Issues I simply cannot seem to resolve

[AWickedWizard]

Hey guys, so I've been quite reluctant to posting here asking for help as I really wanted to figure this out through reading the various articles but I feel like I can't read fast enough or seem to lack enough experience to correctly judge the situation and whenever I try to fix one problem I think I'm creating another one, this is my first grow but I've been reading and dreaming about this for over 10 years waiting for a chance to finally be able to start growing.

So after a lot of hair pulling, trial and error I come in search of some wisdom.

Quick sidenote: I am planning to start a grow journal and be as active as possible, not here just to leech information. Just starting to get really stressed and tired, where a passion is turning into constant scare and headache. The current situation and not being able to easily purchase nutrients / equipment is also making it really hard.

Soo... I planted on the 16th of march into rootit cubes got 100% germination rate, went through some overwatering and had a few issues (I'll make a more in depth post as a grow journal as I took a lot of photos and made various timelapses).
Using Lumatek dual spectrum 600w HPS through a 600w Lumatek ballast (Set at 400w) running 18/6 (This has probably been my biggest mistake)

150x90 grow tent with a 550cfm fan connected to EcoTechnics controller (25oC, 5o hysterisis / 65%RH, 5RH hysterisis / 25% minimum FanSpeed, 55% Max FanSpeed )

Nutes I use are Bionova dedicated (Soil supermix, BN-zym, BN-missing link) going roughly 1 50% feed, 1 RO-Water, 1 RO-Water cycle whenever the top soil is dry.

Now this is where I get issues, I just can't seem to keep the temperatures down and humidity up, my VPD is all over the place. Temps with fans going pretty high (Near the 55% Fanspeed, anything over just seems to pummel the plants) stay around 29oC+ with RH staying around 40 to 55 at best. I have to keep the windows open with the blinds closed and that's what I've been playing around with most, if I open the blinds more temperatures stabilise but RH will go down to around 30 (even with it being around 50 outside) and if I close them more humidity stabilises but temperature goes way up to around 31, 32.

So 2 days ago I tried flipping to 600w and let it run for an 18h cycle (this I think caused stress and excess heat), then yesterday I accidentally left the humidifier running during the 6h off cycle causing humidity to reach 80 to 90+ (Compounded the previous problem) and when I went back into the room to check on them plants looked terrible with all sorts of issues.

Now I'm not sure what to do, should I feed, do I have nutrient lockout, toxicity, lack of some nutrients etc
Also I would really appreciate some advice on tent setup maybe I'm getting something wrong here.

Thanks for the help, I'll take some pics with white lighting as soon as the light's cycle is finished.

 

[One drop]

Hey guys, so I've been quite reluctant to posting here asking for help as I really wanted to figure this out through reading the various articles but I feel like I can't read fast enough or seem to lack enough experience to correctly judge the situation and whenever I try to fix one problem I think I'm creating another one, this is my first grow but I've been reading and dreaming about this for over 10 years waiting for a chance to finally be able to start growing.

So after a lot of hair pulling, trial and error I come in search of some wisdom.

Quick sidenote: I am planning to start a grow journal and be as active as possible, not here just to leech information. Just starting to get really stressed and tired, where a passion is turning into constant scare and headache. The current situation and not being able to easily purchase nutrients / equipment is also making it really hard.

Soo... I planted on the 16th of march into rootit cubes got 100% germination rate, went through some overwatering and had a few issues (I'll make a more in depth post as a grow journal as I took a lot of photos and made various timelapses).
Using Lumatek dual spectrum 600w HPS through a 600w Lumatek ballast (Set at 400w) running 18/6 (This has probably been my biggest mistake)

150x90 grow tent with a 550cfm fan connected to EcoTechnics controller (25oC, 5o hysterisis / 65%RH, 5RH hysterisis / 25% minimum FanSpeed, 55% Max FanSpeed )

Nutes I use are Bionova dedicated (Soil supermix, BN-zym, BN-missing link) going roughly 1 50% feed, 1 RO-Water, 1 RO-Water cycle whenever the top soil is dry.

Now this is where I get issues, I just can't seem to keep the temperatures down and humidity up, my VPD is all over the place. Temps with fans going pretty high (Near the 55% Fanspeed, anything over just seems to pummel the plants) stay around 29oC+ with RH staying around 40 to 55 at best. I have to keep the windows open with the blinds closed and that's what I've been playing around with most, if I open the blinds more temperatures stabilise but RH will go down to around 30 (even with it being around 50 outside) and if I close them more humidity stabilises but temperature goes way up to around 31, 32.

So 2 days ago I tried flipping to 600w and let it run for an 18h cycle (this I think caused stress and excess heat), then yesterday I accidentally left the humidifier running during the 6h off cycle causing humidity to reach 80 to 90+ (Compounded the previous problem) and when I went back into the room to check on them plants looked terrible with all sorts of issues.

Now I'm not sure what to do, should I feed, do I have nutrient lockout, toxicity, lack of some nutrients etc
Also I would really appreciate some advice on tent setup maybe I'm getting something wrong here.

Thanks for the help, I'll take some pics with white lighting as soon as the light's cycle is finished.

Yes the heat from the 600 was a bit much I’d raise the light up , a water flush and get your pots up off the tent floor creat a air gap under them that will help .

 

[AWickedWizard]

Mmh brilliant, I hadn't thought about raising them, I'll see what I can build for that, light is currently 60cm away so I'll pull it up to 80cm away. as for height off the ground any recommendations? I'll try building a plank with holes drilled inside at around 30cm high, should surely help! They have been watered with RO water now I could go for a full on flush in a couple hours, they look better already.

 

[One drop]

Mmh brilliant, I hadn't thought about raising them, I'll see what I can build for that, light is currently 60cm away so I'll pull it up to 80cm away. as for height off the ground any recommendations? I'll try building a plank with holes drilled inside at around 30cm high, should surely help! They have been watered with RO water now I could go for a full on flush in a couple hours, they look better already.

Maybe 10 to 15 cm will be fine glad to help out . Good luck have fun .

 

[Beachwalker]

Explain this paragraph right here

and then talk about your medium, your pH your PPM, and why you're using Ro and not tap water (need pH & ppm of tapwater) and your pictures aren't great but what I think I see is a calcium issue? if you could take some in plain white daylight it would help

 

[Dirtbag]

Yeah you shouldnt ever give plants pure RO really. And I agree, Plants that size dint need so much light. Raise it up substantially and turn it down to 400 would also be my recommendation.

 

[AWickedWizard]

Medium is: Janeco Light mix, sphagnum peat moss, blonde spagnum peat moss, perlite, mineral lime + NPK 12-14-24 Fert, PH of 5.7 / In 1L Containers
The PH I've been giving them has been around 6.5 sometimes a little more the RO water PH seems to come up at 6.8 which they've had a couple times.
PPM I can't test as I'm waiting on my testing stick. Never realised it was a bad thing to give them plain RO, that would explain why it looks like calcium deficiency.


Tap water:
Ammonium <0.05mg/L
Free chlorine 0.08mg/L
Total chlorine 0.2mg/L
Conductivity at 25oC 679 uS/cm
Nitrates 30 mg/L
PH 7.4

I don't have any Cal/Mag should I water or flush with substantial run-off using tap water and PH dialed down to something?

Light has since been raised by 20cm, I'm guessing I should raise it another 20cm? Also set back to 400w, and building a ''raising bed'' to bring them 20cm off the ground.

 

[dire wolf]

Hey wicked , that fan aimed directly at your hps is a bad idea , will end up killing your plants .....

The radiant heat and fan air flow will be too stressful for your small plants...

I think ? But im not there so its tough , try cooling your light with another free standing fan blowing across light not up into it ...

 

[AWickedWizard]

<3 thanks for all the info guys... Sounds like I really needed this.

 

[Beachwalker]

Hey wicked , that fan aimed directly at your hps is a bad idea , will end up killing your plants .....

Exactly why I wanted him to clarify that paragraph! So he is blowing that fan right at the plants then.. Stop! The Breeze from the fan goes between the top of the plants & the light, not directly on the plant

The pH of RO water is not what you think it is, there's no ions in ro and it can't be measured with conventional means

tell us about your tap water? as Dirtbag explained above never use plain RO water. maybe a mix of tap water and RO water might be better, tell us about your you tap water; when will you have your PPM or EC meter

Edit: you might be watering a little heavy too, you want to let it dry out well between waterings

 

[Dirtbag]

By the looks of your tap water, I'd just use that 50/50 mixed with RO, that should put you around 160ppm. No need to adjust ph really as your soil has a buffer. Shouldnt need calmag.

 

[revfunk]

First thing, right away, is overwatering. See how your fan leaves are cupped downwards??? That's due to overwatering.

 

[Dirtbag]

First thing, right away, is overwatering. See how your fan leaves are cupped downwards??? That's due to overwatering.

Totally. Also the heat and dryness is probably putting more demand on the roots than they can keep up with, especially when you throw in some osmotic stress from RO feedings. Droop harder bitches! lol

 

[dire wolf]

Hey guys, so I've been quite reluctant to posting here asking for help as I really wanted to figure this out through reading the various articles but I feel like I can't read fast enough or seem to lack enough experience to correctly judge the situation and whenever I try to fix one problem I think I'm creating another one, this is my first grow but I've been reading and dreaming about this for over 10 years waiting for a chance to finally be able to start growing.

So after a lot of hair pulling, trial and error I come in search of some wisdom.

Quick sidenote: I am planning to start a grow journal and be as active as possible, not here just to leech information. Just starting to get really stressed and tired, where a passion is turning into constant scare and headache. The current situation and not being able to easily purchase nutrients / equipment is also making it really hard.

Soo... I planted on the 16th of march into rootit cubes got 100% germination rate, went through some overwatering and had a few issues (I'll make a more in depth post as a grow journal as I took a lot of photos and made various timelapses).
Using Lumatek dual spectrum 600w HPS through a 600w Lumatek ballast (Set at 400w) running 18/6 (This has probably been my biggest mistake)

150x90 grow tent with a 550cfm fan connected to EcoTechnics controller (25oC, 5o hysterisis / 65%RH, 5RH hysterisis / 25% minimum FanSpeed, 55% Max FanSpeed )

Nutes I use are Bionova dedicated (Soil supermix, BN-zym, BN-missing link) going roughly 1 50% feed, 1 RO-Water, 1 RO-Water cycle whenever the top soil is dry.

Now this is where I get issues, I just can't seem to keep the temperatures down and humidity up, my VPD is all over the place. Temps with fans going pretty high (Near the 55% Fanspeed, anything over just seems to pummel the plants) stay around 29oC+ with RH staying around 40 to 55 at best. I have to keep the windows open with the blinds closed and that's what I've been playing around with most, if I open the blinds more temperatures stabilise but RH will go down to around 30 (even with it being around 50 outside) and if I close them more humidity stabilises but temperature goes way up to around 31, 32.

So 2 days ago I tried flipping to 600w and let it run for an 18h cycle (this I think caused stress and excess heat), then yesterday I accidentally left the humidifier running during the 6h off cycle causing humidity to reach 80 to 90+ (Compounded the previous problem) and when I went back into the room to check on them plants looked terrible with all sorts of issues.

Now I'm not sure what to do, should I feed, do I have nutrient lockout, toxicity, lack of some nutrients etc
Also I would really appreciate some advice on tent setup maybe I'm getting something wrong here.

Thanks for the help, I'll take some pics with white lighting as soon as the light's cycle is finished.

Dont worry , we'll get you straightened out ......

 

[dire wolf]

Dont worry , we'll get you straightened out ......

And i hate to throw so much crap at you at one time , but i cant stand saucers under a container , if you can get one of those home depot plastic light grids or something else to prop your plants up on and create a free drain space underneath pots you will be much better off ....
Wet bottoms always lead to issues furthur up the road

 

[AWickedWizard]

'' And i hate to throw so much crap at you at one time '' haha no worries whatsoever, the more info you guys give me the better, clearly all this has been eye opening and I couldn't thank you guys enough, pretty much saving my grow, looks like neither them or me would of survived this without it!

I'll fix as much as I can asap and post pictures again with the latest setup, the ''overwatering'' happened right after spending 6hours at approx 90% humidity, I've since this discussion given them 200ml of 90% RO mixed with 10% Tap water (This was before getting your answers, I'll do 50/50 next time) which has gotten them to straighten up again, light has been raised tenfold, fan has been moved and I've nearly finished making their new ''bed'' with a load of holes drilled in it. I'll get a tray as soon as possible only thing is all ''home depot'' are currently closed in my country... :/

As for the saucers I had been careful, that runoff would go into a separate container so I could measure it and they've (up until these last couple of days) been kept very clean with boiled water.

That was all the info I could find for the tap water quality.
PPM tester should come in sometime round next week.

Update soon.

 

[AWickedWizard]

Here we are now:
- bed has been raised to 15cm off the ground.
- Fan is pointing between the canopy and light. (Placed on the best side right?)
- Light is on 400w and at 90cm from canopy

I'll post a follow-up of Temps/RH and results once they've gone through a full cycle, now taking far more notes and once this topic is done I'll start the journal (got a lot of pics and various mistakes that'll be worth posting about what not to do...)

 

[AWickedWizard]

Superb!! They've spent a whole 18h cycle with temps not going over 28oC and the humidity stayed around 65% +/- 5% so it looks as if I might be able to start looking into getting a good VPD! Thank's a bunch your advice has proven to help tenfolds.

Now they have perked up and look as if they are ''living'' again but I've still got these signs of deficiencies/toxicity that I'm struggling to determine...
Should I water/flush/feed/foliar or do nothing, if I do, do nothing should I feed next or just water 50/50 RO + Tap? I'm a little unsure of what the next few steps should be, yesterday they were given 200ml of 90% RO, 10% Tap (I now know not to do this again) water which is close to having been used already and the top soil is starting to be dry and there was no runoff yesterday (1L pots)

My arsenal consists of:
RO Water, Tap Water, BioNova Soil Supermix, BN X-Cel, BN-zym, BN-Missing link.
Then I've got a small bag of guano powder (I'll edit with the NPK) & some Oyster shell powder havn't used either of these before so I wouldn't really know how to use them if need be.

I know see what you mean Dirtbag about the guttering system, brilliant idea, I'll get something like that in place as soon as I can!

 

[One drop]

Superb!! They've spent a whole 18h cycle with temps not going over 28oC and the humidity stayed around 65% +/- 5% so it looks as if I might be able to start looking into getting a good VPD! Thank's a bunch your advice has proven to help tenfolds.

Now they have perked up and look as if they are ''living'' again but I've still got these signs of deficiencies/toxicity that I'm struggling to determine...
Should I water/flush/feed/foliar or do nothing, if I do, do nothing should I feed next or just water 50/50 RO + Tap? I'm a little unsure of what the next few steps should be, yesterday they were given 200ml of 90% RO, 10% Tap (I now know not to do this again) water which is close to having been used already and the top soil is starting to be dry and there was no runoff yesterday (1L pots)

My arsenal consists of:
RO Water, Tap Water, BioNova Soil Supermix, BN X-Cel, BN-zym, BN-Missing link.
Then I've got a small bag of guano powder (I'll edit with the NPK) & some Oyster shell powder havn't used either of these before so I wouldn't really know how to use them if need be.

Nice to see a good outcome so far keep a eye on things I’m sure you will be fine happy growing .

 

[Dirtbag]

Your soil has nutes so dont feed anything yet. Not until we tell you! lol
Seriously leave them. They are improving and that's what matters. They have a happy environment, that's the main thing. When they dry up and "require*" another watering, give them 50/50 tap and RO until you get slight runoff. Then leave them alone again until they *require more water. They will sort themselves out quick if you can exercise some restraint lol.

*And only water when they have used up most of the water in the pots. They should feel quite light. In pots your size, I'd guess every 3 days give or take. In that soil you likely wont need to fertilize until they need transplanting. And if you transplant into the same soil... It wont need feeding then either for several weeks.