Article - Starting Up

[align=center]Starting Up

Article Taken From: High Times (April 2002)
Written By: Max Yields[/align]

Creating an artificial growing environment indoors presents a number of challenges. Security must be considered, the proper climate must be maintained and everything necessary to the plantsâ?? growth and development must be provided by the grower. It all begins with designing and building, and requires careful planning and the right equipment.

Planning begins with choosing the size and location of the garden. The floor area (length x width) of the grow-room is up to you, but generally it will need to be at least four feet high to accommodate the large stature of a cannabis plant and the artificial lighting needed. The larger the garden, the more electricity it will draw. Every square foot of grow space will require around 35 watts of electricity to power the required equipment. A significant increase in electricity consumption can be costly and lead to suspicion and legal repercussions, so keep the grow-room as small as possible.

The garden must be kept hidden, so it should be located in an out-of-the-way place that can be locked or sealed off from the rest of the house. Unused bedrooms or closets are excellent locations, as are the basement or attic. A storage shed out back or an unused garage make fine spaces for indoor gardens as well. The garden will need to be maintained routinely and re-supplied periodically, so it should be easily accessible and have adequate storage and work space. Wherever the grow-room is located, it must have access to fresh air and an adequate power supply.

Ventilating an indoor garden while keeping it secret can be quite difficult. Choosing a location with access to the outside through a window, vent or chimney is best: however, steps can be taken to address this issue in almost every circumstance. Ideally, the area chosen should have power, but electricity can be run into the grow-room from an outside source if necessary. The main thing is to make sure that the power source is grounded and has a high enough amp rating to handle the equipment load. A 20-amp breaker is sufficient for most average-size gardens. Just make sure that there isnâ??t anything else drawing a lot of current on the same circuit.

Once the location of the grow-room has been established, it will need to be prepared. If itâ??s necessary to bring in power from outside the garden, use heavy duty grounded extension cords. Hide them and keep them off the floor if possible, especially in the grow-room, to avoid electrocution and short-circuiting hazards.

Sanitation is critical to keeping the garden healthy and pest-free. Fungus and mold can develop on porous surfaces like curtains and carpeting, so remove them if possible. Remove any debris in the area and wash down all the surfaces with a 5% solution of bleach water or a household disinfectant. Leaky containers and spills are common when growing indoors. If the floor canâ??t be mopped easily, a layer of thick plastic can be used to capture spills. For convenience, do this after the room has been built and equipped. Cut the piece a little larger than necessary, and let the extra lie against the walls to contain runoff.

After the area has been prepared, the grow-room must be designed and equipped. This begins by assessing the lighting and ventilation needs for its entire volume of air in the grow-room every three to five minutes, and it will need to provide around 5,000 lumens of lighting per square foot of grow space to maintain healthy, vigorous growth.

Some building may be required to close in the grow-room or adjust its size. Walls can be created in several ways. The ambitious grower/carpenter can put up 2â?x4â?s and wallboard with a nice, secure door. Those who wish to keep it simple can use makeshift partitions made of plywood or cardboard, or hang sheets of Mylar to close off the garden. The walls and ceiling should be as reflective as possible, to maximize the efficiency of the lighting. Mylar reflects around 90% to 95% or the light that hits it. Painting the interior flat white will reflect around 85% to 93%.

Cannabis does best under artificial lighting that most closely reproduces the intensity and spectrum of the sun. The light fixtures of choice for indoor gardening are high-intensity discharge lamps. HID lamps are the most efficient light source available. Their spectra and high lumens-to-watts output ratio make them ideal for indoor gardening. Fluorescent lighting is sometimes used, but rarely as the main fixture. Itâ??s most commonly used as supplemental lighting or to propagate seedlings and clones.

The two most common types of HID lamps are metal-halide and high-pressure sodium lights. MH lamps have a bluer spectrum and are ideal for vegetative growth. HPS lights have a redder spectrum and are better for flowering. Either fixture will work on its own, but a mixture of the two is best. Conversion bulbs are available for those who wish to provide the best lighting possible throughout the plantâ??s life cycle using only one lamp.

Whichever fixture is chosen, a good rule of thumb is to provide between 20 and 30 watts of HID lighting per square foot of growing space. A reflective hood, to direct the light down on the plants, should come with the fixture. If it doesnâ??t, one can be made out of aluminum, stainless steel or sheet metal. The design can be simple as an angled or curved piece of metal or as complex as an umbrella or dome-shaped reflector. The design should include vent holes or some other such contrivance to keep heat from building up near the bulb, which can shorten its life. Without a reflective hood, effective coverage of the grow-room can be decreased by half.

A timer can be added at this time, but isnâ??t absolutely necessary until the garden if flowered. Many growers run 24 hour of light a day until flowering. However, an 18on/16off schedule is most common. Use a heavy-duty grounded appliance timer, and mount it where it will be easy to manipulate when the time comes.

Planning a ventilation strategy begins with deciding how and where fresh air will enter the grow-room, and stale air will be exhausted. Ventilation can be accomplished in a number of ways. If the grow-room is located in a large, cool area such as a basement, walls can be constructed to leave a 6-to-10 inch gap between tem and the ceiling, allowing hot air to rise out of the garden into the main room. A vent cut into a wall, or a small gap in between the walls and the floor, with a pan place nearby will provide circulation and help draw in fresh air as well. If possible, vents with fans can be installed on opposite sides of the grow-room. Place the fans in the vent openings, one drawing air in and the other pulling it out. Draw in cool air near the floor, and exhaust warm air out near the ceiling. This will draw heat from the lamp up and away from the garden.

In smaller, more insulated grow-rooms where heat buildup is likely to become a problem, such as a closet or warmer locations, ventilation can be assisted and directed by exhaust blowers, sometimes called squirrel-cage fans. These blowers are designed to direct the flow or air. The smaller blowers usually have a round exhaust post that can be fitted with ordinary dryer vent hose, which can then be used to direct the exhaust to another location. The larger blowers have rectangular exhaust posts and require some kind of ducting to direct the flow of air.

Exhaust blowers come with a CFM rating, which is a measure of how many cubic feet of air can be moved in one minute. To determine the approximate size required, find the volume of the grow-room (height x width x depth), and divide by three. The result is the CFM rating of the blower required to properly ventilate the garden in most cases.

Mount the squirrel cage near the ceiling or the light to exhaust the warmest air. Make sure you have an intake equal in size to the exhaust port somewhere in the garden, preferably opposite the blower near the floor, for fresh air, and a regular fan in the garden for circulation. Using the vent hose direct the exhaust air out of the grow-room through a wall or the ceiling to another location. This can be difficult in some situations, and requires some craftiness and ingenuity. Tap into the chimney, a dryer vent or a heating duct. Run exhaust into the un-insulated area between interior walls or floors. Leave a 2-inch gap in the bottom of the closet door and vent the blower out the top. However itâ??s done, fresh air must be available at all times, and heat must be vented to control the temperature and humidity.

Finally, the grow-room will need to be outfitted with monitoring devices to keep track of the temperature and humidity. Standard thermometers and hygrometers display the moment-to-moment conditions. Digital devices display current conditions, as well as maximums and minimums that it keeps stored in memory. This type of monitor makes it possible to gauge the daily fluctuations and better control climatic conditions. Install the device somewhere it can easily be read, about halfway between the floor and the lamp. Avoid putting it too close to the lamp or in the direct path or a fan, to get a more accurate reading of the average environmental conditions.

Before starting a garden, the grow-room should be tested and conditions stabilized. Put all the electrical devices on the timer and run it 12 hours on 12 hours off for a few days, checking the minimum and maximum temperature and humidity each day. The temp should be around 80*F, give or take 5 degrees, and the humidity should remain between 30% and 70%. If the temperature is dropping below 65*F during the night cycle or rising above 85*F during the day cycle, try switching the timer to run at night, when itâ??s cooler, and be off during the day, when itâ??s warmer. This should help even out the fluctuations and avoid trouble when hits time to flower. IF it doesnâ??t, the ventilation system may have to be re-evaluated. If itâ??s getting too cold, the ventilation system may have to be but on its own timer or on a thermostat to control its cycles.

If conditions are still fluctuating too much, install the proper climate-control device somewhere near, but not in, the grow-room. An air conditioner or heater is the outer room near the grow-rooms intake will help control the temperature. A humidifier/dehumidifier will help control extremes in humidity. IF necessary, thermostats or climate controllers can be added to these devices to regulate their functions as well. This can be a costly step however, and is a last resort for most indoor gardeners.

These are the general principles needed to design and build an indoor grow-room. They are meant to establish guidelines and present ideas and alternatives to the grower wishing to begin cultivating indoors. Every situation is different, as is every grow-room, but all indoor gardens require the grower to provide optimum environmental conditions. With a basic understanding of grow-room design and the right equipment, anybody can create a near-perfect growing environment, and cultivate cannabis year-round in the relative privacy and comfort of the indoors.

Article - Starting Up - Max Yields