My 3.5 week old AK47 auto is only 7 inches tall and 13 inch diameter but looks fine

Robro, plant continues to grow nicely. Now up to 10 inches tall and 19 inches wide. Amazing, they really do grow like weeds. I've placed an order for a 3'x3' by 6'8" tall grow tent which I'm told should arrive around December 20th. I need to check out other folks setups since I think although my overhead CFL lighting on a chain will work well in the tent I'm not so sure the side lighting will comfortably fit in these dimensions. I plan to add 6.5 pH water ONLY to plant later today per your suggestion. I'll check the ppm of the runoff.

Good decision to get a tent,am sure you will sort the lighting out.
Your girl seems to be her way now,no more overfeeding and she should be fine.
GL.

Rebro, I'm going to start making all my updates over in the JOURNAL area. Please search for "pirate43a" to find my JOURNAL entries. I've taken screenshots of my Excel spreadsheet with all the things I've done so far, including the suggestions you have made. I'll add my pics to the journal also. The titles of each picture will state which day in the life of the plant it was taken. I'll be chatting with you on the journal from now on.

Rebro et al, I have hit a snag trying to move from posting here in "plant problems" area to posting in the JOURNAL area. Apparently images need to point to a URL instead of just being copied into the post (like here in "plant problems"). Until I can figure out how to accomplish this requirement I'll keep giving you the updates HERE. I'll include the screenshots now just in case you are interested.

I always spin my plants every 12-24 hrs to make sure the light gets to all the nodes. I also take short pieces of copper wire and hook them on the branches with bread ties. It makes it really easy to bend and move the branches out of the way of eachother so they get more light and more yield. good luck


nice job on the chart, Keep track of everything and you will see what works and what doesnt.

That's very interesting about how you move branches around. I'm going to give that a try. I have so many fan leaves that I can't see how light can penetrate the outer layer. Just by tucking these leaves I've been able to let new growth access to light but your wire trick might do a better job. Thanks for sharing.

Day 33 of the AK47 auto grow and plant seems to have exploded with new and maturing growth. She's up to about 11 inches tall and now extends beyond the 18 inch diameter round seven gallon pot. When I peel back the outer leaves even the inner portions of plant have some healthy growth. I've fertilized again with 114 ppm Fox Farm nutes in 6.5 pH water with a pinch of earthworm castings. I last fertilized 5 days ago. As I'm approaching 5 weeks of growth I'm wondering when this puppy is going to start budding?

Looking great pirate.
Be patient,at the minute your girl is putting all her efforts into getting bigger.It shouldnt be too long
before the buds start forming,
GL.

Hey Robro, well Christmas came early for me. My grow tent arrived a day early so I've been busy setting it up. I adding some pics to give you an idea of the contents of this 3'x3'x68" tent. It's been a lot of fun. I wanted to make it as adaptable/interchangeable as possible so opted for .75 inch pvc pipe as building materials. The plant itself sits on a 2' x 18" wire 3 shelf table. This table provides a wonderful base to attach the pvc structures by means of nylon zip ties. The main lighting is still provided by an inverted 24" diameter aluminum hot water heater pan which has a bunch of different CFLs attached. The pan acts as my reflector hood. I decided to let this "pan" light system be almost at a fixed height (even though it's hung on a chain) and raise and lower the plant(s) for optimal distance from the lights. At each of the 4 corners of the table I slid on a 3 foot length of .75" pvc. This serves 2 purposes. It allows for attachment points should I want to add clamp lighting and the 4 corner posts also pinch in the pan lighting system so I can tilt the pan light and it stays in place in the tilt. This comes in handy when I take the plant out of the grow tent for measurements, flushing, etc. All the pvc pipe elbow joints are NOT glued in yet. I wanted to have some time to see how I like fans, side lights, etc at the position I placed them. Since the vertical poles are zip tied to the wire table I can still turn or swing them to various configurations. I have a box fan blowing fresh air in at the bottom, a tower occillating fan sitting on an adjustable position platform inside the tent (I used Velcro to hold it on the platform), and a 4 inch duct fan to remove heated air at the top of the tent. I got lazy and added a remote thermometer so I can monitor tent temperature from my bedroom. Since all internal structures are not yet glued (takes me back to my erector set days) the tent setup is still a work in progress but so far it's working well (2 days so take that with a grain of salt). I noticed that I'm starting to be able to smell the plant if I get close. Soon I'll be looking for a activated charcoal filter to add to the duct fan to keep smell to a minimum (hopefully). Let me know what you think.

Looking good pirate,nice job.
Good improvisation to get your lights closer to the plant.
Sound set up for your one plant,and you could extend the table if you want to grow more plants.
Are your lights getting the temp. up to required level in the bigger space?
Between 70-80f is fine.
It will start to smell a lot more as your girl flowers,so you will need to exhaust outside somehow.
Mine goes into an unused fireplace/flue and is about 30ft in the air when it emerges into the atmosphere.
If you have neighbours you want the exhausted smells as far away from them as possible.
Where are you going to exhaust to pirate?
Looking good for now pal.
GL.

Yes, the smell issue is worrisome. My grow room is right below an attic space and since we are in a townhouse area it might be difficult for someone to pinpoint where the smell is originating but I'm really hoping to solve the smell issue without venting into the attic. I've seen several activated charcoal DIY type filters and several say they were amazed at how well they dealt with the smell. I'm again hoping that means the smell is removed completely and not just the smell was reduced. We don't entertain much at the house but I don't want to forbid neighbors from visiting for fear of detection. My plan was to have two AK47 plants growing simultaneously but staggered in their growth stage so only one will be flowering (smelling) but based on this first grow I'll determine if I can have two or just continue with single plant farming. Today is 35 days into the grow.

At least you have the option of going into the attic with it,if the filter dont do the job properly.
Autos are great for continuous growing,coz you dnt have to change the light cycle.
Its more economical too.
They reckon its best to give each plant 100watt of llight each,so you will be fine growing 2 or 3 plants
i would think.Depends on your needs.
Heres a pic of my Auto Russian(white widowxak47xruderalis)
Its 7 weeks old today,in supersoil i made myself.I think ive put too much N in it coz its a bit slow at flowering.
I did start with 3 seedlings but i used some unwashed coco in the top 4" of my medium.It fucked 2 of them but
i managed to save this one.I tested the offending coco (too late,haha)and it was about 550 ppm,minus my tap water ppm
it came to 400ppm.So plenty of salt in there.
I ordered washed coco,so its best to test before use,even if its supposed to be washed.

How are the temps in your tent with only cfl`s and led`s,as they dont give off much heat?

Robro, today my "plant 1" is 36 days old. In the last 6 days she has gone from 6.5 inches tall and 13.5 inches wide to 13.5 inches tall and 25 inches wide. What a burst of size. The leaves look really good now with little or no downward curvature. I did a little research on the web and saw a cheap simple but supposedly effective charcoal air filter. I tweaked it a little and so far I haven't had any smell problems but to be honest it hasn't reached a smell level anyway. The cost was less than $20. Here are a couple pics, top and bottom..... I made it with a 6" fan ($7), green bucket ($1), kitchen splatter screen ($1), a length of pipe insulation foam ($1) and filter charcoal ($6). The filter is serving a dual purpose since it blows air down against my reflector hood and keeps it cool. Temperature in the tent seems to average about 5 to 8 degrees Fahrenheit than ambient room temperature so tent temps range from 75 to 80 degrees. I have noticed an increase in thirst of the plant. Humidity ranges from 39 to 44. I don't know if thirst is because of growth stage or tent temps. I've only been giving pH 6.5 water ONLY for a while now but plant is growing by leaps and bounds and leaves look good. Should I skip a few more feedings? Take a look at the plant pics from this morning.... This gal is growing so fast I'm almost resigned that I can only grow one plant at a time in my tent.

Nice filter pirate,but its supposed to take cleaned air from your tent,not blow it on your lights.
You need some ducting fitted to filter, and then to a vent in your tent.
Your plant is coming along nicely.An inch or so a day growth is normal.
Might be best to give a light feed(300ppm),as it hasnt had anything for a while.Your new growth looks
not bad, which is a good sign.
You will be able to grow more than one plant in there pirate,i think ive had about 8 plants in my 3x3
all at various stages of growth.
GL.

Rats, I thought the filter didn't matter where it was vented since it was just removing odor. Oh well, time for a little reengineering. I already have a 4 inch duct fan in place so I could just add a flexible 4' duct from the filter to the duct fan. I'll sort it out. Sounds good about the 300ppm feeding. I'll do that now. Wow, you really had some plants crammed in your tent. At 25 inches diameter on my existing plant that only leaves 11 inches between sides. The smell, temperature and size of the plant will determine if I can do multiple plants. I calculated that I have about 327 watts of lighting in the tent now so based on your 100 watts per plant estimate I think 3 plants would be about my limit. I'd be interested in testing the boundaries and certainly pleased that you believe I can go much further. I'm very slowly gaining confidence in growing.

Of course i believe you can go further,youve only just started and keen to learn.I find growing weed is addictive,and i think you will too.
I get great job satisfaction when i grow a plant from seed to weed without anything going wrong.
Its a great hobby,and i wish i had started doing it long before i did.
GL.

Looking down the road a bit, do you put molasses in water during the final weeks of the plants life? Also, do you place the plant in total darkness for 24-48 before harvesting? Some sites say this increases THC. I'm looking forward to seeing buds. None yet.

Mollasses are organic,but can be used in inorganic grows too.Ive used it in the last couple of bloom feeds,
when growing inorganic.Its supposed to help the flavour,but it also has Ca and Mg in it,so helps with cocos
tendency to absorb these nutes and not release them.
You should be adding a cal/mag supplement in coco about now to compensate for this.

Ive read about putting plants in total darkness for a couple of days,but have never done it.
I believe its supposed to make the plant think the end of the world is nigh,so it triggers its defence mechanism
and produces more thc.

http://forum.grasscity.com/coco-coir/620656-askeds-coco-guide.html

Have a look at this pirate.

I use a 50% promix and 50% perlite for medium so I don't think this will apply. It drains super well which is nice since I would probably drowned the poor little girl.