First Ever Grow-CFL-Two 37 Gallon Rubbermaids

greenzebra said:

Wow, awesome link gastanker... That is like inspirational.. I can't believe people doubt cfl's when people are yeilding an ounce per plant in 2 rubbermaids. They may take a little more work to optimize the grow, but it's easy to see they're capable. I've been reading as much as I can on this SCROG method and I feel like I'd be cheating my plants if I DIDN'T utilize SCROG. I started LSTing my largest plant yesterday and it looks great already! I'll have an update soon with pictures of their progress. I hope you guys all had an awesome 420!

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I'm a little jealous - I really wanted to scrog this second batch of plants but my first batch matured so far away from eachother that I missed my window at installing screens. Especially makes sense with CFLs. Can't wait for pics.

Oh yeah - forgot to throw in a happy 420 (if I din't b4). I ended up in golden gate park on hippie hill and then was given some shrooms and edibles...pretty incapaciated after that but what fun!

I went to a 420 Music Festival over the weekend and also indulged in mushrooms haha.. And it was also at a very scenic place; a real hippie haven. Didn't do any edibles though, but there were plenty of folks calling out "Ganja Goo Balls!" and "Ganja Cookies".. I Opted to try some dank buds instead..

Update soon

Update day 26 - April 23:
All of the plants have shown some awesome growth! I watered for the first time 3 days ago since the transplant and all of the plants looked greener within hours! I had half strength 5-1-1 fish emulsion and a drop of superthrive in my gallon I used for watering. I started LSTing the largest TCD plant and I plan to LST the others soon.

Changes/Additions:
I've added two more 26watt 2700k bulbs to the mix. I replaced the 6500k's in the main light strip with the 2700k's and moved the 6500ks to clamp lights to give better blue spectrum lighting to the plants. The clamp lights allowed me to keep them closer to the plants.

Because of the new lights being added, my temperatures spiked quite a bit. To combat the heat, I added another fan. Its the same pc fan I originally had where my larger speed control exhaust is. I put this new fan in the lid and made it an exhaust. I made a duct for it to keep the light out just like my other intake/exhausts. I also added a passive intake in the lid to get more cool air pulled in too.

Pictures:
I've included a picture with and without flash for each individual plant. I figured out how to use the macro function on the camera so I had to mess around with it haha. There is also an overhead of all the plants as well. The flash seems to show their colors a little better, but I thought all the pictures looked pretty good.











Here is a picture showing the LSTing I did on the TCD plant. I just took a hanger, cut off pieces, bent them into narrow "U" shapes and push them over the stem upside down to hold it in place. It works very well and my plant grew upwards again within an hour or so.


These show the new fan and light additions.

dude those plants are looking damn good.


I also now see how you got your expertize on overwatered plants from (from the post you made in my thread) hahah good deal man def gonna check this grow out

greenzebra said:

Here is a picture showing the LSTing I did on the TCD plant. I just took a hanger, cut off pieces, bent them into narrow "U" shapes and push them over the stem upside down to hold it in place. It works very well and my plant grew upwards again within an hour or so.

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Plants look great man, I only have 1 suggestion. From what Ive read, its best not to use any kind of metal when doing LST. Ive seen people use metal and they had no problems, but that was generally done in grows that had no heat issues.

I went to walmart and bought an 88 cent pack of plastic coated paperclips for when I start to LST. The metal hangers, if they get too hot, will cause hot spots (burns) in your plants. I believe that if this happend the growth to that particular branch will slow down significantly. Look into it a bit and if you feel its fine as is, just leave it. But plastic coated paperclips are so cheap Or you can buy tie downs made for tomato plants in Lawn & Garden at walmart for probably 5 or 6 bucks a pack.

KB

Awesome work for far GZ, I can see you have been doing some reading up on growing. Hey if you have a Y adapter for your lower light sockets keeping both blue and red spectrum right over the plant {within 3 inches} will increase growth from steady to rapid.

You can start to bend them over and around the rim now. If you are going to stay in your box for flower start the LST following the rim of your ground. Keep the original top nice and low through out the veg. time and up to a coulple weeks of Flow. As long as the top stays low your side nodes..ALL your side nodes, become tops.

Waiting to water is great right? All plants like to dry out, but start paying attention to dryness, could become sooner.

Kolorblind:
Thanks! So far the metal hangers are alright. I have my heat under control at a steady 82-83 now during the day. If they do become a problem I'll probably just go out and get some paperclips or something.

be_more_curious:
I get some pretty good coverage of both spectrums with the way the lights on my lid hang. The 6500ks kind of fit between the hanging bulbs. Even since yesterday when I did the change, I can see more rapid growth. I think I'll be ready to start all the other plants on LST tomorrow if I get the growth I had the past 24 hours. I should also be able to continue training the other plant some more. You were totally right about the watering coming sooner too. The last watering I gave them was somewhat small and today when I went down, all the leaves on the plants were folding upwards and the lower leaves were droopy and lifeless and felt a little dry. I gave them a watering and they looked 100x healthier in no time at all. Thanks for the info!

hey man im lovin the grow.

What are your temps at usually? I attempted a box grow like this with cfl's and the heat was just so bad that I gave up and put my plants outside.

Thanks in advance.

My temps stay around 83 high and 63 low. I have 3 fans in there of different sizes. Two exhausts and one intake. I also have 3 passive intakes, one on the lid and two on the opposite side from the big exhaust. A lot of air moving in there but it keeps the temps in order.. I can get some more detailed pictures if you need them..

Thanks for checking out my journal!