carpet in grow room?

[Tesseract]

thanks for all the advice guys and girls. i did not sign any lease yet, so i guess i will find a different place with a wood floors. or even better a place with a basement.

i planning on doing an equipment upgrade with the new show. i was thinking about 2 1k's digital ballast w/ magnum xxxls 6s. i am not sure which brand to buy, but i was leaning more towards galaxy. i want them to be dimmable, and i really like the idea of a curcuit breaker on them. do electronic ballast save any electricity compared to the magnetics? any imput on a good brand would be great.

soil is way like it, and i am trying supersoil for the first time, i hope it works and tastes as good as everyone says. i am having a lot of trouble finding 12in square pots, if anyone knows where to get them in Socal locally. i would love to know. i really want to attempt a tight SOG setup with 9 plants per square foot. if anybody has any experience with this kind of set up, i was wondering how many mothers do i need to keep to support 300 + clones per cycle? thanks for all the resonses.

JS

Not really much of a difference in electrical costs. The main idea around digital ballasts are:

Can drive almost any type of bulb in 1 unit (only the same wattage though)
Can do either 120/240v (a lot of new magnetic ones do this too)
They produce less heat keeping electronic degradation to a minimum and helping the room stay cooler.
Many have loads of safety features and dimming options.
less noise
Magnetic ballasts lumen quality diminishes over time, an electronic one will never do this.

However, a magnetic ballast can be brighter the first uses over a digital and parts can be replaced. They are also very rugged.

T

 

[Jimmy Smash]

is it worth the extra 200 bucks per light? some claim a better lumen to watt ratio, so i fuigured i would make my money back after 2 harvests. how about bulbs? are the plantmax bulbs anygood. i really dont mind paying a higher intial cost if it is worth it.

JS

 

[CelticEBE]

Something else you can look into would be a pond liner. Especially if you are running hydro.

 

[Nobodynobody]

pool liner from the hardware store. This stuff i have seen people dig 20ft deep hole then pull this stuff over then fill it up as a cheap simming pool. I saw this stuff in a trade show in Florida in Jan-10 Guy had cinder block inside of it with mounts with the water fall. I have had had nutra mist foger that made my tents leak. I have seen plastic get holes easy. Know a guy use 2x4 and plasic tarps. After seeing the Pool Liner from home depot. I go not other way when it comes down to water holding. Be creative with some 2x4 pooliner. they come 9mil thick in full on rubber for big water projects!

 

[darkmatter]

ima carpet borg battler get your slick on

 

[motherlode]

a long time ago in an apartment far far away I spilled some ph down on my carpet

didnt think anything about it until the next day when I noticed the carpet looked like it had some silicone spilled on it

turned out the acid in the ph down was eating away the carpet, basically turning it into what looked like melted plastic

luckily in a past life I used to lay carpet - still cost me a few hundred bucks to buy a new piece

so either roll it up out of the way, or do like one of these other smart farmers suggest and get a pond or pool liner

tarps and plastic wont cut it

 

[Nobodynobody]

a long time ago in an apartment far far away I spilled some ph down on my carpet

didnt think anything about it until the next day when I noticed the carpet looked like it had some silicone spilled on it

turned out the acid in the ph down was eating away the carpet, basically turning it into what looked like melted plastic

luckily in a past life I used to lay carpet - still cost me a few hundred bucks to buy a new piece

so either roll it up out of the way, or do like one of these other smart farmers suggest and get a pond or pool liner

tarps and plastic wont cut it

pH down is acid guys. I use dosers so it frees me up for other projects. when i was setting up things i learn fast acid eats threw everything except ASB plasic. i had new brass shutoff go bad on me because the acid burn the shut off open.... or just have teflon tap holding 5G stock tanks full. Know what your dealing with farmers.

 

[motherlode]

yeah this was in 91 lol

I realize that now

 

[mrdizzle]

pond liner will work, krunch uses it and its saved him a few times. I have 2 bedrooms I need to recarpet, wish I just bought some pondliner

 

[Seamaiden]

is it worth the extra 200 bucks per light? some claim a better lumen to watt ratio, so i fuigured i would make my money back after 2 harvests. how about bulbs? are the plantmax bulbs anygood. i really dont mind paying a higher intial cost if it is worth it.

JS

I paid around $160 for my Xtrasun mag coil ballast and $200 for my Quantum digi ballast. That's a $40 difference, and to me it's worth it, I'll be replacing the mag coil eventually. What I won't spend a lot of money on are the bulbs themselves.

 

[ScuzyRoach]

If you must cover the carpet, I'd recommend layers. 1st off put a decent layer of platic over carpet. Then put down osb or t&g plywood to give you a hard surface. Then if your growing on the floor i'd use construction tarp or the pond liner. I'd rim the whole room w/ 2x4 first so you can make a catch basin by running the tarp up the sides a bit. then you dont have to puncture the floor part at all. You can replace the tarp each grow for $20. If you have the height you can also put down 2x4 floor joists, ripped at a slight angle, before the plywood. This will cause all runoff in one direction. either shop vac it up or devise a drain. I guess it depends on your construction skills and room location.
I've been growing on a raised floor for yrs. and virtually have no punctures each grow except where i drop my shears. Make sure to cut off all the plastic nubs on the pots too. they will tear the shit out of tarps/plastic.

ps- i use the little nails w/ plasic washers on them. usually for roofs/tar paper. you can just put a little silicon on them first before you hammer them in and they seal themselves nicely.

 

[Bobby Smith]

Whereas ripping out the carpet and replacing later is your best bet if it was your own house, the fact that you're renting and may need to quickly breakdown your grow room somewhat precludes that from being your best bet, IMO.

Lay down some plywood and staple some thick pond liner to it and you can have the room looking "legit" in the 24 hours notice that the landlord will give you for inspections.

FYI, if this place has the other things that you desire (whatever they may be), I wouldn't let something as trivial as carpet stop you from signing the lease - personally, I'd much rather be able to spend $40 on plywood and a pond liner to cover carpet than to have to do the same with wood floors (FYI, wood floors are a wee bit more expensive to replace than a piece of carpet, and it'd be harder to protect from scratches when covering).

But yes, a basement would be best (and one with a drain in the middle would be the supertits).

 

[HeadGrow]

Plastic can rip easily, need to be thick. Have also used a tarp but I find it is safest to get a pond liner. I got one made by firestone that is 45mil thick. Put on floor then tape up the walls. Can put in a 2x4 or something near the door to make raised area to keep the water in. (in case of a flood) More expensive than plastic but will be safer and last longer.

A tip. Put squares of Duct tape over the areas you staple. This provides reinforcement so the staples don't pull through. Gorilla duct tape I find is strongest but can peel off the top layer of sheetrock. (for taping/stapling) the pond liner to the walls

Or grow inside a kiddy pool :)

That's awesome, you are the first I've seen that has used the duct tape and staple method like i do.

I found pond liner works best. It doesn't reflect light like the black/white plastic does but it wont tear if you snag the bottom of a pot on it while moving pots around.

 

[jakew215]

pond liner 12" up the wall with staples and guerrilla tape. ive flooded a carpetted room that was done this way. (left the hose on) and it filled up to the edge of the door sill which i had raised a few inches. it made a pool. few hundred gallons. as long as its water tight, no bugs/problems shall arise...

 

[Jimmy Smash]

thanks for all the advice people,

i want a place with a basement, doesnt mean i can find one. but if i had to go with hardwood floor, would it be a problem if i mopped up after a spill? i am going with soil and super soil for flower, so straight water only. also planning on building my own planter out of 2x4 s and pond liner, with a drain into a bucket. is a 5x5 planter good for a magnum xxxl s foot print? should i get pots or should i just fill the planter up with soil? i kinda want to be able to move the plants around and rotate them from time to time. does any one in socal know where i can get black square 12x12 pots? thanks and peace out

JS

 

[el boyo]

rip out the carpet and replace.. its not that expensive and you could prob get money spent back from landlord for ¨improvements´

 

[fasteddy0]

panda wont work for long.

don't know if this has been said already but, 6 mil plastic will definitely not hold up it will tear very easily. Also there will more than likely be moisture under it. Remove the carpet and lay down pond liner if you want to keep the house in the best condition you can. (Your landlord would thank you, if he knew what could happen to his house)