By anonymous
The Grow Tent Saga
Submitted on Wed, 2008/12/10 - 4:18am
Last updated on Thu, 2008/12/11 - 5:09pm
Posted in
The beginning of me acquiring a 48x48x20" grow tent with four 4' Flourescent T-5 lights and buying an English made AutoPot system gisette turned me on to is chronicaled here , so I'll spare most of the uglier details. Quite a bit of frustration, aggravation and thought went into getting it running. It took three weeks from arrival to the first planting but all is going well as I write, two weeks into the first grow cycle.
The 62# package arrived early 11.4.08 and it took about 5 minutes to tear into it and see what I had. Surprisingly the grow tent itself was in the smallest box, the 48" 4 tube flourescent fixture with 4 6500K grow tubes and 4 3800K bloom tubes seemed HUGE. Next thing to do was see just how bright these T-5 tubes really are. They use 200 watts and put out 20,000 lumens so I was expecting a decent amount of light but I thought my eyeballs were frying when I turned them on. This picture was taken on our dining table about noon on a bright, sunny day.
It took about five minutes to set up the tent, everything snaps together and I already had a table ready for it in a spare bedroom. I installed the lamps, put in the velcroed double waterproof liner, a remote temp and humidity sensor from my weather station and put in an old bedraggled tomato plant we'd rescued from the cold outside. The first problem arose when I found the lights hung down 16" from the top so I had to tear them apart and install some eyelets for the high/low hangers to attach to. Now they only hang down about 6" and I can raise and lower them as needed.
After much tooth gnashing grief trying to find a hydro system that wouldn't take more of my quickly shrinking headroom, gisette finally turned me on to Autopots that were exactly what I needed. A mixture of coco coir and perlite resting on a bed of growrocks makes for a perfect growing medium. A $3 brick of coco coir mixed 50/50 with perlite will fill more than two 8.5 square x 6" deep pots and it's fun watching the hard brick turn soft and fluffy. Soon the system was installed and planted with Big Jim green chiles in the left two pots and Anaheim green chiles in the right two. I planted 4 sets of seeds in each pot, two in Rapid Rooters and two in dampened "soil" and covered them with cling wrap to hold moisture. The planting date was 11.24.08.
12.01.08 - 7 days after planting and most of the seeds were germinating
12.09.08 - 15 days after planting and already done thinning of weaker double plants
I'm using a weak mix of General Hydroponics Flora Micro, Grow and Bloom liquid nutrients with an EC of 1.0 in the 12 gallon tank using intermittent airstones to keep it in solution. It's develeped a thick tan colored percipitant on the bottom of the tank that just won't mix. My one gallon jars of the mixes are also accumulating this stuff. For now I'm stumped as to what causes it and if it will hurt anything. Any ideas?
Tomorrow I'll top off the pots with growrocks to help contain moisture and prevent algae.
My weather station is always live so you can see just what the conditions inside the tent are as well as a lot of other Albuquerque North Valley weather info.
Wed, 2008/12/10 - 3:32pm
#2
No test kit yet, can't find one I like that I'm willing to pay the $$ for but might get one of the cheap ones to get an idea of the NPK level. They say to add to soil, wonder if putting a little of my coco/perlite mix would work or would it work with straight liquid mix?
Bacteria hasn't crossed my mind, the tank is covered and has nothing but tap water and nutes in it and the gallon jars of mix have lids. I even got a breakdown of all our city's tap water qualities and it's darn good water in every respect. There's not enough chlorine to taste but they do use chlorine and ozone to purify the water, wonder if that would have anything to do with it? I'm at a total loss, think I'll call the big hydro store 'cross town and ask them - DUH! Been having chest pains and no energy the last few weeks so haven't done much. I have a nuclear.. oops, nuculer heart exercise test Friday morning to see what's going on.
Wed, 2008/12/10 - 6:12pm
#3
That's interesting with the ozone, ozone is added to water to break down excess iron. Your water looks 'rusty' from your picture on the other thread.
Is there some sort of reaction going on with your nutrients, ozone & iron that's causing this colour? Chlorine will also destroy ozone, do we have some sort of chain reaction here: far fetched theory... The clorine breaks down the ozone, which then cannot remove the excess iron which is part of your water and hydro nutes, result; rusty looking water? It sounds good in theory, but may be total rubbish!!! 
Good luck with the nuclear heart test by the way. 
Wed, 2008/12/10 - 10:59pm
#4
These do look great, Bruce - congrats! 
I have no ideas re the water... Well, one idea. If you take a sample of it in a transparent glass, and add some peroxide to it, and it makes no difference whatsoever to its color and doesn't foam, it's probably not bacterial.
Is it at all possible the feeding valve downward is backfeeding muddy water uphill?
Good luck with the test on Friday!!!
Thu, 2008/12/11 - 2:11am
#5
Thanks! I've done all sorts of checks plus the peroxide idea gisette mentioned. I've taken PH samples from the bottom and the top after letting it sit undisturbed and both are the same. I've taken EC readings from the top and bottom and both are the same. I took a sample from the very bottom, stirring up the crud a little and added 25% H2O2 with no change at all. I can stir the stuff and get it mixed with the water but it's so heavy it drops to the bottom in a few minutes. The two airstones don't move it at all. I've checked the city water dept. reports and all are very good. I'm stumped.
Think I'll call autopot in the UK directly tomorrow and see what they say.
Oh, Peat, here's what ozone is good for, excuse the C&P..
- Kill bacteria on contact thousands of times faster than chlorine or bromine.
- Kill virus on contact.
- Kill algae spores, fungus, mold and yeast spores.
- Precipitate heavy metals.
- Remove excess iron, manganese, and sulfur by a process known as micro-flocculation, thus conditioning the water naturally without chemical additives.
- Remove color and odor, leaving a fresh, healthy bouquet.
- Reduce scale build-up on equipment such as pipes and water heaters, and staining of showers, sinks, bathtubs and toilets .
- Ozone leaves no residue, it's only by-product is pure oxygen.
Thu, 2008/12/11 - 5:05pm
#6
One more thing I thought about...
Add your nutes to some distilled water and see what the outcome is, if it's rusty coloured then it's got to be the nutes. If it's OK then it's got to be your tap water. That should solve it once and for all.
Thu, 2008/12/11 - 5:27pm
#7
Great idea! I've got a few gallons sitting around, I'll give it a try. Thanks from both of you, Peat. 
Thu, 2008/12/11 - 6:20pm
#8
OK, I just dumped 7 gallons of mix, cleaned the tank (filter was clean, whew!) and mixed up two gallons of slightly weak Peat's grow mix using distilled water. Final EC is 1.2, PH is a little bothersome at ~5.3. I don't want to add anything extra to change it and since they recommend 5.8 I think it might be OK, what do you think?
Thu, 2008/12/11 - 9:00pm
#9
Since it's a logorithmic scale... I'd try to get it up to 5.8. Don't have any pH up?
Thu, 2008/12/11 - 10:25pm
#10
No PH up, never thought I'd need it. Wonder if a little baking soda would work at least temporarily?
Thu, 2008/12/11 - 10:38pm
#11
Baking soda would work to raise the pH... Add sodium, too. Dunno that you want to add sodium... For outdoor gardens you add limestone dust (lime).
<shrug> It's been a while since you refilled - what's the nutrient-water pH in the AutoPot tray? If it's above 6.0, you're probably fine.
Thu, 2008/12/11 - 11:02pm
#12
Used a bit of baking soda mixed in water - a little goes a long way! PH about 6 now, EC at 1.4. Bottom of tank is clean as a whistle so far.
EDIT - The original mix was 6.3 PH so I think I'm OK, it'll take a while for the PH in all the coco and perlite to change. I hope.
EDIT again... You got my curiosity going, the PH in the pot tray is almost 7! Maybe should have left well enough alone.
Fri, 2008/12/12 - 9:29am
#13
If you can Bruce, try and stay away from kitchen chemicals that adjust the pH.Whilst they do work, they are not designed for hydro and aren't as stable, the pH can drift - which is not what you want. Also, baking soda adds sodium to your water, it can cause problems if the amount is too much.
Proper hydro pH up and down is the better solution. 
Thu, 2008/12/18 - 6:07pm
#14
You're not kidding about PH drifting. I added another gallon of distilled grow mix and a little PH down to keep it below 6.0. I still have the tan/brown precipitant but it's not quite as bad, of course I'm comparing 3 gallons to problably 10 with tap water. The Rapid Rooters are showing a little spurt of growth now, I'd say they're 2-3 days ahead of the plants in plain soil mix. Here's the Big Jims at 24 days....
And here are the Anaheims at 24 days...
Thu, 2008/12/18 - 11:07pm
#15
Happy plants!
Hey, good luck with the tests tomorrow!
Fri, 2008/12/19 - 4:48pm
#16
Those plants are coming along nicely.
Add your nutes to some distilled water and see what the outcome is, if it's rusty coloured then it's got to be the nutes. If it's OK then it's got to be your tap water
Have you had a chance to try this solution out yet? This has been intriguing me since you raised it, put me out of my misery.
Fri, 2008/12/19 - 5:48pm
#17
Yep Peat, I did it immediately after you mentioned it back on the 11th, check back a page. That's what caused my PH problem and baking soda mishap. There is a little gunk on the bottom but nothing like it was with tap water but I'm comparing nutes in 3 gallons distilled vs about 10 gallons of tap water. I think the distilled will be the way to go, I don't want nute goodies settling out. Today the EC is about 1.3 and PH is 6.0 so it's finally settled down. That was a great idea!
Sat, 2008/12/20 - 6:26am
#18
So, it was mainly your tap water which was interacting with the nutes?
Glad it's all sorted now.
Wed, 2008/12/24 - 6:53pm
#19
Yeah, Peat it looks like something in the tap water was causing it. I just added a 4th gallon of 1.6 EC 5.3 PH distilled water mix and the bottom of the tank is still almost spotless. The difference in PH in the tank vs in the autopots is amazing, anywhere from +0.5 to +1.0. This setup is using less than a gallon a week so I'll keep the tank level down to 3 or 4 gallons for now. They have really grown this week and it's time to think about thinning, there's no way the tent would support 15 plants.
There's a pic below of a mottled leaf, only a few look like that - any idea what's causing it? I'm think micronutes so added a little extra Flora Micro.
Chiles @ 1 month...
Hmm, tried changing the "s***" number in the Picacaweb URL and all I got was the caption. Never mind - figured out the dumb thing I did.
Merry Christmas ya'll!!
Edit: Gisette fixed lightboxes - only 3 out of 4 showed pix.
Wed, 2008/12/24 - 10:08pm
#20
Nice, Bruce! 
Is this with your new camera? The pictures look way better than your old ones!!!
I have seen the mottled leaves on peppers, yes. I think it's an early phase of chlorosis, or whatever-you-call-yellowing-leaves. I know you've used more Flora Micro to add N for that but... I started out by using an extra ml or three of Flora Grow, and they like that. Could be Micro would also work.
Yeah, I'm not sure those pots are supposed to have more than one plant per. Were you going to pinch their tops soon? You've got so little space vertically, maybe one plant per pot and try to get them to grow sideways early? I really regretted not pruning off the tops of my pepper plants early in the game. The Aerogrow County Fair manual gives directions for pruning 3-4 week old peppers:
-
When a pepper plant has 3 branches growing off of the main stem, it is time to prune the plant. This typically happens about 3 to 4 weeks after planting your Garden.
-
Cut and remove the main stem of the pepper plant just above the 3rd branch.
Wed, 2008/12/24 - 11:59pm
#21
Thanks! The new camera is sooo much nicer than the old one, I love having 27mm-486mm capabilities with a leica lens, the wide angle seems twice as wide as the 38mm on the old camera and I use it a lot.
I'm tempted to leave 2 plants per pot but that would really be pushing it to the limit. Thanks for the pruning tip, these aren't normally pruned in the field but I think I'll give it a try and it's time to do it. Odd, can you notice how the left pot in both autopots are doing better than the right? I can postulate the far right Anaheim might be affected by the open vent right there beside it but can't come up with a reason the right Big Jim is smaller, it's in the middle of the tent. Weird.
Thu, 2008/12/25 - 1:18am
#22
Yeah, beats me why one pot would do better than the other. Sorta thing I spin theories about, but never really know whether they're worth anything. 
Sat, 2008/12/27 - 8:31pm
#23
33 days... I yanked out two plants per pot and pinched off the plants with three distinct branches, a couple aren't there yet. They suddenly started using water like mad, two gallons in 3 or 4 days. I added two more gallons using distilled water with GH's grow mix - 2tsp Micro, 3tsp Grow, 1tsp Bloom per gallon. All mixed together with the gallon or so left in the tank gives me a 2.0 EC and ~5.8 PH. I hope the stronger mix will get rid of the choliosis/whatever a few leaves are showing. The PH in the pots has settled down around 6 so that's looking good.
I'm loving this new camera but it doesn't have a date stamp feature! They're great in cases like these but I've never been a fan of having them on all pictures anyway. Found a great little program called Gena PhotoStamper that integrates into Win Explorer. I can select a group of pics, right click and apply the date stamp right there. Nice.
I had the brilliant idea that maybe the grow tent was out of level, causing the left plants to get more water... nope, it's almost dead level. still wish I could figure that out.
Edit: Gisette fixed lightbox url's. Bruce - use "s640", not "s912".
Sat, 2008/12/27 - 9:38pm
#24
Happy peppers! Are you going to leave 2 per pot? They look like they're already growing into each other.
Have you tried swapping / rotating the pots, or do they only fit one way? Once the plant roots reach the bottom, whatever-it-is shouldn't matter so much, so maybe swapping would let the short ones catch up without harming the bigger ones?
Mon, 2008/12/29 - 6:06am
#25
The yellow spots could be caused by a number of things, my first guess would be the nutes or water pH. Other things like overcrowding or too much/little humidity and extremes of temperature - stressful for the plants.
If possible keep the grow room at around 75 degrees with a humidity of around 50%. The daytime and nighttime temperature should be within 10 degrees of each other, ideal.
Hopefully the upping of your nute strength should sort any deficiency out, lack of nitrogen, magnesium, manganese and iron can cause chlorosis.
Also, keep a beady eye on these leaves in case they are a precursor to something else. Lookout for the spots turning black/brown or any mold growing.
Why only some leaves are effected is strange, all the other plants are doing great so you would think that the nutes/water are fine? Are these plants near a vent of being blown by the fan? Cold air?
Thu, 2009/01/01 - 4:19am
#26
37 days.. The light spots are spreading a little and I don't know why. PH is within range and I just added another two gallons of grow mix, bringing my tank up to EC 2.4 and PH ~5.5, changing to 6-6.3 in the pots..Can't keep temp or humidity at ideal levels, temps run around 80*F and 30% humidity during the day, 65* and 45% at night. I'm running the light 18 hours, off at midnight. Gisette, yes I can move the pots any way I like, they're square and fit anywhere. I've rearranged them to see what happens.
They're starting to use about a gallon of water per day so I'm buying distilled water jugs by the dozens. It was time to do my final thinning today, it hurt yanking some beautiful plants but there's not room for them all. Here's pics from today, pre and post operation...
Thu, 2009/01/01 - 12:59pm
#27
They're looking very lush, Bruce! I'm sure they'll respond well to the thinning. Any buds yet?
I did a quick google on "big jim chile" and "anaheim chile" and looked at the images. Quite a lot of those plants had yellow-cast leaves. Are you still using grow-stage mix on them? I've heard hot peppers especially crave sulphur, which is in the GH bloom stuff, right? Maybe a little drift bloomwards would help? I'm only guessing.
Another thought was lightburn, but their leaves seem solidly down-cast. Peppers do get lightburnt.
My goofy biggest tomato plant raises and lowers its branches - can elevate 3" or so in the course of a day, then droop them back down. 
I just cut off a leaf tip that went and burned itself too many times in this weird prayer dance. Not going to raise the lights again for one crisped leaf tip... I think "up" happens a couple hours after lights-off, and may go until lights-on, but I'm asleep. Once I saw someone's time-lapse photos of his AG peppers doing their 24-hour gyrations. On my mini bells, this just amounted from droopy up to horizontal and back down, and looks like yours have similar posture. But maybe not... (My goofy tomato has branches that are like bouncing between 20 and 45 degrees. Practically jumping jacks...)
Wed, 2009/01/07 - 8:45pm
#28
That's hilarious about your animated tomatoes. I think the chiles are staying pretty much static but then I'm not up at 6 to see what they look like as the lights come on. I keep raising the light little by little to keep it close but not too close. It's at an angle now to stay close to the shorter anaheims on the right. They're looking pretty nice now, I upped the nutes to ~2.4 EC and they're looking pretty nice, even have a few premature buds showing. They still are growing in an odd pattern, now the inner two plants are doing the best and one Big Jim is really going to town - 18" tall and might need a trim so the others can catch up.
Another odd thing is that as I've thinned back from 16 plants to 8 and now 4 the temperature has dropped 5*F or so and the humidity has risen about 5% overall. The house temp and humidity is the same as always. Anyway, here they are at
5 weeks...
Wed, 2009/01/07 - 9:01pm
#29
They look nice! Maybe you should swap them around counter-pattern - move shorts in and talls out.
I forget - these have all been top-pruned already, right?
Thu, 2009/01/08 - 11:10pm
#30
Yeah, they've all been top pruned and the bottom stems are about a half inch.. Guess I should try swapping places and see what happens, have had other things going on and my scientific methods have slackened some. The pots sit in an inch or so of water and the first time I moved them I made one heck of a mess. Tomorrow I'll lift them up a little and sit them back down at at a 45* angle to drain then move them. Great idea!
Fri, 2009/01/16 - 12:25am
#31
Six weeks and way lopsided - I hated to move things around so left them on their own. They all are healthy as can be, just one heck of a difference in size. The tall ones are almost 24" now. The incoming vent is lower right and the ventilation fan is on that side blowing up, those are the only reasons I can think of that would make them grow at an angle like this. The Anaheims (right) are naturally a little shorter but this is weird. I'm getting lots of flowers from both of the Big Jims and the biggest Anaheim! I'll change out two T5s to 3000K tubes in the morning to encourage blooming and I've moved the nutes towards a bloom mix, EC 2.4. They're using over a gallon a day! First try at using the lightboxer.......
Fri, 2009/01/16 - 12:35am
#32
It's great the way you've got the light angled! A gallon a day? Wild. Maybe too much ventilation?
Fri, 2009/01/16 - 1:47am
#33
Funny you mentioned ventilation. At seed planting the temp was over 81*F and RH down to 20% during the 18 hour light cycle so I wanted quite a bit of ventilation. Now the temp stays in the low to mid 70s and RH 35-40%. (The house temp and humidity has remained the same throughout - 70*, 35% with a setback thermostat) I closed the vent right after I took those pictures today. I still have a 4" fan venting outward at the upper left and may turn it off after watching the conditions tomorrow. So far the temp rose 2 degrees then dropped back 1 and the RH has dropped a couple %, not what I was expecting. I do like those hi/low hangers, they make it pretty easy to keep the light level right where I want it.
AHA! - looking back at my notes, I changed the mix in the pots to experiment. The left two are ~50/50 coco coir and perlite. The third is ~40/60 and the last is ~30/70. My thinking was that chiles like dry roots and more perlite would do that, looks like I made them too dry. Next mix will be 50/50.
Fri, 2009/01/16 - 2:01am
#34
Ooh, good note-keeping! That could well be it!
Fri, 2009/01/16 - 11:06am
#35
Those plants slope just right for your light, nice accidental design.
If you are happy with the size of your plants (they are established enough), you can indeed start to force flower them. Change the light cycle to 12 hours on and 12 hours off, this tricks the plants into thinking winter is coming and they start flowering. There are some musts though...
1. Keep ALL light out of the plant during the 'dark' period. If light gets in then it will upset the whole cycle - this can delay the flowering by days, or weeks!
2. Keep the 12 on/off cycle at the same times, i.e. if the lights go off at 11pm then make sure this is always the case.
You should have flowers 1-2 weeks after forcing, the plant will then continue to produce flowers until it's reached it's genetic end.
I never understood why AG did not put a 'flowering stage' in it's AeroGardens, we remain stuck with the normal growing cycle, a trick missed?
Did you go through the 'transitional' period before moving straight to the full-on bloom mix?
Fri, 2009/01/16 - 2:30pm
#36
Peat, I'm not ready for full blooming yet even though some of the plants want to so I'm trying to hold them back. I've eased into the transitional mix now and replaced two 6400K tubes with 3000K this morning. I'm going to leave the light cycle at 18 hours for now hoping to get more growth on my right two plants. It's like having a baby but not wanting it right now. As you can see, it's not delaying them blooming, this far left Big Jim has at least 18 flowers on it...
Fri, 2009/01/16 - 2:44pm
#37
It is wise to get them fully established first, that picture looks impressive.
You are in the unique position of being able to do the 12 hour cycle with your grow tent, the only way we could get this going, is to hide the AG away in a darkened closet for the 12 hours of darkness.
Of course, there is no need to change your light cycle. It's just 'something extra' that you can do if you want.
Fri, 2009/01/16 - 4:23pm
#38
I'm just guessing on when to force blooming. My Big Jims are about full height but the growing period is normally 75-80 days. I'm just past halfway there, would it take 4-5 weeks for the chiles to mature from flowers or are they growing much faster than outside? They have the record for longest chile - 12" so I dunno but guessing they're growing much faster. The Anaheims are a little stunted and sub-par so I'm focusing on the Big Jims. I'll keep a close watch and in a week or so set them to full bloom mix and 12 hour 3000K light.
My closing the lower vent has had little effect on temp or RH, I'm turning off the vent fan and see what happens. Then if no change I'll close the upper vent completely and see what happens. I have a 6" circulation fan running inside so shouldn't get stale air or unpollinated flowers. I hope....
Fri, 2009/01/16 - 5:57pm
#39
Wow, what a difference turning off the vent fan made. RH went from 38% to 95% in 15 minutes and temp climbed from 72 to 78 in an hour. Don't mind the temp but what about that humidity? I just opened the bottom left vent to see what happens.
Fri, 2009/01/16 - 6:25pm
#40
4-5 weeks for a chile to mature from flower doesn't sound unreasonable, especially if they're big chiles.
Sat, 2009/01/17 - 3:23am
#41
I guess I'm pushing it but have no clue how growing in the tent with autopots will compare with outside. My temp kept climbing after I turned the vent fan off and opened the lower vent (no big deal) but humidty stayed in the 90s. I turned the vent fan back on and you can see what happened....
Edit: Gisette maybe fixed the picture... Too wide?
Mon, 2009/01/19 - 1:04pm
#42
The picture is missing... is it bad?
I'm trying to get a handle on your grow tent, I've listed a few things which you may/may not have tried.
1. Always have the air vent at the bottom open.
2. Have the extraction fan (make sure it blows out, not in) diagonally opposite the bottom air vent at the highest point in your grow tent. The air can then flow across and out at the top.
3. Put the extraction fan on a thermostat, it can then turn on/off as required and regulate the temperature.
Generally, if you can control the temperature, the humidity will follow.
Mon, 2009/01/19 - 4:09pm
#43
How weird, the picture was there last night and I can't edit the post now. The humidity climbs from ~40% to 98% in about 10 minutes after I turn the vent fan off. Temp eventually climbs to the level I want but the chiles can't take the humidity, they go limp and have dropped some flowers.
The lower right vent has always been open until the last few days as I experimented. It's open again.
The 4" vent fan is upper left and blows out. It would be great to have it on a thermostat, I'll have to think about that. Problem is, when I turn the fan off the temp slowly rises to about where I want it but the humidity immediately goes wild. I thought the heat would eventually burn off some humidity but I've left it off as long as the plants could stand it and the humidity stays maxed out. You can check out the temp and humidity graphs on the bottom of my weather page, it's something to behold.
I have one idea left - there's a 6" vent in the top, left side. I'll open it, open both left and right lower vents and turn the vent fan off to see if I can get more convection flow. I'd really like the temp up to about 80*F and RH around 50%. You'll be able to see what happens on my weather page. It's 14:10 my time (-7:00 GMT). Back in a bit.
Mon, 2009/01/19 - 5:30pm
#44
I think you should leave the fan on, it creates a positive vacuum in your grow tent and will remove (suck out) heat and humidity - the humidity will be seen to climb during the lower night time temperatures.
If you leave it on permanently though, does it reduce the temperature too much?
Also, your extraction fan must be 'man' enough for your grow tent : - Multiply your grow room Length x Width x Height to give the volume. Then multiply this by 20 (the air needs to be replaced every 3 minutes or twenty times an hour), this will give you the cubic capacity. Check your current fan has the ooomph to meet this figure - if you know the specification of the fan that is.
Ballast, as you know, generate quite a bit of heat. Digital ballasts are better, they are highly efficient and generate very little heat. Is your ballast affecting the grow room temperature?
Edit - I've been doing some maths on your grow room! Your 4" fan should displace 175m cubed per hour, your grow room is 14.4m cubed (if I have done my inches to metric conversion properly), so your 4" fan is more than adequate.
Edit2 - Just read you grow room spec., you have a digital ballast so ignore that part.
Mon, 2009/01/19 - 5:54pm
#45
It's been over 90 minutes and the temp and RH are right where I want them, so far - 81* & 48%. I have a 6" circulation fan inside the tent so the air should be getting mixed pretty well and hopefully the flowers getting pollinated. I shake them every day when I take a picture, just in case.
Peat, I've always had the vent fan on the 18 hour cycle with the lights and as you say, temp drops and RH rises during the off hours at night. Wow, your edit just appeared as I was writing about the vent fan and had to open another page, I came back and there it was with no refresh.. How neat Yeah, it's plenty macho for my tent.
The light does put out some heat, I've measured the tubes at 118*F and the hottest spot (ballast) at 135*F!
So far things are looking good so I'll let it go for a while. Maybe it won't drink so much water, I need to fill the tank again tomorrow after adding 4 gallons just 3 days ago.
Sun, 2009/01/25 - 7:50pm
#46
Two months - The plants have flowers everywhere and a few chiles almost 2" long! The grow light is now four 3000K tubes and I'm moving the nutes a little more towards bloom stage. I'll be changing the lighting from 18 hours to 13 hours a day tonight. I finally got close to the temp and RH I want by turning off the vent fan, opening the right and left lower vents and the top and upper right 6" vent ports. The high humidity took its toll though, I lost quite a few flowers and leaves before getting it right and the humidity may still be a little high for chiles. Now if I could get 82*F and 30% RH I think they'd be happy.
PH is still a problem using distilled water and I finally bought some odd PH up mixture called EcoChem. The hydro store had no GH brand. The bottle had crystals I added water to and it got HOT but cooled off quickly. Instructions said 1 tbsp per gallon would raise PH 1 point - NOT. 2.5 tbsp in 4 gallons raised the PH from 4.8 to 6.8 so I had to add another gallon of 5 PH grow mix to make it halfway decent. So far this has been fun but I really miss seeing them every day like we do the AGs.
Ahh... can't get lightbox to work right..... check out http://picasaweb.google.com/av8ndv8/20090124# The lettuce and peppers are there too...
Sun, 2009/01/25 - 8:01pm
#47
Ooh, growtent peppers looking great! I wonder if they too will need light to ripen? Could be tough down there.
Are the other AG peppers still producing well?
I finally yanked my latest starter pods out of the pro100 and put them in a bowl of plain water. I think maybe the Aerogarden soup is too strong for starting lettuce seeds, because I'm sure not having much luck starting another two pods.
Mon, 2009/01/26 - 12:36pm
#48
Those plants look really good, plenty of light to bathe in.
What's going wrong with your pH? It's normal for it to drift up, not down - you usually set it at the lower end (5.5) and it drifts up, giving the plants the full range of pH and nutes.
If the plants are taking up little nutes and only water, the pH will go down and the EC rise in the left over solution - are you getting this?
Tue, 2009/01/27 - 3:30am
#49
Thanks ya'll, I'm pretty happy with them, I'm getting fewer dropped flowers and more chiles are starting to set once I got temp, RH and PH about right. I think I have plenty of light but time will tell. I see what you mean about lower *K lamps putting out less light, gisette. Dunno if it's a eyeball spectrum trick but it definitely is dimmer in there than it used to be but the temp is a tad higher. If you look hard at one of the pics on my Picasa link above you'll see how the AG peppers are doing - they're going wild, twice the peppers and bigger ones than before. One little 2"x2" area has 7 or 8 peppers growing. I've never seen plants do so well and look so nice.
Peat, as for the nutes, I've been using distilled water like you suggested and standard GH grow mix formula comes out ~PH 5 and EC 2.2. I made 4 gallons of intermediate bloom mix and the PH was ~4.8 and EC is 2.4. It stays steady because there's no feedback, the pots just take whatever is in the tank when the autovalves open. I haven't tested the soil and haven't tested the PH in the pot sumps for a few weeks. Can't check the EC level in the pot sumps, it's only 2.5 mm deep max but the plants are doing beautifully so I'll leave it alone.
The humidity graph is really odd since I turned the vent fan off. Before, the RH would rise during the night and drop when the lamps and fan came on, then rise when they went off, just like one would think. Now the RH drops about 20% when the lamps come on then within an hour is back up and slowly rises during the heat of the day. Here's the really odd part - when the lights go OFF, the RH immediately drops about 15% then slowly rises during the night but never to the daytime level. The only things I have running (and both on the same timer) are the lamps and the internal circulation fan.
Oh, gisette - I know you don't want to hear this but I started my (your) lettuce in a 1.2 EC grow mix and they've done fantastic, I've raised it slowly to 1.7 and they outgrow weeds.
Tue, 2009/01/27 - 11:01am
#50
No, I want to hear it... My lettuce grows better on the GH nutes too, I think. Just need to flush and refill often, since I can't measure/control it very well... I should probably switch the pro100 back to GH nutes, but haven't yet. I do add a little GH nutes even to the tanks where I'm using Aerogrow's.
Great to see this, I was wondering how it was all going. You don't seem to be running into any growing problems, so far (and I hope you don't), with this tan precipitant.
Did you ever get your test kit for measuring the different nutrients? This may show you what the consistency is in there, it looks like rust? Could it be some form of bacteria, pythium type?
I'm loathed to recommend any treatment until we know what it is.