First Grow OP. FEEDBACK PLEASE !

[trankilement]

Ok here is the deal, I am currently getting my hand on all the material required for a perfect hydroponic grow, but due to my lack of experience in this domain I am not sure where I stand in terms of quality and quantity and I could use your help.
So for what is worth here goes the list of what I have :

1- A hydroponic grow garden system which includes a black reservoir with a white Lid (14"x7.5"x5"). 8 plants.
Air Pump
4" Air Stone
Air Tubing
Net Cups
Rockwool Cubes
Plenty of Hydroton
6 Months worth of nutrients (3 months of vegging nutrients, 3 months of blooming nutrients)

2-Humboldt Seriers Nutrients: - Grow bottle ( 2-1-6) - Micro bottle (5-0-1) -Bloom bottle (0-6-5)

Now for what concerns the lighting system I am going to experiment a bit while staying old school.
I got 3 MH 150w r7s Floodlight ( no heat whatsoever incredible)
3 HPS 150w
I also got 1 220V 190 LED Wide Grow Light 135mm Diamter Bright BLUE
1 220V LED Grow Light Plant Lamp Hydroponic Bright RED.
I was thinking of using 1 MH, 1 HPS and the LED blue for the veg part then when i go into the flowering stage use 1MH, 2 HPS and the LED red. What do you guys think ?

Please let me know how would you set up your garden of weeden if you had this material in your possession. Am i missing anything ? How do you value the material ? Any input will be valuable !

I also have a pH meter and temperature tester to control the box.

trankilement Reviewed by trankilement on 02-11-2011. First Grow OP. FEEDBACK PLEASE ! Ok here is the deal, I am currently getting my hand on all the material required for a perfect hydroponic grow, but due to my lack of experience in this domain I am not sure where I stand in terms of quality and quantity and I could use your help. So for what is worth here goes the list of what I have : 1- A hydroponic grow garden system which includes a black reservoir with a white Lid (14"x7.5"x5"). 8 plants. Air Pump 4" Air Stone Air Tubing Net Cups Rockwool Cubes Plenty of Rating: 5

[MEDEDCANNABIS]

Ok here is the deal, I am currently getting my hand on all the material required for a perfect hydroponic grow, but due to my lack of experience in this domain I am not sure where I stand in terms of quality and quantity and I could use your help.
So for what is worth here goes the list of what I have :

1- A hydroponic grow garden system which includes a black reservoir with a white Lid (14"x7.5"x5"). 8 plants.
Air Pump
4" Air Stone
Air Tubing
Net Cups
Rockwool Cubes
Plenty of Hydroton
6 Months worth of nutrients (3 months of vegging nutrients, 3 months of blooming nutrients)

2-Humboldt Seriers Nutrients: - Grow bottle ( 2-1-6) - Micro bottle (5-0-1) -Bloom bottle (0-6-5)

Now for what concerns the lighting system I am going to experiment a bit while staying old school.
I got 3 MH 150w r7s Floodlight ( no heat whatsoever incredible)
3 HPS 150w
I also got 1 220V 190 LED Wide Grow Light 135mm Diamter Bright BLUE
1 220V LED Grow Light Plant Lamp Hydroponic Bright RED.
I was thinking of using 1 MH, 1 HPS and the LED blue for the veg part then when i go into the flowering stage use 1MH, 2 HPS and the LED red. What do you guys think ?

Please let me know how would you set up your garden of weeden if you had this material in your possession. Am i missing anything ? How do you value the material ? Any input will be valuable !

I also have a pH meter and temperature tester to control the box.

sounds good so far. do you have a ph, ppm, ec tester? that will be crucial. do a test run before you grow anything and make sure your temps an humidity are fine.

[trankilement]

sounds good so far. do you have a ph, ppm, ec tester? that will be crucial. do a test run before you grow anything and make sure your temps an humidity are fine.

pH and temp meter but no ppm and ec tester... EC is for the electric conductivity right ? Why is it important ? and what is the ppm for ?

[polishpollack]

EC and ppm are basically the same. They will each give you an idea of how much fert is in the water. You're right about conductivity and ppm is parts per million. I don't know what a good EC numbers are like but ppm range is usually 500-750 when their small and up to 1500 when their big. You add fert to keep close to those numbers throughout the grow. I'd paint the lid black if I were you, but that's container's wrong. If you do this right, 8 plants will quickly outgrow such a small container. For 8 plants you can use 5 gallon buckets seperately or put two or three plants in large tubs. 8 plants done right in DWC can easily take over a small bedroom if done right. But you've go to do it right, use the right fert, don't overdo the nutes, average temp 75F, give airflow, lots of air to the water with your pumps. Best of luck. Any questions, just ask.

[trankilement]

EC and ppm are basically the same. They will each give you an idea of how much fert is in the water. You're right about conductivity and ppm is parts per million. I don't know what a good EC numbers are like but ppm range is usually 500-750 when their small and up to 1500 when their big. You add fert to keep close to those numbers throughout the grow. I'd paint the lid black if I were you, but that's container's wrong. If you do this right, 8 plants will quickly outgrow such a small container. For 8 plants you can use 5 gallon buckets seperately or put two or three plants in large tubs. 8 plants done right in DWC can easily take over a small bedroom if done right. But you've go to do it right, use the right fert, don't overdo the nutes, average temp 75F, give airflow, lots of air to the water with your pumps. Best of luck. Any questions, just ask.

I should definitely get a ppm tester.. It will show me if I am adding up the nutes right or not.. I was not planning on growing on 8 plants at the time as you said the container is too small for 8 plants. I think I will go with 3.
My system is more of a EBB and Flow system right ?
How do you think I should set up the lights for 3 plants ? ( knowing that i have 3MH 150w and 3 HPS 150w). Let me know what would you do in my case ? And how far should I keep the lights from the plants ?

Sorry for all the questions and I appreciate your inputs ! Thanks.

[polishpollack]

A good ppm meter is expensive but they do help alot. A cheap one will probably suffice, though not be as accurate. As long as you're in the ballpark you should be ok.

Not ebb and flow but sound like a DWC setup. ebb and flow would have the water moving into the grow container, then out of it on a timed cycle or manually operated. If the water stays put in the container, then it's just DWC. You pump air in to oxygenate the roots and keep them from drowning, so to speak. Avoid light leaks into the container as this will cause algae to grow. You might reconsider three plants and just go with two in a tub. Sounds silly, but I'm serious. If you do this right the plant mass will get to be so large to fast, you'll think these plants were brought by the aliens or something. It's ease of fert acquisition and utilization, less energy goes into the rootball and this promotes rapid plant growth. You'll see. DWC, when done right, is easy and kickass. Don't forget all the odor that they'll put out. In flower, they stink like mad.

I don't know if I would bother with the LEDs, but use them if you want.

You might consider spraying them with plain seltzer or soda water as the bubbles are nothing but CO2, which is a growth booster. This way you can put CO2 in the grow space without getting the tanks, valves, etc.

[trankilement]

A good ppm meter is expensive but they do help alot. A cheap one will probably suffice, though not be as accurate. As long as you're in the ballpark you should be ok.

Not ebb and flow but sound like a DWC setup. ebb and flow would have the water moving into the grow container, then out of it on a timed cycle or manually operated. If the water stays put in the container, then it's just DWC. You pump air in to oxygenate the roots and keep them from drowning, so to speak. Avoid light leaks into the container as this will cause algae to grow. You might reconsider three plants and just go with two in a tub. Sounds silly, but I'm serious. If you do this right the plant mass will get to be so large to fast, you'll think these plants were brought by the aliens or something. It's ease of fert acquisition and utilization, less energy goes into the rootball and this promotes rapid plant growth. You'll see. DWC, when done right, is easy and kickass. Don't forget all the odor that they'll put out. In flower, they stink like mad.

I don't know if I would bother with the LEDs, but use them if you want.

You might consider spraying them with plain seltzer or soda water as the bubbles are nothing but CO2, which is a growth booster. This way you can put CO2 in the grow space without getting the tanks, valves, etc.

!!! Damn am I learning stuff. Thanks for sharing the knowledge dude.
Ill definitely go with the two plants in the garden now, should I put them as far from each other as possible or closest to the oxygen pump ?
Will a air purifier do for the smell or ill need something much stronger ?

[MaryJayne420]

Just remember, if your doing seedlings you have a 50/50 shot for male/females. This too was my first grow and I was not blessed with a female.

Kudos to you for doing more than one - your chances raise of getting at least 2 females (if not more). Remember that on seedlings, you want to cut the nutrient solution in half until it is a stable growth (at least 1 1/2 weeks into vegetative). Then step up to 75 percent and then 100 percent nutrient recommendations. I made it a habit of changing my solution every 10 days, but that was just for 1 plant.

You don't want to pick seeds that have the darker shells, as those may be harder shells for water to penetrate and to bring moisture to the embryo inside the shell. You generally want a medium brown color for your seeds. best idea is to germinate your seeds in a damp paper towel. I germinated my seed by paper towel in a small bowl with a little water (tap water is fine to start). remember to germinate it needs darkness.

Once your seedling spouts out of the growing medium, cover the top of your rockwool with the hydroton rocks so that algae does not form on the top of your grow medium (Algae needs light and moisture, covering the grow media with hydroton will block the light).

[tinytoon]

That purifier will prob work as well as pissing into the wind and trying to stay dry :wtf:
You need some type of charcoal filter to knock the smell down. Are you setting this up in a spare room? closet? or ???????
The more O2 you can get into the water the better so if your air pump has more than one outlet or strong enough to branch off of then add another stone. I have a 55 gal res and last run I had 2 6" Bubble bars and now I'm running 2 12" bars. Lots and lots of bubbles is what you want. You dont have to go quite as strong with nutes in DWC as you do with other styles since the roots are always in the nuted water and not just getting "fed" 4-5 times a day. If you want when you start everything up you can start a grow log and we all can follow along and try to help where needed. Other than that .................. Welcome to Hydro :jointsmile:

[polishpollack]

MJ and Tiny, coming through in the clutch....

How many plants you grow depends are a few factors, how much you spend, how big the space is, what is the likelihood of getting caught, how stinky you want your place to become, how much money you want to spend. Decent people here can help you with the grow, it ain't hard and you can get your questions answered. Unfortunately, I can't vouche for the accuracy of all answers, but oh well.

Personally, I like the idea of using 5 gallon buckets for DWC, for several reasons. It isolates each plant so if you have a fert problem in one it may not be shared by the others. Also if you have to move containers, you can do so more easily than lifting a larger tub full of water and a heavy plant. That's cumbersome, difficult. If you only want to grow two plants, then just get a couple black buckets with black lids. You can probably use a 6 round hole saw to cut a hole for the netpot, or buy lids from the store that are already cut. Northern Light and Garden in Wash. and Oregon will probably do this for you if you wanted to have them shipped and can't find what you want locally, if you don't live in the area. The store has a site - NORTHERN LIGHT & GARDEN

Remember to mix the ferts with water in the container first, don't mix them together without putting a gallon or something like that in the fert container first. Ferts shouldn't be mixed together without immediate dilution, so put water in first. Otherwise element bind together and become useless.

Air is key to making DWC work. Alot is good. You can keep your air pump a few feet away, I don't think it matters as long as there's no leaks in the tubing. Run the air tubing, which you can get in fish and aquarium sections at walmart, along with airstones and air pumps, in through the very top of the bucket, right under the edge of the lid. This way when you have to take the lid off you can do so without disturbing the air tube. It would be smart to get an additional bucket to set the plant in temporarily without water, when you need to change the water in the grow bucket the plant usually resides in. Otherwise you'll have to have to have someone hold onto the plant for you so the roots don't get damaged.

I don't know anything about Humbolt ferts. This should be interesting. What do these contain? What does the label say?