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View Full Version : TABOO TOPIC IN THE CABINET SECTION? COME ON IN!



BlueBear
07-14-2006, 02:43 AM
OK ladies and gentleman, and weed smokers too, I want to get some dialog going on a subject that seems to be very taboo on these boards. The topic I want to hear about are the different things that have been seen and herd about turnkey grow systems such as the BC boxes, caddie/coolcab, power grow boxes, X grow boxes, Suncell boxes, Stealth boxes and so on.
Before all of the anti commercial, anti capitalistic, anti greedy money hungry corporate American tempers flare up, let me try to explain my reasoning over this. There are many MJ users using for medical purposes, which generally assumes that there are a significant amount of users that have a chronic, sickness or disability which causes them to use. This being the case I think that it is advantageous to help them have a realistic option of growing on there own and not always having to buy.
For instance there are some users that have had back surgeries that may make it more difficult for them to build a cabinet, do to severe pain or lack of mobility/paralysis in certain parts of their body. There are other users that have congenital eye problems that cant even put a screw in the head of a screw, or duct a hood to install a fan.
Some users who face chronic depression and anxiety can't even leave the house to think about getting the many needed supplies to start a set up. Others can even get so depressed before finishing a cabinet that they might just give up becoming discouraged do to their depression.
I could go on, but if you don't see what I am driving at then either I am so far out in left field that I have "Left the building" or some people can't put their selves in the shoes of those who can't construct a set up for what ever reason. As we all know, those of us who have looked at these set ups know they are extremely, extremely costly so for a person on disability that may save for several months, an informed decision from the cannabis community should be readily available in my opinion.
Maybe people can give constructive criticisms on these products, meaning don't just trash them all if you can help it, most of our home built cabinet set ups are seldom perfect, taking much tweaking and upgrades to become efficient.
Perhaps I can get the ball rolling. A member recently enquired about the Sun Shed products, the manufactures of the Caddie, Mini Caddie, Coolcab and the Coolcab mini. First off I don't know any one who owns any of these, but I have researched them over the web as much as I feel is possible. Overall, they seem like they have some attractive features, but with the exceptions of the fallowing. The cady and mini caddy have to be kept in a dark area during the dark cycle do to some light vents that accommodate the bulbs, also leading to light leakage when the lights are on. I believe that this is accurate info. also, I will pass on a reply that I gave to another person when inquirering on the same line of cabinets. "I went to their sight and if you go you will
notice that they have a message board. When I started reading the post I was thrown off. Several people, almost everyone said that the sheds run much hotter
than advertised, right off the top when reading the fine print of the moderator on all of his posts replying to the heat problems he says that the units
have to be kept at least a foot away from the wall with a house fan pushing hot air from the area for optimal, bad spell, results. Some of the posters
stated that it was a poor build quality. And I found a couple posters that said the scrubber and Ozone gen didn't do anything to kill the smell. I am sure
that there is more, but I can't remember right now.
One other thing, quite a few posters said that with heat issues that these units should not be placed in a closet, but I guess you could vent the closet,
but that seems to defeat the purpose a little of spending all that money on a fully self contained system, if you have to add more to make it functional.
I have herd a few more good things about these
www.homegrown-hydroponics.com/mistgrcaw17h.html
The only thing, they don't have a message board to hear about the real life use of these units.
Well good luck."
Another box, the SunCell grow boxes found at www.suncellsystems with a hefty price tag of $2400 and up. seem to be reasonably built, the problem that I have found with these units is people posting on different boards making claims about these boxes, only to find out that they were trying to market the boxes. I have talked to the distributors of the box and aside from having a poor website in my opinion, they tried to answer my questions, being very friendly and patient.
They say that the units can be ran with hydro or soil, but they recommend soil do to some of the height restrictions. They say that the upper temps of the cab run in the mid to upper 80's while the lower cab stay in the 70's. Mind you after he said this, he said that as a rule of thumb the units run about 10 degrees above room temp. With these units I have herd yield clames as high as 1.5LB a harvest, but I think that a more conservative quote I herd was from a board that said to expect up to half a LB per harvest depending on strain and number of plants. Pot TV has a small segment on the SunCell boxes that is somewhat informative.
The BC bloom boxes are another unit that I have looked into for one reason or another. As a matter of fact there is a current thread on this board with a user of the Producer going through a grow right now, maybe someone can post a link, it is fairly informative in spite of the bad luck that the grower is having, do to problems seemingly unrelated to the efficiency of the unit. Note the thread starter, XLT hope he doesn't mind says that the unit is extremely louder than advertised and has some light leakage, also he comments that as far as stealth is concern he keeps it in his garage because it is quite obvious that the unit isn't a file cabinet, that was my interpretation of his stealth comments. In the words of my wife, "It looks like some giant funky safe thingy."
Aside from that, the unit is supposed to be the Hightime winner this year for grow boxes in the October issue. This is what the company told me. They also told me that a complete novice could yield a 1/2LB off the unit per harvest. All novices take this with a grain of sand for the most part.

Well, I hope some other folks put in their two cents. I have other things to say about some of the units here and there, but I hope to get some dialog started before I continue to research these cabinets. Hope that I am right in thinking that there are some medically disabled or chronic pane patients and such that this discussion might assist.
Adieu

Zandor
07-14-2006, 05:38 AM
well beside saying "anti commercial, anti capitalistic, anti greedy money hungry corporate American" that is a good way to make friends here.

What makes you think this subject is taboo? There was one post earlier this year but they guy worked for the company and was only looking for fee ad space. He too only had a few posts before he started spouting off about how great he was and how great they were and he could out grow anybody with them. That did not go over to well here you could imagine.

We have a good thread started by a member who has one of those systems you are talking about. It's just that most people don't have the money to buy them.

There are many of us here who have medical cards to grow but I personally don't use one of those systems. I have evaluated 2 of them for some local stores who sell them for a growing. They worked fine but they just like anything else take time to get the timing down and work out the little bugs. They do grow small plants are mostly a sog type of grow system.

I am not sure just where you are going with this if you are looking for information about them or what?

BlueBear
07-14-2006, 07:14 AM
Oh, Zandor I am not trying to offend you or anyone else on the board. After I wrote it up, having different medical MJ users in mind I thought that I had did a fare job in laying it out in such a way to not be misconstrued., so when you make it sound like I might be questionable, it discourages me a little considering that I have done allot of research on all kinds of turnkey systems and for safety reasons I wont say much except that I myself have a disability that has made it extremely hard for me to grow in the past and at this point in time I do not own or have any type of affiliation with any makers or distributors of any systems and do not plan on it unless out of the blue one of them were to call me and drop a few $2 $3000 units on me which I do not see happening. so first off let me start by saying that when I said, "Before all of the anti commercial, anti capitalistic, anti greedy money hungry corporate American tempers flare up." I was making a comment relating to the attitudes that many of us growers have and rightly so, but in this case I was trying to start off the talk by trying to explain that perhaps this could be a discussion about a group of commercial products that are yes, over priced, but may still be a help to some MJ users that are not able to do what many others on this board do in the way of growing without the attitudes that I feel are attached to these systems and voiced by quite a few people on the board that seem to come up when the topic of turnkey systems are posted. I don't know if that is out of line, at least I thought I was coming at this the right way.
As far as the currant thread that is going on right now about a grow box, the Producer, if you look closely you will see that I have been trying to help XLT grower. With any of my post as few as they are I think that it would be clear that I am strait up.
One of the reasons that I brought this up besides the reasons I mentioned in my post that still seem to be valid in my opinion, is because when ever I have read a post on the board regarding someone making inquiries about turnkey systems they generally seem to get more nocks about building their own and how much a rip off these turnkeys are. I figure that being the case it would be hard for a person to get a run down on these systems in the same way that people give advice on other equipment on the board such as lighting, hydro set ups, soils and so on.
Again, I am not trying to offend anyone, I have read the archive thread about the fellow who came on pushing the suncell box and I laughed as you put the "smack down" on him by showing some lovely picts. I have read so many of your threads and even in the short time I have been on here I generally cross reference allot of things I might say by reading any posts that you may have made on the particular topic and I have put allot of time in doing so because I have come to respect so many of your comments. You have made more things clear to me in a few months than years of being on the scene.
Well, that's my spill. Doesn't look like this will get the discussion going that I had intended. The best laid plans of mice and men go a stray I guess.
Adieu
PS. If I seem a little sensitive in my reply it is because when a person who is a wealth of info and knowledge such as yourself comes through and seems to say "Hmm are you trying to run some smoking mirrors trick on here," that's what the little heart on my sleeve said in my ear, it is quite discouraging as I said above.

jamstigator
07-14-2006, 10:58 AM
I don't particularly think any of them are really overpriced. I mean, three grand, okay, that's the cost of a decent computer system, which is neither a huge amount nor a small amount. That's the cost of a pound of good bud, depending on your area. If it'd take you, say, 50 hours to build one yourself, at a third the cost, then you'd save two grand, at the cost of 50 hours of work, or 40 bucks an hour. For some people, that's a reasonable tradeoff, and those people are the target audience of these turnkey systems. And, as you pointed out, some people are simply not physically capable of building their own box. If there were no market for these systems, no one would be selling them, so there is obviously a market.

I too have seen people disparaged for mentioning these systems, but I don't really get that. Sure, it's rewarding to build your own. But if you CAN'T build your own, or you're willing to spend the money in order to not have to build your own, there's nothing wrong with that. If the seller and the buyer are both ultimately happy with the deal, well, that's how business is supposed to work.

That said, I haven't seen a ton of people with these systems. I did see the same thread you mentioned, the guy with the Producer box, but haven't seen much else info from anyone with any real experience with these types of boxes. I'd be interested in hearing more about them from people who own them too, even though I don't see myself ever buying one. I might, however, recommend them to friends, if they're good enough (e.g. reliable, durable, low maintenance, low smell, reasonable yields).

the image reaper
07-14-2006, 03:11 PM
trying to read all that makes me go blind .... :D

Mnoutdoorz
07-14-2006, 03:52 PM
trying to read all that makes me go blind .... :D

haha the ole wall-o-text...classic...:D

Just playing guys. I think this is a really good topic. I've looked into the turnkey cabs before as well and I'm always curious how well they work. And you bring up such a valid point that many people interested in growing their own cannabis may not have the ability to build their own box. I've had my cab built for about a month and a half now...I think and I'm constantly having to do things and it's still far from perfect. I've already spent a little over $500 and to get it where I want is still going to be another $200. But I've also put at least 20 hours into building and tweaking, and that's not including the time I've spent just tending to my plants.

This is a great topic hopefully more people have turnkey experience to share.

Happy tokin':rasta: