New improved gorw box but plants growing slow :(

Hi all

I posted a few weeks back with my homeless style grow box that ended up getting binned due to concerns over safety etc

Anyhow I created a new one

The thing is it seems my plants or more so plant... is growing slower than most of the other people who post on here

Heres some information that will help

I dont have a thermometer inside the the box but the outside temps in my area have been between 16 and 30deg C

I'v just used regular potting mix see the pic

I'v also every now and again splashed some of this liquid nute stuff in the pot, mixed of course a little weaker than the directions state

Light is 3 x 23 W CFLs all are 6500K

Plants have been inside the box for 3 weeks i think

I pinched the node about 2 weeks ago

Lights are running 24hours a day

Also as you can see from the pics the older leaves are looking somewhat unhealthy

I clipped off a couple of the old almost dead first leaves

thats about it

Any suggestions?

other pics

just wondering, u no how u have ur pot, then ur saucer at the bottom? do u fill that saucer up? or how does that work?

i have it like that too, i have a large bowl instead of a saucer, but yer, i find that theres sometime little tiny bugs on the resovoir, (where the water is) and i need to change it almost everyday, please, advice....


and btw, if thats foil u have in ur box, u might wanna get it as flat as possible, no crinkles, koz they generate hot spots and its a fire hazard. ive gone with white office paper, sounds like more of a fire hazard i no, but it works really well, reflects a lot of the light back.

hope i cood help, nd hope u can help me

laterz

Mikey

Do you have an intake fan for the box? If you don't, this is easily remedied by installing an intake fan as close to the bottom of the box and as far away from the exhaust fan as possible. Also, the intake needs to be drawing in at least the same amount of air as is being pulled out by the exhaust.

The last I remember, fluorescent lights didn't emit too much heat energy, but I'm not sure about CFLs. Aluminum foil also won't help your situation because it really isn't that efficient of a light reflector and reflects quite a bit of thermal energy. You could always paint the inside a flat white which should be a cheap and effective solution.

Finally, I'd say minimize the distance from your plant to the lights as much as possible. If what I remember about fluorescents and heat is correct, then your lights should basically be hugging your little plant. Remember that the intensity of light decreases with increasing distance due to the inverse square law (Intensity ~ 1/d^2 where d = unit of distance). CFLs don't have a high enough lumen/watt ratio to be effective any further than a few inches, so keep 'em close!

Just my 2 cents, but I hope it helps!

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the intake needs to be drawing in at least the same amount of air as is being pulled out by the exhaust.

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You could always make a passive intake untill you can get another fan. Also like Hazeus said CFLs dont put off much heat at all so you want them close to the plants as possible. If you add more light then they will grow faster. After I added 2 cfls to my cab I saw a big diffrence. They sell Y shaped splitter things where you can have 2 cfls in the place of one.

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Originally Posted by mikey420budd

just wondering, u no how u have ur pot, then ur saucer at the bottom? do u fill that saucer up? or how does that work?

i have it like that too, i have a large bowl instead of a saucer, but yer, i find that theres sometime little tiny bugs on the resovoir, (where the water is) and i need to change it almost everyday, please, advice.....

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I just have the black plastic tray thing to stop any water leaking out into the box after i water the plant

I have a small bowl in there as well which is filled with water to try and keep the humidity level up and i have also noticed tiny bug things like to grow in there.... I guess its something that lives in the potting mix and likes the water so I just empty it every couple of days to get rid of them, I'v never seen any bug things on my plants thankfully

As for the foil vs office paper my 1st grow box was lined with office paper and it did a great job however considering the whole box was made of cardboard my partner got paranoid about the house burning down so i had to scrap it and went with foil in my plastic box.... the lights dont generate much heat so im not worried about the fire aspect as the box never gets hot to the touch however i'll put some more foil in it and try to get as little crinkles as possible

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Originally Posted by Hazeus

Do you have an intake fan for the box?

The last I remember, fluorescent lights didn't emit too much heat energy, but I'm not sure about CFLs. Aluminum foil also won't help your situation because it really isn't that efficient of a light reflector and reflects quite a bit of thermal energy. You could always paint the inside a flat white which should be a cheap and effective solution.

Finally, I'd say minimize the distance from your plant to the lights as much as possible.

Just my 2 cents, but I hope it helps!

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Cheers for the reply

Might look into some flat white paint ;)

When the lid is on the box the plants are pretty close to the light

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Originally Posted by TxChronic1

You could always make a passive intake untill you can get another fan. Also like Hazeus said CFLs dont put off much heat at all so you want them close to the plants as possible. If you add more light then they will grow faster. After I added 2 cfls to my cab I saw a big diffrence. They sell Y shaped splitter things where you can have 2 cfls in the place of one.

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I think I'll get another light today

Unfortunately i cant find any y adaptors here in the land down under... and when i called up some lighting and electrical specialty shops people were like huh what isnâ??t that dangerous...? :(

I might go with the passive intake hole for the moment heat isint a problem however will the plants benefit by having the extra air going through the grow box?

Updated pic looking a bit more happy now

any idea on what strain this might be? grew from some bag seeds

well i guess ill be the first one to say (unless i was to high and missed it) that by the looks of the picture of the soil element content it looks like it is pretty high in nitrogen, phospherus, potassium (N-P-K). a little too hot when the plant was younger (lower growth burnt). I would feed water only for the next couple waterings. :twocents:

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Originally Posted by keeko

well i guess ill be the first one to say (unless i was to high and missed it) that by the looks of the picture of the soil element content it looks like it is pretty high in nitrogen, phospherus, potassium (N-P-K). a little too hot when the plant was younger (lower growth burnt). I would feed water only for the next couple waterings. :twocents:

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Im mixing 1 cap full 10ml to 1L of water shouldent that be weak enough?

good to see your determined to keep on trying. personally, i'd shitcan the foil all together, it's too hard to get smooth enough to prevent hot spots for one thing and it's just not very reflective for another, go buy a can of flat white spray paint, try to find the kind made for painting plastic, maybe the kind made for model cars.
also, you'd probably be better off with a passive intake rather than trying to put in an intake fan, if it's not done just right, they compete with each other and create LESS air movement.
here are some pics of a Rubbermaid box made by 'smokedoja' that he posted on another forum, hopefully, he won't mind my sharing them here with you. i'm not gonna post ALL the pics, there are several, so if you need more, just ask.
anyway, i hope this helps

bozo,
peace, love, dope

sorry, i do that a lot, anyway, the pics

1) and 2) are the box assembled
3) shows the pins he uses to hold the box together
4) light fixture (for CFL's)
5) passive intake (elbowed to prevent light leaks)

he uses foil too, even so, it's a BAD idea.

1) the top with fixtures installed
2) the bottom
3) the exhaust fan (pc fan)
4) the results
5) ditto

this is a scrog believe it or not

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Originally Posted by justanotherbozo

this is a scrog believe it or not

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That is pretty slick. Do you know how much lighting was used?

It's funny because I was thinking of doing something similar just for fun.

unfortunately, those pics were put up in 'smokedoja's' thread so he (the dude with the scrog) didn't give any details, i'd like to know myself. anyway, it looks very intrguing doesn't it?

bozo,
peace, love, dope

That my friends is a KICK ASS scrog!! Well done whoever did that!! You might want to make sure that when the plant gets older you have trace elements as well and change to a nute that does not have as much nitrogen for flower. yeah lose the foil, flat white is the way to go. good luck!

Thanks for the encouragement guys

I'v got Monday off work so i'll ditch the foil just paint the inside of the box flat white, do u think that car spray paint will be ok? or just use the regular cheap everyday spray paint will do the trick?

I'll cut a hole in the box to make a passive vent when I do the painting on Monday

I'll also stick another light or 2 in as well

From the pics posted it looks like i might be off to the plumbing department as well

Thanks to everyone for their input

The V ScrOG was probably lighted with a 150 in a cool tube.

Box is now painted inside flat white

Small passive vent cut

Plumbing to help reduce ligh leaks

2 x extra lights added..... wish we had double adaptors where i live

looks good man, that you're actually following suggestions looks good too man. something you'll want to consider in the next month is another bin flipped upside down and used as a top, you will run out of space in no time if you don't.
keep it up, and remember, everything you do now, all your success' and your failures, especially your failures, is just practice so the next time will be better

bozo,
peace, love, dope

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Originally Posted by wangman

Im mixing 1 cap full 10ml to 1L of water shouldent that be weak enough?

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not talking about nute solution, talking about soil content.

Wow, another nice looking grow. Good to see the advice and suggestions coming to you, and you heeded some of the GOOD advice.

Did you ever identify/isolate the reason you felt the growth was stunted in the beginning?

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Originally Posted by Technique2

Wow, another nice looking grow. Good to see the advice and suggestions coming to you, and you heeded some of the GOOD advice.

Did you ever identify/isolate the reason you felt the growth was stunted in the beginning?

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Im guessing that the potting mix wasnâ??t that good + the bag seeds were a bit old

I was also running 3 lights with foil in the box

Im now running 5 with flat white paint so hopefully that will give them a big boost

I just hope that after all this the plant doesnâ??t turn out to be a male :wtf:

Cheers again for everyoneâ??s help i'll post up new pics every few days

one thing that i have noticed since painting the inside of the box is that the little bug things that like to grow in the water bowl I use seem to like hanging around the base of the box... nothing the vacumme cleaner cant fix though

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Originally Posted by wangman

I just hope that after all this the plant doesnâ??t turn out to be a male :wtf:

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that's why cloning is so important. without it you will never achieve reproducability. with only 1 seed you have a 50% chance it's a male, not good odds. as a newbie myself, i would strongly suggest you learn how to clone (it's not hard).
it's a pain to raise several seeds until they're big enough to cut, then waiting til they root, then waiting til they flower enough to show sex but, if you do that, then you will have a female to raise up until it wll provide you with more than 100 cuttings per year (if you do it right a momma will provide you with more than that). the great thing will be that they are ALL female, GAURANTEED.

anyway, keep it up man

bozo,
peace, love, dope

Well if worse comes to worse i'll just veg the bastard till its 2 big for the box and make brownies with it.... Male plants do contain THC in the leaves to the same levels as the females? its just the buds which are the difference?

Also if it turns out to be a male can I make it a hermi just as u can make a female a hermi?

Hi guys been a while

Decided i would post an update

Plant is starting to go crazy now with @ least 7 nodes sprouting new leaves all over the plant

I'v topped the plant again and as you can see the new nodes are going well, notice the difference between the left and the right.

The left seems to have 3 nodes sprouting "bit cramped for space" while the right has the usual 2

This is due to me only topping the baby leave that had just started to sprout on the left while on the right i topped off the leaves the baby leaves were sprouting from

PLEASE BE A GIRL!:D

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Originally Posted by wangman

Well if worse comes to worse i'll just veg the bastard till its 2 big for the box and make brownies with it.... Male plants do contain THC in the leaves to the same levels as the females? its just the buds which are the difference?

Also if it turns out to be a male can I make it a hermi just as u can make a female a hermi?

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typically the plants dont have any thc in the fan leaves, let alone a male having thc in the leaves......it would be a waste of brownie mix.]

and no, you cannot turn a male plant hermie and make it have female parts

Im a little worried at the moment because this plant hasent shown any signs of sex yet... no balls from what i can see and no hairs either....

or is this more to do with the fact that its under 24h light and wont show any pre flowers untill it goes into 12/0?

Is it possible to have all male plants or should I have at least one female out of four that are growing?

you will not see the sex of the plants till you change the light setting to 12/12 all you will have is a very big plant.

its all good mate turned out to be a nice female

anyways i started a new thread as a grow log so mods feel free to close this thread