Time to hit the drawing board.

[tokinmarine2008]

Finally! I am moving out of my apartment into my own 2 bedroom house. The awesome thing is I was looking at this house the same time last year when it was for sale, but decided to wait. Well this economy is so terrible it has not been sold and is actually lowered 20k. So i am hitting the drawing board to deck out my basement grow room. Here is what I have so far. This will be my first room build, and I am looking for advice. Here is the equipment I have and what I am thinking of doing.
1 400 w HPS air cooled, Flower
1 600 W HPS air cooled Flower
1 1000 W HPS( possibly if i decide to purchase it.)
2 4ft 4 tube t8's for vegging,
6 inch carbon filter
6inch 424 cfm blower.

Room size I was thinking 6ft deep, 8 feet wide, height would be about 7 feet. This will give me the option of throwing the 1000w in there if i decide to purchase it down the road. Otherwards I will use the 600 and 400 to cover a 4 feet deep by 5 feet wide are to flower 25 plants or so in . I will pull air through my lights from outside the room in the basement. The carbon filter I will have dumping the warm grow room air outside through dryer ducting. So that right now is what I have planned on doing. I will probably take some pictures of this whole process. It is very interesting, to me and I enjoy builing my own room much more than buying a tent. Although they are great for apartments and for the person who isnt a DIY'er. Anyways more to come... I would love input and any thoughts. Thanks

 

[Flyinghigh]

Room size I was thinking 6ft deep, 8 feet wide, height would be about 7 feet. This will give me the option of throwing the 1000w in there if i decide to purchase it down the road. Otherwards

Kool and welcome
mine is like urs, with what ur talking about that will be fine if u go with auto flowering or short plants no taller then 5 feet
If ur going to do tall plants then u Don't have enough Head room!
I have found that out and had to tie each and every branch down so it won't hit the 1000 watt Hps Bulb.

 

[PencilHead]

I don't know too much about flouros--some here have great results with them--but me personally, I'd get me a MH conversion bulb for one of those fixtures if you're planning on vegging and flowering simultaneously.

Your stretch shouldn't be as bad with the MH and you can keep them in your 7' to 8' ceiling, no problem.

Jeez, Flyinghigh, I must be growing the wrong strains--I keep going for height with longer and longer vegging periods but still end up at like 4' to 5' from the top of the soil at harvest. I keep the lights right on top of them and get colas you could hit baseballs with, but never went over 5'. Did a sativa bagseed and got the same thing: 5'.

 

[tokinmarine2008]

Flouros have worked excellent for me to veg with so far. I have recently went back to using a 400w lamp, as i needed some quicker growth, but yes the flouros work great for me. They are the reason I started to lollipop plants as they cannot penetrate well, so i just grow colas. works well for me.

 

[meds4me]

For veg I use a 70 w mh at lowes for $50 and way better than flouro's...

 

[tokinmarine2008]

meds4me, how many plants can you actually veg fairly decent though? I would imagine a 70w is no where near enough for 40 plants. I cram 24 under each of the 4 ft 4 tube flouro fixtures i have, and they veg nicely. They grow a little slower yes, but they grow nice...

 

[PencilHead]

Love the lollipops. Doing that this grow and I'm really happy with what I'm getting--no popcorn for one thing--big fat colas for another.

 

[tokinmarine2008]

Yea pencil head, its an awesome way of doing things. I LOVE just growing a slender lean plant, that just packs on monstrous colas. My favorite part is when i harvest, I unstake her and watch it fall over and crack the stem. Its rather funny... I have had good luck with lollipopping the OG. 5 branches giving 10 grams a piece is not bad by any means...

 

[NorCalHal]

Finally! I am moving out of my apartment into my own 2 bedroom house. The awesome thing is I was looking at this house the same time last year when it was for sale, but decided to wait. Well this economy is so terrible it has not been sold and is actually lowered 20k. So i am hitting the drawing board to deck out my basement grow room. Here is what I have so far. This will be my first room build, and I am looking for advice. Here is the equipment I have and what I am thinking of doing.
1 400 w HPS air cooled, Flower
1 600 W HPS air cooled Flower
1 1000 W HPS( possibly if i decide to purchase it.)
2 4ft 4 tube t8's for vegging,
6 inch carbon filter
6inch 424 cfm blower.

Room size I was thinking 6ft deep, 8 feet wide, height would be about 7 feet. This will give me the option of throwing the 1000w in there if i decide to purchase it down the road. Otherwards I will use the 600 and 400 to cover a 4 feet deep by 5 feet wide are to flower 25 plants or so in . I will pull air through my lights from outside the room in the basement. The carbon filter I will have dumping the warm grow room air outside through dryer ducting. So that right now is what I have planned on doing. I will probably take some pictures of this whole process. It is very interesting, to me and I enjoy builing my own room much more than buying a tent. Although they are great for apartments and for the person who isnt a DIY'er. Anyways more to come... I would love input and any thoughts. Thanks

If you are planning on getting a 1000w down the road, then you should make the room 6x9, allowing you to run a 4x8 growing area. I am not sure what yur growing method is going to be, as that will be a factor in room size and design,imo.

Do you have 2 blowers or just the one 6"? I think your will need 2, 1 for the lights and 1 for exhaust thru your carbon filter. You will also need an intake allowing fresh air into the room. You do not need a blower for this as it can be a passive intake.

Exhaust and Intake are critical to a succesful grow room. Be sure to "think out" the placement of your exhaust and intake also, like where to put the carbon filter for example.

Your electrical will be important too. Be sure everything will operate safely, and if you need advice, just holler, there are alot of great electricians here.

Let us know a couple of more details and I think we can all help ya out man.

 

[tokinmarine2008]

Awesome Norcal, exactly the type of input I was looking for. Ok this might get a little long explaining but I think i can do an alright job and make my point. I will make the room that extra foot so I can get 1 4x4 table and have another 4x4 section to put larger plants on the floor. I grow many different strains, some which really stretch, some not so much. I would like to have an active intake pulling air from the basement, or outside at night. With that being said, for a 6x9x7 room = 378cubic feet? If thats correct then I can use my 6inch 424cfm blower to bring air into the room, then I would need a larger fan???? 600cfm?? attached to my scrubber exhausting the room outside? Please if this does not sound right let me know. I did the math so I believe I am ok.. So that covers my intake and exhaust... The lights will be cooled with another blower... I have questions about using passive intakes as well cause I may go that route to same on money. It is what i am doing now and it works perfectly fine... Anyways can it just be some small holes in the grow room walls? How big do they need to be etc. I hope that this post isnt to confusing, I have been smoking some fine hash all day long, and while typing this post... I will cover the electrical in another post in a little while, I am curious about the advantages of using 240v circuits, and how to wire them into your breaker box. I have electrical experience, so thats not a real problem, just planning what is going to work best.

 

[NorCalHal]

Awesome Norcal, exactly the type of input I was looking for. Ok this might get a little long explaining but I think i can do an alright job and make my point. I will make the room that extra foot so I can get 1 4x4 table and have another 4x4 section to put larger plants on the floor. I grow many different strains, some which really stretch, some not so much. I would like to have an active intake pulling air from the basement, or outside at night. With that being said, for a 6x9x7 room = 378cubic feet? If thats correct then I can use my 6inch 424cfm blower to bring air into the room, then I would need a larger fan???? 600cfm?? attached to my scrubber exhausting the room outside? Please if this does not sound right let me know. I did the math so I believe I am ok.. So that covers my intake and exhaust... The lights will be cooled with another blower... I have questions about using passive intakes as well cause I may go that route to same on money. It is what i am doing now and it works perfectly fine... Anyways can it just be some small holes in the grow room walls? How big do they need to be etc. I hope that this post isnt to confusing, I have been smoking some fine hash all day long, and while typing this post... I will cover the electrical in another post in a little while, I am curious about the advantages of using 240v circuits, and how to wire them into your breaker box. I have electrical experience, so thats not a real problem, just planning what is going to work best.

I think you should use your 6" attached to the Scrubber for an exhaust. Then, if you want, you can use a 4" blower to pull air in. You can just use the 6" to exhaust and a 4" "hole" for a passive intake, and that would work fine too.

 

[tokinmarine2008]

I am going to need another 6 inch blower to blow through my lights as well correct?? Three lights is a lot to cool.... 2000 watts....

Electrical:
So far I will be using a total of just shy of 3000 watts. I will need to get another blower. My question is wether or not there are any real advantages to running 240? I know the operating amperage is lower, but the power draw is still the same... I remember the phrase PIE for electrical calculations when dealing with watts, amps, volts etc. It is actually P over I E in a circle, if any electrical people are familiar with that they will know what I am talking about.... Anyways thanks for all the help from everyone so far, there really is a whole lot to think about when building these rooms.

Where is the best place to locate a carbon scrubber? I am going to hang it from the ceiling with my fan, short run right out of the room... Is there an "ideal" placement?

 

[NorCalHal]

So, if u use a passive air intake, you will need 2 blowers, 1 for your lights and one for your room rxhaust attached to your carbon filter.
Hanging from the ceiling would be ideal!

IMO, ballests seem to run better and longer if they are ran usuing 240. You are correct in that it will not be a significant differance in cost.

 

[BuddyLuv]

I used 2 Can 8"HO 737 cfm to cool 8 600w hps. I figure you would need somewhere in the range of 550-600 to cool 3 bulbs efficiently. As far as 240 vs. 120 I did not see much of a difference electric bill wise. They are about the same to install, and always be careful around electricity. Be sure to run the proper independent circuits for all parts of the room. 1 20 amp for your lights, 1 20 amp for your fans, and 1 20 amp for your misc. stuff should suffice.

 

[BuddyLuv]

Where is the best place to locate a carbon scrubber? I am going to hang it from the ceiling with my fan, short run right out of the room... Is there an "ideal" placement?

you want it up high on the opposite corner of you intake. This will allow for a full exchange of air when they cycle.