4x4 closet w/ 400W MH/HPS adj

So I just started out. This is my first legitimate grow. I have a 400w ballast with metal halide right now. Just have seedlings but going to use MH during veg and then switch to HPS for flowering. Everything is fine so far, but I am having issues with keeping humidity up and heat down.

I need to install filter/exhaust system but can't just yet. With the door closed the temp gets up near 90F, so I've been trying to leave the door open as much as I can, but I obviously don't want that to be a regular thing.

Humidity has been as low as 30% and up to about 46%, mainly around 40% tho
I'm hoping humidity will naturally increase as the plants grow and I am using more water.

I'd appreciate any tips, advice, comments or notes anybody has.

I started germ 8 days ago by the way...planted half of them one week ago and the other half 6 days ago. The ones I planted second took off to a better start and are the taller ones in the pictures with larger leaves.

I was having a similar problem, after installing my 600w hp+. I used fluoresents on my first grow.( with average success ). So, i recently installed a bath vent in my closet ceiling. To help vent the odor and some of the extra heat created by the hp bulb. also had to put a small humidifier in there too. You must try to keep the humidity around 45-50 %. Good luck wth the grow!

Thanks SP.

Humidity has risen the last day or so. I had a dehumidifier running on the other side of my basement and I cut if off and I think this has increased the humidity in the whole basement including my grow room. The humidity has been around 45% since yesterday. Temps are still around the mid 80's when the doors closed and mid 70's when I can leave it open. Hopefully this is going to be ok for a week or two until I can go get the venting that that want/need.

The plants seem to be doing ok. I wish they would grow faster, but I think I'm just being impatient.

Setup looks good! How far from the light are the sprouts? I'd move them a little closer if the temps allow.

Your humidity is well within acceptable limits. Being too high or low really doesn't have much effect in this stage of development, so I think you are over analyzing that whole aspect of the grow.

Thanks for your input in my thread. I'm subscribed to this to see how it goes.

Thanks.

I just lowered the light closer. I had read that you don't want to keep it too close (like 1m away) when they are still seedlings, but I guess they are starting to develop more seeds. I lowered it and I'll track how it goes.

Strapped in . Cant wait to see these start growing under that light . my next grow i plan to swap out the cfls and get the hps mh hoods. if i can manage to keep the temps controled. im sure i will still be adding cfls into the mix as well to better position light. keep it up man looking good.

I meant "develop more leaves" not seeds. obviously they are a little young to be making seeds, haha

Yeah. I would like to add like four CFLs into the mix, especially as they grow they might want it and it might help keep them from stretching too much.

The problem I am worried about it how much the one outlet in the closet can take. Does anybody have a rough estimate here? I need to look at my electrical box to see if any other outlets or lights in my basement are wired to the same breaker. So far, I have two small fans (could ditch the smaller one once I get a good ventilation system) and the 400W balllast/light running from the two outlets in the closet. I will have to be adding the exhaust fan also (replacing it for the smallest fan). Do those use a lot of amps?

Would there still be amps left for some sort of CFL action in there too? Looking at everybody's grow journals and pics, I am amazed at how well CFLs seem to perform considering the way everybody talks about them. I'm sure the MH/HPS lighting will be great, but CFLs seem easier to regulate and appear to do very well.

just by looking at your set up pics, i would suggest moving your ballast away from your plants...that will help with some of your heat issues...

nice setup

jonboy30 said:

just by looking at your set up pics, i would suggest moving your ballast away from your plants...that will help with some of your heat issues...

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But for a 400W metal halide bulb/reflector like that what is the ideal distance from the plants? I know the rule of thumb is to hold your hand under it and see if it feels too hot, but that's not a very exact thing. In other words, how far will be too far or really start to effect the light?

lightsgreenaction said:

But for a 400W metal halide bulb/reflector like that what is the ideal distance from the plants? I know the rule of thumb is to hold your hand under it and see if it feels too hot, but that's not a very exact thing. In other words, how far will be too far or really start to effect the light?

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I think he's talking about the white ballast on the floor, not the reflector. You're fine getting the light closer to the youngins. Those ballasts put out a lot of heat, so if you could relocate it outside the grow area it could be beneficial.

i would def try and get that light down bout a 12 to 18 inch away should be good. dont want them babies stretching too much. looks great man!! great setup! o and the ballast does put off a lil heat but i dont think its enough to really worry bout you make just want to have a fan on your light.

Yeah. I'm trying to keep everything in the closet to keep it more stealth. I will check it to see how hot it gets. Hard to tell from pics, but it does sit back a little away from the light at at least.

I have a general question about cloning. Even though I'm no where close to this point. Essentially, I have only one grow space. These are bag seeds I'm growing now, so I have no idea if they will be male/female when it gets to flowering time. Once the females show (unless I'm REALLY unlucky), I will want to take clones of them, but I need the space for flowering. So what is the best way to get female clones and minimize the amount of time I need to have them outside the grow space. In short, how late in flowering can I take a clone and get it to revert back to veg cycle to grow them a while before flowering? Can I wait till just a couple weeks before harvest to take female clones? That way I can get the clones rooted and happy by the time I'm ready to harvest the other room and put them back in veg cycle in the room. I just don't really have the means to keep clones alive outside my grow room.

I'd love to hear any suggestions on how I can work this. I'm sure it's a common issue for people who want to continually grow but only have one room.

Related question, how long will a clone take to get happy and switched back to veg cycle? I think that's just like a week or two, so not long enough for my entire flowering time.

UPDATE 11-18-09
So it's been a week or so since I showed you all my set-up and babies. Since then, I've straightened out my heat issues for the most part. The room is relatively stable around 75F when the light's on.

I actually realized that my timer worked differently than I expected and the light has been on 24/7 for this first week. I know that's not a big deal, but it def wasn't helping my heat issues. I think I have it sorted out now to go off for either 5.5 or 6 hours each night. I will have to check it this weekend to make sure, as I don't want to stay up so late during the week (...work sucks).

I've also gotten humidity to come up a bit to between 45-59%, mostly right around 50% though. So I'm happy about that.

You can tell from the new pictures, but I've lowered the reflector to just around 14" from the tops. I figure they'll grow some and get to about a foot in no time. Then I'll start raising it with their growth. I def want to keep stretching to a min because I have no supplementary lighting on the sides right now, so if they grow too fast the lower parts will not be getting enough light.


So one thing I'm kinda wonderin bout is if these seeds are not all from the same strain. I saved up bagseeds for a while and put them all in the same little bag so I probably have a mix of stuff. They should mostly all be from mids buds but some weeks were def better than others ya know. To me it looks like the three in the front and prob the one in the middle are the same and then the three towards the back might be different (slightly more rounded leaves and slightly darker green color). Anybody have any thoughts on this?

I'd like to hear what everybody thinks about how they look. Anything I could change to make them better/happier?

alright first off, grow looks good nice job so far! and yeah, as JB said, move your lights a little away from the plants, and that should help your heat problem a little, and you can go to walmart, and buy a fairly good size desk type fan, that cools fairly good for like 5-10 bucks, that could replace the smaller fan in your first set of pictures, and have just those two medium-ish sized ones in there .

and as for humidity issues, you could probably go to walmart aswell for that,and get a humidifier(or however its spelt.. not sure if thats correct haha.) for probably the same price, maybe 15 bucks at most. and would fix that problem fairly quick too for cheap too. but just my 2 cents goodluck with your grow i subbed and +repd you

Thanks DLC.

The humidity has been fine being at like 39% on the low end and 59% on the high end, so I think that's fine.

I'm a little worried about a few of the first sets of fan leaves (the singles) turning yellow. Overall, I wish the leaves were a little more green, not sure what's going on there.

I am happy for the most part though.

So, even though I've got a long way to go with these plants, I'm already doing a lot of thinking about my next steps.

I want to make better use of this grow closet. So here's my current idea:

Build my room to split it halfway up vertically. On the top half, I will have my flowering ladies and my 400w HPS bulb running 12/12.

On the bottom half, I will block the light somehow to divide the two parts. This could cause issues with air flow. Any suggestions on how to do it right? Anyways, the bottom half will have a propagation/clone box to get my clones going. Once they are looking good, I will take them from there and put them in soil next to the clone box under some sort of fluorescent lighting. I'm thinking a 2 foot (2 or 4 bulb) T5 fixture. I just need some light to keep the vegging plants growing and alive until I am ready to put them up in the flowering part.

All of this just to keep my growing all female and continual. I will be doing short vegging periods to keep my plants small and manageable.

Let me hear what you think. What problems am I going to have? How can I fix them?

lightsgreenaction said:

So, even though I've got a long way to go with these plants, I'm already doing a lot of thinking about my next steps.

I want to make better use of this grow closet. So here's my current idea:

Build my room to split it halfway up vertically. On the top half, I will have my flowering ladies and my 400w HPS bulb running 12/12.

On the bottom half, I will block the light somehow to divide the two parts. This could cause issues with air flow. Any suggestions on how to do it right? Anyways, the bottom half will have a propagation/clone box to get my clones going. Once they are looking good, I will take them from there and put them in soil next to the clone box under some sort of fluorescent lighting. I'm thinking a 2 foot (2 or 4 bulb) T5 fixture. I just need some light to keep the vegging plants growing and alive until I am ready to put them up in the flowering part.

All of this just to keep my growing all female and continual. I will be doing short vegging periods to keep my plants small and manageable.

Let me hear what you think. What problems am I going to have? How can I fix them?

Click to expand...

hey man...just my opinion...reverse your set up...you'll need more space for your flowering ladies...they stretch during flowering...you dont need too much room for vegging/cloning...