My Pandemic Project featuring Chinese LED Strips

Gardenator said:

People trapped in a sealed box will die from suffication, air is depleted of O2 and CO2 through breathing and transpiration, a completely truly sealed container only holds so much volume of air, our cillia in our lungs uses the oxygen in the air and breathes out the carbon dioxide, you would fully deplete the "air space" of breatheable air if CO2 and O2 are not replenished, the plants however only transpire CO2 durring the day when photosynthesizing and transpire O2 durring their dark period because they are still metabolically active but not photosynthesizing. The plants are creating his fresh air only because he is enriching the day period with CO2 which contains O2 that they will later transpire when the lights go out... dead air does exist thats why people die when a mine shaft collapses because they physically run out of breatheable air, also in this case i imagine every time he enters and leaves his room fresh air is exchanged in due to negative pressure unless he has an air curtain on his door in which case air is pushed out of the space...

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Ya a mineshaft is different, you gotta under stand, our room are not truly sealed in that sense...like I have a open and closing door to walk into the flower room. I never have my co2 levels above 1500ppms so its never a real danger or anything. Your thinking of sealing a room as in a glass box in space when its not really like that. For instance I framed in my room in a basement which had 2x4 ceiling rafter. I had to cut out foam board and stick in between the 2x4 square the were created by framing a wall. I sealed the foam board with great stuff insulation foam spray around the edges. It can only be so perfect to air can get in and out. I had to seal up like 10 of these 2x4 rafter spaces above the wall I framed in. This is the wall and door outside of flower room- these are the rafters boxes I had to seal in-

We basically seal are rooms the best we can to run proper co2 levels. Let me tell you this-since running a sealed room, I'm growing the best bud I've ever grown! Thats the truth.

sf_frankie said:

My stubborn ass wanted so bad to make a portable or window shaker work. Been reading about modifying them to work for like 12 hrs straight. Finally came to the conclusion that it is not the right way to do it so I ordered a minisplit.

I will never finish designing and building this grow room will I. Dammit

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That's how it goes! Once you think you got everything you need! Something else pops up or you think of something else!
Sick ass laundry room man! That'll be a killer grow room come flowering!

Gardenator said:

Im going to try sealing it up, i will have to unduct my canfan and seal the ducting up so this will have to be after this current flower cycle im on. Only one thing is i want to run an inline canfan on a damper duct relayed to kick on if the oxygen level in the room drops below a certain level, i will have to solder in a 5v relay into an air quality meter on its alarm signal to kick on the fan and pull fresh air in from outside through a custom filter box. Probly a tote with holes drilled in pulling in air through filters i can change in and out as i need to...

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I don't understand why you worrying about oxygen levels. I don't think any grower monitors oxygen levels. You should just be focusing on your co2 levels and keeping them in the 1000-1500ppm level and you're good to go. I mean you could have that in-line fan kick on and push fresh air in the room if your co2 levels got to high but that shouldn't happen if your room is dialed in. You could run fresh air in the room when lights are off as well but I don't see the point. I believe your overthinking this.

Keesje said:

Dead air does not exist.
It is more a thing we say when we - people - are in a room which lacks fresh air.
But plants only need CO2 and O2.
CO2 you can supply with a bottle or a burner. And O2 is always present.

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Ya you're 100% right. Also the air isn't stagnant because I have an carbon filter>>inline fan>>blowing air all around the sealed room. Plus 2 big oscillating fans on the wall blowing air/co2 over the plants. Air is constantly moving in my flower room. I leave the oscillating wall fans on when the lights are off as well. I really like how they strengthen up my plants. Actually I've been running my minisplit when lights are off cause it been so fucking hot up in the northeast this past June, just run it on auto in the high 70s. So it kicks on here and there. Doesn't have to run to much. Also any of you guys with a mini split-->you have to get the sensibo, you sync the sensibo up with your minisplit controller then to your phone. Download the app and you can control your minisplit and flower room from phone. Yesterday I was at the store and turned on my minisplit 10 mins before lights went on from phone. Really cool and cheap, only like $100. You can also set a 7 day on/off time schedule from your sensibo app on phone. Its sweet. Wish I got the thing a year ago. My mini split controller only had a 12 hour timer on it so I always had to be home, fucking sucked. Don't know why they only have that option, seems a lot of minisplit companies only have a limited timer on their controllers. You think they would have so you could set it up for the week.

Dead air does not exist. Lack of O2 does exist.
Of course when you put someone is a absolutely 100% closed room he will eventually die.

But let's keep it practical and not theoretical: we are looking at grow rooms here.
A grow room, even when it is a 100% sealed one, contains so much O2 that it will take a really long time before the roots consume all this O2.
Roots of most plants use 200 mg of oxygen per kilo of roots per hour.
A cubic meter of air contains almost 300,000 mg of oxygen.
So lets say you have 20 kilogram of roots on your plants, they will consume 4,000 mg per hour.
If your room would have a capacity of 8 cubic meters there will be 2,400,000 mg of O2.
2,400,000 divided by 4,000 = 600
So there will be enough O2 for 600 hours which is 25 days.
In a completel closed room!
But rooms never are completely sealed. there will always be a small gap. And people have to open the door, so new O2 will come in.

So the fear of 'stagnant dead air' is not necessary.

oops. double post. sorry

Fonzyyy21 said:

That's how it goes! Once you think you got everything you need! Something else pops up or you think of something else!
Sick ass laundry room man! That'll be a killer grow room come flowering!

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Ha thanks! Ive been “done” with the build like 10 times

Dividedsky said:

Shit dude 2800 ppms!!! You must be locked out. Have the co2 levels gone up at any time? Usually locked out plant can uptake co2 and your room will have really high levels of co2. I'm running a sealed room, hit me up if you have any questions. Don't sweat it bro, shit happens, after taking a few months off I ran in to some problems starting back up, you'll be alright. Just water straight ph'd water for a week or 2. I can recommend canna nutes- its the canna terra line. Really easy to use, its 1-grow nute, 1-flower nute and a few additives. I feed 2-3 feedings in a row then straight watering. Last feeding was 650 ppms and then a few day later when I did straight water, my runoff was 300 ppms. I use r/o water sometimes half r/o half tap. Canna nutes are the shit and work for me.

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Yeah, I’ve got bad lock out for sure. Gonna flush for the next week at least and then switch to my new nute recipe. CO2 levels are okay. I’ve backed off the gen and only run about 750ppm. Haven’t had a spike from the plants at all. I’ve seen the canna line, they do look good but I’m gonna give this maxibloom recipe a try. It’s well balanced and stupid cheap. Should be able to do a whole run for less than $50. I don’t run RO water cause my tap is pretty benign. I’ve got a carbon filter that filters heavy metals and chlorine and I’ve got a giant air stone in the res so I let it off gas to make sure all the chlorine is gone before feeding.

Dividedsky said:

Ya you're 100% right. Also the air isn't stagnant because I have an carbon filter>>inline fan>>blowing air all around the sealed room. Plus 2 big oscillating fans on the wall blowing air/co2 over the plants. Air is constantly moving in my flower room. I leave the oscillating wall fans on when the lights are off as well. I really like how they strengthen up my plants. Actually I've been running my minisplit when lights are off cause it been so fucking hot up in the northeast this past June, just run it on auto in the high 70s. So it kicks on here and there. Doesn't have to run to much. Also any of you guys with a mini split-->you have to get the sensibo, you sync the sensibo up with your minisplit controller then to your phone. Download the app and you can control your minisplit and flower room from phone. Yesterday I was at the store and turned on my minisplit 10 mins before lights went on from phone. Really cool and cheap, only like $100. You can also set a 7 day on/off time schedule from your sensibo app on phone. Its sweet. Wish I got the thing a year ago. My mini split controller only had a 12 hour timer on it so I always had to be home, fucking sucked. Don't know why they only have that option, seems a lot of minisplit companies only have a limited timer on their controllers. You think they would have so you could set it up for the week.

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I’ll check out that sensibo. My minisplit has a USB port on it for a WiFi enabled controller. I’ve got most things in my room hooked up to smart switches so I can control them from anywhere. The nice thing about the switches is that you can monitor power levels which you can use to monitor activity. Like if my ac is pulling 1200w I know it’s on full blast. I can also monitor temp and humidity from my phone and get alerts if it gets to high or low. If I get a crazy humidity spike I can remotely trigger my exhaust fan.

sf_frankie said:

I’ll check out that sensibo. My minisplit has a USB port on it for a WiFi enabled controller. I’ve got most things in my room hooked up to smart switches so I can control them from anywhere. The nice thing about the switches is that you can monitor power levels which you can use to monitor activity. Like if my ac is pulling 1200w I know it’s on full blast. I can also monitor temp and humidity from my phone and get alerts if it gets to high or low. If I get a crazy humidity spike I can remotely trigger my exhaust fan.

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Nice that's cool, ya I'm slowly switching all my stuff over to smart controls, its the way to go. Seeing I'm in a legal state I'm not worried about it anymore. People used to be all worried about smart tvs listening to them, ect. I'd be hesitant back in the day if they had smart technology with whats come out how "they" monitor people...but I also think people are a bit paranoid, if smart devices are monitoring you its pretty much to make algorithms to market shit to you so you buy products, thats about it.

Yeah I doubt these can really monitor much. They don’t have any microphones or anything hooked up. My house is full of smart shit though. If they are monitoring me they’re probably bored. They get to listen to me fart all day. Not like they can feed me ads anyway. I’ve got a DNS ad blocker. Plus this grow is 100% legal. There is no plant limit here. Just have to keep your canopy under 100 sqft so I could double the size and still be okay!

Check out the smart switches. They’re dirt cheap. Usually get a pair for less than $15. Make sure to get the 15a ones. Before I went sealed I was able to automate my fans and ac. If the ac started to run full blast it would shut off my exhaust fan so I wasn’t sucking out cold air. The trigger was the power draw. The ac pulls 1200w at full strength so I set the fan to shut down if the ac plug sensed a draw of over 1200w. There’s all kinds of cool ways to interpret the data to get an idea of what all your devices are doing when you aren’t in the room.

Dividedsky said:

I don't understand why you worrying about oxygen levels. I don't think any grower monitors oxygen levels. You should just be focusing on your co2 levels and keeping them in the 1000-1500ppm level and you're good to go. I mean you could have that in-line fan kick on and push fresh air in the room if your co2 levels got to high but that shouldn't happen if your room is dialed in. You could run fresh air in the room when lights are off as well but I don't see the point. I believe your overthinking this.

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CO2 is always at 1200+ ppm, i have a small room, like i said walking in and out is an exchange of air, it just depletes O2 quickly when you dont allow any other air in or out and generate asuch CO2 as i do... the term stagnant or dead just reffers to the fact its depleted of O2 and CO2 i dont literally mean its "Dead" lets be real here. A 5x5 sealed flower space thats 8ft in height wont take long for the volume of air to have either too much co2 or that in conjunction with depleted O2 levels, i use exhale bags monitored with a controller hooked to a burner as back up. The bags just make Co2 even when the exhaust is on full its at 1500ppm or 1700ppm if i sealed this room i would literally kill my plants whith CO2 and no O2, in just a few hours CO2 levels would be above 3500ppm's and the plants would def die

See Sensibo's comments on ebay. There is great dissatisfaction.

Gardenator said:

A 5x5 sealed flower space thats 8ft in height wont take long for the volume of air to have either too much co2 or that in conjunction with depleted O2 levels,

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Too much CO2 you can control (with the right controller)
Too little O2 will never, ever happen.

Keesje said:

Too much CO2 you can control (with the right controller)
Too little O2 will never, ever happen.

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All i want to do if i seal my room is relay an air quality meter on a relay or a programmed timer to kick on a filtered fresh air intake and exhaust fans on to exchange the air out, id rather dump and change the air every so often, i think its healthier to have fresh air you dont have to agree

You know you’ve got a popular grow journal when people argue in it! Not bothered by it at all, actually enjoy the debate!

I installed my minisplit today. Was actually super simple. Thanks again to @Gardenator for being quick to answer questions when I was unsure of a step. Hopefully have a sparky coming tomorrow to wire it up for me. I could do it myself but I don’t like to fuck with electricity. Especially getting behind the breaker panel. Still need to track down or buy a vacuum manifold to vacuum the lines then she’s ready to roll.

Cleaned up the room a bit and moved a couple things around to be more ergonomic.

Plants are at the start of a one or two week flush period. My buddies nute recipe was no bueno. My runoff measured 2800ppm with a pH around 4.7. Plants were completely locked out and now they’re fried. They should recover no problem. What doesn’t kill them makes them stronger...I hope. They’re still growing which is good. Gonna need to start culling the herd soon. Will probably end up with around 10 fewer plants for flowering unless I add some supplemental lighting.

Gardenator said:

i think its healthier to have fresh air you dont have to agree

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Of course one should always do what one thinks is right. Even if it is just for ease of mind.
But things like 'fresh air' are human judgements. Us humans like rooms where the humidity is not too high and the amount of CO2 is not too high. If we stay in a room where the CO2 is too high for a long time, it makes us feel tired and can cause even headaches.
By opening a window and letting in 'fresh air', we even out the amount of CO2.
Plants absorb molecules of CO2 through the stomata and O2 through their roots. There is no 'bad' or 'fresh' O2. O2 is O2.
Plants also don't care about high levels of CO2 (not too high of course)

Keesje said:

Of course one should always do what one thinks is right. Even if it is just for ease of mind.
But things like 'fresh air' are human judgements. Us humans like rooms where the humidity is not too high and the amount of CO2 is not too high. If we stay in a room where the CO2 is too high for a long time, it makes us feel tired and can cause even headaches.
By opening a window and letting in 'fresh air', we even out the amount of CO2.
Plants absorb molecules of CO2 through the stomata and O2 through their roots. There is no 'bad' or 'fresh' O2. O2 is O2.
Plants also don't care about high levels of CO2 (not too high of course)

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O2 isnt the part that is "bad" or "fresh" and O2 is O2, but air does become "stagnant", the term literally refers to the air quality being too low to be safe to breathe, Air Stagnation. Too much CO2 and plants will close their stomata and stop uptaking O2 from their roots and stop retaining water and lock out nutrients, turn yellow and die, they become sick from CO2 toxicity within a couple hours above 2200ppms, also if a single powdery mildew spore got into a sealed room where would it go? Your air scrubber also wont scrub the spores or anything but the organic material in the air thats meant to be absorbed by the activated carbon behind the screen, it will not improve your air quality past reducing the particulate count in your room and removes organic terpenes from the air through absorbtion, it will never however create a clean and breatheable enviroment on its own and doesnt make it any safer to have that scrubbing the air then it would be to turn on a fan for circulation with an air filter taped to it. all your are really doing is eliminating the smell of any airborn paticulates or terpenes in your air and taking out the dust and organic particulates. Im concerned that legitimately in less then a couple hours my CO2 would be over 3000ppm with the bags, id have to ditch those and solely rely on my burner for enrichment. The plants will use the CO2 over time and i doubt it would build up too much unless the burner malfunctions and stays lit, the bags just pump it out faster then plants use it.

Look i know you would never let the plants get CO2 toxicity or allow the air in the room to be unbreatheable and that would be the extreme end result, but in anycase air quality drops the longer a volume of air stays in one spot unchanged. Plants def care about O2 or the roots would die. CO2 readily combines with water to create carbonic acid, this kills everything. And nothing likes CO2 to be more then 1500ppm's except for maybe some of your more tropical varieties of plants or jungle vegitation like ferns but still topping out under 2000ppm's. When water goes bad or becomes stagnant its not because the water dissapears from the cup or is a different molecular make up, its still H2O, but its because its not safe to drink. This is because its either polluted or full of nasty bacteria or its not being 02 enriched as it should be to stay from becoming stagnant, like you would aerate your res or the solution goes bad. Same as air stagnation doesnt mean the air is gone, it means what your plants are breathing is unhealthy and could lead to a variety of problems for you in the future such as contamination and low transpiration levels and slower growth rates. Nobody said O2 went bad, nobody said that air goes bad, i said air quality is reduced, as it is over time in a stationary volume of air (circulated or not) and that is called Air Stagnation. It exists and it happens, its not a judgement call, or made up by people it literally means its hard and/or unhealthy to breathe and the air has been depleted of O2 or is full of nasty contaminants and particulates that reduce air quality. Ill keep getting fresh air to my plants because i feel they need it. i still think ur flowers are badass and looking super healthy, props for being able to seal your room and it not be an issue, im too skeptical to go full seal and not allow any air exchange to happen.

Plants continue to improve. I moved all the big healthy ones to the outer edge of the tables and put the strugglers toward the center. Hoping to slow down the big girls and give the weaker plants a chance to catch up.



My Runtz plant is a stretcher for sure. A good foot taller than the other 3.

This little freakazoid is some random strain called doctors order. The guy at the dispensary basically gave it to me. It started as a little beanstalk with like three leaves. It’s growing weird but it’s super healthy.

I was worried the peanut butter Breath wasn’t gonna stop growing out but it’s finally adding some height.

I’d say this chili verde suffered the worst of my nutrient burn problems but it’s bouncing back and looking better everyday!

Manifold gauge to vac the minisplit lines should arrive by Wednesday so I can finally dump this shit portable. Can’t wait for that.