# Begginer setup question(s)?



## grow2smoke (Sep 11, 2020)

Hello guys.

I am about to grow my first indoor crop (I have grown a couple of times outdoors before, when I was a sloppy teen - bag seeds, minimum effort on my part, poor yield, etc.), so basically I have next to no experience and a couple of books under my belt, and a lot of enthusiasm. Would you be so kind to explain a couple of details I have a hard time figuring out?

So, I would like to be able to contiuously produce ~250g per month from this operation. I will be growing in a DIY tent/s. The space(size of the tent) is not an issue, but electricity consumption much above 400 to 800 wats 18h/day will get suspicious. Also I have a tight budget and am not able to buy expensive stuff at all.

So, I will be using about 20, 23W CFLs (6500K cool day light) to start with. Can I use those for flowering too, or should I get 2700K ones?

I will be making a tent out of plastic PPR pipes and sheets of tarpaulin lined with mylar. Will use 2 small USB fans for ventilation, and later on will probably hack some carbon filter if needed, or buy activated charcoal and make my own filter or something.

I have decided to start with an auto strain as it is much easier and I've picked up northern lights auto fem,
as it is fast growing, resilient, heavy yielding and very potent, and does not smell much during flowering.

I have many unknowns at this point, but the most important questions are how big my tent should be, what shape, and how many plants should I begin with. I think of making a tent 50cm x 100cm x 150cm height, use 15 l textile pots and start 6 plants, then after a month start another 6 and put together another (50x100x150) tent, so I have one for flowering and one for veg. Also, I will adapt some small box for a nurcery.

How is that for autos grow op, sounds viable?

So, to sum up:
Are 15 l pots ok?
150cm - 20cm pots - 30cm fixtures = 1 meter for plants, that ok for northern lights?
Can I get 40g from a plant(6 plants ~250g)?
How big of an area can be adequately illuminated with ~20 23W CFLs?
Can I adequately flower autos with 6500K cool daylight?



P.S. I know I won't get nowhere near 200g on the first run.


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## Kyfarmerb (Sep 11, 2020)

grow2smoke said:


> Hello guys.
> 
> I am about to grow my first indoor crop (I have grown a couple of times outdoors before, when I was a sloppy teen - bag seeds, minimum effort on my part, poor yield, etc.), so basically I have next to no experience and a couple of books under my belt, and a lot of enthusiasm. Would you be so kind to explain a couple of details I have a hard time figuring out?
> 
> ...


Well there's many factors that will effect the harvest outcome bro.a girl vegged atleast four weeks grown in five gallon airpots and flowered under a hundred watts each of hps and I usually see two ounce or more per girl.u can check my current and last grow out here,it's called (Back in the saddle again),and( back in the saddle again x2).any and all questions are welcome.happy growing to you bro.heres a lil pic of a gsc from last grow ..


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## Oldbay (Sep 12, 2020)

I think you should start designing around what kind of light you can afford - likely LED as the way to go with electricity concern. 
E.g. if you can have something that will properly light a 4x4 tent you are looking at a larger upfront cost - I use an HLG 550 but you can get similar for cheaper from Mars hydro, Spider co, Kingsbrite etc... 

If that is out of reach right now, maybe go with something that can properly light a 2x2 which keep a lot of people well stocked with smoke and can be later used as a veg tent if you need to scale up a bit. 

Pot sizes will fall in line with tent size as well, 2-3 gal for the 2x2 and maybe 3-7 gal in the 4x4 as a general idea but like anything else, many schools of thought on the topic.


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## samarta (Sep 13, 2020)

I agree with oldbay on the LED's for electricity and HEAT! Are you dirt/coco or DWC? I like DWC in limited space and if you do not have to worry about smell, I just use a closet and vent with a fan and window because I grow when it is cold outside and I can control my heat. DWC makes lots of problems if you don't control heat. I do not know about dirt/coco.


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## WeedHopper (Sep 13, 2020)

Hey Samarta,,good to see ya posting brother.


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## grow2smoke (Sep 13, 2020)

samarta said:


> I agree with oldbay on the LED's for electricity and HEAT! Are you dirt/coco or DWC? I like DWC in limited space and if you do not have to worry about smell, I just use a closet and vent with a fan and window because I grow when it is cold outside and I can control my heat. DWC makes lots of problems if you don't control heat. I do not know about dirt/coco.



Yeah, but I don't have the money to buy a LED panel right now. I think of building my own later on, though CFLs would need to do for now. Also I'm using just soil. I'm making grow bags from landscaping fabric btw, which is cool I think (lack of money = more self sufficiency, I guess)

But I'm trying to figure out the dimensions of my grow tent. I've settled to 70x110cm, given that you'll need one to 2 feet per plant, that is roughly 2x3, for 6 autos. I don't think I'd be able to illuminate properly bigger space with 20ish bulbs, just hope those autos would flourish in 1 foot space.

P.S. Hey, weed growing is making me use your crappy imperial system, how about that.


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## Oldbay (Sep 13, 2020)

You can definitely pull some smoke from CFLs, lots of people have. Just manage your yield expectations. Make the tent taller than you will need for them so you’ll have some head space for later on if/when you want to upgrade. Do you have your ventilation and odor control sorted?


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## samarta (Sep 14, 2020)

I like cheap too so when I say led's, I started out using led flood lights, and now I'm trying those led's advertised on TV as a garage light. 1400 lumens at 65K daylight. If it works I will hit the girls with two 27K CFL's when I go to flower. 20.00 for two. We'll see??


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## samarta (Sep 14, 2020)

WeedHopper said:


> Hey Samarta,,good to see ya posting brother.


Somebody took out some of the garbage on this site that was causing me a lot of nausea!!


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## grow2smoke (Sep 15, 2020)

Oldbay said:


> You can definitely pull some smoke from CFLs, lots of people have. Just manage your yield expectations. Make the tent taller than you will need for them so you’ll have some head space for later on if/when you want to upgrade. Do you have your ventilation and odor control sorted?



Kind of. I have a hole for a dryer, so that's cool. I'll use 2 USB fans, and will replace with bigger fans if needed. I've found some kitchen respirator filter pads with activated charcoal, probably would figure out something with that. I can buy activated charcoal and make my own filter, if needed. You can even make your own activated carbon at home BTW, the process is very easy.



samarta said:


> I like cheap too so when I say led's, I started out using led flood lights, and now I'm trying those led's advertised on TV as a garage light. 1400 lumens at 65K daylight. If it works I will hit the girls with two 27K CFL's when I go to flower. 20.00 for two. We'll see??



I remember reading somewhere that those LEDs are the wrong spectrum. Might've been a bullshit though, people are probably not used to messing around with LEDs too much, yet, I guess. But honestly, that sounds almost too good to be true.

Something I've been wandering though is that, we have a generation of people that are used to entry level growing with CFLs, and a large number of tutorials and setups, and so on, but those bulbs are being phased out - they don't manufacture them any more and it is becoming extremely difficult to source CFLs locally as only the 2700K are left on the market, and after some months or an year those will run out as well. So what will replace those as dirt-cheap grow lights - LED bulbs, flood lights, regular flourescent lamps? 

Nothing will be more cool then seeing people trivially putting together their own panels and experimenting with spectra, but that remains to be seen, I guess.


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## boo (Sep 15, 2020)

g2, check out the grow forums, there's a lot to learn...your battle will be lights and heat...manage them and you've got a great chance as long as you don't love your plants to death...


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## Kyfarmerb (Sep 16, 2020)

boo said:


> g2, check out the grow forums, there's a lot to learn...your battle will be lights and heat...manage them and you've got a great chance as long as you don't love your plants to death...


One of the most common thing s people do wrong in there start of cultivation is love there girls to death.to much water,to much deets,to much picking at it.not letting her go long anuff.and just plain over thinking it.just slow it down,stick to a script and enjoy the ride.happy growing to all of y'all


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## Mike143 (Sep 17, 2020)

Kyfarmerb said:


> Well there's many factors that will effect the harvest outcome bro.a girl vegged atleast four weeks grown in five gallon airpots and flowered under a hundred watts each of hps and I usually see two ounce or more per girl.u can check my current and last grow out here,it's called (Back in the saddle again),and( back in the saddle again x2).any and all questions are welcome.happy growing to you bro.heres a lil pic of a gsc from last grow ..View attachment 264413


Now that is pretty tasty looking.


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## pute (Sep 17, 2020)

Good morning!  Looks like the start of something good.  Best of luck samarta. Looks like you have plenty of help.


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## zem (Sep 18, 2020)

For 250g/ month i would say 2x600w HPS or its equvalent in LED for 4x6' to 4x8'. Some strains produce more than others, much more in fact but it would be on the expense of quality.personally i look more for quality and i find myself harvesting in the 0.5-0.75 g/w range under hps but i have experienced plants that give huge yields that were of average quality last i remember was that Moby ****, it looked so perfect with huge nugs just that the smoke was regular taste and low potency. I guess it could easily surpass 1g/w under hps if quantity is what you are after. Good luck!


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## samarta (Sep 20, 2020)

Kyfarmerb said:


> One of the most common thing s people do wrong in there start of cultivation is love there girls to death.to much water,to much deets,to much picking at it.not letting her go long anuff.and just plain over thinking it.just slow it down,stick to a script and enjoy the ride.happy growing to all of y'all


 Great Point!!! My first and biggest problem was PATIENCE!


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