Stealth Grow Closet

2.5 weeks into flowering, I would think the stretch is pretty much over and they will be working on bud formation now. So I dont think a whole lot taller. I have no idea on the yield. I think my plant is pretty much done with the stretch and its like 20 days into 12/12. Pics are in my sig for current grow. Peace

 

Disaster has struck!!


Oh crap, where do I start?


I'll get straight to the point. The water pipe that supplies my whole house happens to run under the foundation in my bedroom, then under the closet, then it continues on a bit further to the water heater.


After comming home from work about a week ago, I stepped in a soggy spot in the rug (not carpet just an area rug) in my bedroom. I thought it was a spill at first. I was wrong. I just told Mrs. Gardener that I had stepped in a spill, thought nothing of it, then jumped in the shower. Before my shower was done, Mrs. G informed me that the spot was getting worse and she didn't think it was a spill. I had a BAD feeling in my gut while I dried off...


When I pulled back the rug I found that my worst fears had come true. The galvanized pipe had ruptured under the foundation and water was seeping up through a couple of pin holes in the concrete. I was in utter dismay. I had to shut off the water to the house and just turn it on long enough to flush the damn toilet, then immeadiately turn it off again. All that everytime the toilet needed to be used.


The water began to come through the holes more quickly, then a third hole appeared. "Oh shit..." was all I kept thinking. I had a mind to perhaps shut off the water and try to seal the floor with epoxy, let it dry, and hope it works. I thought to myself, "If the strength of the epoxy is greater than the hydrostatic pressure under the concrete then it could work."


I called on a good life-long-friend who is pretty knowledgeable about home construction/remodeling. He's an electrician but he knows his plumbing too. After looking at the leak and hearing my suggestion, which he immeadiately threw out the window, he said "This problem is not going away." He used the analogy of a dam with water comming out of a hole and you trying to plug the hole with bubble gum, but the dam keeps getting more and more cracks and holes in it.


He said that we needed to rent a concrete saw and cut through the foundation the entire length of the room, dig up, then replace the pipe and pour new concrete. Oh crap! THAT was my very worst fear. I really didn't want to go that route if at all possible... (this is all I can write for now, but the news gets worse as for how this new and unwanted development affects my precious closet)


To Be Continued...

 

Your friend's right.

 

Many gardeners have had to shut down their grows because of various reasons. It's a good idea to have a temporary vegging/flowering area to keep things in when problems arise. At the very minimum you should have a small box to veg in when your main garden is down so your mother plants and clones are not affected.


I live in an old house and leaks are a recurring problem and always require plumbers to go into the attic. I just turn off the exhaust fan and cover it with a cardboard box while they are up there working. Your problem is much more serious so I would call in professionals asap.

 

So sorry to hear man...


Best of luck.


Grat


assit:

 

PEX Sharkbite


There is good news and bad news. The good news is that the busted water line has been replaced. The bad news is that I had to tear down all of the nice cabinet work I had done and the air filter box as well. All that just to get to the water line.


The old line running under the concrete has been abandonded. The new line is a type of flexible water line called PEX Sharkbite. The new line has been rerouted through the garage and into the closet. From there it feeds everything in the house. The installation is easy. Simply push the pipe into the fitting and it's secure with no leaks.


The new water line








Since it is now so easy and convenient to get to, this is where I will tap into the water line and and the drain pipe.

 

Thanks HHHG. I took your advice and the new temporary location for the rest of my young plants is here in this armoire which I have in my garage. This will be their new home while I fix up the main closet again.





And here's the inside, they are doing O.K. for being light deprived for about 3 weeks. Albeit the the tops are more yellow than they were before they were baby sat. I hooked up their lights and Mrs. G just gave them a shot of Big Bloom at half strength. I think they're starting to perk up already.

 

Repairing the noisy fan


My 6" centrifugal fan was beginning to get very noisy. I had bought it used and it had gradually become louder and louder. The vibrations were driving me crazy. I took it apart, blew out the dust with an air compressor, greased the main axel, put it back together and it sounds great!


Then, I wanted to improve upon the way it was mounted. I dug around in my stockpiles of junk and found four old rubber feet. I mounted the fan to the ceiling using those rubber feet (or grommets).

 

This is a really good diy, and a good grow. I've always wanted to try REAL NL! Any updates on this?

 

Thanks for the kind words GangaBoBanja. Here's the latest update. The plants have been vegging for a while in their temporary grow cabinet.








Some of the leaves in the second photo are a bit deformed. I am not sure what has caused it as I have been out of town for a while but I know that the plants have had to endure some very cold nights in the garage. Perhaps that's it? Anyway, they are ready for transplanting. Mrs. G and I just picked up some bags of Ocean Forest and some more pots. The pots are called the "Giant Pot" from Sunlight Supply. They are 4.75 gallon (18 L) and are 1' square. I'll be transplanting them tomorrow. Here' a link to the pots if anyone is curious http://www.77hydrostore.com/gipot4ga18l.html

 

Sometimes it takes a setback to...


Back in the closet, I have just finished installing a new water spigot. It will be handy to have water available right there in the closet. It was fairly easy to do using the PEX Sharkbite pipe. All I had to do was shut off the main water valve going into my house, then I used a hacksaw and made a cut exactly where I wanted to tee off for the spigot. When I went to The Home Depot I did not feel like spending $12.85 for this style of tee, though they are simpler to use.





Instead, I chose to go with one of these barbed style tee fittings. They're brass and they were about $3 for a pack of 5.





Now the problem with these is that they need a clamp. The proprietary PEX clamps require use of THEIR tool. It costs a whopping $68! Instead I opted to purchace hose clamps from an auto parts store. They were only $3 for a pack of four and they can be installed with a screwdriver or a socket. I used a socket so I could really torque them down.





Here's the finished product. , not the best photo. The faucet is actually a ball valve and it too is brass. I can install any type of hose here, or drip system. I am starting to think about a water filtration system as well.





Soil is fairly forgiving, but I'm going to start fooling around with hydro soon, and when I do I am definitely going to want my water to be filtered somehow. The price of RO does not sit well with me but that's what it may take.


My next project will be installing a drain...

 

The drain


I've always wanted a drain in my grow room and since I had to tear it down anyway I wanted to improve things this time around.


As luck would have it my recent installation of a "tee" went very quickly and smoothly. I was installing the fitting near the existing trap. Obviously, I installed the fitting above the trap as I do not want the smell of sewage in my grow room.


I'm not a plumber but it is my understanding that with PVC you use a primer then glue. With ABS you don't use the primer, you just go straight ahead with the glue. In my case I used an all purpose glue that can be used for either PVC or ABS. In my case ABS.





The "tee" fitting is threaded on one side and I have a plug there. It's my intention to drill into the plug so as to allow a 1/2" black flexible tube to terminate there. I am very pleased about having drainage capability in the grow room. It opens up all kinds of options. I can flush the plants without having to move them to the sink, bathtub, or outside. They can simply remain where they are. When I go hydro it will be easy to drain the reservoir as well.

 

I was curious about the pipe and so I took the plug out while the washer was draining to take a peek. It was interesting to watch. The pipe is 1 1/2" and there was still plenty of room in the pipe for me to flush or drain, even while the washer was draining. With the washer draining at full tilt there was still about 70% free space inside the pipe. I'm golden!

 

You've been a busy (bushy, if you're Micheal Scott) beaver.


I haven't done any real plumbing, since that Sharkbite line came out, but aren't those connections the shit?! Alittle 'dear', but no sweating!


Nice Job

 

Update. I've transplanted the 5 that were vegging in the 6 inch white pots into the 1' x 1' (4.75 gal) black square pots that I was talking about earlier. They love their new homes! The rate of growth was too slow in the garage cabinet, their temporary grow space. I delayed putting them back in their normal closet because I wanted to get some work done in there.


I couldn't wait any more. I've been giving them 18/6 under the 400w HPS for about 10 days. The growth rate is awesome now! Here's a shot of the canopy. Hard to take a pic when it's pitch black! All the light is from the flash.





The 5 are a bit over a foot tall. The thing is though, I have taken cuttings from the lower branches of them all, and buried more of the stems. I did the same, minus the taking of cuttings, the last time they were transplanted. Each of the 5 have been transplanted twice. They went from solo cups, to 6 inch pots, to the 1' pots. They were clipped from their mother plant on 10/01/09. I plan to flip them on 2/1/10. They'll have vegged for FOUR months! The low temps really retarded their growth. But now that they're under this warm lamp they're doing much better.


Another thing, I have topped 3 of them as well, about a week ago (the other 2 were topped much earlier). I wanted to bush them out a bit and at the same time make them uniform in height.

 

I want to begin making use of the drain soon. Individual sauces will no longer cut it. I need a large sturdy tub that is big enough to hold all the pots but is the right size for my closet. Botanicare wants an arm and a leg for their trays and reservoirs.


I settled on a black 2' x 3' x 8" mixing tub from Lowes. It's only $11. They're doing maintenence on their site right now so I can't put in a link to the product. The plastic is thick and it's nice and sturdy, it could work as a flood tray too. There was only one product review. I laughed when I read it. The guy said, "I used this tray to make my own homemade hydroponic garden system." That's when I KNEW that this item was for me.


:thumbs-up:


Edit: Here's the link. http://www.lowes.com/SearchCatalogDisplay?storeId=10151&langId=-1&catalogId=10051&N=0&newSearch=true&Ntt=19252

 

The drain went on the back burner for a bit. I needed to get my intake filtration system back installed. This time I opted to get a smaller filter box and put it right over the intake ports.


First I cleaned up the area around the intake.





After measuring, I bought the smallest filter grille they had in stock, which was 12" x 12". It was only $11 and change! Then I made a 2x4 frame.





At that point the final installation was super easy. After I attached it with some screws, I filled in the edges with fiberglass insulation. It doesn't have the finished appearance that the grille did but it went in easier and it's actually in a better location.

 

Stealth


Even though I serviced the fan a while back, still there has been this vibration coming from the fan for quite some time now. It's not terribly loud but it has been bugging me. My mind would be more at ease if the sound of the fan was completely gone.


Time to eliminate some noise and vibrations, after all this is a Stealth Grow...


I was inspired to build a box around the fan by this video. At 7 minutes into it he shows the box around the fan.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FgF_PleJ1U


The thing is though, he never shows HOW he did it. He just did it. It was time for me to come up with my own design.


I originally planned on building a ply wood box and lining it with that egg foam type stuff that they use in sound studios, though I did not know exactly where to find it.


Then Mrs. G had a great idea, use the Memory Foam from our old mattress topper (we went from a queen to a Cal-King). That idea turned out to be fabulous! Have you ever felt the stuff? It's so dense, yet soft and spongy. It's the perfect material to absorb sounds and vibrations! I knew the fan would love it's new bed!





This unit is now hanging up, the ducting is attached and it's fully up and running. All noises are GONE!! .... Ahhhhhh, I love the sound of silence!

 

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to Mr. Gardener again.


asssit:


Grat