My Room Design Journal

Hi all!

I figured I'd start a "grow room design journal", 'cause I've got a lot of things to do to set my room up before the really good stuff starts to happen (which I am soooooo very excited for, heehee). I've been gratefully tapping into the collective knowledge of this community for about a week now, and I am ready to start building, so I figured I'd share my journey and hopefully receive uninhibited ideas and inspiration from all of you! I'll describe the scenario, and then post some pics. Once I begin to grow, I will create a grow journal in the appropriate forum... I just thought it would make sense to have my grow room design journal in this forum... hope that's cool with everyone!

It's a basement crawl space with the following dimensions:

9 ft. wide X 7 ft. deep X 4-ish ft. high (uneven, dirt floor)

I think this space has tremendous potential. It's in the most remote area of the house, and I think I should be able to set up a stable environment for growing. Today, I have some dirty work to do.

• Clear out the junk on the floor
• Vac out all the NASTY cobwebs
• Cover the ceiling with R-19 fiberglass insulation
• Seal a minor area in one corner that has a light leak to the outside, which I will do with a can of "Great Stuff" (expanding foam in a can from Home Depot)

If I can get these things done today, I'll feel pretty good. I'll post some more pics of my progress tomorrow.

Since it's a dirt floor, I was thinking about digging it out a little bit- I would love to open up the space to 5 ft. high... we'll see what I hit when I start shoveling. I figure I could then add a thin layer of gravel, maybe some bricks or stepping stones around the perimeter of the room so I can get around without rolling around in dirt every time I crawl in there. I'm planning to grow in soil, but in containers. In the center, I figure I could dig down a bit more, enough so that I can embed the pots and maximize vertical grow space (estimating the plants will have about 4'6" to stretch out under the light fixture).

I'll be working on augmenting the electric supply, which will not be a problem for me, and I know I will have to set up temp/humidity meters. As far as lighting goes, I guess I need to figure out how much wattage I am going to aim for, but I think I will see if any of you out there have suggestions about how many plants I can comfortably fit in the space before I decide.

I'm going to add a thin layer of luon plywood to cover the ceiling after I insulate. For the walls, Home Depot has some rigid-foam, moisture-resistant, insulation, that comes in thickness' ranging from like 1/4 in. to 3 or 4 in.... the cool thing is that one side of it is reflective, although I don't know if maybe that's the moisture resistant side, lol... I'll have to see, might have to mylar (or paint/foil) the walls anyway.

My big challenge to think about (for now) is how to deal with ventilation. You will see in my pics the heating duct that comes through the opening of the room. I am thinking I will disconnect the duct from where it's attached to the ceiling and clear it from the "door" opening, because the room above my grow-space-to-be is just a walk-in closet. This way I can construct a sturdy door with an air-tight seal, and I think I can vent out through the wooden joist above the door. The sewer main is near to this room, so I may just connect to that. My only other options would be to run a duct to the other end of the house (to the back yard)... or I guess I could exhaust directly into the basement if I can devise a flawless air scrubber (although, if I use CO2, it might not be good to vent that into the house). Then there's the question of where am I going to draw air from... should it be the outside? It gets cold here in the winter. Would it be okay to draw air from the room above, or just from the basement? Any ideas?

Well, that's all for now- hope I'm not boring you, and hope you will all watch my space develop and chime in with your 2 cents!!! Hope these images post correctly...

[img=http://img441.imageshack.us/img441/9758/gatewayyj0.th.jpg]
[img=http://img70.imageshack.us/img70/613/roomshotwz8.th.jpg]
[img=http://img61.imageshack.us/img61/8960/floorbq3.th.jpg]
Cheers!

So, does it make more sense to have like 2 400W fixtures set up side by side, or one biggie (like 1000W) in the middle of it all? Anyone? Let's say I was going to try to set up like 25 or 30 plants. Is that a ridiculous amount?

Prepping this room is going to take a little more time than I hoped, but I'm not discouraged... I swear I hauled like 1000 pounds of dirt out of that room and up the basement stairs today ... that's okay, filling in all the holes the dog has dug up in the back yard over the years.

There's like 10,000 spiders in there... now there's about 5,000 in my shop vac, heh heh... hopefully I'll get some more work in tomorrow!

25 or 30 plants is not good in that space good amount maybe 15 and thats pushing (remember they get wide) and u would want to do two 400 watt lights rather than one 1000 watt its a good space remember to block off the entrance you can solve alot of problems with a lock GOOD LUCK

all depending on how long your vegging the plants for.. i did 26or was it 28 under a 1000w last time I prently have 38under a 1000w..Im only going to veg a few weeks last time was 6days