Eight Light Op From Start to Finish in Pictures

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LionsRoor

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I've been on this forum for some time. I've posted several journals and engaged in numerous threads over the years, but I have not been on as of late. I continue to be an active gardener but I have not had time to post any of my work. At the end of my last journal, I started hinting at a new 8 lighter I was putting together, posting build out shots but nothing with working material. As promised here are those pics of that zone. The room has had one successful harvest after another, and short of one ballast failure, all equipment has held up nicely.

I might make a few comments along the way, but this will mostly be images - from plans, to build out, to harvest and everything in between. It may take me a few days to get all the images sized and posted, so if the final harvest shots aren't included, I am still working on it--check back soon. For continuity sake, I am going to re-post the images from the aforementioned thread in this thread so we can have the entire project in one spot.
 

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LionsRoor

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I kept it simple in this room - natural air cooling - no AC, but mostly sealed lights. We used 8" ducting throughout, with 2nd gen Magnum XL's. Quantum 600 watt ballasts were used on the first run, but 4 of them were upgraded to 1000's for the second run. For the third run, 3 600 watt Wings were hung down the aisle, to bring the final light count to 11; 4 x 1000w and 7 x 600w. We opted for 4x4 trays as they are easier to move, clean, and drain better, than 4 x 8's.
 

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LionsRoor

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Here are a few more shots of the room coming together.  I laugh, as the Sero S1 controller I was so excited about has now gone out of business!  Yeah - in theory it was awesome, but they never worked the bugs out and it was just a little too clunky to use effectively.  The controller has since been replaced with a Sentinel.
 

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LionsRoor

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I hooked the RO up under the sink. The angle-stop-adapter-valve pictured is key for ro installations - tap in at any sink or toilet water inlet. Like the rest of the grow, we kept the RO system simple but effective.
 

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LionsRoor

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The plant material for this room was in Solo cups for a couple weeks too long! I wanted to have material ready right when the room was complete, but you know how that goes... the build-out took longer than expected and this material is a little stretched and out of her comfort zone. The good news is, these are two of the best cuts of OG - Pornstar and Skywalker.

Pornstar, or the original SFV, is a cut I've worked with for many years and have written a fairly extensive journal detailing growing with this particular OG strain here. This cut of SkyWalker is truly exceptional as well. I've since lost that one and NONE of the SkyWalkers I have seen since come close to that one. These varietals are largely Sativa dominant so they stretch quite a bit naturally, but this batch got excessively tall and skinny. The purple stems are evident that these plants were not getting what they needed. They should have been transplanted two weeks ago. Instead, they had to go through that vigorous initial growth spurt in Solo cups under weak light; I restricted the plants natural energy.

The environment of the flower room is quite a bit drier than the veg room these Solo cups came from. They really drooped not too long after they arrived. We started off with a bit of a challenge with these stretchy girls, but these genetics are worth the extra work.
 

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LionsRoor

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After settling in to the new digs in Solo cups, at Day 3 we moved to larger pots. They are still droopy as they adapt to the flower room - and recover from transplant. The new room was running quite dry, so these girls were still working to adapt. I was still working out the kinks and getting used to the new room temperature/humidity changes.

The Sero environmental controller wasn't helping matters either. I truly believe I was the first (and possibly only?) to actually use this Sero S1 in a real grow. As the company is already out of business, I won't even begin to discuss the shortcomings of this unit and the numerous bugs and glitches it shipped with. The addition of the Sero TechPak only compounded the problems! Hahaha - it's easy to laugh at now, but at the time it was real headache.

Can we turn these ugly ducklings into swans?
 

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LionsRoor

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Things started looking up after they were in the big pots a couple days, but you can see the stalks are still purple, the leaves are still quite droopy, and general health is so-so. I really wanted to flip these girls as they were already way too big, but I wanted them to be a little more healthy as went into flower.
 

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LionsRoor

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At day 10 of veg things look OK - but these plants are still far from what I would like. The leaves are not a healthy color, the plants are still stressed. The room has been running cooler and drier than expected. The need for more light is obvious too. I made do with just 4800 watts for this run, but for round 2 in this room, I upgraded four of the 600's with 1000's.

At this point, I really need to flip and can't wait much longer for these to come around to what I'd like. I'm still confident this batch will eventually make me proud - though it's certainly nothing to brag about now!
 

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LionsRoor

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At Day 13 of veg, there's quite a bit of new green growth and the plants are looking better. Some of these plants are double the height I'd like to flip at, but what can ya do! The shorter plants are Skywalker; there's just a dozen or so Skywalker, with the rest being Pornstar. I flower in the next few days...
 

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LionsRoor

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This is the final day of veg. All of the Pornstar is way too big but I'm ready to do some creative bending and such to accommodate these wild beasts. The SkyWalker doesn't stretch as much, and they were much smaller cuts to start with, so they are just about at the perfect height to flip in this room. This will be an action packed flowering for sure!

Round 2 will be much better planned and executed, but I still think we can get through this first run nicely too. Read on to see what happens...
 

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LionsRoor

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Oh my gosh. It's been so long - as I look back at these pictures now, I remember how freaked I was at the size of these things. In retrospect, I should have hacked them back big time, but they were unhealthy, and I didn't want to do anything to further disrupt them. They branched on me too... branching can be nice, but not to this degree. The stress from their veg still shows on these plants as we enter flower. Not the ideal way to start... but it could certainly be worse!

This is the first run in this room - and it runs dry and cool. The Sero controller was giving me fits. The RH and Temp sensor included with this unit is really not up for the task - disappointing because the idea behind it was fantastic.
 

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