Radogast: Grow Big Or Go Home

[Amy Gardner]

I think I'll go with the Quantum Boards.

I would! I really just pointed you to the other ones for comparison with the high-end stuff

550 r-spec from hlg

Definitely those for flower (or the newer Diablo’s ) and what Gray says for veg. That’s my vote. Those boards he designed (that is what’s on my rig), or strips. Strips would be really versatile in a stacked set up. Super easy to work with and lots of air movement around and through them.

What an awesome thing to be planning

Edit: Budget LED are a sponsor here and make QB arrays. Have you got a quote from them?

 

[Magnus8]

What an awesome thing to be planning

Yes it really does sound like a ton o' fun.

All my best,
~Magnus

 

[Radogast]

I would! I really just pointed you to the other ones for comparison with the high-end stuff

Definitely those for flower (or the newer Diablo’s ) and what Gray says for veg. That’s my vote. Those boards he designed (that is what’s on my rig), or strips. Strips would be really versatile in a stacked set up. Super easy to work with and lots of air movement around and through them.

What an awesome thing to be planning

Edit: Budget LED are a sponsor here and make QB arrays. Have you got a quote from them?

I truly appreciate the specific recommendations. I'll look at the 550 r-spec from HLG and whatever DEvil board a Diablo is.

I didn't hear back from Budget LED, but on their website their 500W dimmable Series 3+ came in at half the Fluence 631W and NextLight 650W Mega.

That said the Shenzhen Meijiu 480W QB came it at 40% of the cost of the Budget 500W
The Shenzhen Meijiu 650W grow bar with a strong resemblence to Fluence SPYDRx series was even less than the BudgetLED 500W

- - - -

In terms of performance, not pushing the envelope with CO2 but planning for some fresh air and heat pump conditioned recycled air would you automatically choose 650W over 500W? It's only about 4kw hours more in heatload to the room.

Yes it really does sound like a ton o' fun.

All my best,
~Magnus

I'm having so much fun I'm having trouble sleeping!

Today I:
Did most of the electrical wiring plan, deciding on switched 60W green ceiling lights for nighttime.
Moved my drying area into the rafters of the flowering room
Expanded from 1 to 2 rooms for pre-flower after transplant
Investigated netting and posts for the flower room rows.
Sized and did a step by step soil management plan (cement mixer and storage bin sizing),
found a place to locate my (5) 4x2x4' high soil bins and decided they needed drop down doors to properly empty, and
storage closets above the soil bins.
Relocated my veg room door
Made a weekly activities checklist
decided I would have to go with a bud trimmer (Twister T6 looks good) and played with placement & storage

LOTS of thinking and planning today!



I am playing with the idea of 50 gallon drums for bud washing whole canopies.

I am also wondering if I need to get sophisticated contactors and such for turning on and off multiple 15 amp circuits.

 

[Amy Gardner]

having so much fun I'm having trouble sleeping!

I can well imagine!

I’m just off to bed myself so will bid you a very good night or whatever time it is for you. I hope i dream of enormous and fully-equipped grow spaces...

 

[Tead]

not pushing the envelope with CO2

Got natural gas going to your hooch already? Do a burner hooked to a Co2 meter/switch. I feel it's the most harvest-increasing steps I've ever taken.

would you automatically choose 650W over 500W?

Yes.
You see very little difference in lamp fixture temps. The drivers may run hotter, but I'd bet you're going to remote them.

Moved my drying area into the rafters of the flowering room

What made you choose that location? I'd think it would be fairly moist.

Made a weekly activities checklist

Man... I need to start that habit.

Twister T6 looks good

Except the price tag!
I found my local grow supply place has lots of used equipment including various trimming machines. You might see if you can chase down a cheaper one.

 

[Van Stank]

I tried many different sizes and had tipping problems in them all.
Sounds like you've got plenty of experience with them.... how do you deal with tipping issues?

Thanks for the cleaning tips... they've been hanging around in a pile all dirty for many moons now. I'll try the vinegar and stuff them in a drawer somewhere when they're clean.

I only have had tipping issues when growing outside on my deck. Of course I live on a hill called Windy Hill so go figure right? When growing indoors, I don't have tipping issues. I also find the tipping issues is more pronounced in square pots vs round pots.

 

[420]

I didn't hear back from Budget LED, but on their website their 500W dimmable Series 3+ came in at half the Fluence 631W and NextLight 650W Mega.

@Budget LED

 

[Elevated Lighting Company]

I truly appreciate the specific recommendations. I'll look at the 550 r-spec from HLG and whatever DEvil board a Diablo is.

I didn't hear back from Budget LED, but on their website their 500W dimmable Series 3+ came in at half the Fluence 631W and NextLight 650W Mega.

That said the Shenzhen Meijiu 480W QB came it at 40% of the cost of the Budget 500W
The Shenzhen Meijiu 650W grow bar with a strong resemblence to Fluence SPYDRx series was even less than the BudgetLED 500W

- - - -

In terms of performance, not pushing the envelope with CO2 but planning for some fresh air and heat pump conditioned recycled air would you automatically choose 650W over 500W? It's only about 4kw hours more in heatload to the room.





I'm having so much fun I'm having trouble sleeping!

Today I:
Did most of the electrical wiring plan, deciding on switched 60W green ceiling lights for nighttime.
Moved my drying area into the rafters of the flowering room
Expanded from 1 to 2 rooms for pre-flower after transplant
Investigated netting and posts for the flower room rows.
Sized and did a step by step soil management plan (cement mixer and storage bin sizing),
found a place to locate my (5) 4x2x4' high soil bins and decided they needed drop down doors to properly empty, and
storage closets above the soil bins.
Relocated my veg room door
Made a weekly activities checklist
decided I would have to go with a bud trimmer (Twister T6 looks good) and played with placement & storage

LOTS of thinking and planning today!



I am playing with the idea of 50 gallon drums for bud washing whole canopies.

I am also wondering if I need to get sophisticated contactors and such for turning on and off multiple 15 amp circuits.

Apologies we have been extremely busy lately and having trouble with our email sending requests to the spam folder. How can we help you?

 

[Radogast]

not pushing the envelope with CO2

Got natural gas going to your hooch already? Do a burner hooked to a Co2 meter/switch. I feel it's the most harvest-increasing steps I've ever taken.

I'll think about it. I was planning on continuous outdoor air replenishment.

Since I will have one flower room sleeping while the other flower room is awake, I could probably take advantage of respiration cycles and pipe air between rooms to manage most of the air replenishment needs.

This sounds like more thinking, research, and help is in order.

would you automatically choose 650W over 500W?

Yes.
You see very little difference in lamp fixture temps. The drivers may run hotter, but I'd bet you're going to remote them.

I was planning to remote them to the upper corners of the room. I doubt I can do 8-26' runs between the ballasts and and the LEDs.

Radogast said:
Moved my drying area into the rafters of the flowering room

What made you choose that location? I'd think it would be fairly moist.

Space.

Since I'm not stacking or rolling racking the flowering girls, there is a lot of 'wasted' space over the central aisle in the flowering rooms. I expect to run 40-50% humidity in the flowering rooms and haven't had an issue with indirect lighting while drying before.

Twister T6 looks good

Except the price tag!
I found my local grow supply place has lots of used equipment including various trimming machines. You might see if you can chase down a cheaper one.

I'm willing to spend under 10% of my lighting hardware budget on trimming hardware with a 3 year warranty. I'm trying to keep what I carry in and out to a bare minimum, and hauling out broken equipment, shopping for, and replacing with used equipment isn't really in my schedule. My main need for a trim machine is saving my time and developping osteoarthitis. I haven't calculated the ROI on trim, but I'm sure it's there.

Apologies we have been extremely busy lately and having trouble with our email sending requests to the spam folder. How can we help you?

 

[Tead]

I was planning to remote them to the upper corners of the room. I doubt I can do 8-26' runs between the ballasts and and the LEDs.

In the LED realm, they refer to the power conversion units as "drivers". Yes, it makes me want to beat people too... but apparently there are somehow differences... but it may all be marketing smoke. Meh!
I remember doing the research on run lengths. 30' was my personal limit to keep me way on the safe side. I think technically it's 60' before it starts to be an issue and, of course, you need thick enough wire. All my panels were home-runs to the driver room. The far end of my room was about 30' from the drivers. I enclosed/sealed the driver room and ran outside air thru it to keep it 'cool'. It ran about 90f in there when the sun was pounding.
The point I'm trying to make.... why cool what you don't need to?
On the other hand, they may make a nice heat source in a cool garden.... nothing I have any experience with at all.

 

[Elevated Lighting Company]

I'll think about it. I was planning on continuous outdoor air replenishment.

Since I will have one flower room sleeping while the other flower room is awake, I could probably take advantage of respiration cycles and pipe air between rooms to manage most of the air replenishment needs.

This sounds like more thinking, research, and help is in order.



I was planning to remote them to the upper corners of the room. I doubt I can do 8-26' runs between the ballasts and and the LEDs.


Space.

Since I'm not stacking or rolling racking the flowering girls, there is a lot of 'wasted' space over the central aisle in the flowering rooms. I expect to run 40-50% humidity in the flowering rooms and haven't had an issue with indirect lighting while drying before.




I'm willing to spend under 10% of my lighting hardware budget on trimming hardware with a 3 year warranty. I'm trying to keep what I carry in and out to a bare minimum, and hauling out broken equipment, shopping for, and replacing with used equipment isn't really in my schedule. My main need for a trim machine is saving my time and developping osteoarthitis. I haven't calculated the ROI on trim, but I'm sure it's there.

If still interested please dm me and I can get you taken care of ASAP.

 

[Radogast]

@Budget LED

Thanks for the @Budget LED

Apologies we have been extremely busy lately and having trouble with our email sending requests to the spam folder. How can we help you?

I'm setting up new grow site in an old building. I am looking at 4 flowering rows of 40x4' - 40x5'
I am mainly intersted in:
- amps
- BTUs of heat load
- umol / ppf
- suggested retail price
- staggered or random startup suggestions to mitigate the peak power on load (I'll be running 2 rows on, and 2 rows off)

I'm also looking at stacked racks for veg, presumptively two 8'x18" double stacked rows and two 8'x18" triple stacked rows. I haven't done the full sizing so this may expand a little, but i'm looking at 18-24" stacked rows.
I am mainly interested in:
- amps
- growing close (2-5") to low profile fixtures
- suggested retail price

I would also like to know if you are interested in being a named sponsor in a large-ish perpetual grow journal on 420 magazine with or without other LED vendors in the same grow rooms.

The prices are something we can negotiate outside the grow journal, but any of the other solutions you would like to present can go here or in my inbox.

 

[Radogast]

In the LED realm, they refer to the power conversion units as "drivers". Yes, it makes me want to beat people too... but apparently there are somehow differences... but it may all be marketing smoke. Meh!
I remember doing the research on run lengths. 30' was my personal limit to keep me way on the safe side. I think technically it's 60' before it starts to be an issue and, of course, you need thick enough wire. All my panels were home-runs to the driver room. The far end of my room was about 30' from the drivers. I enclosed/sealed the driver room and ran outside air thru it to keep it 'cool'. It ran about 90f in there when the sun was pounding.
The point I'm trying to make.... why cool what you don't need to?
On the other hand, they may make a nice heat source in a cool garden.... nothing I have any experience with at all.

I forgot I redrew the room so the furthest run would be about 44' between driver and LED arrays. I have to run power outlet wiring or run driver outputs cords to the same points in the room, so I don't care much about which wire I run.

I am actually more concerned about heating costs vs cooling costs, to the point where I may have to run a heater AND heat pump. With the efficiency of these LEDs, I believe most light in the room eventually becomes heat in the room (some of it converts to plant sugars and plant growth), so I suspect the lights may dump more heat energy than the drivers.

Drivers vs Ballasts is like relays vs contactors or modems vs codecs (modems seems winning) - why invesnt a new name for something that does the same thing? Drivers and ballasts are really just transformers with fancy controls, right?

 

[420]

I would also like to know if you are interested in being a named sponsor in a large-ish perpetual grow journal on 420 magazine with or without other LED vendors in the same grow rooms.

We usually don't suggest comparisons, because they almost always end up in arguments, people getting upset and leaving, and a lot of work for us to clean up. The only request we have is if you do a comparison, that you select another 420 sponsor, to remain within our guidelines

 

[Radogast]

If still interested please dm me and I can get you taken care of ASAP.

For the record, I never meant to imply you were slow to respond. I sent an email in the wee hours of Saturday on a 3 day weekend and had not yet recieved a reply by the second business day. I don't consider that a customer service failure!

I'll DM

 

[Radogast]

We usually don't suggest comparisons, because they almost always end up in arguments, people getting upset and leaving, and a lot of work for us to clean up. The only request we have is if you do a comparison, that you select another 420 sponsor, to remain within our guidelines

Thanks - I don't expect to be doing a comparison. If there were a significant difference, I'd be kicking myself for installing half my area with lower performing solution.

 

[Radogast]

I've been been looking into CO2 burners, environmental controllers, and ventillation options.

Environmental controllers don't seem such a big issue as I thought. Heat, light, rh, and air are related but in most cases can be independently regulated.

CO2 burners are in interesting addition. If I run natural gas CO2 burners in the winter heating months they will pump anywhere from 10-25k BTU into the flower room. That is 10-25% of an average house heater capacity. Since my rooms are about 15% of a house size, and there is similar heat output from LEDs - that covers winter heat! It looks like I can forgo a furnace and rely on heat pumps for heating as well as cooling.

This is too complicated to be guaranteed until the profressionals give estimates, but I have in my mind a system of 3 heat pumps, grow and ambient lights, 2 (carbon filtered) exhaust fans, 2 air intake fans, 7 dehumidifiers, and 2 CO2 burners.


The biggest assumption I have made is that daytime CO2 supplementation covers the need for daytime fresh air supplementation. I am theorizing that the additional CO2 is the only air replenishment needed for daylight plant respiration and that nighttime fresh air intake (for oxygen) will replace enough trace gases in the night time to allow for recirculated daytime air to meet the plants needs. If I'm wrong, running the intake & exhaust fans 24x7 should be OK. I just won't neccesarily know that I'm wrong

- - -

Next step - air circulation fan strategy.

I don't see a lot of oscilating floor fans in grow house videos. I wonder what they do?

 

[Radogast]

And FYI: Budget LED has been talking with me in PM.

Helpful.

 

[Tead]

Some of your Co2 words work, but any thought of them as a significant source of heat are way off base. Granted, mine was in a smaller space, but it only ever ran for less than a minute at a time except for the morning start up and it only kicked on about every 1/2 hr. The burner really brought up the Co2 in an extremely quick manor. Don't count on it for heat.

 

[Radogast]

Some of your Co2 words work, but any thought of them as a significant source of heat are way off base. Granted, mine was in a smaller space, but it only ever ran for less than a minute at a time except for the morning start up and it only kicked on about every 1/2 hr. The burner really brought up the Co2 in an extremely quick manor. Don't count on it for heat.

Darn it. If I can't plan on it for heat, I can't plan on it for heat. Now I want software that produces environmental graphs showing me values throughout the day. The dream only gets bigger - LOL