 at 8:24 PM, growopz said:

We did a bit of a write-up on this topic, if you want a summary of [plant and lighting science].

and there's also "What's the difference between LED/HID/CFL technologies?" further down the [main FAQ].

 

We will be starting a side by side grow next week, when the clones are ready.

 

In the one tent, 3W LEDs (monochromatic Epileds and white Bridgelux) in a 2:1 ratio of our flowering spectrum to our veg spectrum.

And in the other tent, our Samsung QBs & Cree reds, done in the horticultural spectrum (2 white : 1 red) as advised by Cree.  

 

600W vs 600W.  

 

The QBs and Crees should trounce the 3W LEDs, but it'll be a good experiment anyway.  

I expect the monochromatics should compete well in veg, but that the QBs & Crees will crush it in flower.

 

In my experience so far, Vero29 COBs plus Cree XPE-HEs get over 1g/W pretty easily.

One customer recently claimed 1.4g/W, which is very good.  

 

This will be our first test of the QBs & reds, and I expect similar results to the COBs + reds.

 

I have never actually used HPS, but in my opinion, it's old tech.  Double ended gavita pro has max 40% wall plug efficiency before taking into account cooling.  That just won't compete with 60-70% wall plug efficient LEDs.  Combining LED and HPS is pretty successful, anecdotally.  One customer says they're getting superb results with 3W LEDs supplemented with 15 minutes of HPS every 2 hours.

 

PS. Budwizer's claim, "1000 umol at about 1 meter", is very unlikely (the VyprX technical spec says 750uMol at 45cm which would be measured dead center.  At double that distance, it would be a quarter of that.  Less than 200 uMol).

So? What happened on your comparison? 

Look, I know Growguru are decent guys. I can attest to their good service.

But. Making a big deal of your Black Friday sale, and not having the stock to back it up is like sending out invitations to a party , and then forgetting about it. You have people arriving all dressed up and ready to party, but no band, drinks etc. It’s a dick move.

Such a stupid site

Have a Black Friday sale and no stock. Yeah Growguru. Way to piss of potential customers 

Just another incompetent business faking it in SA. 

You cannot use water with such a high ec. Period.

You have to change your water source, or get a RO unit.