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 phychotron
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Registered: 02/17/11
Posts: 1,995
Loc: Earth (mostly) 
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 Day Build: LED grow cube 
#824904 - 03/19/17 04:28 AM (8 years, 1 month ago) |
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Woke up with a fit of rage and a need for a little flower chamber. I was looking at 2x2x4' grow tents for about 40 on ebay and that seemed kinda nice, but I have a bunch of panda film left over from the last garden I tore down prematurely. SO I decided to build a small frame and line the walls with panda film.
Basically I just need something to sex plants and for maybe a small seed operation. I was hoping to get some SOG, short plants in there. Its called the Grow Cube because I expect to have a 2x2x2' canopy area with all the equipment, pots, etc.
The actual container I built was with some 2x2" that come in 8' lengths. So I cut two in half, two into quarters and built the basic frame. Some 1x3" for side supports and slats. The actual dimensions of the entire cabinet is 27x27x48" but the inner grow area is 24x27x48 based on its construction.
I put some computer exhaust fans on the top blowing out and one at the bottom blowing in. I used a light switch box to house the power drivers for it. I thought I had 120mm fans but one of them was 140mm, so I had to mount the 120mm's sideways at the top to make the gap. Cardboard was put in place around as a seal.
I used panda film on the sides and planned on using cardboard to protect the thin plastic. I have the one piece on a side and around the fans but don't have a bunch of large cardboard boxes laying around to finish it off. I'll secure the other side and back as time goes on.
I had to light proof the exhaust port by overlapping layers of panda film with a cardboard slat to form an S type junction. Still working on light proofing the lower exhaust.
I need some sort of cardboard piece for the door. I was thinking of lining it with panda then velcroing it to the front. Or maybe get a piece of plywood on hinges. I aimed to keep this light, so the cardboard might be the way to go.
I also scored the yesterday when I took apart a projector TV at the dumpster for parts and grabbed some castor rollers. I threw those on too.
I built up a little shelf for the plants to sit on. I think a small res tank with an ebb and flow system might be in order.
Total cost was less than $15 for the lumber. I got a discount on the plywood which was normally $8 but the guy cutting it told me to tell the lady at the counter to do 70% off. The 2x2's and 1x3's were both under $2 per 8' and I had all the screws and small stuff laying around. The fan drivers are cheap as well as the fans. $2-3 per driver, same for each fan. Some fans were just extras sitting around.
And what better than to put my two custom built LED's in there to try it out? Its a total of 100w, but I'm getting another ~30w of red diodes coming to upgrade one of the lights.
I was hoping to maybe work on getting these lights hard mounted and then getting some side lighting built in as well. Since I'm already building LED's might as well build some sweet side lighting to go with it.
                 
I also just got a bunch of free samples of Elete Nutrients from the hydro store I'll probably be trying out. I'll post a grow log of that in the future when I get the rest of the thing finished. I need cardboard and a front door and it's ready to go.
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Any help given is for educational purposes only. Its your responsibility not to break any applicable laws
 Bamboo Bongs I make | Perfect Dry and Cure | Grapegod under LED
“Human beings, vegetables, or cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune intoned in the distance by an invisible player.” ~ Albert Einstein
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phychotron
Medicated
Registered: 02/17/11
Posts: 1,995
Loc: Earth (mostly)
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Thanks. Panda film is black/white poly that reflects 90-95% of light. I was about to buy a piece of space blanket for the front door so that It would have a window but I didn't want to have to build a light block for that if it needed it.
I put a door on it the next day but never got around to posting it. I also ordered some more diodes, aluminum, fans and power drivers for some side lighting. it'll take about another month or two to get the rest of the parts but it should be pretty decked out by the time I'm all done with it.
I decided on a top feed recirculating system and got a small tub to collect the run off. I had to cut the small white trays to drain over the lid with holes in it. The lid is like a perfect funnel.
 
I found the pallet liners the next day when i went to the hydro store to check out trays. The cardboard liners were free out of the cardboard bin and make it look nice and clean.
 
Got the water system somewhat in place. I still need to decide the exact configuration for feeding.
 
Cardboard and panda film loosely taped over the vent to stop the light at the input fan. I still have a light leak at the base from the plywood and a little around some of the cardboard but I'm working on that next.
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Any help given is for educational purposes only. Its your responsibility not to break any applicable laws
Bamboo Bongs I make | Perfect Dry and Cure | Grapegod under LED
“Human beings, vegetables, or cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune intoned in the distance by an invisible player.” ~ Albert Einstein
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phychotron
Medicated
Registered: 02/17/11
Posts: 1,995
Loc: Earth (mostly)
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Got the diodes and drivers for the light on the top on the same day so I put them into work. Got it so that the white is always on with the fans, then blue and red on switches.
Can't wait for the side lighting to come in now.
 
White, white/blue, white/red, white/blue/red
   
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Any help given is for educational purposes only. Its your responsibility not to break any applicable laws
Bamboo Bongs I make | Perfect Dry and Cure | Grapegod under LED
“Human beings, vegetables, or cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune intoned in the distance by an invisible player.” ~ Albert Einstein
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phychotron
Medicated
Registered: 02/17/11
Posts: 1,995
Loc: Earth (mostly)
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 Re: Day Build: LED grow cube [Re: phychotron] 1
#825802 - 05/07/17 03:27 AM (7 years, 11 months ago) |
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Got some work done over the past few days. Built the frames and had the fans mounted a few days ago, then the wiring harness. Today I finished the actual fixtures but still need to mount them better.
The frames were easy going this time as its becoming more natural to work with the drill and aluminum. I could have thought it out a little better for consistency but its all together much better than the last two. Its even set up to be able to take a third bar in the center.
 
I added two switches for the side lighting and didn't want to add more plugs for all the stuff. I used 3 screw together connectors that are in strips of 10 and you can cut away as many as you need. Pain in the ass getting it up but it shouldn't be an issue later. I tried cutting as much cost as I could in the building of the wiring harness.
 
I'm running all the fans off one DS100 fan driver. It keeps them slow but thats nice cause I don't want a bunch of wind burn on the plants. I'll check the temperature later to see if I need to bump up the current.
The diodes were all taped on. Most worked from the start but 3 of the 8 circuits had faulty diodes. One also had one backwards on accident. Taping was a bitch cause I cut the squares to 9 parts each to save the double sided heat sink tape.
    
Testing the sides out
 
Gonna put some bungee cords or something across the front to keep them held against the walls. The screws are kept long on the cooling fan to allow room for air flow. I might get shorter one's and remove the 1/2" gap between the heat sink and the fans.
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Any help given is for educational purposes only. Its your responsibility not to break any applicable laws
Bamboo Bongs I make | Perfect Dry and Cure | Grapegod under LED
“Human beings, vegetables, or cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune intoned in the distance by an invisible player.” ~ Albert Einstein
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phychotron
Medicated
Registered: 02/17/11
Posts: 1,995
Loc: Earth (mostly)
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Re: Day Build: LED grow cube [Re: phychotron] 1
#825826 - 05/08/17 01:16 AM (7 years, 11 months ago) |
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The new addition is 125watts of side lighting, for a total of 250w of LED total. I contemplated not putting the creebay back in when I adjusted the top lighting but left it for this first run.
   
She aint pretty but she's got some plants that I just transplanted just for her. She's got 5 in there right now, I'll probably start a grow log in the next few days if I can get around to it.
 
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Any help given is for educational purposes only. Its your responsibility not to break any applicable laws
Bamboo Bongs I make | Perfect Dry and Cure | Grapegod under LED
“Human beings, vegetables, or cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune intoned in the distance by an invisible player.” ~ Albert Einstein
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phychotron
Medicated
Registered: 02/17/11
Posts: 1,995
Loc: Earth (mostly)
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Haven't found the time to start that grow log, maybe I'll just keep it updated here as this flower cycle progress. I'm going to be gone for the last 2 or 3 weeks of flower so I can't start a proper grow log anyway.
  
some spot bleaching where the diodes make contact. These were from about a week ago.
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Any help given is for educational purposes only. Its your responsibility not to break any applicable laws
Bamboo Bongs I make | Perfect Dry and Cure | Grapegod under LED
“Human beings, vegetables, or cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune intoned in the distance by an invisible player.” ~ Albert Einstein
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phychotron
Medicated
Registered: 02/17/11
Posts: 1,995
Loc: Earth (mostly)
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Re: Day Build: LED grow cube [Re: phychotron]
#825976 - 05/20/17 02:10 PM (7 years, 11 months ago) |
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There was a day where they became noticeably bushier. I threw a few into flower right after I transplanted so I think maybe its when the root zone picked up.
      
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Any help given is for educational purposes only. Its your responsibility not to break any applicable laws
Bamboo Bongs I make | Perfect Dry and Cure | Grapegod under LED
“Human beings, vegetables, or cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune intoned in the distance by an invisible player.” ~ Albert Einstein
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phychotron
Medicated
Registered: 02/17/11
Posts: 1,995
Loc: Earth (mostly)
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Re: Day Build: LED grow cube [Re: phychotron] 1
#826172 - 05/31/17 10:46 AM (7 years, 10 months ago) |
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Some updated photos
So far so good. Some singed hairs after that last heat wave but they're starting to grow back.
   
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Any help given is for educational purposes only. Its your responsibility not to break any applicable laws
Bamboo Bongs I make | Perfect Dry and Cure | Grapegod under LED
“Human beings, vegetables, or cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune intoned in the distance by an invisible player.” ~ Albert Einstein
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phychotron
Medicated
Registered: 02/17/11
Posts: 1,995
Loc: Earth (mostly)
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Re: Day Build: LED grow cube [Re: phychotron]
#826335 - 06/11/17 10:51 AM (7 years, 10 months ago) |
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Any help given is for educational purposes only. Its your responsibility not to break any applicable laws
Bamboo Bongs I make | Perfect Dry and Cure | Grapegod under LED
“Human beings, vegetables, or cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune intoned in the distance by an invisible player.” ~ Albert Einstein
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phychotron
Medicated
Registered: 02/17/11
Posts: 1,995
Loc: Earth (mostly)
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Last photo for awhile, gonna have someone else tend to it for a while. I'll try and get some photos when they're done in three weeks, if they're still alive when I get back.
Getting pretty dense on that front plant. It was in the best condition going in and it shows. The pineapple express is some of the dankest looking nuggets I've seen. If I wasn't in a hurry to leave I'd get some nice macro shots. They don't show their beauty with this tablet.
 
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Any help given is for educational purposes only. Its your responsibility not to break any applicable laws
Bamboo Bongs I make | Perfect Dry and Cure | Grapegod under LED
“Human beings, vegetables, or cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune intoned in the distance by an invisible player.” ~ Albert Einstein
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phychotron
Medicated
Registered: 02/17/11
Posts: 1,995
Loc: Earth (mostly)
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Re: Day Build: LED grow cube [Re: Theman] 1
#827117 - 07/07/17 02:13 PM (7 years, 9 months ago) |
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Got an update after being away for over 2 weeks. I had my mom maintain them while I was gone.
They thing has potential but I can tell they buds are not as full as I had hoped. More light needed, but the cheap diodes are so inefficient that I don't know if its worth it to upgrade. I'll get some better photos when I actually harvest. Not sure when but sometime soon. Also the plants were not in prime condition when going into flower and the one's that were healthier are showing it.
  
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Any help given is for educational purposes only. Its your responsibility not to break any applicable laws
Bamboo Bongs I make | Perfect Dry and Cure | Grapegod under LED
“Human beings, vegetables, or cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune intoned in the distance by an invisible player.” ~ Albert Einstein
Edited by phychotron (07/07/17 02:14 PM)
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phychotron
Medicated
Registered: 02/17/11
Posts: 1,995
Loc: Earth (mostly)
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Re: Day Build: LED grow cube [Re: ashfiken]
#827640 - 07/25/17 08:43 PM (7 years, 8 months ago) |
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Buds been chopped down and drying for a few days now. Not the best yield but its important to remember that a lot of these plants were in prime condition to flower. The one plant did extremely well--except it hermied as expected. I found out from its mother mid-flower.
They all smell very well, but I'm not impressed with the lights. Those cheap diodes are missing something that makes the buds fill out. I left all the under brush on them which probably didn't help, but I still think the diodes are lacking in some spectrum.
I did no work to these plants other than keep them watered.
                                  
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Any help given is for educational purposes only. Its your responsibility not to break any applicable laws
Bamboo Bongs I make | Perfect Dry and Cure | Grapegod under LED
“Human beings, vegetables, or cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune intoned in the distance by an invisible player.” ~ Albert Einstein
|
phychotron
Medicated
Registered: 02/17/11
Posts: 1,995
Loc: Earth (mostly)
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Re: Day Build: LED grow cube [Re: phychotron]
#827699 - 07/28/17 02:12 AM (7 years, 8 months ago) |
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Trimmed the bud. Surprisingly its denser than I thought in some of the top colas. Cherry pie was mostly larf. RF2 was also more larfy and smokes like shit if its not nugget, so most went to the trim bag. Pineapple express was denser but still low yield. RF5 did alright. The real winner was the larger plant, the Chocolate Hash Berry X Pineapple chunk, labeled Corey. It hermied but still a great aroma.
I've extrapolated the data to see how each plant is doing in terms of grams per square-meter, as well as potential if it was the only strain.
Corey shows that I could easily grow 170g.Most of the bud was of decent density. I think that if I were to get a good yielding strain with better training and skirting I could increase that to 200g or more. I need to find that SOG specific strain. At 170g/250 it would yield .7g/watt. That's not too bad.
Total electricity used was 168kw/h. using about 12 cents/kw-h it consumed $20 in electricity during flower. Nutrients were free samples, so it cost for $20 for 112g. SO 17cents per gram.
My top light was up fairly high for the low power consumption they were using. I could have lowered them down a bit to increase intensity. A PAR meter would help.
I'll work on taking some photos of the trimmed buds. So far I've smoked them all and they're a bit rough but at that point where they should be. They have a lot of potential in terms of flavor and quality with a good cure.
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Any help given is for educational purposes only. Its your responsibility not to break any applicable laws
Bamboo Bongs I make | Perfect Dry and Cure | Grapegod under LED
“Human beings, vegetables, or cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune intoned in the distance by an invisible player.” ~ Albert Einstein
|
phychotron
Medicated
Registered: 02/17/11
Posts: 1,995
Loc: Earth (mostly)
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Re: Day Build: LED grow cube [Re: phychotron]
#827741 - 07/31/17 10:07 AM (7 years, 8 months ago) |
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Some photos
Cherry Pie
 
Pineapple Express
    
RF2
   
RF5
    
Corey
  
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Any help given is for educational purposes only. Its your responsibility not to break any applicable laws
Bamboo Bongs I make | Perfect Dry and Cure | Grapegod under LED
“Human beings, vegetables, or cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune intoned in the distance by an invisible player.” ~ Albert Einstein
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