Long time, first time. (AG, Stealth, garage) *PICS*

Hello RIU crew,

I have been lurking for a while on a few different forums and thought it was time to take the plunge and start a thread and see what happens. I have seen a lot of threads where you can tell the people haven't searched and they hardly get any replies. I hope that doesn't happen here as I have taken the time and not just thrown out the "I got a AG, what's next" post.

Here we go:
I have been a smoker for sometime now and just got sick of the constant hassle of finding the goods. Or when I got them they were less then good or light. ARGHHH I hate that. After talking with my wife I got the green light to do a small personal setup in the corner of my garage.

Here is the corner I am working with: (Attached picture below)
The tape represents the box, the hole at the top will be the exhaust that vents right to the outdoors. The yellow container at the bottom left will be the intake vent. This will be 30x30x40 MAX and would prefer it as small as possible but worth my time and effort, this is all for personal use. It's mapped out at 28x28x35 as you see it.

Here is the plan:
Use the Aerogarden Deluxe with a lowryder strain (both on the way) and only grow two babies at a time. I have read the units limits and that's ok with me for now. If I get into this and the AG is too small I would have built the "box" big enough for a small DIY setup to fit inside anyway and will just do that but for now I will try the AG.

I was thinking of getting the Homebox XS and enclosing that inside an insulted, sound deadened lockable box. Would that be overkill? I just need to make sure this is under the rader being a productive citizen and all. I was thinking with the Homebox I would't need to mess with Mylar , be concerned with total darkness, etc and I like just kind of like it for some reason.

Sorry for the long thread, I will wrap it up here with my parts list. Am I missing anything? Thanks for the help and I will keep this updated with pictures that will hopefully help some newbs in the future.

Unit:
* AG deluxe
* A 4-5 Airstone with pump

Test Subjects:
* Novelty Lowryder #2 Fem & Diesel Ryder seeds

Liquids:
* Lots of Distilled water
* Nutes (Liquid Nutrient Trio Soil Formula- Big Bloom, Grow Big, and Tiger Bloom)
* PH up/down

Lighting:
* Stock AG Deluxe lighting
* Supplemental lighting- four to six 25-42 Watt lights (each light with est 2000 lumens each)
* Misc reflectors and reflective walls

Ventilation:
* Room temp inlet into box with fan (still unsure on what exact fans)
* 3" outlet venting to outdoors with fan
* DIY Carbon scrubber
* Small oscillating desk fan

Meters and Tester:
* Temp and humidity displays
* PH meter

Misc things:
* Timer
* Power strip
* Electrcity useage monitor
* Ducting



Ok, I just have a few questions on a setup like this.

Nutes:
1. Are the Fox farm products the way to go? If so will the Trio I listed above be good enough or should I get the Open Sesame, Cha Ching, and Beastie Bloom also? If not steer me in the right direction.

Lighting:
2. Should I try to stick with a bunch of supplemental CFL's or would it be better to get two or three 2ft. T5 bulbs? In the future I would be interested in a smaller HPS setup but for now I'll try the AG hood with light.

Ventilation:
3. If I need to pull room temp air into the box from a duct 8 feet away what sort of fan would I use? I wouldn't think a bigger computer fan would suck in enough air, but am not sure

Testers:
4. Is a $100 digital meter needed? Can I just use the strips to test the PH levels or will be digi save me a headache a month down the road? Is a PPM/EC tester needed?

Whew, I need to go to bed now.

you have read the grow faq right
if not take a look at that it should have at least some of the answers you are looking for

on another note what do you have your sr20det setup in

i'd buy the george cervantes book then you will know everything like me.

you have listed to many questions.

1 no
2 no
3 bigger
4 no

1. foxfarm nutes are great, i had a clone that was hurting, i put it in foxfarm nutes and it came back like a champ and is growing nicely. Go with ocean forrest potting soil and then get leap frog acid loving plants, mic the two together according to directions, plant your seeds, seedlings or clones, then water, badda bing!!

2. if you are going to do florecents i recommend getting t5's, they chould each put out 5k lumens so you'll need 4-5 IMO

3.i'd go to you're local hardware store and pick up and inline booster fan, they are about 275cfm, and the 6" is about 30-50 bucks, you'll need to wire yourself a plug for it

4. A digital PH reader comes in handy so much it is unbelievable, but from the sounds of it you are doing soil, so you wont need a digital one. Just get the PH strips for when you mic the nute in the water and test that to make sure water is about 6.2-6.5 if you do that you shouldn't need to check the ph of the soil, it should normally be in that range if you use that PH water