120W LED + Rainforest 66 + Papaya

Hi,

I will be using this journal to document my 1st LED grow. I will be growing papaya in a rainforest 66 and using a 120W tri-band LED.

Light: 120W tri-band LED from HTGSupply. Instead of normal tri-band technology (orange) it uses full-spectrum white which is the latest tech.

Hydroponic/DWC: Rainforest 66 from General Hydroponics. They call it the 66 because it has six 6" pots. I will only be using 5 sites and doing maintenence work (filling, draining, ph testing, etc.) via site 6.

Seeds: Nirvana Papaya seeds. For some pics and info about papaya see kevin's papaya grow.

All comments and questions are welcome!

I began germinating 5 papaya seeds 48 hours ago and only one has cracked. The other seeds looked like they were about to crack so I put them all in rapid rooters, gave them some water, and placed in rainforest.

I just flipped the switch on the LED about 20 minutes ago and WOW, it is much brighter than I expected. After exposure to the light for more than 15-30 seconds, my vision temporarily turns green when I leave the tent...which lasts for 1-2 minutes.

It is producing almost no heat and is extremely quiet, which were my main reasons for getting it so I'm very happy.

I will be growing them as-is for a couple of days before filling the res and activating the air stone and vortex sprayer.

Any feedback would be much appreciated.

damn. that light is nice. i especially like the table. i am def looking into both. i may try a setup like this. never seen that table before. looks really clean and simple. I'll be watching. good luck man. seeya soon. oh and the tent fits everything perfectly. how would you say the heat compares to 120 watts flouro. 2 48"t5ho bulbs i guess? even cooler? well let me know. looks great

I was really thinking about growing some papaya, ended up going with blueberry and a few blueberry crosses in the end though, pick n' mix.

I'm also really curious about how these plants will grow under LEDs..

1982grower said:

how would you say the heat compares to 120 watts flouro. 2 48"t5ho bulbs i guess? even cooler?

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The biggest CFL I've used is a 65W Fluorex and there is really no comparison even to that so far. This LED is putting out almost no heat, and the little that it does seems to be blown out of the top quickly by the fans. The glass bottom is only slightly warm to the touch...I would feel comfortable leaving plants pressed against it.

Thanks for checking it out

nice so little to no downward heat. looking into the table to hold a variety of mothers. its perfect. havn't even thought about the leds yet. waiting on some money and then i'll def look closer. i figure theyre like computers. no sense even looking 2 months before you buy. I have 4 weeks left in my 2 little grows so we'll see after that. Somebody mentioned that the leds can be moved to dif angles? i didn't think so but not sure? does yours? it seems like once you get a little canopy top of leaves those leds will be hitting them with all its force and there will be little wasted light. keep posting. seeya looking good

Hi 206,
I ran a rainforest for a while. It is a nice unit and produces very fast growth.

1982, the pictures don't tell the story that the spacing on this unit is pretty tight.

206, I hope you realize that you will not be able to veg 5 plants from seed to maturity and then flower them out in this system, it is too small.

I'm confused when you say you are going to be "growing them as-is for a couple days". Does that mean you are going to hand water the Rapid-Rooters?

Consider putting your mister on a timer. You could use a 2-3 / day cycle to water with the pump if you'd like to automate. There are other reasons to use a timer on the mister:

AeroKing said:

Heat is the #1 reason people run the pump on a timer.

Theoretically aeroponics will provide enough o2 to the roots, that they should not need a "drying out" time, like as is required with soil or ebb and flow hydroponics.

However, it seems that the problem isn't the lack of o2, but the fact that when roots are soaked consistently, they tend to mat together. When the roots are fluffy and spread out, they grow many tiny little white hairs that are very effective at absorbing water, nutes and o2. When they become matted, you will see less of these fine root hairs and the plants will not grow as fast.

So, the #2 reason would be to allow the roots time to dry out, not to provide o2 in and of itself, but to allow the roots to "fluff up" again(which they will not do if being sprayed constantly).

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yah it looks just a little small for mothers but doable if i took clones constantly and keep them small. I havn't seen it up close so i'd have to see the measurements. either way it looks high quality.

AeroKing said:

206, I hope you realize that you will not be able to veg 5 plants from seed to maturity and then flower them out in this system, it is too small.

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I'm not sure all five seeds are going to crack, so I might only do 3-4. We'll see though.

AeroKing said:

I'm confused when you say you are going to be "growing them as-is for a couple days". Does that mean you are going to hand water the Rapid-Rooters?

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Yeah that is what I meant to say

AeroKing said:

Consider putting your mister on a timer. You could use a 2-3 / day cycle to water with the pump if you'd like to automate. There are other reasons to use a timer on the mister:

Click to expand...

Thanks for the suggestion I will do this. If you have any other tips for the rainforest let me know

Looking forward to seeing how this turns out, good luck.

i have heard many times that papaya seeds are diff to germ. never tried them though

1982grower said:

i have heard many times that papaya seeds are diff to germ. never tried them though

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I'm starting to get worried about the four that didn't crack during germ...but I've read many times that papaya seeds are difficult to germ and if you just plant the duds they will grow in a few days. I'm hoping this is the case as they haven't popped up yet. The one that did have a tap root is now poking its head above soil, which was a nice sight.

Anyway today I filled the res and added 3 caps of micro/gro/bloon. First test 20 mins after filling:

188ppm
6.82 ph
55 degrees res temp
67 degrees ambient temp

Any suggestions? (This is my fist hydro grow but I have all the supplies like ph up/down)

ALSO: If anyone has experience with the rainforest 66 is reading this, can you please tell me how you ran the power cable from your vortex sprayer? I was expecting the sprayer to swivel back and forth, but mine just continues to swivel clockwise, eventually twisting up its own power cord??? I'm really not sure how to fix this? Can I secure the vortex sprayer in place or will that make it ineffective? Please help!

Pic 1: Installed a 12" air stone and air pump.
Pic 2: Strong ripples and bubbles from air stone, very impressed.
Pic 3: First one to sprout!
Pic 4: New top-down pic of tent. EDIT: hahaha...just realized how funny the ties on the light must look! I didn't have any cord so I cut a standard USB cable in half and it was a snug and secure fit...just not pretty.

Also if anyone can help me with a Rainforest 66 problem (see previous post) I would really appreciate it! cheers

man that light does look brighter than the pics can tell. if that makes sense. your seeds will sprout. i don't know from experience but i read a thread that sounded like yours and his sprouted within a week. they apperently have a hard shell and should be presoaked for 1 day but not positive. the guy who was growing them seemed reputable though. so they'll sprout. seeya soon

1982grower said:

man that light does look brighter than the pics can tell. if that makes sense.

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You are totally right. If you look at the first pic in my last post where I am installing the airpump, you can clearly see the LED's reflecting off very industrial plastic at the bottom of the res. And that is with a crappy digital camera and the downscaling...you get the idea.

Thanks for the encouragement, I hope the rest of them sprout soon.

hey man. i have a guy who grows papaya seeds like crazy. met him on his thread. sorry i don't know how to link you there. he is pming me to let me know exactly how he germs these seeds. everybody says they are difficult. so don't ditch them yet until he gives me a timeline. should be any moment. and he seems to know his stuff. i'll post soon but dont give up on those seeds.

well the news is good. after getting his very general answer he did say that he germs them like any other with presoaking in water for 2 hours first. he says they take forever but when they do pop even late, it doesn't seem to affect growth. not much help but at least you know a guy that has success with these has the same prob so they should sprout any time. seeya.

Your sprayer should engage into the grommet that it sits in.

The head of the sprayer should not move. It should be stationary and only the impeller should rotate.

I think I remember that happened to me when I was first setting this up. I think the little collar above the spray ports was getting caught in the grommet, which confused me. Push it down past and the head itself should fit snuggly into the grommet.

Hopefully, with your LED, you won't have the res temp problems that I did. I ended up installing a chiller, even after insulating the reservoir and the water lines. I was running it under an air cooled 400w MH.

I also found the res to be undersized for how fast this system grows. I'd fill it in the morning, and come back to it being below the minimum line for the sprayer to work. I added a float valve to auto fill off of my RO feed, but after adding all this plumbing, there was even less room in the res. I considered adding an external res, but in the end, I decided to just start custom building systems to fit my needs.

Thanks very much guys, +rep. I was able to secure the sprayer. The sprayer is much louder than I thought and is causing some weird rattles from the trays and pots because of vibration. I'm going to see what I can do about dampening the sound as this is very close to where I sleep.

Still haven't seen any more sprouts but I'll be patient.

After 8 hours with the sprayer activated, there was been substantial growth in the one seedling. It is also nice and humid in the tank now and just feels much better.

221 ppm
6.33 ph
65 degrees ambient temp
68 degrees res temp

Any advice on optimal ppm for 18 gallon tank + seedlings would be appreciated. I have GH micro/bloom/grow and fox farm grow big to work with. To date I have only been adding cap-full's of GH.

Thanks and more pics tomorrow. Peace.