Rubbermaid Auto BlueBerry Grow of Doom

So, to start things off. This is my first grow. I'm sure I will make plenty of mistakes along the way, but I'm hoping by documenting and sharing I will keep those mistakes down to a minimum. While waiting for my seeds to arrive, I've been doing a fair amount of research and development and decided to start with something simple. And now for the logistics:

Strain: DP Auto Blueberry
Containment: Two 30 gallon Rubbermaid tubs
Soil: Fox Farm Ocean Forest
Lights Veg: Four 26W 6500K CFL's
Lights Flower: Six 26W 2700K CFL's
Water: 2-day filtered tap
Nutes: Undetermined
Planted: 01/24/2011
Germinated: 01/27/2011

And now for imagery.

Day 1

Like your setup bro, im subbd. Try and post regularly dude and nothing will go wrong cause the peep here are always helping noobies like us. Respect man.

was thinking about doing a set up like this, and was hoping you could answer a few questions. How are the temperatures in the box? what kind of fans you using?

looks like a pair of computer fans, you can cut them out of an old computer and wire black/black red/red with a 12v phone charger, don't forget to use electrical tape on those wires showing don't want to start up any fires!

I will be constructing a growbox such as this one pretty soon, when i get it started ill postem up!

King Blunt said:

Like your setup bro, im subbd. Try and post regularly dude and nothing will go wrong cause the peep here are always helping noobies like us. Respect man.

Click to expand...

Thanks, I'll be trying to update it as much as I can.

prototypeone said:

was thinking about doing a set up like this, and was hoping you could answer a few questions. How are the temperatures in the box? what kind of fans you using?

Click to expand...

Sure no problem. I keep this setup in my closet, where the room (ambient) temperatures are around 68-72 . With out lights on, the setup sits at this temperature. With lights on, the setup hovers around 79 to 83. In a confined place closed like the closet, temperatures will vary by a factor of 2-/+ degrees depending on room temperature. The intake fan is a SilentX 80mm PC fan rated at 23 CFM. The exhaust fan is a Excalibur 120mm PC fan rated at 83 CFM (made by Cool Master.)

Krokaine said:

looks like a pair of computer fans, you can cut them out of an old computer and wire black/black red/red with a 12v phone charger, don't forget to use electrical tape on those wires showing don't want to start up any fires!

I will be constructing a growbox such as this one pretty soon, when i get it started ill postem up!

Click to expand...

Correct, you can use a phone charger as a power source with the molex connectors for the PC fans or you can grab a 4-pin molex power adapter which is what I'm using. They only run around $8 to $12.

cool I luv the rubbermaid grows, so I'm subbed! personally I would use the same fans for intake and exhaust like the biggest pc fans you can find, I also would've put the intake and exhaust on opposite sides, but thats just my preferance. I also got some nifty adapters, where I can control the speed.

so thats in your closet, I assume is light proof? I was dumb and actually painted one of mine black, for no reason at all.

Thanking about making one of these for a SOG that I could keep behind the couch... subbed wanna see how this goes.

Hippy putting your Auto in a 12oz party cup will stunt its growth and give you a terribly small yeild. your auto needs to be placed in a larger at least 1gallon size pot, remeber with autos the taproot is the most important. larger pot (in soil or hydro)= bigger tap root = More bud

weedman82 said:

cool I luv the rubbermaid grows, so I'm subbed! personally I would use the same fans for intake and exhaust like the biggest pc fans you can find, I also would've put the intake and exhaust on opposite sides, but thats just my preferance. I also got some nifty adapters, where I can control the speed.

so thats in your closet, I assume is light proof? I was dumb and actually painted one of mine black, for no reason at all.

Click to expand...

Yes the intake and exhaust are on opposite sides, they were just on the same side for photo purposes. I might be upgrading to a 140mm fan for higher CFM for a carbon filter down the road, but I will wait and see where it goes. As for being light proof, it could be if you painted it black like you said. These tubs are mass produced so light leaks out in some parts of the plastic where its not as thick in some spots as it is others. Also if you were to put fan filters on the intake and exhaust and plug any holes. I personally am not worried as I live alone and don't have much to worry about.

FlatTopBud said:

Hippy putting your Auto in a 12oz party cup will stunt its growth and give you a terribly small yeild. your auto needs to be placed in a larger at least 1gallon size pot, remeber with autos the taproot is the most important. larger pot (in soil or hydro)= bigger tap root = More bud

Click to expand...

The party cup was just for germination, easier to raise up a party cup up and down to the lights then the gallon pot I have waiting for it. That and I wasn't 100% sure I would achieve germination. But originally I had planned to transplant the seedling to the 1 gallon pot after its soil break which it has so I suppose I will be transplanting this lady today. Thanks for the heads up.

Sevren said:

The party cup was just for germination, easier to raise up a party cup up and down to the lights then the gallon pot I have waiting for it. That and I wasn't 100% sure I would achieve germination. But originally I had planned to transplant the seedling to the 1 gallon pot after its soil break which it has so I suppose I will be transplanting this lady today. Thanks for the heads up.

Click to expand...

It'll make a difference bro. The taproot is the first thing to pop from the seed, and the longer that root travels down the taller your plant will grow. using a party cup will inhibit this growth. if i were you i would transplant now.

thanks for the info man, good luck on the grow

Well it's a good thing I transplanted today, the taproot had almost shot all the way down to the bottom of the cup in that short amount of time. Luckily I was able to cut the cup in half and remove the bottom and transplant with ease. So from here on out she's in a gallon pot. In the following photography below it looks like the soil in the pot doesn't go up high enough. It does, I left a slight lip of space in case I choose to LST later on using the rim of the pot as an anchor. And now for some new logistics:

Temperature with fan: 70 - 71 F
Temperature without fan: 75 - 76 F
Cycle: 20/4

Day 2

nice im watching +rep

just my experience from "bagseed" I underestimated the space for root grow in a 1 gal pot

5gal pot, your plants will grow absolutely huge for the space.

for rubbermaid growing

Sevren said:

Well it's a good thing I transplanted today, the taproot had almost shot all the way down to the bottom of the cup in that short amount of time. Luckily I was able to cut the cup in half and remove the bottom and transplant with ease. So from here on out she's in a gallon pot. In the following photography below it looks like the soil in the pot doesn't go up high enough. It does, I left a slight lip of space in case I choose to LST later on using the rim of the pot as an anchor. And now for some new logistics:

Click to expand...

I knew that fucker would grow fast. lol
any thoughts on your nutes?

FlatTopBud said:

I knew that fucker would grow fast. lol
any thoughts on your nutes?

Click to expand...

Yeah I was pretty surprised when I cut the bottom of the cup off and saw a small white root dangling there. Thanks again for the heads up.

As for nutes, I haven't really figured that portion out. I was thinking of using FF Big Bloom. Although I'm not sure if it will be enough.

I like the ghetto ingenuity. I mean ghetto in the best way possible btw. Subbed. +rep.

FF line is actually pretty reasonable for the price. I've heard some good things about Dyna grow too

you might wanna just order your nutes, I got charged almost double the price for everything at the hydro store.

YungMoolaBaby said:

I like the ghetto ingenuity. I mean ghetto in the best way possible btw. Subbed. +rep.

Click to expand...

Haha, yeah I tried to keep it as simple as I could. Thanks.

weedman82 said:

FF line is actually pretty reasonable for the price. I've heard some good things about Dyna grow too

you might wanna just order your nutes, I got charged almost double the price for everything at the hydro store.

Click to expand...

Yeah I have quite a few local hydro shops to check out when the time comes since I have about 3 weeks before I need to start buying anything. If nothing else yeah I'll just order them.