Indoor Grow Box Set-up

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Originally Posted by Malsor

Yea? MH all the way? How does it make it more potent? Sounds interesting....I'll look into that, I heard plants grow triple in size once started flowering which means if I veg until they are 2' when their adults they will be 6' tall! If I make at least one ounce per plant I'm happy, especially if I can grow 8 at once.

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I let my plants get to a foot tall before flowering and pulled 3 oz per plant. Imagine two feet before you flower. :)

It works due to the MH putting out more blue and also a bit more UVB radiation (despite the filtering borosilicate glass shell.) This increases trichome production and thus THC content versus other cannabinoids.

I've included two pics - the first one is of my (poorly-done and heavily-burned) red-dominant LED grow. Notice there's some frosting, but not much.

Second pic is under blue-dominant lighting. Notice how much more frosty it has gotten (and it even suffered the same burning.) it's about three weeks behind the red-dominant one on flowering, as well. had I not let it burn, odds are the entire plant would look like I tried spraying it with that glass grit crap the poor guys in southern UK get to increase their yield.

You may want to consider having the intake at the bottom of the cabinet and the exhaust at the top if at all possible with the theory being that you'll draw cooler air from the floor and pull hotter air out from the top for maximum temperature control.
Just a suggestion from personal experience with small spaces to work in.

Good luck!

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Originally Posted by GanjaThump

You may want to consider having the intake at the bottom of the cabinet and the exhaust at the top if at all possible with the theory being that you'll draw cooler air from the floor and pull hotter air out from the top for maximum temperature control.
Just a suggestion from personal experience with small spaces to work in.

Good luck!

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the intake is going to be in the bottom and the exhuast is from the top im just ducting the air out from the bottom.

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Originally Posted by khyberkitsune

I let my plants get to a foot tall before flowering and pulled 3 oz per plant. Imagine two feet before you flower. :)

It works due to the MH putting out more blue and also a bit more UVB radiation (despite the filtering borosilicate glass shell.) This increases trichome production and thus THC content versus other cannabinoids.

I've included two pics - the first one is of my (poorly-done and heavily-burned) red-dominant LED grow. Notice there's some frosting, but not much.

Second pic is under blue-dominant lighting. Notice how much more frosty it has gotten (and it even suffered the same burning.) it's about three weeks behind the red-dominant one on flowering, as well. had I not let it burn, odds are the entire plant would look like I tried spraying it with that glass grit crap the poor guys in southern UK get to increase their yield.

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wow, yea. The second one deff looks more frosty. Lets say if my plants grew up to 6' would my vertical setup work with plants that tall? Also, during veg should I keep the light vert or hori?

I found a article on a website on MH for flowering. It basically says the buds wont be as big as if you were to flower using HPS but the quality will be better. I copied a section......

Metal halide (MH) lamps can be used for flowering, but there are two problems that they have when compared with high-pressure sodium (HPS) lamps. The first is that they don't emit as much total light. HPS lamps emit more than 20% more light, so MH lamps are not as intense when covering the same area. Second, they do not emit as much orange and red light as HPS lamps. These spectrums seem to promote flowering.

However, MH lamps do have several advantages over HPS. First, they are less expensive to purchase. Second, the light does not have a really weird telltale
spectrum. It looks white, not pink or amber.

Third, the lamps emit more UVB light than HPS lamps, although still in very small amounts. The amount of UVB light plants receive is directly related to the quality of the buds. The more UVB, the higher the quality.

Buds grown under MH light will not be as big as buds grown using HPS lighting. However their quality will be as good or better.

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Originally Posted by Malsor

wow, yea. The second one deff looks more frosty. Lets say if my plants grew up to 6' would my vertical setup work with plants that tall? Also, during veg should I keep the light vert or hori?

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Yes, it will work, you will just need to be able to raise the cooltube to keep the plant exposure, lighting from the undersides is majorly inefficient.

As for buds under MH being smaller than buds under HPS, I've found that to be absolute nonsense in my own grows. Lumens means nothing, and the MH has superior spectrum and PPFD output versus HPS. It's more like actual natural sunlight. In the world of professional greenhouse horticulture, MH is the preferred primary after sunlight, HPS is the supplement to get even closer to sunlight color temp outputs. They're moving to LED, it's not quite as good as MH but definitely better than HPS in some aspects.

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Originally Posted by khyberkitsune

Yes, it will work, you will just need to be able to raise the cooltube to keep the plant exposure, lighting from the undersides is majorly inefficient.

As for buds under MH being smaller than buds under HPS, I've found that to be absolute nonsense in my own grows. Lumens means nothing, and the MH has superior spectrum and PPFD output versus HPS. It's more like actual natural sunlight. In the world of professional greenhouse horticulture, MH is the preferred primary after sunlight, HPS is the supplement to get even closer to sunlight color temp outputs. They're moving to LED, it's not quite as good as MH but definitely better than HPS in some aspects.

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Makes sense, I might go with MH the whole way just to try it out. Do you think super cropping would be a smart idea for a vertical grow?

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Originally Posted by Malsor

Makes sense, I might go with MH the whole way just to try it out. Do you think super cropping would be a smart idea for a vertical grow?

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No, I would recommend you just let your clones or seedlings grow straight up to two feet tall, then right before you flower, clip the tops (make clones for moms or another cabinet,) and then flower out. No supercropping needed, and the plants are going to bush hard.

Listen to Khyber. He provides much higher level advice. I have never run a vertical grow. My experience to date is outdoor. I am in the process of prepping my indoor grow room. Read read read.

the only questions I have left are....

How far do I keep the light from the plants during veg and flowering, I know in the middle but how high/low, and as they grow in size where should I focus the light?

Can I use 4 gallon square pots or are 5 gallon pots recommeded?

I might have a problem clamping the 6" circulating fans since the plants are going to be against the wall, any suggestions?

....I might have more but thats all from the top of my head. I continue to do my research, I want to take my time and get everything right the first time.