First Grow - Aero FAIL moving to DWC

jestermite said:

hey sccr - when u got ur ph meter and quit drops, did you find that you had been close on what u thought for ph level?

im stuck using the drops right now and adjust for a deep piss color and drops that turn yellow not green when they hit the water. i think that puts me just below 6.0 i assume that all the kits use the same color scheme.. what color looked right?

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I didn't compare them for too long. I (the pH) was way high so I dumped both reses that same day. However, now that I have a meter and see that I never have to put in pH up and not much pH down, I can see how I made wild swings with the amounts that I was using. I think that if I had to go back to the drops I could probably do much better.

From pH burn:


To:



This concludes my update for today.

Here's my babies:


Getting all grown up.

Still low profile, thank you homemade LST/scrog net.


Earlier I mentioned that I FIM'd/topped these ladies:

It was my first time and I pretty much took a chance at it. Look pretty good, each has 4 big shoots and one has an extra, smaller shoot.

Going to 12/12 on Thursday. I scheduled for a res change so I am going to alter the nutes at that point. I also scored a piece of glass tubing from work to make a cheap heat control reflector for my 400W HPS. I am hoping to get that done on Thursday as well, it may have to wait until Saturday morning.

looking good man i like the setup i noticed you got the top fin 4 outlet 7w pumps lol i use the same one. you have no idea how many people talked shit to me on this site for using that thing but it works great for me. are you still using the same little green air discs i used those as well changed them out to heaver ones cause the little green ones kept flipping upside down and making big bubbles instead of the little ones and plants started looking over watered from it. i use the home depot buckets and have high res temps all the time 80 usually and i just add some h202 religiously with nutes and roots and res have never been cleaner i just add once when water is changed then add back once halfway through the week. here are a few pics the little one was when i first threw her in flower the others are now and the one of the roots was when she was allot smaller i cant pick her up and take photo by myself anymore but they are currently taking over the 5 gal bucket lol i will get a photo later with help.
anyway looking great want to see these ones finish out keep it up.

Looking good sccrfrk.

Orange you glad you dumped the Rubbermaid?

Now you need to get a Bluelabs Tri Meter. And don't whine about price.

I have the hannah but the bluelabs is portable.

And it's sexy.

lookin nice!! keep up the good work

drgreentm said:

are you still using the same little green air discs

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Thanks for taking a look. No, I am not using those crappy discs anymore. Mine weren't flipping but the bubble size was no where near that of a normal stone. Each res has (2) 4" airstones. I have another of those air pumps and was running both, half in each tank, but the setup was getting noisey. I switched to 1 and haven't had problems with lack of watering.

I've got some buckets too. I think I may use 4 resses or link them for my next go-round.

Ha! It seems like yesterday I posted my first totally noob question with dead/dying plants. I don't know what I would have done without RIU. Thanks for helping me out, BB.

Ditch the rubbermaid and any grow medium besides DWC;lLess moving parts, less maintenance, less nutes used, faster growth... Get some coolers (Team Water Cooler! Lol, Weedler), get a pH meter, and keep the ppm low. After that it is like watching plants grow... except you get to continually alter your setup.

sccerfrk26 said:

Ha! It seems like yesterday I posted my first totally noob question with dead/dying plants. I don't know what I would have done without RIU. Thanks for helping me out, BB.

Ditch the rubbermaid and any grow medium besides DWC;lLess moving parts, less maintenance, less nutes used, faster growth... Get some coolers (Team Water Cooler! Lol, Weedler), get a pH meter, and keep the ppm low. After that it is like watching plants grow... except you get to continually alter your setup.

Click to expand...

You've come far.
Now it's fun.
Sometimes less is more.

Keep it up, looks good.

I need some help determining if these are ladies or if I need to trash them. First up is the big plant:



And now the smaller one:


I understand that it is still very early in the flowering stage but I am hoping those with strong eyes can sex these.

I have my opinion, I'll wait to see what other people think

Any ideas on the sex of these plants? Pics were a little blurry and only a couple days into bloom. I'll try to take better pics mid-week if nobody can tell from the preflowers.

stil going to have to wait a little longer i see no signs yet gotta be getting close though.

Little bit of snow here in Chicago...

Still haven't switched to my 400W HPS light but they are thriving under the T5:


Still trying to determine sex. They have been in bloom for 10 days now. I'm going to find some preflowers and try to take clear pictures to get all your help.

Also, I picked up a spare door at the hardware store that I will be modifying with intake/discharge vents to get the room ready for some real lamps.

Trust me, when they show their sex, you'll know instantly if you have read books or seen pictures on the internet. Females shoot out two fine, white, velvet strands from the little preflowers. Males make nanners. The two are unmistakeable.

Looks like you revived your plants very nicely. Good work. Should be able to tell if they're girls pretty soon.

Started working on my new door. Cutting some panels out to put intake/discharge vents for the light fan:


The discharge has flaps that will close when the light/fan turn off. The intake just has a little sheild, I'll be making flaps out of duct tape to help eliminate stray light.

Day 11 of 12/12

Here are some shots of my ghetto cool tube. I got a piece of 4" glass pipe from work and affixed it using bungee cords to the econowing. I used some 6x4 duct adapters to get around the junction box of the light and again at the 6" fan.


It has been running for 30 minutes or so and the air coming out of the discharge vent is fairly cool. Makes me figure that I have enough CFM going through the 4" flex ducting. The vents I installed in the door max the light fairly well:

I still need to get my 6"x10" vent at the bottom of the door for room ventilation. I will probably use 2x computer fans.

I'm figuring that it is day 11 of bloom. Did a res change today, upped the ppms to 350-360. I have a feeling with fresh cool resses and a 400W bulb that these plants are going to take-off even more.

Just some glam shots:

First, my little helper. Not actually helping, more like slowing down


The big bunch of 2:


New growth at nodes shots


They are each taking in about a pint per day, maybe a little more. pH appears to be in check and the slightly higher level of nutes isn't negatively effecting them.

There is really a sense of relief for a new grower when you get to wake up in the morning and instead of asking yourself "are they still alive?" you think "I wonder how much they grew overnight!"

I'm keeping my eyes out for any signs of males. Both are from seed and even though they are feminized I am still scared I went through all this for nothing.

Hmm...



Or are those young leaves that just look like balls?

Looks like a male!!