First Time Grow Plan

hey everybody thanks for reading

I'm planning on starting up a grow system and here my plan, let me know if you have any suggestions

I will set up a box about 10 feet long by 4 feet wide by 5 feet high to hold this operation
I am using a hydroponic system similar to this one for growing (making my own)
(http://verticalhydro.com/images/Ebb-&-Grow-12-Bucket-L.gif)
I will be using white widow seeds from marijuana-seeds.nl (mothers)
I will clone these seeds to make buds (flowers)
I will be using Flora nutes
I will have 2 400w HPS lights (8 plants per light)
The lights will have homemade reflectors on them
I will line the walls with either spray paint or tin foil
I will have a seperate place for mothers and vegitative etc.
Water will probably flood 2 times a day, one before lights turn on and one before lights turn off
Milk jugs with some yeast in them (CO2 production)
I will have a small fan blowing down the line of pots for ventilation

kinda will look like this
[][][][][][][][]
<----------- (fan)
[][][][][][][][] (plants)


thats about it this setup will be in a abandoned semi trailer near me being powered by car batteries (cant do it in my house)
I am also going to try some outdoor cultivation too once the weather gets better

If you have any suggestions or questions please let me know and thanks again for reading

happy smoking

Sounds like a bad idea already. You should do some research for a few months before attempting this.

Sounds like a bad idea already. You should do some research for a few months before attempting this.

Click to expand...

I have been researching I've read tons of articles on growing and hydroponics and everything and I've kinda combined different strategies to work with mine

How many plants are planning on growing?

Will this box be split into to sections? One for flower and one for veg? If so, think about a light with more blue spectrum for the veg side. Like an MH or even just add a couple CFLs to the HPS. Generally you should have more light for the flowering side though. Obviously you will have two different reservoirs too right? Oh and in general white paint good, tin foil BAD!!!

ok i will do the white paint

I will have one 55 gallon water container as my res, so i think it should be enough
i plan on doing 2 rows of 8 plants ea (16 total) 2 rows of 4 under each hps light
i have a separate area with MH lights for mothers and clones

ok ok this sounds good. only final thought I have is that you need more ventilation. hps and mh burn HOT so I would say you need at least one fan per light and either passive air inlets or another fan for intake.

this is in a semi trailer outside in a temperate climate, like 50s-60s at night and 70s during the day so i am going to have the lights on at night and off during the day, try and keep the temperature somewhat stable so i actually want them to burn kinda hot
or will they still be too hot? and is having the lights on at night a bad idea? (the door is closed and no light can escape i.e. getting found out)

as long as you are pretty thorough with fixing light leaks that shouldn't be a problem at night. however, this alone will not solve the heat issues caused by your lighting choice. in an enclosed area hps lights could easily elevate the temp above and beyond 90F.

ErroneousRex said:

as long as you are pretty thorough with fixing light leaks that shouldn't be a problem at night. however, this alone will not solve the heat issues caused by your lighting choice. in an enclosed area hps lights could easily elevate the temp above and beyond 90F.

Click to expand...

Ok that is a problem because of the limited power supply (using car batteries)
would it be possibly if I put 3 CFL's 30 watt or so around each plant to grow?
should keep them cooler but maybe not yield as much

I will make a grow journal once I start on my grow (march 1st or close)

once i start constructing all the parts i will post some pics and ask for any more suggestions

also i am going to try to make a completely cheap and home made pc grow in a couple weeks with autoflowering do you have suggestions on strains and where to order them from? I dont need feminized because i will be pollinating one female for TONS of future seeds

there is a lot of contradicting sources out there on the use of cfls and yield. not having tested both myself I cannot say which for sure which is more efficient. however, one interesting piece of literature I have come by states that the lower the wattage of cfl, the higher the ratio of lumens per watt is. thereby stating that two 23w cfls will put out drastically more lumens than a single 42w cfl. with that in mind you may be able to build a system with low wattage and heat and high lumens. the power savings should hopefully allow you to run a fan or two as it will still be necessary.

ErroneousRex said:

there is a lot of contradicting sources out there on the use of cfls and yield. not having tested both myself I cannot say which for sure which is more efficient. however, one interesting piece of literature I have come by states that the lower the wattage of cfl, the higher the ratio of lumens per watt is. thereby stating that two 23w cfls will put out drastically more lumens than a single 42w cfl. with that in mind you may be able to build a system with low wattage and heat and high lumens. the power savings should hopefully allow you to run a fan or two as it will still be necessary.

Click to expand...

Hey thanks a lot for your input I did hear that 30 watt cfls have the best lumen to watt ratio so I plan on using some of these is 5 different pc
grow boxes

but thanks a lot for confirming what I heard before that you don't need watts for lumens

make sure you post some pics when you get it up and going!

I'd be less concerned with what kind of lights you have and more worried about some other stuff.


How are you wiring HPS lights to a car battery?
How are you going to recharge the car battery? I know in my car, 1 night with my headlights on would easily kill my battery by morning.
Are you going to be swapping batteries in and out?
If so, is the trailer in a place where people are going to notice a person getting in and out of it?
Who's trailer is this?
Is it sealed up or are people going to notice this strange UFO glowing trailer at night?
Can you lock the trailer? I wouldn't leave plants and grow equipment just out in public unlocked for the taking.

Rex is right too, you'll probably need more fans. Also if you have to swap fresh batteries out each day, don't plan any vacations for awhile unless you've got a friend who can take over your daily recharge duties.

My hunch is that this isn't going to work due to your sketchy growing environment. But you could be an electronics whiz and as long as you're confident the trailer won't disappear during your grow then what do I know! Good luck man. This is definitely one of the more unique approaches I've seen on here.