First Grow - Converted Portable Closet

[ThatGuyThai]

Hello everyone!

I needed a cheap solution to grow my own ladies. I wanted to do a SoG but have a bunch of seeds (3 batches of unknown seeds I've decided to call "mystery", "blank" and "?¿" because of how they were labelled in the little box in my fridge) which ill experiment a little bit with as well as pick a mother to clone and do a proper SoG.

I really didnt have much $$ to start with since I still have to pay for my green so I scavenged my in-laws and my garages for supplies to throw something together for cheap to get started in.

So here's a quick overview of my build and I will continue this journal with my grow

 

[ThatGuyThai]

Had this portable closet from ikea sitting in the garage with a few coats in it. Time to convert into a much more useful grow closet. Drilled some new holes into the frame to place the 2 shelves where I wanted to.

Used contact glue to stick reflective insulation to the inside. Note to self, this step proved to be a lot of work and ultimately pretty unsuccesful. Much better to put it in piece by piece, held by the frame and tape the pieces to each other which I had to do anyways.

 

[ThatGuyThai]

Zipper open, second door closed.

 

[ThatGuyThai]

With the added insulation the outer fabric didnt quite closed well so I made a slit on the side, taped it shut and now it closes.

What it looks like with the insulation on the inside with the shelves at the right spots.

 

[ThatGuyThai]

No lights in the flowering chamber yet. Carbon scrubber with exhaust set up. Originally I wanted to set it up in the veg chamber to leave more room in the flowering chamber but realised the height didnt clear in the veg chamber so up it went.

1 large comp fan for air intake into the flowering chamber and 2 small for air flow. Cut 3 holes in the shelf and put elbow pvc to allow air flow from the bottom chamber into the top.

Set up 6 clf's for light, a large comp fan for air intake and a small desk fan for air flow in the veg chamber. Placed some seedlings in under 20-4 light cycle. Planted in Pro-mix organic seedling mix. Planted 6 "mystery", 6 "blank" and I have 6 "?¿" germinating in paper towel.

 

[ThatGuyThai]

Realised that the connector for the bottom chamber's air intake was on the fritz and wasnt always working, changed to a different connector and all is well. Heat got excessive (up to 95°F) so I took out 2 lights and fixed the air intake issue. Hopefully it cools down soon; the soil was drying up REAL FAST.

Any suggestions to cool it down in there? Take out more bulbs? Add another air intake or fan?

Thanks!

 

[Wreckedsummer]

Subbed in! That is an awesome set up!!! +reps for the creativity. Yeah you don't want the soil drying out super quick. In my opinion, I'd maybe have another outtake fan up the top where the lights are, with like a small USB fan on the other side pushing the hot air out, you don't really want to take lights out, the more the better. You could get away with less during the seedling stage while you are working out you temp problem. I'd also raise them up a bit if you can't lower the lights to stop a big stretch.

Did I mention how awesome your set up is? Looking forward to this one....

 

[ThatGuyThai]

Thanks WS! I'm pretty excited to see how it all turns out. I'll try adding an outake near the lights like you suggested. Shouldnt have too much smell from the veg chamber so im not to worried about exhausting air out from there without a scrubber. I was trying to be stealthy by putting it in a large closet to hide from guests but admited to myself that wxhausting hot air into a closed closet and then intake it back in wouldn't actually cool it lol so in the bedroom it will stay. I can easily slide it in the closet if necessary anyways. Im sure this will all help get the temp down. Thanks for the compliments about the setup. I read through a lot of different cab/desk/box/closet setups and came up with this. Since I scavenged a lot of the pieces, I only spent about 100$ on it (including the cost for grow stuff like soil, pots, etc). Hopefully I'll be able to get a cycle going where I can yield enough for my wife and I's consumption needs lol should be fun!

 

[ThatGuyThai]

So after leaving the grow closet in our bedroom overnight, we decided that it was just a tad too loud for comfortable sleep so the decision was made to move it to the spare bedroom this morning. I turned the heat off in the room and placed it so that the air outake points out an open window. That really helped the tempature drop down; it quickly went down to 80 so im going to keep an eye on it and make sure it doesn't plummet too low. I put the 2 clf's back in so there are 3 6500k and 3 2700k. Mixing it up a little. I added a wooden step stool to bring the seedlings closer to the lights.

On another note, the seedlings germinated a day too long in the papertowel while I was finishing the closet and with the tempature issues I had, I doubt they will survive. Lukily, I anticipated this and started germinating some more seeds. If I don't see any improvement from the ones I already planted, they will be chucked and replaced with the ones that will be ready in 1-2 days. Fingers crossed these get a good start and I can get this grow kicking!

 

[ThatGuyThai]

Did some more fine tuning on the closet today. Added two small comp fans to outtake heat from the lights in the veg chamber. I have been running my fans off a desktop computer since I could easily attach them and had a scraped desktop sitting around but noticed that it sometimes gave out. Got annoyed and looked for a 12v adapter. Found an old power adapter for an external harddrive that didnt work anymore. 12v output and 2A. Runs my 2 120's and 2 80's no problem. I also added an exhaust hose to the exhaust fan to send it out into the room rather than behind the closet where the intakes are as well. I also added a room fan in the closet to circulate the air and make sure no heat stays stuck back there. All of it greatly helped the heat issue and I am no longer concerned.

 

[ThatGuyThai]

Sitting comfortably, smoking a j, listening to some sublime, looking at my grow closet, day dreaming about some beautiful homegrown... life is good lol

 

[Robert Celt]

well on your way

 

[ThatGuyThai]

Thanks Celt! The hardest part for me over the next few months will be patience, especially in regards to harvesting at the right time haha

 

[Robert Celt]

No worries Mate There are many of us here following along to help you and answer questions

When the time is getting close, buy yourself a 30x loupe or one of the 60-100x pocket microscopes. I have one of each and I think it was under $30 for both online. They are the best way to view trichomes and judge ripeness

 

[ThatGuyThai]

I'll definitely pick up a pocket microscope. I would hate for my smoke to suffer because I jumped the gun and harvested a week early.

 

[Nicholas Flamel]

Thanks Celt! The hardest part for me over the next few months will be patience, especially in regards to harvesting at the right time haha

Patients is the hardest part about growing for me too. You can do it. Sublime is great. They were a very unique band cut short in their prime. Good music when smoking for sure

 

[ThatGuyThai]

Yeah they're one of my favorite bands to just kick back, relax and smoke a J to. There are some other pretty obvious options too but I think I just have a certain nostalgia about them which makes them my favorite. Yeah it's really too bad that he fell off the wagon on that last tour and OD'd. There's just something real about Bradley and his music. Anyways, on another subject, first seedling poped up last night. Ill take a pic when there are a few more lol

 

[Robert Celt]

Hey Thai, haven't seen you around in awhile. Hope all is well with you and yours

 

[ThatGuyThai]

Hey Celt! Thanks for the message; I have been MIA haven't I haha In fact I stepped on a sliver of aluminum or something while building the closet barefoot (I'm assuming thats what it was as I drilled new holes in the frame; it's the only thing I can think of since I didnt actually feel like I stepped on anything) and my heel got wickedly infected. Between work, family, baby (I have a 10 month old girl), sproutlings and taking care of the infection (had a bad wound on my heel I couldnt walk on; had to soak 3 times a day, put a special ointment 3 times a day and take 4 antibiotic pills a day) I haven't taken the time to visit the board. Now the infection is all gone and the wound is pretty well healed up so here I am! Haha

 

[ThatGuyThai]

So here are the little ones. The sproutlings kept dying in the jiffy cups so I temporarily cut some tims cups which have done the trick. The 2 in the middle (ceramic pots) are about 3 weeks and the others 2. I'm thinking of doing SoG and force flower very soon. Ill toss the males and get another set of seeds going. Ill cut some clones of the better ladies from the first batch and hopefully just clone from there!