New Grower Newbie's 1000 Questions (not as much but plenty!)

[giogio8]

Hello everybody! I am very happy I found this great forum and I am learning so many things from all of you.
As you can understand I am totally beginner and I hope this post will help me and future new growers.My English are not very well but I have uncle Google
I have psoriatic arthritis and I want to grow one plant per time.I decided to start with Lowryder 2.

So let the questions rain begin!

My setup (waiting to receive it at the next 2-3 days):

Budbox small 75cmx75cmx1m
PRO Ballast with Euro Reflector 250w HPS
RVK 100A1 Fan & 100mm Rhino Pro Filter 175m3/hr
Clip Fan
Digital Min/Max Thermometer Hygrometer
Mechanical Timer for light
Rope Ratchet Hangers
PH meter for water
PH meter for soil
Hygrometer for soil

My soil will be ALL-MIX by Biobizz
and for nutrients I have Biobizz Grow, Bloom and TopMax

I will germinate in jiffy peat pellets and I will plant it in a 11 litter (3 gallons) square pot, no nutrients untill 3 week.

Questions
1:Should I change or add something?
2 After how many days I should plant the seedling in All-Mix? I read that All-Mix is "hot" but some strains have not problem.What about Lowryder 2?
3 In what height the lights should be?
4 How many hours the RVK 100A1 must be on?
5 Where the fan clip should point? On lights? Must be in the floor of the tent?

Thank you very much!

 

[The Squid]

Hey man welcome to the site! Let's see what we got...

1. Nice setup. At first look, it seems like you have everything more or less. Great start.

2. How big are your Jiffy Pots? I don't know anything about the All Mix, but generally you want to start in seed starting mix for the first two weeks. Jiffy Cups are too small for this. The pellet ones need to be transplanted as soon as they sprout. They're small. Not sure about LR2.

3. Start your light at 24 inches.

4. Your exhaust fan and filter need to stay on 24 hours a day. As well as the clip on fan.

5. That depends on the setup. It just needs to create airflow and a gentle breeze for the plant(s). I point mine at the wall and get bounce back as to not blow directly at the plants.

Good luck!

 

[Keyser]

I agree with The Squid but would like to add a few things:

1) 75x75cm seems like a nice space for 1-4 small autos; but a 250W HPS in a 1m high room? How will you be taking care of the heat? I'm not familiar with those "Euro Reflectors", I personally prefer Adjust-A-Wings + PC fans and I'd personally opt for a 150W HPS or an LED panel - but if you can manage the heat from the 250W you should be fine of course.
I'm not sure about the BioBizz AllMix either; I always hear people prefer the Light-Mix. I've been using BioBizz nutes on soil for a few years but have never used BioBizz soil, only the stuff from my local garden center (containing Perlites, costs ~5€/20l).
IIRC BillyWu's 3rd grow diary contained an exchange about BioBizz nutes and the need (or lack thereof) for balancing pHs when using BioBizz nutes. I have personally never done any balancing during my grows (until I moved to hydro obviously), only varied fertilizer doses.
To me personally your fan and filter "sound big", I'm not sure about the noise level but you probably are so that should be ok. Just make sure to test drive everything before actually depending on everything to run, aka leave yourself time to change stuff if you need to.
As for the nutes/ferts: You might want to get some BioBizz Alg-A-Mic as well, that helped me out a lot of times. Plants looking yellow and/or sick? Add some Alg-A-Mic and poof! Magically everything is healthy green again 2 days later. At least for the deficiencies I had it always worked wonderfully.
And do you have some sort of root stimulator? I always used BioBizz Root Juice; actually I have 900ml of a 1l bottle left over which I'll never need again *doh* That stuff's not mandatory either but I'm my roots seemed to grow healthier and more quickly if I used it during week 2 and 3 from seed.
Oh I almost forgot, do you only have an HPS, no other lamps like an MH? I've grown plants from seed to harvest under just bloom CFLs and HPS so I can tell you that it will work fine but an MH seems to make for much healthier, more generous growth from what I can tell.

2) Well, basically you have a choice between putting the seed(s) right into soil after germination or growing them in <insert medium here> and put them in soil later.
I think both work; I use rockwool, sit them under a humidity dome, let them grow until they have a bunch of roots sticking out the bottom, then transplant straight into the final soil. Take your pick :joint:

3) I agree with The Squid, 24" would be 60cm btw. I've always used that distance (50-60cm) until around 3 weeks from seed before lowering my lamps to around half (12"/30cm). But 60cm distance won't be easy in your case, you lamp assembly will probably take 20cm + 60cm distance leaves only 20cm for your plants... and if you were to lower it to 30cm above your plants you'd probably burn them unless you have a good cooling solution.

4) People will probably bash me for this but: if you live in an area that's very humid, you have very nosy neighbors who could smell your plants or you have to keep the room outside your growbox completely smell free, keep it on 24h.
If you have neither but can keep that box slightly opened all day every day and can get fresh air into the room your box is in... you can skip the inlet and outlet fans completely. Yes you have to be a little careful and might have to invest in a dehumidifier instead (which you should anyway). But you need less energy, money and make less noise.
Since you already bought it though you should probably keep it on all the time unless you think it's too noisy. You don't have to worry about any smells until some time during flowering so you could also keep them off and instead keep the box open slightly (if possible) until then.
But you will probably need more fans inside, see next answer.

5) What The Squid said, many people like to keep their fans like that. Depending on how well ventilated your box is you should use one or more fans inside. Let me just do a quick count, I have...
- 1 silent 12cm 12V computer fan in front of the lamp ballast
- 2 silent 12cm 12V computer fans behind my 150W HPS
- 1 silent 25cm 12V computer fan between my plants and my HPS
- 1 silent 12cm 12V computer fan at the bottom where the plants start (not yet installed but soon)
- 1 silent 4cm 12V computer fan in the computer power supply that powers all of the other fans

But I'm also the kind of person who'd rather put 10 (silent) fans in his PC just to make sure it's nice, quite and cool. I hate heat. And so do our favorite plants (and computers).

Good luck with that grow man! :gthumb:

You might even think about getting slightly bigger plants if you can get cooling sorted out; I still think the 250W lamp might become a problem though so maybe you should keep an eye on that.

 

[giogio8]

Thank you both for welcoming and comments
I recieved today my things and I shocked haha The tent looking very good but the outlet fan and the filter are huge.I was planning to put the tent in my bedroom.Now that thing looks like a factory
I maybe follow your advice Keyser and keep that box slightly opened all day.As i said its in our bedroom and the noise will be annoying.
Tomorrow the electrician guy will come and put everything in the right order.I have to avoid burning the house lol

 

[Duck Commander]

Id wait at least 7-10 days before putting a seedling into All mix mate:thumbs: Nutes are also good you might want to think about getting some Alg A Mic too is very good for your girls helps protect against fungi and also prevents nemotodes.. i didnt find that the topmax did much for my girls so i dont use mine.. Also with bio bizz soil and nutes you shouldnt have to ph your feed.. If you do then DO NOT use chemical PH up/down it will mess with you actual PH I dont PH my feed at all and my run of is 6.4/6.5 Si

 

[giogio8]

Thanks Si, I will follow your advice and wait 7-10 days before putting the seedling into All mix:check:
Alg A Mic is for spraying the leaves? When I shoult start using it and how often?

 

[Keyser]

Alg-A-Mic can be sprayed onto foliage or applied as fertilizer, I always did the latter. BioBizz calls it a "Vitality Booster"; it contains Nitrogen, Phosphor, Potassium, Calcium and Magnesium.

You don't have to use it all the time; BioBizz says you should add it to their Light Mix every watering but not to their All Mix; so you should only add it if you need it. Like I said I added it whenever I saw a particular kind of yellowing, that's all.

Then as si1984 mentioned there's also TopMax (among other additives); I always used that during flowering and felt like it helped but never did any objective testing.

You should get your hands on the BioBizz feeding schedule; unfortunately I don't have a link on hand but it shouldn't be hard to find.

 

[don]

I would have thought beneficial fungi would protect the roots more than a posh seaweed extract
top max side sides are not great. keep it simple your first grow. grow and bloom max run 1

 

[1highman]

KISS is the best route for a first time grower, get the basics down first before moving up to beneficials, additives, supplements, etc. Just my

 

[Duck Commander]

Yh as keyser said the alg a mic is more for lightmix that was my bad i forgot you were using all mix, If your not too confertable with nutes and growing then as everyone mentioned keep it simple just grow and bloom To be honest there isnt much to bio bizz nutes my first 3 grows all i used was grow and bloom and still managed to yeild between25g and 1 1/2 OZ..
There are many feeding charts on Oggle just type in bio bizz feed chart and take your pick.. Ill keep an eye out for your grow thread and help best i can mate :group: