cannatari
Well-Known Member
Waddup RIU!
This journal is about my DIY 2010 grow cab. This is my 3rd cab build and my first time using water-cooled lighting and a digital ballast. This build took about 2 weeks for me to design after I had decided on the cabinet. It took me 2 months to decide on a cab. The cabinet that I chose is a 3 foot wide x 2 feet deep x 6 foot 6 inch tall steel janitorial closet with black powdercoat. I bought it new online. Main factors in my decision were security and stealth. Currently the cab is designed to also cure and store. Most pre-fab cabinet systems put a veg chamber in with the extra room. My reason for designing it this way was to keep all the stinky under lock and key, and under the same treated exhaust.
The cabinet has been made completely light-tight and has a HEPA filter intake and a carbon filter exhaust. My resivoir for the light is a top-opening freezer with 16 gallons of chlorinated water within a .5mm visqueen lining. The hydros are 2 Stealth Hydro bubbleponic units that I "lost the tubes and kept the bubbles". I had to build a wooden platform for the cab to sit on to support the weight of the 2 8gal hydros. A 4" 154CFM duct booster fan hangs in my attic and pulls air from a hole in the top of the cab and runs 24/7. Temps stay at room temperature within the cab but it ain't summer yet. Total build cost including black-out curtains for the room was about $2600.
Currently, I have 6 plants in the cab. The largest one on the right is a Barney's LSD from seed, the 2 medium sized plants in the middle are grab-bag Soma's from seed and the 3 small plants on the left are Strawberry Cough clones. Growing different sizes this way my first round should reveal my optimum plant size for the cab. So far it's looking like bigger is better, as long as the LSD doesn't out grow the cab or grow whispy buds down low. The girls are fed Dyna Grow as per the manufacturer's feeding chart with the addition of 29% H2O2. Ph does not fluctuate and is maintained at 6.3. Tap water is at a beautiful 40ppm right out of the faucet and I don't let it sit out overnight. I will add bat guano tea towards the end of flowering as an organic flavor enhancer. I run the guano through an old coffee machine and brew a pot. I've never heard of anybody doing this before. It was an experiment in my early days when there wasn't much of a hydro-organic market. Old school growers will tell you "Ain't nuthin better than bat guano" and I agree.
Thanks for stopping by, usual rules apply here and incidentally it was researching this build when I discovered RIU and I want to thank y'all for getting me this far. Best of yields to all!
This journal is about my DIY 2010 grow cab. This is my 3rd cab build and my first time using water-cooled lighting and a digital ballast. This build took about 2 weeks for me to design after I had decided on the cabinet. It took me 2 months to decide on a cab. The cabinet that I chose is a 3 foot wide x 2 feet deep x 6 foot 6 inch tall steel janitorial closet with black powdercoat. I bought it new online. Main factors in my decision were security and stealth. Currently the cab is designed to also cure and store. Most pre-fab cabinet systems put a veg chamber in with the extra room. My reason for designing it this way was to keep all the stinky under lock and key, and under the same treated exhaust.
The cabinet has been made completely light-tight and has a HEPA filter intake and a carbon filter exhaust. My resivoir for the light is a top-opening freezer with 16 gallons of chlorinated water within a .5mm visqueen lining. The hydros are 2 Stealth Hydro bubbleponic units that I "lost the tubes and kept the bubbles". I had to build a wooden platform for the cab to sit on to support the weight of the 2 8gal hydros. A 4" 154CFM duct booster fan hangs in my attic and pulls air from a hole in the top of the cab and runs 24/7. Temps stay at room temperature within the cab but it ain't summer yet. Total build cost including black-out curtains for the room was about $2600.
Currently, I have 6 plants in the cab. The largest one on the right is a Barney's LSD from seed, the 2 medium sized plants in the middle are grab-bag Soma's from seed and the 3 small plants on the left are Strawberry Cough clones. Growing different sizes this way my first round should reveal my optimum plant size for the cab. So far it's looking like bigger is better, as long as the LSD doesn't out grow the cab or grow whispy buds down low. The girls are fed Dyna Grow as per the manufacturer's feeding chart with the addition of 29% H2O2. Ph does not fluctuate and is maintained at 6.3. Tap water is at a beautiful 40ppm right out of the faucet and I don't let it sit out overnight. I will add bat guano tea towards the end of flowering as an organic flavor enhancer. I run the guano through an old coffee machine and brew a pot. I've never heard of anybody doing this before. It was an experiment in my early days when there wasn't much of a hydro-organic market. Old school growers will tell you "Ain't nuthin better than bat guano" and I agree.
Thanks for stopping by, usual rules apply here and incidentally it was researching this build when I discovered RIU and I want to thank y'all for getting me this far. Best of yields to all!
This left me some room to spread out the remaining Somas and SCs. Check out the 2 and 4 main colas:
