Soon to be Med Grow Room

TheDurty

TheDurty

New Member
Hello everybody,

My mother was just diagnosed with cancer so I have moved back home to California to be with her and serve as her caretaker. I have smoked marijuana for a number of years now but my mom has always been vehemently opposed to the stuff. After a difficult initial sell I talked her into trying it out and she has now been using mj for the past 2 months or so and the effects have been wonderful. My mom is living on a very small fixed income and the medical mj is not covered by Medi-Cal so it has become necessary to grow myself. I have wanted to grow marijuana for many years so I do look forward to this process, I just wish this garden was coming under better circumstances.

I am coming here before I start my grow because I need some help in narrowing down between types of grow room setup, lighting, and ventilation options. It is all very overwhelming and I’m not sure what I need and don’t need. I have been reading tons of different grow journals and have watched countless videos and have read a few books on the subject but I am still left with so many questions.

I should say that the climate here is desert so it gets very warm in the summer. I am planning on using a spare bedroom in the house and have a total area of about 4’(deep) x 8’(long) x 8’(tall) that I can use for the actual grow space as some of the bedroom is used for storage. The ceiling is 8’ so I may need to build the grow room slightly smaller to allow venting to come out. Under CA law, I am able to grow a total of 12 plants veg, AND 6 plants flowering (because both my mom and myself have doctor recommendations). My goal is to yield as much as I can, as efficiently as possible so that we can offer any extra mj back to the Co-Op and help pay for all the costs of growing.

I think I want to go for a hydroponic setup because it is cleaner overall w/o all the soil and also because I can get more and faster. I know this is my first grow and I should probably start with soil but I am home almost 24 hours a day as a caretaker and really feel like I have the dedication to this to make it work. I am going back and forth between ebb and flow and deep water culture.

So here are some of my questions:

1. Are there any suggestions for sizing of the rooms?
2. Any suggestions to how I should construct the rooms? They do not have to be stealth, so as functional as you can possibly think. I’ve seen the Ultimate Grow videos where he uses the black plastic but I wonder if it would be better to build cabinets?
3. Would it be wiser for me to start w/ only 1 room for my first grow and expand down the road? (I really would like to not have to keep finding and buying clones). If I do have 2 rooms, I don’t really need to veg 12 plants – but I do need to always have at least 6 viable plants to put into flowering.
4. What type of grow setups should I use in each room? I don’t want to clean all the tubes involved in a drip system all the time. So DWC and ebb and flow are attractive to me. I would like to be able to let it be for a few days at a time if possible. I would also like to get the largest yield possible.
5. How long can a mother plant really be left in the veg room? I have heard that it can be over a year or longer, but I wonder how you keep it from growing through the roof while you are just keeping it in the veg room?
6. Although this is a legal grow, neighbors are decently close and I would prefer to limit smell as much as possible. There seems to be a small crawl space area above the ceiling where the ducting runs that I can vent into to get air out of the house (there is an exhaust vent on the outside of the house that that ducting runs to). My question is if there is anyway to use 1 carbon scrubber to clean both rooms or will the fans needed to do this be insanely loud?

I’m sure I have more questions but for now this should help my in my planning.

Thanks to all who read and take some time to help me out – I truly appreciate it.
 
Well still no responses - I know that initial post was long but any help at all is appreciated.

I have recently changed plans slightly. I am going to be building the grow room in the garage now which gives me all sorts of flexibility and makes venting the smell out very easy. I have also decided to use soil now instead of hydro. I just don't know enough about growing to be able to recognize all the signs of stress quick enough in a hydro grow so I think I'll play it safe, at least on this grow.

So all I really need now is some advice on what the ideal size of my flower and veg rooms should be. Again, 12 vegging plants, and 6 flowering.

The ceilings in the garage will probably allow me to go at least 10" high if I wanted to.

:thanks:
 
I'll be your huckleberry.
1. If ya get some 8 week flowering strains your could move three plants in flower every month and harvest three plants every month.

2. As for room size ya need a min. of 36 ft square (L x W) for 18 plants. that's giving each plant 2 square feet to grow in. That makes veg. space 24 square feet and flower 6 square feet.

3. What kind of lights are ya gonna use watts mh/hps, LED's, flouro's?
If ya give the veg room 30watts per sq foot you'll need 720 watts or 2 400 watt mh's.
If ya give the flower room 100 watts per sq foot 600 watt you'll need 1 600 watt hps.

4. As for they type i see you said your going soil which is cool but don't overlook or overestimate DWC Roseman has lots of nice tutorials on his setup. It's really nice setup.

5. Which leads to smell and again i point to Roseman's thread on DIY carbon bucket.

6. Mothers can be kept indefinatly because of expenential growth. As long as she gets enough light and nutes she'll produce clones forever. Some people talk about genetic degredation overtime but a lot of the videos i've watched on breeding and seed companies they have been keeping mothers and fathers and cloning them for years and years. I could explain more but it would take forever. P.S. i would check out how cali classifies clones. don't want to have 12 in veg and take 12 clones from each and get in trouble for having 24 plants instead of 12.

Sorry if it's long winded i'm a little buzzed and i tend to explain things too well like this but i hope this helps ya out.
 
Best wishes to you and your mother. It's wonderful that mj has helped her, and that she was willing to give it a try. I hope when you get your growroom started you'll start a grow journal. You'll gain so much help on your grow, and we all get to watch your garden grow. Here's a couple places to visit -
Medical Marijuana Lounge - 420 Magazine
How to Make a Grow Journal

Pictures help immensely. Peace and mmj :peace:
 
Thanks a lot for the information, Stretch. I guess if I keep taking clones from the mothers I should be able to keep them under control. Also, my state supreme court just recently struck down the limits on how many plants can be grown. So I won't have to worry about having too many clones or anything like that. :smokin:

As far as lights, i definitely plan on using HPS in the flowering room, but am still undecided for the veg room. Everyone has a different opinion as to what is the best route. MH is generally regarded as the best, but also the most expensive including energy costs. So more research on that is needed. I was thinking of using CFL's or flouro's to try and keep the mothers growing a little slower. I don't know if that would really matter much or not.

The room size you are suggesting for the flowering room seems so small. 2x3 doesn't seem like I could fit 6 full sized flowering plants. I have the space to expand this. Are there advantages to having 6 plants in a smaller space and using a net or something to focus just on the main colas? I appreciate all the help and advice.

Happy Kitty, thank you for the warm regards. I would love to start a grow journal. Hopefully I can get my hands on a digital camera because I realize that pictures are the only real way to get anyone to follow my thread.
 
TheDurty said:
Thanks a lot for the information, Stretch. I guess if I keep taking clones from the mothers I should be able to keep them under control. Also, my state supreme court just recently struck down the limits on how many plants can be grown. So I won't have to worry about having too many clones or anything like that. :smokin:

As far as lights, i definitely plan on using HPS in the flowering room, but am still undecided for the veg room. Everyone has a different opinion as to what is the best route. MH is generally regarded as the best, but also the most expensive including energy costs. So more research on that is needed. I was thinking of using CFL's or flouro's to try and keep the mothers growing a little slower. I don't know if that would really matter much or not.

The room size you are suggesting for the flowering room seems so small. 2x3 doesn't seem like I could fit 6 full sized flowering plants. I have the space to expand this. Are there advantages to having 6 plants in a smaller space and using a net or something to focus just on the main colas? I appreciate all the help and advice.

Happy Kitty, thank you for the warm regards. I would love to start a grow journal. Hopefully I can get my hands on a digital camera because I realize that pictures are the only real way to get anyone to follow my thread.
Click to expand...

What ever space you have, It just depends on how large you want to grow the plants. Ex: 25' x 25' room could fit 100 plants and you'd get a huge yeild with that, or you could grow 10 Large plants and get the same yeild. Pretty much how ever much you put in you lighting, you'll get back. MH is the best for Veg, I'd reccomend a Hortilux Blue bulb if it's in your budget. look up some "Scrog" (screen of green) grows if you want to go the "netting" route. You can get alot more from you plants this way.
Hope it helped
Be sure to contact me any time with any questions!
Jack.O.H
 
I've been doing some research on a Scrog grow, however, I was hoping to have a perpetual garden. It doesn't seem like it would be terribly easy (at least on my first grow) to do LST on the clones while they are vegging up so that I can get them ready for the Screen in the flowering room. Seems like most people who use the Scrog method use it throughout the grow - both vegging and flowering. I don't think I have the know how for that just yet with 2 separate rooms.
 
Hi TheDurty!

I would keep things simple for your first grow, and I recommend going with soil on first grows even though it's messier.

I wouldn't recommend a SCROG on your first grow either.

If you want to maximize your chances for a successful first grow, I'd go with a good quality soil, proven nutes, an HPS light for flowering, and a T-5 fluorescent for vegging.

Divide your space into two 4 X 8' areas, or if you want, maybe make the flowering side a bit larger.

Wherever you vent to, you definitely want a carbon scrubber. You can have it external and connect both grow areas to it with a Y connector and ducting, but that may reduce air flow.

Do you have A/C in the house that you run in summer?
 
Thanks Setting Sun!

This grow is going to take place in an uninsulated garage, so I will be insulating the specific rooms that I build in the garage. I will have to get a small A/C to run in the summer but hopefully the insulation helps to protect against the heat.

I don't know if I will have enough space, or budget for that matter, to have two 4x8 areas. I was thinking more along the lines of 5x5 for both the flowering and vegging rooms. Would you adjust these ratios at all? Maybe make the veg room a different size?

The issue for me right now is money. It will take way too much light to cover the 4x8 rooms and I am even worried that 5x5 might be too much for me to fill. I was planning on using one 600w HPS in the Flowering room and have been wavering on the veg room lighting. Although I think I am leaning toward the T5's so that I won't have an issues of the clones getting too much light from a nearby MH or something.

Let me know what you think.
 
If you're going to grow a max of six plants, you don't need much space for veg, so instead of splitting it 5/5, I would go with 4' for the veg room, which will still allow you to run 48" T-5's if you want, and 6' for the flower room, which will let your ladies stretch out a bit more.

The veg and bloom rooms have to be completely isolated from each other as regards lighting, so what you use in one room should not influence what you use in the other.

I think if you can afford a 600 HPS in the flower room, that would be great, but you're going to have to spend some money to ventilate the heat from 600w, and that usually takes at least 6" fans and ducting, and you may need an air-cooled hood also.

Insulating the grow areas will help a lot. What ambient temps are you going to be dealing with in winter and summer?
 
I realize the veg and bloom rooms have to be separated, I'm just worried about having the clones in the same room as the mothers and the vegging plants under a MH. I think the clones might get too much light from the MH. I would rather not have to make 3 separate areas if I don't have to just to keep the clones in, so that's why I was thinking of just using 48" 8 Lamp T5's in the veg room - this way I can really just use the one light to take care of the clones, 2 mothers, and the rooted clones that are vegging.

As far as the flowering room lighting, I think 600w is going to be the best bet in the long run as far as yield goes. I realize this is going to get hot, but I plan on buying an air cooled hood so that i can just clear the air out of the hood with a small fan, and that way I won't have to have as big a fan doing exhaust functions.

Temps in the winter are pretty great here - the lowest it gets is about 35 at night, and that is only for a few weeks. Daytime in the winter is around 50-60. Again, this grow is taking place inside of an uninsulated garage, and then inside of an insulated grow room. So the colds won't be a problem at all.

As of now, Feb 15, its 80 outside and beautiful.

The summers are the real problem - it can get very hot in the summers, as hot as 120 on some days. These hot temps last a couple months so this is when I plan to have an AC unit running.

How does this sound so far? Is my vegging logic sound? Can I keep the mothers, clones, and vegging plants all under the 8 Lamp T5 without a problem?

I do have some flexibility with the sizing of the rooms, just not unlimited flex. The garage is only a 1 car garage and is still being partially used for storage. I can leave the Veg room at 5x5, or 4.5x4.5, and still make the Flowering Room 5x6. I'm just thinking the 600w would not be enough light to fill this area - what are your thoughts?

Again, thank you so much for your time. You are a tremendous help.
 
I think T-5's for veg would be fine, especially if you're going to have the clones in there too. Yes, you can keep mothers, clones and vegging plants all under the 8 lamp T5, although you're going to have to adjust their heights to keep them all at effective distance from the light. It's very doable.

A 600w HID with air-cooled hood should work great for flowering, and it will cover 5 X 6 just fine.

Sounds like you will have summer temps covered with the A/C, and the insulated grow areas should take care of the winter cold. You could always ditch the air-cooling of the hood to use the lamp heat if it gets too cold, and maybe warm air from that space to heat the veg room also.

your plan sounds good ;)
 
Thanks!

I have another question for you. When I construct the rooms, should I build two separate, detached rooms, or can I build 1 large room just separated by black plastic.
 
Light-wise, you can do it either way. Plastic or a wall will keep the light schedules separate.

Temperature-wise, a wall will isolate the rooms from each better, which could be positive or negative, depending on circumstances.

Some of this you won't know until you actually start to use the spaces.

What I would do is the least permanent option first and see if it works well. I'd use the plastic first and see how it goes.

Then, you'll still have the flexibility to juggle your veg and bloom room sizes and see what works best before you put up a more permanent divider, or you may find that the black plastic works just fine and stick with that.

You can check for light leaks by getting in there, closing the door, and looking for any light coming in. Even a pinhole can throw off your bloom, so I'd probably use a couple of layers of the plastic to ensure no light comes across and for extra insulation.

Some small spacers between the sheets would create a narrow airspace that would insulate well.
 
That's a great idea on using the plastic first in case I need to adjust room sizes. Could be a big saver down the road.

Thanks a lot.
 
So I got the garage all cleaned out and I realized how stupid I was trying to plan this build. There was so much stuff in the garage that I was able to get rid of that it allowed me to see clearly and I realized that I should just build this room in the very back of the garage. The wall is 10' wide already which fits in perfectly with what I wanted to do and this way I already have 3 of the walls constructed!! I can make the flowering room 6x5 and the veg room 4x5. All I have to do is add insulation and some OSB. (The panels and cardboard on the walls can come down easily).

I still don't have a digital camera, but here are some shots of the area taken from my laptop:

This is the garage all cleaned out


Here is a closer shot of the area I'll be growing in


And finally, this is a shot of the two vents already built into the garage



The two vents will both be inside of the flowering room so I will need to figure out a way to get the exhaust from the veg room to the exhaust duct and also how to get intake air to the veg room. Obviously I will be using ducting but I'm still not sure what the best way to do this is. What complicates it is that I will have to hook an A/C unit to that vent at some point, so I'm not sure what to do exactly since the vent will be in the flowering room. Do I have to run the A/C in the flowering room??

Also, are there any suggestions for what I should use as doors to get into each room? I was thinking that if I just used black plastic rolled down that it wouldn't be insulated enough and basically the 2 door sized holes would make all the rest of the insulation pointless. What do you think?
 
I think it's time to get some other heads thinking about your future grow room.

What I suggest doing at this point is to cut and paste your above post into the:

Cabinet, Closet, & Grow Room Setup - 420 Magazine

that's the best place to get help and suggestions for where you're at right now.

You can design a great grow room in the back of that garage, so I don't want to limit your possibilities with just my ideas and thoughts.

let's see what others have to say ;)
 
Hmm, have to put some thought into this...

How much are you looking to spend?

what area (dimensions) do we have to work with in the back of this space?

Are you looking to do something similar to what I have? ie perpetual grow harvest about 1-1.25 pounds per month using 8x4 flower area, 2x4 veg and a small cloning area. Check out my GWS journal and my latest perpetual hydro journals. I use 2 x 600 and 1 x 400 HPS for flower and floro's in veg. I use hydro but can also work with soil. I recommend soil first to anyone to get used to it but you can go hydro off the bat with some good homework.
 

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