new grower! need advice!

Thanks man! Ill just tell my mom if she doesn't buy it for me ill run away ha jk. But if not ill just wait. But how many plants do you grow under that?? And could I do a full grow with just cfls? (Remember this is noobie central ha)

nice find mudslide. so you should def go for that if you can make it happen somehow. theres way cheap nutrients out there to tide you over this first time. I personally have a cool tube but you could always jimmy rig that one or upgrade next time if heat becomes an issue.
Wasn't tryin to be a dick on the half ass comment, lunchbox. It's just, that's exactly what it looks like in retrospective, half ass. Seems like takin it slow when you do it, and then def just feels like bad decision making when it's too late. esp at the price mudslide found!

What I'm confused?

Since you have to go with CFL's for now man. I'll tell ya how my veg area is setup. I'm currently veggin my 6 Widows under the MH light that I posted earlier, however I'm almost done with another room setup just for veggin. I have the little veg room set up for 6 plants in 1 gallon grow bags. I went to lowes and bought 6 clamp shop light reflectors ( you know the little aluminum circular shaped shop lights) Then I bought a socket extender and a 'Y" socket and have each of the 6 clamp lights setup with 2, 1650 lumen CFL's. So each plant has roughly 3300 lumens (so long as they stay around 2" off the tops of the plants) This veg area is only intended to veg clones for 4 weeks before moving them to flower under the 400w HPS. So long as the plants don't get too big then 3300 lumens per plant should be enough to veg to around a foot in height. Each shop light can be raised and lowered independently so that each one can stay at 2" off the plant at all times.

Just get creative with it and you'll figure something out that will work for you. If you going to veg them bigger than a foot or so then you'll probably want at least 5000 lumens per plant and in order for them to get all of those lumens the lights must stay literally inches off the plants. Too far away and you reduce the amount of usable light available to your plants.

Also as far as nutes, I kept it very simple. I'm currently using Jack's Classic 20-20-20 blend with mirco nutrients for veg. I think it was like $7 for an 8oz bucket. Jack's Blossom Bloomer for flower is 10-30-20 I think, which is also really cheap and easy to use.

Thanks for all the help man. I think I'm gunna buy that setup you linked me to. How many plants can you put under it?????

can there be to many lumens?
i ask because i found this http://www.amazon.com/400w-HPS-Hortilux-Bulb-Pressure/dp/B000BZ98BQ/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1289187925&sr=1-3-fkmr0
and its saying 55k lumens

You can burn your plants I just think it depends on how far away the light is and how many plants your growing. And that looks way to pricy for how much its giving off. I've seen 250w hps lights for only 20$

CryptKeeper said:

can there be to many lumens?
i ask because i found this http://www.amazon.com/400w-HPS-Hortilux-Bulb-Pressure/dp/B000BZ98BQ/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1289187925&sr=1-3-fkmr0
and its saying 55k lumens

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No there really can't be too many lumens. I don't think a plant uses more than 10 or 15,000 lumens unless there is C02 generators involved etc. There can, however be too much heat. I read a forum from a dude who tryed both a regular HPS bulb ($25-$30) and an expensive $85 bulb and he said he didn't see much difference in his plants growth. I use $30 bulbs in mine and I'm having good results.

lunchbox4101 said:

Thanks for all the help man. I think I'm gunna buy that setup you linked me to. How many plants can you put under it?????

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Lunchbox, there are several methods for cultivation. If your going to just let plants go, I would put no more than 4 plants under the 400w, but if you are going to top and LST your plants you can do around 6. If you scrog you can get great results with 6 plants and if you SOG you can fit maybe 20-25 plants under it =)

Mudslide9791 said:

No there really can't be too many lumens. I don't think a plant uses more than 10 or 15,000 lumens unless there is C02 generators involved etc. There can, however be too much heat. I read a forum from a dude who tryed both a regular HPS bulb ($25-$30) and an expensive $85 bulb and he said he didn't see much difference in his plants growth. I use $30 bulbs in mine and I'm having good results.

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righto then, much thanks for the info

only regular HPS bulbs ive seen at the home depot or canadian tire for that price were very low watt so i dunno
my city does suck so that might be a major factor in that

so cmon man. lets get it goin. awhile back you asked about cfl's all the way through. you can do it. but dont expect a great yield. so how many cfl's can you do, since hid is out of the question. you want about 10000 lumens per plant for flowering, but only like 3000 for veg. each 26/23 watt has between 1500 and 1750 lumens. advantages to cfl's is that you can run ALOT of them. for my first grow i used my 2 85 watters and 6 or 8 26 watt, with no heat issues at all, and the light was always 3 to 4 inches away from the tops. for my HPS i have to have it 20 inches away or it will burn the tops.

Ya, I was a little bit stoned writing my last post and in a hurry, sorry if i confused ya lunchbox. I was more or less just agreeing with mudslide. So how are things goin with this (hope you didn't have to run away lol)?
If this link works, A beginners guide to indoor growing , I've been looking around for somethin good for beginners with flourescent. I know better options have been well discussed at this point, but if you'v got a free min maybe you want to look some of it over anyways.
peace

Well I pretty much begged my mom and she said it will be my birthday and christmas gift ha. And she said I better make a lot of money or she's kickin me out so I really hope this works! Ha

I really wish my mom was that cool back when I was a kid, lol. Anyway, listen to these dudes talk about CFL's and take it in. Don't be in a hurry to throw something together. Do some reading and talk with the guys on this forum. I think one of the worst feelings for you would be if you rushed your first grow and failed. Take a couple weeks to get your grow cab nice and organized and your plants will reward you back greatly for your efforts =)

Lighting, ventilation, soils, nutrients, get yourself armed with knowlege for when they start to act up on you (when your getting nute burn, or when your over watering) There is alot involved in this hobby if your doing it right. This isn't a get rich quick scheme and it will take time to get good at it. I'm still on my first grow and my plants tell me something new every other day =)

Good luck!

and do you know anything about the attitude seed bank? I ordered from ams and never got my fuckin seeds :l but I just ordered from them cuz I saw good reviews so yeah?

I hear there pretty good. Sucks that you didn't get your original seed order. I ordered from Nirvana. Nirvana is smaller and I think the only sell strains that they create in there labs, however I heard Attitude is ok and you get some decent freebies from em

Yes attitude are a good place to get your seeds. They are just a reseller so you have a great selection of seeds.

I agree fully with Mudslide read as much as you can now rather than starting and making a balls up that costs you money.



J

attitude has my vote. I'm not sure about the guranteed shipping, (i never get it) but i live ... between the east and west coast and my orders take between 2 and 3 weeks. but i have always gotten my beans that i ordered. right now im 3/3 everytime that royal mail pakage comes to my door i get so excited. here is a list of all the strains i got from attitude

De sjamaan- purple widow
K.C. Brains- K.C. x Brasil
TGA- Third Dimension
TGA- Jack the ripper
Dinafem- Cloud 9
Dinafem- Blue Hash
Royal queen- Amnesia Haze
Royal Queen- Special Queen
Greenhouse- Bubba Kush

sasquatch19 said:

attitude has my vote. I'm not sure about the guranteed shipping, (i never get it) but i live ... between the east and west coast and my orders take between 2 and 3 weeks. but i have always gotten my beans that i ordered. right now im 3/3 everytime that royal mail pakage comes to my door i get so excited. here is a list of all the strains i got from attitude

De sjamaan- purple widow
K.C. Brains- K.C. x Brasil
TGA- Third Dimension
TGA- Jack the ripper
Dinafem- Cloud 9
Dinafem- Blue Hash
Royal queen- Amnesia Haze
Royal Queen- Special Queen
Greenhouse- Bubba Kush

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Have you grown the purple widow? I was curious about that strain. I would like to try it sometime.

Mudslide9791 said:

I bought a 400w switchable ballast complete set for $150 on amazon.com, it included a 400w HPS bulb and 400w MH bulb. If you can beg borrow or steal that money you DEFINATELY would not be dissapointed and it would more than pay for iteself on your first grow, as you can squeeze 4 good sized plants under it and SCROG around 6 for nice yield.

Click to expand...

Mind sharing link for that? Sounds like a great deal

Btw how many you get under your 400w? Isn't rule of thumb 1 per 3x3