First time growing, looking for feedback on my growing setup

[Hot Tamale]

This is my first time growing. I've read a lot about how to grow from various places on the internet, mostly from this site. And I am excited to get started.

I currently live in an apartment and want to grow about 5-8 plants out of my closet. As you can imagine my biggest concern is containing the odor. I have provided a blueprint of how I currently think I am going to make my set up. As you can see it is divided into three sections, the far right section is going to be decicated to mother plants and clones. The bottom left section is going to be deciated to plants in the veg state. And the top left is going to be for plants in the flowering stage. I plan on using fluorescent lights for the mothers and clones, MH lights for the veg state, and HPS for the flowering. I also plan on keeping the ballasts for the HPS and MH lights outside the setup. Each section has its own intake fan, and I currently only have one carbon filter/exhaust fan in my system. Currently I am planning on having my exhaust fan bigger than all three of my intake fans combined. Do you think I should have and exhaust fan/carbon filter for every section or will one be alright?

Does anybody has any suggestions or improvments that I could make to my set up?

 

[dwcponics]

Okay -- I am assuming you already have plants in the three stages... clones, flowering, vegatative?

If not.. forget about having three sections till you get to that point and focus on one section at a time.

If you do have all three stages going -- looks good to me.. I'd go/work on a 91 day program.. you would constantly have stock --- eight week flowering/harvest with continuous cloning and you have a constant harvest.

It takes 91 to 100 days from when the clones are cut to the time they are ready to harvest. The setup SWIM implemented is: 30 Clones, 10 vegging, 30 flowering. You force the clones to flower when they are a foot to a foot and a half -- therefore you make the most out of your light.

Are your mothers strong? Are you sure you have good genes?

There is a lot more to think about.... keep on truckin'.

G

 

[dwcponics]

Other than what I said -- looks good, but I would be sure to put inline fans from each section so that they support/feed the main fan for the exhaust.. other than that.. looks groovy to me... be sure everything is light/sound tight, foam, caulk and tape are your friends.

Also -- be sure to stay ontop of temperature and humidity.

Hydro or soil or?

Best Regards,
G

 

[wordtothewise]

Unless you are doing sea of green with over 12 plants, I don't recommend having sections. Set it up so plants can grow from start to finish you be happier with how much more you'll produce out of 6-8 plants.

 

[DW4174]

i think you will not be very happy with the set up, I also live in an apartment and I had a similare set up and I hated it so I re thought it and split my closet in to and used it that way but the closet was 4x6x8ish and there was more to work with So i agree that you might just want to do start to finish grows. What you could do is get a for sure female and before you flower her take some clones and get them started, then flower your girl. This way you will have a crow getting ready to go into flowering by the time your ready for them. And you will only want to use one hid light if you in a apartment it cuts alot on heat and in a closet it make a lot of heat fast. I would say for your veg state and clones just use florecnt tubes (i use tubes with great results). But I would deff. just slpit your design in 2 one side vegg and the other flower.

Best of luck

 

[Hot Tamale]

Thats for all the help. So it sounds like my new design is going to be just two sections. The right section will be deciated to the veg state and will use flou lights, while the left side will be for the flowering state and will use HPS lights.

The next question I have is where should I put the mother plant? Or in this setup do I just keep making clones before I flower, and never keep the mother?

 

[wordtothewise]

Thats for all the help. So it sounds like my new design is going to be just two sections. The right section will be deciated to the veg state and will use flou lights, while the left side will be for the flowering state and will use HPS lights.

The next question I have is where should I put the mother plant? Or in this setup do I just keep making clones before I flower, and never keep the mother?

Are you doing hydro or soil? If i were youI wouldnt even have sections, mother plants, clones, etc. You only store a mother where you'll pick clones off every week. I say you keep one big open space, veg in there and then flower. Start from seed or start from clones. Don't waste youre time growing a mother then taking clones and worrying about what to do with you're mother. Check out my grow, Im not using a closet but I have one space and I grow as many as a I can in that space. I say you get 8 clones or seeds and grow them big.

 

[DW4174]

You can still gro big plants using the area you have drawn because you will not have the shelfs in your way giving you the hight you need to grow some large buds.

How I would do this is (just my opinion) I would take your area 5x8x2 (I am asuming this is the sapce you have) and make a light proff section on one side. YOu can do this by gettign thinck black plastic and spliting the room then put the plastic over the front of (lets just say) the left side. Now that pice of area should be 2 1/2 X 2 X 8 and this will be the flowering room because you have compleatly seperated it from the other area and from any outside light. In this room I would have a HPS light on a timer for the 12/12 cycle, I would cover the walls with ehter mylar or poly warp, and a exhaust fan like in your drawing. I would have that exhaust fan set up so i takes air from both rooms like your plan. I might put a small (and I do mean small) fan for intake are but with a power fan for exhaust air will find its way in.

In the other room I would set up ether 2 CLFs (300 w conversion from incondecent light) one bright white and one warm white, or flourecent tubes on the wall because you can hang them the tubes are to long. Once agian I would cover the walls in the reflective material. In this room you can put the lights on a timer but I do not for I belive plants will grow around the clock as long as they are provided with light water and air. But if you want to save on elecrtic put the flourecents on a timer for 18/6 (thats 18 on and 6 off). Same thing with the fans I would just have the exhaust (as long as it is powerfull enough I would not wory about the intake, I guess I should mention that the min. fan I would use is 80 cfm).

Now that the set up is ok, I can explan the reason to my maddness. In the veg. room I woul have 4 plant growing the the size of about 1' 6" Then take 2 clones from each plant and have them in the same room (the reason for 2 clones per plant is one will do better than the other, keep the better one). Then two weeks later, when the clones should have a nice root system, I would put the big plants in the flower room and the clones I would set them up to start regular growing. Two weeks before you harvest out of your flowering room take more clones off the old clones that are now 1' 6" ish. Then the second you harvest put the new crop in to flower and let the new clones grow big. The do it agian and agian.

If you do this, you will have 1/4 pound every 2ish months and to me that better than waiting 3-5 months for new/fresh bud.

I hope this helped you out.