Sooo... having found out that my 'day gig' has vanished...

...and, with my final paycheque in hand (and it's only like 7hun, not the 11hun that I was kinda expecting), I realize that I can either be responsible, and pay the rent on time, oooor...

get firkin' serious about the show. BOY, am I motivated, by now.

After about 200ish inquiries, I have finally managed to track down some serious clones. I got raped on the price ($20ea, for 8 = $160! Ouch!), but the person I got 'em from was a starving actor, they looked really good, and the deal was one of those that you either jump at RIGHT NOW, or it ain't gon' be thea t'morry. So I walked a mile to my bank, pulled out way more than I was hoping to, and walked back to pick up my lovely little girls (all well-rooted in dixie cups, with nice looking leaves, the correct sex (of course!!!), and the most heavenly smell, even at 2-4" tall.

I then set 'em up on the top shelf of my lockable closet in my bachelor apartment, with a single cool-white 4100k 45w CFL (200w equiv) starin' at 'em. They seemed ok with the arrangement, and I set about building their proper enclosure.

I figured that I could either lay out 200-500 beans for a nice shiny mylar grow tent (couldn't find one used that I could get for a reasonable price), or, I could spend a bit on some basic lumber, and put my [somewhat rusty] carpentry skillz to work, and build a better space, cheaper.

My initial (hopeful!) budget was something like this:

100 Lumber/building materials
100 Clones/seeds
500 Light(s?)
----
700 Final paycheque. IEEEEEEE. Stop worrying. sIGH.

Since I spent 1.6x what I was hoping to, I really needed to find a bargain at the lumberyard, or shop really hard for the cheapest stuph that would do. The objective was to build a free-standing cabinet/closet, with a hidden entrance, that /just/happened/to/ blend in with the living room soooo much, that people would naturally mistake it for just another wall.

With Carte Blanche, this is No Problem.

With a hunnert bux, it's a firkin' creative nightmare, but fun.

Initial shopping list at Revy. Any ole timers out there from Canuckland will know the store of which I speak, tho it goest by another name now, which shall remain nameless.

4x 1/4" OSB, like 6bux each.
12x 2x4, pick out the nice ones, ARGH! 2.49 ea.
8x 2x3, even harder to find straight boards here, 2.09 ea.
j-box, 1.49
screw-in fixture, 1.49
Nice Big Light Bulb 16.79 (at WallyWorld for 19!)
Pack o' cheap extension cord/powerbar/6plex plug, 6bux.
1/2ga. of Mudding Compound, 4.79.
Paper tape. Not for what you think, but yeah, some o' that too.
Hmm, what did that work out to, plus t4x in our Socialist Paradise? F&*K! I'm overbudget again (at 120 and change!), and I still have to get that cheapie timer/powerbar thingy at a shop across the road, that is not only kuul, but the cheapest timer I can find (and digital!), that also handles 1875 watts, easy. I also break down later and buy a 4.5m/5yard heavy extension cord to power it, tho I bitch at the 11 dollar price tag on a FIRKING EXTENSION CORD. Geebus.

Where were we? OH yeah. I still have to get this home, and since they don't allow LUMBER on public transit, and I can NOT afford a cab, I wind up sweet-talking the manager of Revy to loan me one of their heavy plywood carts so that I can walk my purchases "a couple of blocks to home--I live in the neighbourhood."

The manager was really kind, and tho I offered to leave my drivers' license, they didn't ask, which was good, because it was close to closing, and there was no way that I was going to be able to walk to my apartment, off-load the lumber, and get back before they locked the doors.

Normally, it would take me 35 minutes to walk unencumbered to the LumbaSto, but with four sheets of OSB, plus a buncha 2x3s and 4s, it took almost an hourannahaff (pant pant) to lug the stuph home. And just as I'm /trying to nonchalantly sneak a huge lumber cart into the back of my apartment building, THE F**KING SECURITY GUARD sneaks up on me, and asks me why I'm doing construction in the middle of the night..! I gently and tiredly protest that "hey, dude, I work a night job, and this was the only time I could do this... and don't worry, I'm not going to be doing anything tonight, I just have to off-load this quietly, and get some sleep... Can you give me a hand? (That's whatcha get for being a busybody!).

HEy. I'm just building some shelves, eh? And I can build waaay more of 'em by buying the raw lumber instead of those shitty particle board kits. Gotta make some small talk going up in the elevator with the stuph that will fit...

F!CK. The OSB won't fit. No matter /how/ I try to bend it. So I have One. Last. Choice {why de **** didn't I get that lovely lightweight grow tent again?}

I have to lug the stuph up the stairwell, one sheet at a time. In the middle of the night. Quietly. Alone. Without leaving any pile of stuph alone farther than 20 feet from me at any given time, cuz I live in a rough neighbourhood, and if you leave shit alone out here, it gets took. Yaz. It done does. Did I mention that it was late?

So I planted the cart in the base of my nearest stairwell. Nothing too odd about a lumber cart underneath the stairs, is there? And then, all sheets to the second floor, one at a time (2.5, actually). Then, from there, all sheets one at a time to the 4.5 floor. Then to the 6.5 floor (ready to pass out now, sweating like a pig). Then, after a short catch-my-breath-please-God-don't-let-me-die break, all sheets to the inside of my kitchen hallway, one at a time.

I want to sleep now. REally I do. But there's still one more thing to do.

MEHUPE. I still have to walk that heavy lumber cart back to rEvY. aWW....

So I light a quick one up, change sox and shoes, and resignedly go downstairs to finish getting my daily workout. Walk. Walkwalkwalk. ouch. my. feet. hurt.

Somehow, I got home that morning, and you have no idea how fast I was asleep after my head hit the pillow. You need Really Expensive Scientific Instruments to measure durations like that...

And the next day, thus beganeth The Building.

Of The Sanctuary.
:chainsaw:

http://boards.cannabis.com/members/c...-first-2x4.jpg

http://boards.cannabis.com/members/c...first-wall.jpg

http://boards.cannabis.com/members/c...into-place.jpg

http://boards.cannabis.com/members/c...ast-up-top.jpg

http://boards.cannabis.com/members/c...gnore-mess.jpg

PS: I should mention that with the exception of a corded 3/8" reversible variable-speed drill, there were NO power tools used in any of this. For noise, of course.

maybe you should think of being an author lol, i enjoyed that read very much. Looks good so far can't wait to see the finished product!:jointsmile:

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by CovertCarpenter

Initial shopping list at Revy. Any ole timers out there from Canuckland will know the store of which I speak, tho it goest by another name now, which shall remain nameless.

---

RONA lol, I also hate the name change, too girly for that kind of store IMO:jointsmile:

...sooo, where did I leave off..?

Firstly, chillbrah and michaelpeg, thanks for your kind comments! michaelpeg, you nailed it... the store name is too 'girly' now for a firking building store. May gH0d smite down all those female-dominated 'consumer focus groups', eh?

chillbrah, thank you... I have often thought about being a writer, and perhaps this is the impetus that I have needed to get 'practising' that craft ;)

On with the build...

First things first, I had to put up an initial wall to get things started (see pix above). It is a mazillion times easier planning an event like this when you can count on a second person (and their extra set o' hands) to be there to help. It SUX when you have to basically build everything (quietly!) yourself, and can't really tack any temporary shite to the existing walls.

Remember--this has to be a 'freestanding' cabinet that my landlord can't freak out about, /if/ she ever finds out it's there. Aaaannnd.... I have to be able to take this thing apart, just in case I /have/ to disassemble or 'fix' it, or for when I move (I put sooo much work into this thing NOT to be able to take it with me when I go).

Now, who out there in my massive audience has ever had experience working with lumber? Any hands? How many of you have /ever/ found a perfectly straight board in any standard pile in your average building store? Anyone?

Yup. Boards are /never/ straight. Even the straightest one, viewed on edge, will have some kind of bend or twist to it. So, you pick the straightest ones, and then work with 'em to pull their standard bendiness out, or put it to your advantage.

So, I basically built the first frame, with 3" #8 flush-head woodscrews, and put the OSB on it with 1½" #8 fh woodscrews, then put it up into place, noting a slight twist it had that I would pull out later.

I then put up the other four straightest 2x4's, using the very straightest ones for the opposing corners. After deciding which board went where, I built first the middle frame, then the opposite (end) frame, and placed them. I then used 2x4 bottom runners going the long ways, and tacked 'em to the frames with a single 3" screw on either side, so that I could correct any twist later. I then tacked runners to the top of the frames, a 2x4 in back and a 2x3 in front, because I was kinda running out of the initial lumber I estimated.

Now with a box built, I had to fix the twists. Myself. Did I mention that this stuph is waaaay easier when you have a helper? Since I didn't, I used a technique that I learned from builders on a log home yard. Two or three of my 2x3's (and one 2x4 at one point) were used as temporary cross-bracing in various places, so that I could correct the twists, and put in my permanent crossbracing to keep it that way. I wish that I had taken more pictures to show this properly, but I was way too busy building the dang thing :)

Here's a pic showing both permanent and temporary cross- and side-bracing.

http://boards.cannabis.com/members/c...hten-frame.jpg

The crossmember that is in 'front' of the chair is the first of the permanent ones, and is being used to primarily push the top corner of the first wall frame back to the wall it's supposed to be flush with. The crossmember going above and across the 'floor' is temporary, as is the slightly-off-vertical one behind the chairback.

I was initially going to locate my ballast up on the middle frame, out of the way, but then I placed it in the rearmost corner, on the back side of the long runner, so that it had a nice long concrete wall to vent its minimal heat against.

Once the main frame was built and straightened, I reinforced any joins that had only one woodscrew with another, to 'fix' the frame in place. Now ready to be 'walled in', I then set about enclosing the insides, so that I could get my girls outta their closet and into their real home.

I started on the bottom, using a triple-layer of pandafilm, stapled to the crossmembers and runners, forming a nearly 4'x4' bowl, so that any leaks or spills would be contained.

I then worked my way up the sides, using two 8'x10' sections of pandafilm, hung from the insides of the frame with lotsa staples, upholstery-style. I began the film at the middle section of the first wall, wrapped the first around the room so that the endmost 4' would be the first 'curtain', and then overlapped the second section with two-sided carpet tape, and ran around the room the other way, with the endmost 4' as the second 'curtain'.

With these done, I was standing nude on a chair in the middle of 'em, sweating like a pig in the near dark, putting up the pandafilm that would become the inner ceiling. Carpet tape was again used on all seams, so that the resultant structure would be pretty close to air-tight.

Sigh. I have to sit down and take a break now, remembering how exhausting that step was. :rastasmoke:

Once /that/ was done, (with me remembering to thread the cable for my light fixture before I had it all buttoned up!), I hung two 5' lengths of 50lb test chain from a couple of screws in a crossmember right along the centre of the room, and mounted my fixture/shade. This meant that my bulb was approximately 24" from the 'ground', and 16" from the top of my plant pots at its lowest point. :)

Nearly done, I had to get the intake port at least semi-done before I could move plants into The Sanctuary. This proved to be more of a pain-in-the-ass than I would have liked, but worked out in the end. I took the ducting, placed it, traced the outline of the hole it would need on the front wall (already tacked into place), and then cut the hole by drilling the corners and along the sides, then using my saw's rounded front edge to cut the hole from the inside.

I then put the plastic back into place (not yet sealed at the bottom, thank gH0d!), and cut thru where I needed the hole, with some duct tape to hold the edges while I got to the outside finishing of the duct.

After this was done, I had to put the duct back into place and then put a small crossbeam along the top to hold it into place. The eventual final 'fit' would be mostly 'friction', with a couple of staples on the shroud to hold it into place. And I can change the filter from the front without removing the whole 'fixture', as well as remove the assembly later should I need to.

Here's a pic, nicely not showing the duct at the bottom right corner ;)

http://boards.cannabis.com/members/c...section-up.jpg

OHyeah! I also gotta mount that firking exhaust vent, and wire at least the main exhaust fan before I turn that light on, or I'm gonna cook the little girls!

I first mounted the 6' length of non-flexible 4" ducting to the single elbow that would need, using some good ole duct tape. I then used some of the carrystrapping that they wrapped my lumber in, to mount the duct assembly to the outside of the curtains (still within the outer part of the sanctum.

Sigh. Back onto the chair. Into the dark sweaty place.

The elbow, at the top, now had to be attached to the inner 'tent'. I cut the sections within the port to triangles, then duct-taped them to the insides of the elbow. I then duct-taped the inside outer rim of the output port, and hoped that my single 130cfm 120v muffin fan down at the end of the vent would be enough to vent the entire room. I was wrong, but it was easily correct-able.

The fan was attached to pandafim shroud at the end of the ducting, and powered from a j-box on the frame right next to it. I used a cheapie two-wire extension cord for this, and properly wired everything and closed it up tight with a plate as is proper.

I did, however, have a really bad "F*%*%*%*%*CK" moment when I realized that I had inadvertently trimmed the fan leads (already pretty short!) when I was trimming the shroud around them, but I managed to splice 'em with some duct tape, and everthing went well after that.

With all this in place, I could now place my girls into their Sanctum, and turn on the /real/ light... ARGH! Gotta mount the powerbar/timer first... grumblegrumblegrumble.

I previously found a nice cheapie powerbar/timer arrangement for twelve bux at the H--- D---- across from Revy. I put the battery into it (for the digital clock/timer!), set the time initially for 9am on, 3am off, mounted it at an out-of-the-way place, put the plants in to The Sanctuary, plugged it in, and...

Wow... that's bright... wait--it's getting brighter.... Ow! that's really bright now... ARGH! gotta stop looking at it :)

Happiness. And to keep all of that luminescent happiness /in/, I used some velcro self-adhesive strips on the inner and outer curtains.

Since I really wanted to get my girls into their proper chamber quickly, I finished the first (innermost) part of The Sanctuary, and then set about finishing the rest of it, including the door.

I will not reveal the entire method I used to build the door and hinges (kind of a trade secret!), but I will mention the constraints that I had to build it to, and leave it to the readers' ample imaginations to suss-out the eventual method :) I /will/ mention that I redesigned the overall door-and-frame /four/ /times/ before finally deciding on the exact 'how'.

The door had to be as invisible as possible, and have no external signs of 'door-ness'. The door had to be openable and closable by one person, without massive exertion. The door's hinges had to be quiet, and replace-able or fixable, should the occasion arise. The door should be closeable from the inside, and the seams/edges of it should not show, or they should show in a way that does not suggest that they are seams/edges. The door should also be openable in a different way in an emergency, should someone on the outside block the doorway that makes opening it in the 'normal' way impossible. IF this happens, the door must be able to be 're-hung' without taking down a section of the front wall. And did I mention that all of these constraints had to able to be met by just one person, working alone?

Once /that/ thorny little problem was solved to my satisfaction, (and it took four days, much to my consternation!), I then felt pretty good about putting up the last wall section. Since my floor-to-ceiling height was 8'3", and a sheet of OSB is 4'x8', I hung the outer walls right to the ceiling, leaving a 3" gap at the bottom that I would hide with the 4" wide trim boards. Nice that they used such wide trim when initially building the place ;)

http://boards.cannabis.com/members/c...n-going-up.jpg

The hardest part about hanging the /final/ wall section was getting it to overlap with the door section's edges correctly and tightly. Since these would be rubbing against each other for their entire lives, I solidified their working edges using runs of woodglue-soaked paper tape. When this dried, I hung the final wall section without problems.

As tight as I could get 'em to the ceiling and existing walls, though, there was still a half-inch gap in some places, due to the extreme non-straightness of my existing walls and ceiling. I solved this in two ways--on the inside, with a double-layer of pandafilm stapled to the inside of frame, and on the outside with a layer of paper tape soaked in woodglue, to make a nice hard corner. This is a bit of a bitch to work with, but a great way to make a strong corner in a place that doesn't have enough backing to it normally.

Once these were done, I set about mudding and taping the screwheads and ½" gap between the two main wallboards. I wound up mudding the whole walls with a thin coat, to simulate the texture of the existing plaster-over-concrete walls in the place. I initially extimated that I would need ½ga of mud to do the whole job, but then found out that a half-gallon was only enough to do one panel and a bit, and I had another three to go. After I quitmybitchin, I ran down to Revy to get some more mud, this time a 1.25ga size. Both mud buckets would later fortuitously become parts of my first design in the HobbitHydro line (tm) ;)

I had another "F$(%#*#$&K" moment when I realized that, after going out to have a nice supper with a friend, I came home to greet a 24-hour entry notice (!!!!) that was due a couple of days hence. So I /HAD/ to get the minimal finishing done just in case my landlawd was there for the fire alarm test thingy that they were performing.

Here's a pic of the wall after mudding and sanding, with the first coat of paint going on nicely that night. Isn't it great that we live in a day and age where a decent paint store can just scan your paint chips, and colour-match things nearly exactly (even amongst different manufacturers)?

http://boards.cannabis.com/members/c...g-painting.jpg

I got the main room done first, and then remembered that the 'outside' of the first wall was now blocking what used to be the entrance to my living room AT MY FRONT DOOR, and so had to be finished invisibly too.

After clearing the shelves and cruft away, I again used woodglue and paper tape to solidify and seal the corners on the first wall, mudded the thing to match, and painted it nicely with one good coat.

Moving the shelves and things back, my roomie commented that it was amazing how invisible everything was beginning to look (amidst the mess!). My landlawd paid me the ultimate compliment when she didn't notice the missing entrance to my living room, and basically walked on with the fire inspector dude to the next suite :)

Ahh... time to light a d00b to celebrate :jointsmile:

Comments from the other builders on this site would be most appreciated.
Hell, comments from anyone out there would be most appreciated!
(c)C :chainsaw:

PS: If you know anyone in the TO metro area who needs some 'special' carpentry done... my 'dance card' could use a few extra bookings ;)

Great Work!!
Looking Good :)
REP +

are you still building this?
It is looking really nice.
Do you have more pictures?
of the inside?

...but I'm still getting my shite together in my personal life to be able to properly update my logs the way I'd like. I know that this is a horrible excuse, but I promise that There Will Be Updates Real Soon Now.

My http://boards.cannabis.com/grow-log/...ng-partay.html thread/log features the plants in the inner sanctum of the garden, but doesn't really show how it connects to the outer part, or how they interface with the outside.

My http://boards.cannabis.com/grow-log/...-vanished.html thread/log shows the construction of the sanctum, but not the 'step-in-the-doorway' shots, though some of the zoomed-out shots kinda show things a bit. I was a bit rushed to take pix of the ventilation when I was finishing the build, but will do so, and with an update, as I add a homebuilt carbon filter to the mix, and extra ventilation.

Thanks to everyone so far for their kind words and suggestions! Not sure if I should include this teaser, but it's from an album of mine... It shows the seedlings (unfortunately recovering from heat stress :() in their new CFL livingroom digs :)

http://boards.cannabis.com/members/c...re-600x600.jpg