SwiftGrow Journal

Helo all i figure as started my first setup i will do a grow journal to show you what i've been up too and what it requires to get a optimal setup going.

First off this a completely legal grow It wil be for me and my mother who are patients and the rest will be made into hash, edibles and lotions to help with medical problems. Me and my caregiver are roomates and have a 15x10 or so basement with laundry room. The basement is unfinished and provide a nice grow environment as its stay near 69 degrees year round. Keep in mind my original plans where much bigger much effciency and budget took over in the end. This setup up ran me around 5k dollars but I know the owner of a grow shop shop so it prolly is upward of 7k in equipment. Also my roomy owned the 4x4 tent, 600w lumatek digital ballast and the cloner so that would make it around 8k$. I would shave down the cloner from a 45 site to a 25 probably tho


Major Supply List:

8x8x7 secret jardin tent (flower room)

4x4x7 secret jardin tent (veg room)

2 600 watt HPS lumatek ballest ran into hortilux bulbs inside 6" cooltubes (w240v cables)

2 h150 kessil LED magenta spectrum for blooming/flowering booster (w/ 240v cables)

1 h150 kessil LED blue spectrum for vegging (w/240v cable)

2 48 inch shoplights with 2 daylight and 2 plant/aqaurium bulbs

1 C.A.P MLC4XT lighting controller unit and 20ft 240v cable

25ft of 8" and 6" ducting

420 cfm active air 6" fan and 700 cfm active air 8" fan

Huge Active Air Carbon filter (see picture thinks it a 36x12 model or something)

8 pack power grower setup with resiorvors ( ran as two 4 pack in flower tent)

4 seperate power growers ( ran in veg room )

45 site power cloner from botanicare (also had get inserts for it)

Bontanicare Flood Table setup (approx 100$ great for stealth grow)

3 active air 4 outlet air pumps

Stealth RO200 System provides 7ppm water on constant basis
Home depot clamps, screws, tape, hosing, tubing, storage containers, etc (cost me like 400$ worth of crap)

Multiple digital timers and 2 humidity/temp gauges

Advanced Nutrients and Extreme Gardening Nutrients (almost all Advanced Nutrients)


That is most the list minus some small stuff since my caregiver already had ph/ppm testers, bamboo, scissors, a drill, minor tool kit.


I wanted to comment on the picture of the 8x8 room you notice they have large girls in there. Those were actually my friends mother plants and that weve cloned off them twice we are gonna flower them for our firhast run. I will not be giving many details on them as there history is very different. For this grow journal I will concentrate on the new clones that are around 10 days old. I labeled this week 1 as it is the first week out of the cloner for our girls, most went into the flood table but 4 got power growers(see pictures). This is week 1 of the Veg feeding schedule. We plan on vegging approx 3-4 weeks and flowering for 8.

I encourage questions as I will do my best to answer. I did over 3 months of research before investing into this so im serious when i say ask away and i will do my best to answer.

nice plus rep

I'll tag along for the ride - nice to see another Kessil user, although my Magenta Kessil H150s are the only flowering light source that I am using, I'm not using them as boosters.

Nice bro yea they seem to be the newest best LED technology I could find. I would not be suprised if the kessils work by themselves.

Great to see another Kessil user

I had a few teething troubles with a dodgy pH meter - far too acidic waterings caused all sorts of nute lock-out, but a couple of flowering clones under the Kessil are doing very well.

Give me 3 months and I will know for sure whether the Kessil is a good stand-alone light source, although hopefully I will be too baked to document my findings

Hey! I shall be tagging along.
As you say it is similar to what I have planned.
looking forward to some news

They more the merrier .

A few things I forgot to mention:

I was off on the cost a little bit. I forgot to take into account that the 4x4 secret jardin, the cloner, the 2 ballast and the 2 bulbs my roomy had previously so that will add approx a 1,000$ to the cost of the setup. I will change the numbers about to 6k$-8k$ to reflect so. I'm not sure well end of keeping that power cloner though im thinking we need a smaller one too free up a little space in the veg tent.

Also the strains i currently have are G-13 Haze, Purple, Mazar and Melody ( a mix of Mazar and Cinderella something).

I also wanted to clue you all in on a few things that i wish i had lol.

A 700$ sentinel CHHC-4 Co2 and environmental controller and a 2nd Co2 tank to avoid running out.

5 more Kessil LED's (assuming they work well) 4 more red h150 for flower and 1 or maybe 2 more blue h150 for the veg tent.

subed nice bra

WEEK 1 Update:

Well things are looking good had to install a 4 inch exhaust fan in the 4x4 veg room because the 4 power grower produce alot of humidity. Added a piece of styrofoam with 3' holes to block light from getting to the roots in the flood tray that also spaces the plants out evenly. The power cloner is working very well on average it take around 6-10 day for all the clones to get enough roots to transfer into the flood tray. We rearranged the tent also so the power cloner is in front for easy access. Here is updated picture of the veg room.

clean set up plus rep. do you have a co2 controller or do you just release it manualy? and how much it cost you to refill that tank? i got mine in the mail on the way here and i was wondering what it cost to fill it

Nice setup! I swear by advanced. Pricey, but worth it when it comes to an awesome crop. So no CO2?

In a 10x10 SEALED room it could last 3-6 weeks depending on how often u have to vent for heat. Outside to outside Air cooled reflectors are almost a must in a sealed room.

I would love to have a sentinel controller for Co2 but we started out with a simple co2 setup just a co2 tank with regulator/solenoid hooked to a digital timer. Its shown in picture on original post. We used http://www.hydroponics.net/learn/co2_calculator.asp to calculate CO2 output for our area. I was really easy then just set timers accordingly. Ours is on 45min then off 2 hours then on 45 min over and over while lights are on. We used a simple CO2 Test kit to test it. We also have our fans/carbon filter on timer so they turn off when CO2 is on . A 20lb co2 tank is around 200cubic feet or so will last me around 21-24 days and only cost around 13$ to fill. The intial setup was the most expensive but not too bad for the Co2.

140$ for co2 tank and about the same for the regulator/solenoid kit so maybe 300$ tops for basic Co2 setup. Just remeber to use calculator on the website http://www.hydroponics.net/learn/co2_calculator.asp

Best of Luck

Check out the Sentinel CHHC-4 controllers if your a dreamer

I have a cap ppm3 and cap regulator. I just take my tank and exchange it for full ones for 20 bucks. This is my first co2 grow. My last one was very successful without it. But now that I have everything dialed in, I'm ready to max it out!

20$ highway robbery holy crap no wonder you stretch out your co2 for 6 weeks lol j/k. Shop around you can find somewhere cheaper to fill Co2 probably but i guess does depend on where ya live .

It doesnt usually last 6 weeks lol but i have outside to outside air cooled reflectors so i dont have to swap air during the co2 cycle. And my temps are steady at 82-84. I do swap it at night to bring the temps down tho. I just like being able to swap it out. In and out and done. I can probably get it filled at the gas place cheaper. Where do you fill yours?

Plus with the cap ppm3 meter I can set it and forget it! (pun) I would like to buy a cheap backup tank. Since I always exchange mine it doesn't matter the condition as long as it's still certified and inspected.

My roommate works at a hydro shop so that where we get our tank filled. Ya i will definitely be getting a controller for the Co2 but for now a regulator with solenoid w/ digital timer works fine.

i know where you can get a 200 dollar controller hit me up if you want the link

Much appreciated but I have my heart set on a sentinel controller chhc-4 they retail around 700$ but I can get one for like 500$