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Tent 4‘ x 2‘ x 6‘
Homemade 1x3 wood frame with 2 layers of panda plastic. Hinged door with latch.
Two 5“ fans at bottom rear feeding fresh air in. One 5“ exhaust fan from top fed though ducting to another window mounted 5“ fan exhausting outside (8th floor). Absolutely no smell in room while budding Super Skunk unless you opened the tent door. Maintains 26° C. with all lights on.
Lights used for both veg and budding are 2 x 150 watt Full Spectrum LED cobs (8“ x 1“) no lens, on individual heatsinks with fans. Each LED and bank of LEDs on own switches.
Hung on heavy cord with pulley and cam lock system for height adjustment at each end, all 3D printed.
Different colours are used during various phases of growth.
120 watts of 620 nm Red LED tape along walls about bud height (10 meters total length),
30 watts of 460nm Blue tape (5 meters)
9 watts - 400nm UV
39 watts - 445nm Royal Blue
18 watts - 460nm Blue
27 watts - 520nm Green
9 watts - 660nm Deep Red
18 watts - 720nm Far Red, all 3 watt LEDs seperately switched.
LEDs mounted on heatsinks inside 2 long square boxes, one for each side with a 2“ fan in each. That is pretty much 570 watts total.
The idea with the colours all on switches is so the Red and IR can be used for budding, the blue works good for slowing stretch in early flower. Green I am just experimenting with.
75 watts per sq ft in bud mode , 56 watts in veg.
Grow medium is 50 - 50 potting soil and perlite in 5 gallon buckets
Nutrients - General Hydroponics MaxiGrow, MaxiBloom and CaliMagic on their Medium Feed Schedule
Average tap water ph is from 5.4 to 8.8, 87 ppm, EC 165 µs/cm
I use vinegar or lemon juice as phdown.
150 watt heatsinks are made from scrap sheet steel, all fans are 4 or 5 inch fans salvaged from electronics. Infrared red and UV LEDs also salvaged. 1x3 wood recycled from old futon frame. Electrical panel near ceiling inside tent with all 120 and 12 volt supples with surge protectors, switches and timer.
Total cost of the whole setup before the seeds and nutrients was 170 Can., thats tent, lights, buckets and grow medium and all the little extras. I happen to have electricity included in my rent so there is no cost there. For the next few years I will only need to buy seeds. I recycle the grow medium by just heavy repeated flushing after each harvest and have used this batch for 5 or 6 years with no problems. I consider it to be pretty much inert by now other than all the small roots in the mix that compost naturally.
The reason I am posting this grow is to show that a reasonable setup need not cost a small fortune. I drooled over some nice tent kits but they are far more than my budget can afford.
Complete setup, tent, LED's, containers and the little extras cost me a total of 140 Can.
Homemade tent 2x4 x6, 1x3 wood frame and Panda plastic with hinged door.
Leds are 150 watt full spectrum COB. For budding 120 watt of Red LED tape and 40 UV and 40 IR small LED's added. 71 watts per sq/ft in bud, 56 watts in veg
All LED's, fans and 1x3 wood were salvaged.
The reason I am posting this grow is to show that a reasonable setup need not cost a small fortune.
I also have 3 Super Skunk a month younger that is posted in another dairy.
My city water supply sucks. The ph rises and falls in such a wide range that it is difficult to keep up to what it needs to level out the ph. I have seen 5.8 up to 8.9 just in the last month.
Is there a cheaper method than using the standard PH down?
Lemon juice works pretty good to drop pH. I can buy distilled water at my local grocery store for cheap. I think a gallon is .19. You could do that, depending on pot size and numbers.
Here's a link that should help you out:
https://www.growweedeasy.com/adjust-ph-organic-marijuana
A little bit more defoliation, any fan leaf that was in the shade. Tied back four main branches to open up the center more. That will get trimmed out more later and the four branches will be brought closer together.
Growing very healthy and showing no signs of stress from pruning or training. I would like to put it into bud now but I would like to wait for the Super Skunk to catch up some so they can all go into bud at the same time. If needed I will just bend down the branches sideways to keep it a little lower.
30 years ago I grew a lot under HPS and have just recently gotten back into it. One thing we always did was to turn off the lights for a 24 hour period to supposedly trigger the plants faster. I learned this from the person who taught me how to grow.
Has anyone heard of this?
Heard of it, yes... necessary, no... Just changing the lights to 12/12 will flip them into flower... but the 24 hour lights out certainly won't hurt!
Welcome back to the wonderful world of growing! A lot has changed but I think the basics will always be the basics!! Good luck...
This lady is one of the healthiest strains I have done yet. Continuing with the LST, since my tent is in my workshop I found masking tape to work quite well for holding branches down. A loose loop around the stem works great.
She doesn't seem to care how much I feed her, I hit her hard a couple of times with no signs that she didn't like it
I will grow this strain again simply cause of how easy it is.
Tape is off and she got tied up with a purdy white ribbon. A bit more lower leaf trimming. That ribbon will get moved up as the buds start acting as initial support..
I decided to flip them all now. Fruity is going to reach a fair bit I think and I will be limited to a 5 foot maximum. More LST in during stretch.
Finally went with a real ph down by Root Farm. Plants seem to like it better than vinegar.
Fed them their first of the MaxiBloom and set timer for 12/12. turned on all the red LED's and IR and UV LED's
My buddy is growing two of the Fruity and two of the Super Skunk as well as a few others. With a mistake in timer setting his started flowering a month ago so he is officially putting his into bud as well with 12/12 and MaxiBloom.. Considering the open setup with about the same amount of lights he will get a fair crop although a little fluffy.
She started stretching within a day and grew 2 inches in a couple of days, Added extra Blue LEDs and stretch has slowed down considerably.
Lots of LST to keep it close to bucket size and a little thinning. Buds forming quickly. Very healthy.
Without the LST she would be two feet taller.
She is doing pretty good. More LST to help control the height, already half way up to max for the tent. Buds are starting to build up. MaxiBloom and CaliMagic seems to be what this one likes, Heavy drinker lately. I pushed the nutes to the max and saw the leaf tips just starting to show stress and backed of a little. For now she is happy.
Adding Blue LEDs has helped lots with slowing the stretching.
Fruity is happy and starting to fill out the buds. Buds everywhere. A few lower leaves are dying off. Going to trim out a few more leaves in the canopy a little sideways LST.
Fairly slow stretch and most has been LSTed, gained an inch in a week. Still drinking lots.
I'm sticking with the Maxi Series feeding schedule and she loves it.
Fruity is starting to yellow a few lower leaves, could be a little lack of nutes but hope it is just the natural die off. I did more LST to keep her flat on top.
Buds are thickening nicely. Pretty happy so far. Tough strain.
Buds fattening up. Lots more yellow leaf in the bottom end. A trim of yellow is scheduled later today.
A light green colour is from low N, I just fed them.
Some pistils turning colour. Tricome count is increasing daily. Stated bud time is 7 to 9 weeks. This is week 7 so she should be heading towards finish soon. I'm hoping to go to week 9 at least.
Fruity seems to happy. Buds are really filling out. Lots of fresh white pistils coming out. Some turning brown.
Tricomes are mostly cloudy already except near the fresh growth. Considering she was 10 weeks in veg and got triggered then pulled back into veg I am not surprised to see cloudy tricomes already. She might be done in another week or two which would put her about where the stated budding should be.
She started showing a little over feeding (brown leaf tips) so I likely won't give her anymore food till she is finished.
Update
Took a close look with the digital microscope and find that the tricomes are not cloudy afterall, mostly clear so it looks like another week or two. That is good cause the buds can fatten up lots more. I will be using the microscope for tricomes from now on.
Fruity seems very happy. Buds are filling out faster and loads of crystals. The tricome build up has increased a lot since adding more LEDs.
I have had the following LEDs on for the last week and the plants seem to love it.
2 x 150 watt Full Spectrum LED
60 watts of 620 nm Red LED tape
9 watts - 400nm UV
39 watts - 445nm Royal Blue
18 watts - 460nm Blue
27 watts - 520nm Green
9 watts - 660nm Deep Red
18 watts - 720nm Far Red,
9 watts - 850nm IR
I checked the trichomes today and found they are about 80% cloudy. Close enough for me. They will be finished after two days of Blue only.
I'm trying the method described by VVord_Alchemist in his last harvest with an all Blue light for the last 2 days.
There is 30 watts of 460nm Blue LED tape and 9 watts of 400nm UVa, 39 watts of 440nm Royal Blue and 18 watts of 460nm Blue. 96 watts total, no other lights.
I think Fruity will yield fairly well considering how she has been treated during her hard life.
Chop in TWO days.
A special Thank You to all the fellow Growmee's that responded to my questions.
A great help and resource. The best damn social media site I have even been in.
Zappdoggy
