New Grow, a few questions

[audix2359]

I've been planning my grow for a little while and I've had to make some alterations here and there but I'm now almost set. My grow will be in a wardrobe that's got about 5 square feet of grow area. I was planning a larger grow but had to scale it down a bit. Here are some details:

I have a 400W HPS light with a MH conversion bulb so I think I'm set there.

I have a 4" duct fan that will be exhausting out of the room. The ambient air temp in the room runs between 73F and 69F.

I have a DIY carbon filter that I'll throw on the exhaust when it starts to smell.

My seeds arrived today so I'm very excited to get this grow started. I made 2 orders, one from the Dr. and the other from Gypsy Nirvana. Both arrived the same day!

For my soil, I'm planning on using the best potting soil I can find (although that might end up being some Organic MG), some perlite, some dolemite and some worm castings. How does that sound?

I also have a question about air intake. I think I'm exhausting enough but how do you all get air into the grow area without having a light leek? My converted furniture will be in a room that will sometimes be lit while the grow area needs to be dark. I thought of cutting a hole and sticking some of that black carbon filter stuff over it - do you think that would work? I suppose I could also make an intake hole and attach some ducting to it but I still think the light might get in.

Any pointers there would be great, along with any other helpful advice for a virgin grower.

BTW, I'm looking to grow some White Widow, Big Bud, Ice and some Magic Bud. When I ordered, I got 2 types of seeds from each provider, planning for 1 to be intercepted. But since they all got through, I'm planning to germ 3 seads of each and keep (hopefully) 1 female per strain.

 

[shuggy4105]

first of all, if you can`t get "Fox Farm Ocean Forest" which is the best, then get some sterile soil and make your own pre-mix, i.e worm castings, blood/bone meal, fish emmulsion etc. if you can,try and go organic all the way. this will help you with keeping your plants from burning/over-fert, as that is the most common problem new growers experience.
make sure your exhaust fan is at the top of your grow space, the temps sound fine, is that with the light on?
am i correct in thinking you`ve converted a wardrobe?
during the dark period you can turn your fans off, as long as the temps aren`t too high.
during the day that 400w light will put out a load of heat, which will have to be controlled by using fans inside the grow space.
it would also be of benefit to you to keep your ballast out of the grow space, as this will lower the temps further.
getting air into your grow space can be done simply, when the light is on open the door a few times a day, that should be enough ventilation for the size of your space. even leave the door slightly ajar whilst the lamp is running.
as far as light leaks go, just keep the fans off when your in the dark 12hrs. the fans are mainly used to control temps and strenghthen stems, so when the lamp is out, the temps will come down substancially.if you find that light is leaking,get it plugged ASAP or you`ll have a load of hermies to deal with:shocked:
hope this helped ya dude, all you need to know to become a good grower of quality bud is on this site.
any Qs don`t hesitate to ask anyone on the forum, we`re all one big happy family,lol.
good luck man,
:lama: -Shuggy-:lama:

 

[audix2359]

Thanks for the tips. The temps are without the light on; I have not run the light in the grow area yet so I'm not sure what the temps will turn out to be inside the room. I'm not overly concerned because I'll just crank down the outside air if the room gets too hot. Overall, I'm working with about 40 cubic feet and my inline fan runs at 80 CFM so I'll be exchanging all of the air every 30 seconds (if I understand it correctly). The exhaust will be going out of the room alltogether. And yes, the fan is at the top of the grow space.

As for the square feet, I was a little off. I measured again and it's just over 6.5 square feet. The MH bulb I got says it's 38K lumens so I'll be running 5700 lumens/sq foot for veg. The HPS bulb puts out 55K lumens so I'll be at 8200 lumens/sq ft for flower. I realize the general rule is 1 plant per square foot but with the additional lumens perhaps I can get away with an extra plant or two (?).

I'm still a little concerned about air intake but I can tinker around with it a bit. I also got some of those yellow bug traps which I'll plant when the plants start to sprout - an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, right?

Hopefully I'll be able to post with some updates from time to time and snap a few pics along the way.

 

[usandthem]

Audix, if you want to run your exhaust fans in the dark with the door closed you can do what I did. Get a PVC elbow(I use two on my box) and paint the inside flat black. Cut a hole in the side of the box(near the bottom) so that the elbow can be inserted through the hole from the inside of the box.Aim the elbow away from the most direct source of light and fix in place with Gorilla glue or duct tape.My box has two 4" cp fans exhausting when the lights are on and one when the lights are off. All on a timer. I keep my door closed all the time to keep my weed lovin' felines out. The floor space of my box is exactly 6 square ft. and the box is 6 ft.tall. I'm using 360 watts of CFL and I'm about to harvest my third grow with this system.I'm gettin' two hit weed out of it so all is good from here where the grass is blue.

 

[audix2359]

Nice man. How many plants do you grow under your CFL's?

I'm about to scrap my whole HID lighting for now since I'm having problems keeping my temps where I want them. I'll be able to use it later on so I'm out the cash at least. I've been looking at LED's and I'm going to try some out. I'll be shooting for somewhere around 150 watts of LED and I think I'll be able to produce some nice plants with them.

As far as the lighting and exhaust and intake, I did exactly what you've suggested. I'm using elbows and quarter inch carbon filters to black everything out.