How long should I veg??

[Rottedroots]

I need a little help with this one. I'm vegging under 900 watts of 3590's but my ceiling height is barely five feet. I will end up running 9 plants under 18 COBS. I've pinched once and want to pinch once more b4 I switch to 12/12. I'm assuming that once I switch I'm done pinching or at least I've never pinched after a switch under HIDS or CFL'S.
If I switch at 1 foot how much stretch can I expect through flowering with LED's and how big/tall would the finished plants be under ideal conditions?? Thanks. This first LED grow is producing a lot of ainxst. Hopefully it will produce product as well.

 

[canadian1969]

1. relax
2. 50%

 

[verticalgrow]

If I switch at 1 foot how much stretch can I expect through flowering with LED's and how big/tall would the finished plants be under ideal conditions?? .

3ft tall

 

[Rottedroots]

Actually I'm not stressed at all about the grow itself but the new lighting system presents a learning curve. Barring catastrophe this will be a cakewalk. I been grafting woodies for forty years and have bred my own named and accepted Hemeracalis/Daylily and maintain a half acre veggie garden and another 3/4s of and acre of ornamentals. Based on 40 years of gardening it is more difficult to grow good eggplant and melons than weed.
I'm flummoxed (I like that word) with the level of complexity they've conditioned people were requirements. I can get 90 percent of the nutes I need from my own compost and teas but I'm falling prey to weed specific chems and way over priced bottles of easily obtained nutes for zero cost. I'm old school. Why buy what you can make or source. For an iron deficiency stick in a rusty nail, wood Ash in the hot composted bins and vast quantities of seaweed tea. (Free). The tea adds no NPK but has all the micronutrients a plant could ever need and the bonus is that it allows the plants to better utilize the NPK already present. I it's the key that unlocks many problems.
I was just looking for some basic clarification on how much stretch I'll be getting if I flip at one foot. Not surprisingly I get two different answers both appreciated but conflicting. I've just never dealt with a low ceiling on an indoor grow. That's not a luxury with MH or HPS.
I also remain confused as to how to use the potentiometer/dimmer. It's wired to three separate drivers but I missing how I should be using that capability.
I just kicked them up to three gallon pots so for now I'm only 10 inches off canopy but lights are about 50%. I figured to let them settle in a bit and then raise my light to 16 inches and go full on with the lights.
I do have to say that at the two week point from germination I've never seen such rapid root development and the top growth internodal spacing is tight. They look like little pocket rockets.

 

[CannaPadawan]

It also depends on the strain and how tall your led fixture is but I think you will be fine under 2ft tall. I got some at 2.5' in a 5 ft tent (w/ DIY Cree LED setup) right now and I'm gonna spread out the tops with a scrog net to bring them down a little before I switch. Next time I'm doing a full scrog to help with the height. GL!

 

[Rottedroots]

CannaP your grow seems to be pretty much the same set up as mine. I did three 300w DIY LED COBS kit all wired as one. I'll be able to get as close to the ceiling as the pin heat sinks will allow.
I do have the issue that I started with 30 female beans and am down to the 12 most healthy. Problem is they are all different. There's everything from Blueberry Gum, Blue OG, Blueberry Headband, Sage and Sour, LSD, Bubbledawg, Critical Jack, Pineapple Express, Purple Haze, Blackberry, Skunk #1, and that's just what's potted up. I'm figuring two 3590's @ 3500k per plant and I'm thinking of some suplimental light but I'm not certain I need it. I do want to get a second pinch done and some aggressive scrogging going before I flip. I'm thinking I'll have plenty of room height wise.
Tell me CannaP how far from the plants are your lights and do you just keep the light volume cranked up? I have an old commercial food processor that just ground to dust a five pounds bag of lobster bodies. I'll incorporate those right into my seaweed stew bucket along with some dried gury and a tablespoon of molasses. Lots of air being pumped thru the water and the molasses helps things from going putrid. I don't mind putrid outdoors but moldering ingredients indoors can be trouble. Hopefully CannaP I can pick your brain a bit as I move on down the line.

 

[sixstring2112]

As big as you can lmao.


Theres a doorknob back there somewherez haha.
If 5 feet is your max i would stop veg around 2 feet and hope you still have some wiggleroom when they finish stretching in flower.peace

 

[BM9AGS]

View attachment 3881032 CannaP your grow seems to be pretty much the same set up as mine. I did three 300w DIY LED COBS kit all wired as one. I'll be able to get as close to the ceiling as the pin heat sinks will allow.
I do have the issue that I started with 30 female beans and am down to the 12 most healthy. Problem is they are all different. There's everything from Blueberry Gum, Blue OG, Blueberry Headband, Sage and Sour, LSD, Bubbledawg, Critical Jack, Pineapple Express, Purple Haze, Blackberry, Skunk #1, and that's just what's potted up. I'm figuring two 3590's @ 3500k per plant and I'm thinking of some suplimental light but I'm not certain I need it. I do want to get a second pinch done and some aggressive scrogging going before I flip. I'm thinking I'll have plenty of room height wise.
Tell me CannaP how far from the plants are your lights and do you just keep the light volume cranked up? I have an old commercial food processor that just ground to dust a five pounds bag of lobster bodies. I'll incorporate those right into my seaweed stew bucket along with some dried gury and a tablespoon of molasses. Lots of air being pumped thru the water and the molasses helps things from going putrid. I don't mind putrid outdoors but moldering ingredients indoors can be trouble. Hopefully CannaP I can pick your brain a bit as I move on down the line.View attachment 3881032

Nice chair.

 

[Mellodrama]

Could you re-phrase your questions about dimmers? What do you mean by "it's wired to three separate drivers"? Do you mean you have one pot controlling 3 drivers, or do you have one pot per driver?

This is just my own personal preference, but I like to dim the lights a little bit for a day or two after stressing the plants by topping or moving to bigger containers. That may be bad advice for all I know.
I tend to run the lights a little bit close. I'm guessing that a foot or so of clearance is probably close to a minimum, especially as you crank the lights up. As the plants get bigger you may have to increase the clearance to get more even coverage.

Stretch is largely determined at the genetic level. That's why you'll get so many different answers. You can pull and twist and etc. but the plant is gonna try to do what it wants to.

Some folks say you can pinch right up to the flip. But some people say you can top after the flip, which doesn't seem right to me. The consensus seems more like a week or two between last top and flip.

 

[Rottedroots]

I like the great outdoors for that reason sixstring. For me growing true monsters in raised beds using my own soil is like the quest to grow the world's largest pumpkin. Big to me is when they have a trunk and not a stem and you could beat a seal to death with a limb. HaHa.
That's a fine chair as you note BM9. It holds some extra cartridges and some coffee and is the perfect height for a pop up blind or a short grow room. Sup Mello I meant one potentiometer for the drivers with each driver pushing 6 3590s. I may change that up and with everything being so modular it'll be easy. I really don't know what I should be doing with the dimming that raising the light wouldn't accomplish but my gut feeling was to do what your doing. I intend on dimming everytime I stress the plants. Nothing empirical but seems to make sense. I also know that the stretch will vary primary based on on genetics which in my case means 12 genetics variations to contend with. Sure glad each set of six COBS move independently. I also Fall in to the school that says the plants has to recover fully from a pinch b4 the flip but maybe I'll test the theory out.. Rock on....

 

[Ernest Benoit]

I need a little help with this one. I'm vegging under 900 watts of 3590's but my ceiling height is barely five feet. I will end up running 9 plants under 18 COBS. I've pinched once and want to pinch once more b4 I switch to 12/12. I'm assuming that once I switch I'm done pinching or at least I've never pinched after a switch under HIDS or CFL'S.
If I switch at 1 foot how much stretch can I expect through flowering with LED's and how big/tall would the finished plants be under ideal conditions?? Thanks. This first LED grow is producing a lot of ainxst. Hopefully it will produce product as well.

Indica= up to half the plant total gets added. Sativa= double or more. If my total height is 6' they should stop at 4' for indica and 3' for sativa. Check the genetics for specifics.

 

[CannaPadawan]

First time growing with COBs and still a bit of a noob in general but here's my setup. The tops of the canopy are at about 2 1/2 ft and as they stretch I'll pull them back and spread out like a scrog. Did some pinching and will give it a week or so to flip it. My DIY lights are thinner than the driver so I should be able to adjust the lights pretty close to the top of the tent...