9x9 Setup Questions

[goldfish6]

Hey guys, I am a new member to this forum and am interested in starting a grow room soon. I'd like to do it as a hobby and was wondering if you guys could chime in some input.

Some basic info: I live in CA, plan to get a medical card soon and will have some people under me so I think I can be a collective/caregiver and have <99 plants. I plan to have a 9x9 room and have some questions about equipment.

1. Low power usage is important but so is light effectiveness. Based on research, I've found that there are 3 types of lights: HPS, LED, and HID. I am leaning towards LED but all threads I find are from <2012 and say that the technology isn't as good as HPS in terms of yield. Has that changed? What is the best kind to use now 4 years later? My research has led me to want to use 4x 1000wHPS in a 9x9, so what is the LED equivalent?

2. What kind of fans and filters do I need and how many?

3. Besides the small electrical accessories, what else do I need? Will I need to water them myself or have a self watering system?

4. How many plants can I expect to have under the LED equivalent of 4x 1000wHPS lights in a 9x9 room? The math from 1g/1w leads me to 4000g per blooming season but that seems like a lot so what can I realistically expect for a first timer with good seeds on average?

5. I plan on using digital ballasts. Those are the best, right?

5. Most important question: How much electricity should I expect to be using per month on average for the entire grow room? An estimate in kWh is fine since I can calculate the monthly price using californias pg&e per kWh price. Also a dollar estimate is ok too.

Thanks so much!

 

[goldfish6]

Ive read those guides but most of them are for smaller rooms and I've been trying to find some for 9x9's but nobody really has them :\

 

[JuanCarlos]

1. HPS is HID. The lights you should be researching are LED, double ended HID, and CMH. I think LED technology is capable of growing nice plants at this point. I would shoot for 4000 actual wattage draw in your space for LED. I would go for a larger number of smaller units versus few larger units.

2. That's 810 cubic feet of space with ten foot ceilings. They say you want to exchange the air in your space once every 3 to 5 minutes, so at least 200 CFM capacity. Personally I would look at ventilation that will move at least 1000 CFM. Better to go big and throttle it down. Filter will be matched based on your fans CFM.

3. You will need a ton of other things. You need to look at grows, read some books and the FAQ section of this site. Wate them however you like, either works.

4. I would put around 25 plants or less in that space.

5. LED lights don't use ballast, but digital is the way of HID.

5. Use math. 1000 watts is one kilowatt. Now take your kilowatts and multiply them by your expected number of hours of usage in a month. Now multiply that by the price of a kilowatt hour of electricity.

 

[goldfish6]

1. HPS is HID. The lights you should be researching are LED, double ended HID, and CMH. I think LED technology is capable of growing nice plants at this point. I would shoot for 4000 actual wattage draw in your space for LED. I would go for a larger number of smaller units versus few larger units.

2. That's 810 cubic feet of space with ten foot ceilings. They say you want to exchange the air in your space once every 3 to 5 minutes, so at least 200 CFM capacity. Personally I would look at ventilation that will move at least 1000 CFM. Better to go big and throttle it down. Filter will be matched based on your fans CFM.

3. You will need a ton of other things. You need to look at grows, read some books and the FAQ section of this site. Wate them however you like, either works.

4. I would put around 25 plants or less in that space.

5. LED lights don't use ballast, but digital is the way of HID.

5. Use math. 1000 watts is one kilowatt. Now take your kilowatts and multiply them by your expected number of hours of usage in a month. Now multiply that by the price of a kilowatt hour of electricity.

Ive seen pics of a 9x9 with 6x4 plants so 24-25 is good. So 4000 watts actual draw LED does that mean youre suggesting that I use the equivalent of 10,000w HPS? Or 1600w LED = 4000w HPS? Sorry I am most confused about that.

Edit: I found this LED light that has a 400 HPS equivalent and uses 165 watts. Assuming I want 4000w HPS, I would need 10x of those which puts me at 1,650 watts, correct?

 

[JuanCarlos]

No, LED wattage is weird. Lights that are advertised as 300 watts generally only draw 140 watts from the wall. I am advising you to use lights that equal approximately 4000 draw watts, so I would use 15 units that are 600 watts or 30 units that are 300 watts.

Don't take this the wrong way, but I would advise taking a step back and reading some books then scouring the beginners section of this website:

How to Grow Marijuana - Everything You Need to Know

You will save yourself a ton of time and money by being extremely well read before spending a dime. You have to figure out how you want to grow, what you want to grow and then you have to design the space. That research should take you a few months.

 

[goldfish6]

No, LED wattage is weird. Lights that are advertised as 300 watts generally only draw 140 watts from the wall. I am advising you to use lights that equal approximately 4000 draw watts, so I would use 15 units that are 600 watts or 30 units that are 300 watts.

4000 draw watts is going to cost $200 a month in electricity assuming the price is .13/kWh. Holy crap. Thats 1440kWh /month if i do 12/12. With the fan and other stuff it will cost $300-400 a month in power i would assume...

Ok yeah thats what I need to do. Ill read thru the links and further educate myself on the topic. And yeah I do want to do all the research before spending $$ since its going to be expensive to operate a room that big esp if I want to be energy efficient

 

[JuanCarlos]

I added on to my last post. Reread it.

 

[Graytail]

I think I can help some. I've put in a lot of thought over the years about rooms, how their requirements change with size, how they don't etc. I run a 4x4 bloom room with another 2.5x4 veg room. I've imagined how to scale up, and I like the idea of individual rooms for a number of reasons. You get the benefit of reflective light off the close walls, you can isolate one group of plants from another, you can run a diminishing light schedule on some, etc. But then I also need a much larger space to empty a roomful of plants into, to work with them, and I need space to store stuff. So, the total lighted space is a smaller part of the total area. I digress. So, anyway, I've thought of 4x4s, 5x5s, 6x8s, etc, and how much power they'd need and how to size the plants for the space.

A good rule of thumb is 50 watts per square foot. In my experience, for a grow that has to function, not just a hobby grow, it doesn't matter a lot whether that's hps or LED. LED probably wouldn't get you much more yield, but quality would be up. So, in your case, for a 9x9 lighted space, that's 81 sqft, so you want 4000 watts. Your four 1000s are right on the money. However ... 600 watt hps are significantly more efficient, so I'd suggest 6 of those instead.

Your electrical usage will be the watts x hours x 1000 x 30 days = KWH per month. My juice costs 0.14 per KWH, and my 1000 watts bloom (11/13 cycle = 11KHW per day) and 600 watts veg (20/4 cycle = 12KHW per day) use about 23 per day and 690 KHW per month = about $100.

In a room that size, heat is not as much of an issue as it is in small tents, so hps loses some of its disadvantage compared to LED. Reliable LED panels can be had for well under $1/watt these days, but that's still quite a bit more than hps. As far as ballasts, I wouldn't necessarily get the good expensive ones. You'll probably want to upgrade your lighting after a couple cycles. I ran a cheapo 600 watt complete set ($150?) with the chintzy bent metal reflector and it ran flawlessly for a year (had to change bulbs of course).

I run relatively small plants and mine occupy 2.5 sqft each. If you have the height, you can run plants larger than 4 sqft each. It will depend in part on what medium you use, soil, organic, hydro.

I'll leave the fans and filter for that sized space to others - that's 800 cubic feet and outta my league.

 

[JuanCarlos]

I cannot agree more with GT about splitting the space. That way you can have a veg and bloom area. Very useful. Since you are in Cali maybe you could tour some grows in your area and take notes.

 

[Spitz]

Some good advice posted above. I'm going to just make 1 suggestion... Instead of trying to outfit a 9x9 room, just start with 1 (or two) 600w lights and get a couple plants started. You'll get a feel for how YOU are going to grow (soil, hydro, organic, screens, 12/12, etc..). I think you'll find it much easier to expand your operation to suit your styles. Planning and execution of 4000W of lighting, venting, and cooling will likely be overwhelming (while still trying to grow plants). I wish you the best of luck!

Your going to need to do some electrical wiring too.