SOG Grow box - My first time and I need help

Hi all,

I am looking for suggestions. I have read so many posts I don't know what direction to take.

I am working with a crawl space that is only 48" high.

I want to make a 4'w x 8'l x 4'd box out of plywood and 2x4's. The inside will be styrofoamed and all corners sprayfoamed followed by white plastic or mylar with 6" pots to grow SOG (I think).

Computer fans for ventilation and a carbon scrubber for odour.

Post will be soil and a mix of manure and vermiculite.

The lighting would be (1) 250w MH for veg and (1) 250w HPS for flower.

The pots will sit in a 2 x 4 water basin and apparently I can water them from the bottom up rather than top down. (Can anyone shed some light on this for me)


Am I on the right track?????
Is my lighting going to be adequate for the square footage???
If I veg until the plants are 24" and trip them into flower will they grow much higher???? (I don't want them to touch the lamp)
Can anyone suggest a strain??

I am a first time budder so any help would be greatly appreciated.

I have many more questions but will read more of the posts here and wait for any answers or direction you can point me in.

Thanks for some great ideas and suggestions in this community.

Me.

hello blink,water from the top but try not to let it sit round the stem,grow a indica they grow more bushy and dont get so tall,when you force the plants into flower however high they are they will double at least,your lights are good when flowering i would use both the m.h and the hps so you will get a full spectram good luck dude lets us know how it comes along:thumbsup:

Thanks for the help.
It is my first time so I don't want to be dissapointed by setting it all up incorrectly.

In teh box can I fit 100 plants?
Is 6 inch enough or should I be going with 8"?

I will post pics and plans as I progress.

Any more advice or suggestions are welcomed.

Thanks again.

blink - "Crawl space" would indicate that you are growing under a house - is that correct?

As far as the construction of your box goes - with what you hve in mind you have reduced the interior height of your box to about 3.5', maybe less. Build the box with 1"x2"s or 2"x2"s and do away with the styrofoam inside. Also, don't use spray foam on the corners - it's not made for that, it doesn't work well for that, it's hard to use and... it's just the wrong stuff. Use caulking instead.

If your crawl space is under a house, be sure to use GFCI breakers for all of your electric.

Thanks.
It is under a house and GFI are a great addition.
I am using waferboard and 2x2's then.
I guess the 4 x 8 panel will have to open to allow me access to all plants.

Back to the drawing board..

Blink - Don't use waferboard, it doesn't hold up real well to wet conditions. Plywood costs about the same and will last longer.

Ordinarily I don't recommend GFI's for grow ops, they're too sensitive to moisture and can trip when you least expect it. But, when a person is crawling around on (potentially wet) dirt and touching electric fixtures, they're probably a good safety item. Do you know how to use a GFI receptacle for circuit protection instead of a GFI breaker?

I will look at some marine plywood perhaps. Might hold up really well to the moist conditions. Or maybe that's too excessive.

I know how to change a regular outlet to a GFI....and know how to put the plug in...is there more to it?

Will//

Blink - Just get regular plywood. There used to be a big difference in grades of plywood due to the glue used. That was years ago before advanced polymers. Now, plywood glue is all excellent. The difference in grades and costs comes from 1) The number of plys (layers of wood) - more plys = stronge plywood and 2) the surface quality. If one or both sides are nice sanded wood, as opposed to wood with tears and knots in it, the plywood is more expensive, eh. But you don't care what your box looks like so just buy the cheap plywood. Save your money for better lights, not better plywood.

A GFI breaker has two sides to it - line and load, eh. Line is the electricity coming into the receptacle - pretty straightforward. The Load side is where it gets trickier. Any receptacles that are down circuit from the GFI rec'le will be protected by the GFI breaker if they are connected to the load side. If you DO NOT want down circuit rec'les protected by the GFI (and there are many good reasons why you might not), then hook everything together in the box - black with black, white with white, run pigtails from your connection and hook the pigtails to the appropriate connections on the receptacle.

Simple enough, eh?

My Canadian is a little rusty but I've translated this as best I can, eh.

Great translation.
The current makes sense.
Thanks for the advice, eh.


Now for another question...

In terms of air curculation, if 4 computer fans are at the bottom of the 8ft side and a vent (dryer size) runs off the top of the box, will my air circulate properly??

You are going to need fans to vent the air and fans inside the box to move the air. Since you want to draw as much hot air as you can from the box, the exhaust vent should be on top. Did you envision the computer fans exhausting air or inputing it? Exhausting from a low point isn't an effective way of exhausting the hot air.

The CPU fans would input from the bottom. Cooler air.
There may or may not be a fan inside to circulate.
There will be a vent (exhaust) at the top with a scrubber that will vent with my dryer outside the house.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by blink_inc

The CPU fans would input from the bottom. Cooler air.
There may or may not be a fan inside to circulate.
There will be a vent (exhaust) at the top with a scrubber that will vent with my dryer outside the house.

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Blink - I don't know how to say this real nicely, but this plan sucks in so many ways. :D But that's ok because many initial plans suck, I know mine did. Until you actually have a bulb burning inside a box you don't really appreciate how hard it is to get the heat out and how much ventilation you actually need.

I really think you should go to the cabinet/closet section and do some reading about grow boxes and ventilation.

To use a scrubber, you need a fan attached to the duct the scrubber is on. passive air flow won't work. Most scrubbers connect at the end of a duct. i.e., they don't go in-line where you have duct -> scrubber -> duct.

And fans inside your box are a definite must. The plants need/love air circulation.

Thanks.

I will read more on fans and circulation.
I am concerned about inside temperature.

blink - I'm glad if I can help! I'm just a couple rungs higher than you on the noob ladder, so I don't know a whole helluva lot - yet. However, I am pretty good at construction - you can check out my latest grow cabinet here - and the mistakes and lessons of starting up are still fresh in my head.

So a little update,

I went and picked up a 16 cubic foot rubbermaid container and lined it with black/white plastic. $99.00

Picked up some 4" fans at hardware store and mounted them on the inside with cable ties by drilling through the box. $18.99

Found some full spectrum flourescents at the local homegrown hydro store 3 of them give 15000 lumens. $95.00

This "room" will be my clip to veg room as I can only veg until about 14 inches. 2 mothers will be held in here as well. I can fit 100 clipping s plus the two mothers without overcrowding. Right now I have 12 sprouts that are 5 days in and have now pushed all 4 starter leaves and stand about 1.5-2 inches high.

Hopefully I can build a decent 4 x 8 box as mentioned earlier in this post to flower.

Has anyone ever worked with minimal height before???
I figure that I have only 28 inches from top of soil for plant growth....I will be clipping the bottoms to maintain order and space hopefully ending up with solid 28inch colas...

If you have worked with this height before, what sort of yeild can I expect??? 80 plants in a 4x4x8.


Still having fun,
x

Wow...fan off 102F, fan on 94F.....tops are 6" from lights.
6 days in and the 6th leaves are showing. pics to come soon.
Tips are a little brown. Heat might be playing a factor here..

wayyy tooo hot in there, need temp about 80