Help with lights and nutes and my beginner questions please?

"wattage doesn't matter, PAR, PPFD, DLI and spectrum are what matters"

True, but we know what wattage is required from each light source to give us those figures(roughly).
And in the case of LED bulbs you need to know what the real wattage is because they like to advertise them with equivalent wattage, which is based on the light output in comparison to old incandescent bulbs.

So you might see an LED household bulb labeled as 25w , when it's 4w and end up drastically under lit.
Similarly some grow light companies are still using these tactics to sell lights.

And yes, you can have those bulbs very close .

Back in the days of CFL bulbs you had to have them almost touching.

SalmanEskay said:

It's currently hitting peak colds in temperature

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It gives you plenty of time to plan for the warmer temps. Find a good location, plan how to get your supplies there.

SalmanEskay said:

My neighbours are nosy and I'm planning to exit the air outdoors through a window with an exhaust fan and a carbon filter with activated charcoal but I'm not sure it will kill the odor.

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I would spend a good amount of time on the stealth sections of this forum. You’ll get alot of ideas in there.

20 years ago you could find kits online, or plans, to grow in a PC case. Granted, they were some really, really, really small yeilds. But it was better than nothing.

If you have really nosy neighbors, and can’t get real grow lights, a 3x3 tent might be a little ambitious.

I don’t have any experience with those types of LED lights, but back in the day I did quite a few grows off CFLs. The plan was to line the top of the grow area with as many CFLs as you could fit, and get them as close as possible to the plants. Back then, T6 lights were better, but CFLs could often fit in places T6’s couldn’t. I’d opt for a line of T6’s before I’d use those LEDs though (but that’s me).

You could also dismantle a HPS system from a home supply store, used for outdoor security lights (although getting harder to find), like this. It’ll put out significantly more heat than CFLs, LEDs, or T6’s. But it’ll put out much better light.

I know you don’t want to hear it, but everyone else in this thread is right. Save up and buy a grow light. Even if the cost is 4x what someone else can buy it for. If you get 10-20x the amount of product, for the same work, it’ll pay for itself in time anyway.

SalmanEskay said:

Then there is the problem of unavailability of marijuana fertilizers or being too darn expensive due to shipping. So I'm planning to buy each of the N, P and K separately and mix into different ratios myself.

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If you’re good with chemistry, you can do this. But I would HIGHLY HIGHLY recommend you don’t.

I made my own fertilizers in the 90’s, only because I wanted to get a better understanding of the chemistry behind it all. And things were very different back then. But it’s really a pain to do, and very easy to make a mistake. You also need to have a really good understanding of reading your plants for deficiencies. If you’re starting off, getting some good soil and some basic fertilizer and you’ll be fine. Yeah, some MJ fertilizer will be better, but even some miracle grow acid will work to learn.

If you’re on Reddit at all, there is a forum called /r/SpaceBuckets - it’s all about creatively growing in small spaces and containers. A lot of people are growing in small wardrobes, lidded trash cans, or even PC cases. Check it out for some inspiration. “Necessity is the mother of invention”