First grow attempt indoors. Need advice/opinions good or bad!

Elmo's Closet

Active Member
Hello, everyone! I am completely new to the forum in terms of posting but have read a lot of stuff on this forum. I have gained a lot of what i believe to be very helpful and valuable information so I would like to first off say thank you :grin:!

MY BOX:
(Temperature referred to in F unless mentioned otherwise.)
I have recently built (not yet complete) a roughly 18" x 18" x 40" grow box/tent using panda film and pvc. I had to make it that size so it would fit into the corner of my closet making it as least visible as possible. I currently have 4x 23w 6500k cfls and 2x 48w 2700k cfls being used to grow my plant. I had 1 pc fan (4") blowing air out of the box and a bit smaller cpu fan pushing air in. My plant is now on day 20 and the temperature in my room after just getting a temperature/humidity device that the temperature was in the upper 80's and the humidity ranges around mid 40's so far. We keep our condo around 69-70 degrees. I got so scared for my plant that I opened up the front flap a bit and positioned a small plug in fan to blow air from inside the closet into the tent which seems to have brought the temp down to around 80. I realize that this lets essential light escape the box which is counterproductive. I also realize that when this little (hopefully girl) starts getting bigger it will smell and I will be forced to close the tent. I forgot to mention I also built a homemade Walmart carbon filter after reading a guide online.

MY PLANT:
I am using an unknown seed that I collected from a batch I had probably a year or so ago. I feel like it was good stuff but who knows since i had only been smoking for a few months before i obtained it. I am treating this as a practice run of sorts since I will have some fem. white widow seeds soon. That being said this is still my first (indoors) and I love it like its my own blood! I topped the plant at the end of day 18 right above what I believe is the 4th node (above the 4th set of leaves starting from the first true leaves.) This may have been done too early but I read different tips on topping from so many different people lol. An odd thing that occurred with my plant that I have never seen before was that it grew a 3 leaf set as each of the 2 true leaves. Looks like this: \ | / .

Here are my questions:
What can I do to keep my box at a temperature that allows the plant to grow without ducting to outside as this is not possible in my situation. Do I need more air intakes than just the one I have?
Will I be able to get my pc fan to be able to get air to exit through the carbon filter or should I make two?
Am I using too many watts for the young age of the plant? Will removing some temporarily solve my heat problem while keeping the plant growing at a good pace?
My tent is about 41" tall. Accounting for my 4 gal. pot, at what point should I start my 12/12 cycle?

My plant is reaching the end of day 20. It was topped at the end of day 18. Tomorrow will be 3 weeks and it feels like its going by so slow!

Currently working on getting pics up of the end of day 19.
 

Elmo's Closet

Active Member
Here is an update on my plant and a couple pics of my (in progress) grow box. As you can see it needs some cable management and some cleaning up. I also haven't attached the filter as it hasn't started smelling past the plant itself. Some things I have added to the box since last post: A second larger exhaust pc fan at the top giving me 2 fans pushing air out. I also added a second hole at the bottom for air intake. I held an incense up to the openings at the bottom and the smoke rushed to go inside the box. I guess this means i have negative pressure or something like that which is a good thing. So far my temps range from 81-85 with the lights on and 78-80 with the lights off. When I add my carbon filter to the exhausts, I am scared it will shoot my temps up too high thus stressing my plant. I am prepared to make a second filter for the second exhaust which will hopefully keep the temp rise at a minimum.
 

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