Referring to the last 4 photos: I think I could ha...

When in doubt, it is always best to defoliate less. Also don't defoliate during the first 3 weeks of flower, you will take the plants energy away from producing bud sites, delaying the flowering. You seem to have left some bud sites with no leaves, every bud site that you want to develop needs leaves to get energy from. Some LST would be good to get a more even canopy and expose more of the mid lower bus sites. As for the lower stems / foliage, bud sites that low you can get rid of (since they will barely amount to anything); as for leaves, there's no point in getting rid of the lower leaves, you gain nothing, unless you want to improve air circulation, at the very least they serve as an early warning system against deficiencies. Hope that helps, good luck