Ng Co2 Burner Was Killing My Plants

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mittenmedgrow

mittenmedgrow

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Once this crop I'm on is done I am going to try getting the burners going again for the next run. I was about a week in my first crop in these new rooms before I noticed something was off. Before loading the room up I put one hogs breath in to be my canary in the coal mine. It was in for two weeks and showed no signs of stress so I loaded the room with plants, 12 different strains. By chance the hogs breath was one of the couple strains that didn't show anything wrong for a month. The wifi and white russian were the worst affected showing serious issues within days of moving in. I have been running the same strains for years in numerous locations and have never had issues so right away I knew something was wrong and it had to be environmental or pests. I have never seen the effects of broad or russet mites first hand so I thought maybe I have a pest that I've never dealt with before. I took the USB scope and started searching. After a few days and hours and hours of scoping no sign of bugs so I'm left with only one cause, it must be environmental. I added exhaust fans that would exchange the air in the room quickly and set it to come on 4 times during the light cycle and twice at night. I was about 4weeks into flowering at this point and the damage was already done, plants were dropping leaves. I needed my second crop to go off as planned so I went back to what I know works for me and shut off the burners. I am going to try running them again on the next round.
 
fishwhistle

fishwhistle

4,686
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@We Solidarity I agree with that,Burners are not for smaller rooms nor are they for sealed rooms.I think another issue is what people consider sealed,if your venting at all i dont consider that sealed,sealed to me is recircing and scrubbing the inside enviro over and over,no outside influence.
If i had my way id vent or truth be told id be in a greenhouse or outdoor ideally but thats just not possible now so to keep my privacy i stay sealed.I love the convenience of burners they just dont work for me.
 
NE Gardens

NE Gardens

17
3
After nearly a year of having them fuck things up in a major way, I now have propane and NG burners running in a variety of room sizes, with excellent results. The smallest rooms are about 8'x12', the largest 24'x50' and I run the rooms fully sealed, never exhausting the air the entire run.

As I mentioned above, make sure the regulators are placed outside the room, and you have checked for all leaks.

The other thing that I have found is that no matter what, certain Titan Controls / Autopilot / Blueprint (I think they all probably come from the same factory) burner units will cause rooms to die. The strange thing is, I have a few of them (exact same model) to work great. I can only guess that there are inconsistencies in the manufacturing that make some leaky or burn incompletely.

These days I only use the newer sentinel burners "ICG-30" and haven't had a single problem with one.
 
phenotyper

phenotyper

851
63
NEGardens, sorry I may have missed your point. I had a plumber install my NG line and he put the regulator in the same room as the CO2 burner. Why did you suggest it is outside of the room?
 
NE Gardens

NE Gardens

17
3
NEGardens, sorry I may have missed your point. I had a plumber install my NG line and he put the regulator in the same room as the CO2 burner. Why did you suggest it is outside of the room?
The regulators usually have a small pressure release hole, so if the gas is at high pressure and the regulator is in the room, it can leak raw gas in to the room. Which will instantly cause severely sick plants.
 
phenotyper

phenotyper

851
63
Good to note, I will definitely check on that as a source of error. Thank you very much @NEGardens.

Has anyone ever used one of the combustable gas detection units? Are they reliable and can they detect at low ppm? I just picked up a couple of these and was wondering their efficacy:

"Kidde KN-COEG-3 Nighthawk Plug-In Carbon Monoxide and Explosive Gas Alarm with Battery Backup"
 
phenotyper

phenotyper

851
63
I've got a plumber coming to checkout the unit and probably move the regulator outside of the room. Besides the connections between the hose and regulator, the hose from regulator to device, and the actual brass valves (2), are there any other connections to check? Any other litmus tests to perform? Seems like a fairly simple device, but I just want to make sure I have all my bases covered. Thanks again, and I hope I can be up and running co2 again soon.
 
NE Gardens

NE Gardens

17
3
I've got a plumber coming to checkout the unit and probably move the regulator outside of the room. Besides the connections between the hose and regulator, the hose from regulator to device, and the actual brass valves (2), are there any other connections to check? Any other litmus tests to perform? Seems like a fairly simple device, but I just want to make sure I have all my bases covered. Thanks again, and I hope I can be up and running co2 again soon.
I've had some of the Titan Controls/Blueprint/Autopilot branded burners leak from internal fittings, but since I switched to the Sentinel ICG-30 models, no problems in any rooms. Just spray down every single fitting you can with soapy water, and fire up the burner while watching for even the smallest amount of bubbling. The NG burners run at a much lower pressure than the propane burners, so I think they generally have less problems.
 
phenotyper

phenotyper

851
63
I snagged one of the icg-30 units today and going to install it tomorrow. I have a small room but I'm hoping this new burner is the end of my problems.


@NE Gardens Did you end up testing any of the burners on that unit? They look strictly different than any burner I've seen and I don't know how to go about it. I'm not sure my plumber would know either. Any advice you can offer? Thanks again!
 
NE Gardens

NE Gardens

17
3
I snagged one of the icg-30 units today and going to install it tomorrow. I have a small room but I'm hoping this new burner is the end of my problems.


@NE Gardens Did you end up testing any of the burners on that unit? They look strictly different than any burner I've seen and I don't know how to go about it. I'm not sure my plumber would know either. Any advice you can offer? Thanks again!
No, I haven't specifically leak tested any of the burners on the icg 30 unit. I do leak tests on any of user assembled screw fittings that are in the room, and if there are no leaks, I fire it up. I have about 8 of the icg-30s running in various rooms with no problems.
 
phenotyper

phenotyper

851
63
I am happy to report, that after three days after having the new Sentinel ICG-30 burner, everything still looks good. I am very hopeful that this solved the problem. My Natural Gas/Propane/Carbon Monoxide detector is all showing 0 ppms as well. The plants look good, and I'll report back in a week if things go south.

The new burner is absolutely fantastic. Changing BTUs on demand is fucking awesome. Now my burner is on for about 1 minute or less and my room is brimming with co2.

I HOPE MY ISSUES NEVER COME BACK! And I hope that between this thread and the VPD thread that co2 growers can figure out the issues they are having. As for me, I am hoping my Crockett Family Farms Clementine blows up with the added co2 :)

@Seamaiden maybe worth a sticky given the number of times I've seen this issue or similar issues?
 
G

GreenGeek

1
1
Hi Guys n Girls,

Heres my take, co2 burner long time, full digital control with pc interface/graphing to monitor.

The problem is this, we only measure CO2 not CO or Oxygen levels or the other by products produced, so you don't know what the real levels/toxins are in the room.

I found you need to slowly bleed the room, for me its 2mins on 5 mins off with a smaller extraction setup, then the main extraction comes on for 10 mins every 1.5 hours during sunlight.

You will need to find the right bleed off for your room size and burner size, I still get 4 weeks on 8.5kg bottle.

I highly recommend a enviro controller so you can see whats going on, mine even shows room pressure and I also measure soil moisture to control watering and monitor plant health as its easy to see when they are not well.
Also note your fruiting cycle will slow down to even pause if the balance is not right, the dropping leaves and leaf damage is more to the extreme out of balance.

I have spent many hours sorting this out and if I change the room layout I need to review the bleed off!

hope thats of help.
 
H

Hydronpk

8
3
After nearly a year of having them fuck things up in a major way, I now have propane and NG burners running in a variety of room sizes, with excellent results. The smallest rooms are about 8'x12', the largest 24'x50' and I run the rooms fully sealed, never exhausting the air the entire run.

As I mentioned above, make sure the regulators are placed outside the room, and you have checked for all leaks.

The other thing that I have found is that no matter what, certain Titan Controls / Autopilot / Blueprint (I think they all probably come from the same factory) burner units will cause rooms to die. The strange thing is, I have a few of them (exact same model) to work great. I can only guess that there are inconsistencies in the manufacturing that make some leaky or burn incompletely.

These days I only use the newer sentinel burners "ICG-30" and haven't had a single problem with one.
Hi:
Could you confirm that the Sentinel ICG-30 Propane works fine?
Thanks
 
H

Hydronpk

8
3
I am happy to report, that after three days after having the new Sentinel ICG-30 burner, everything still looks good. I am very hopeful that this solved the problem. My Natural Gas/Propane/Carbon Monoxide detector is all showing 0 ppms as well. The plants look good, and I'll report back in a week if things go south.

The new burner is absolutely fantastic. Changing BTUs on demand is fucking awesome. Now my burner is on for about 1 minute or less and my room is brimming with co2.

I HOPE MY ISSUES NEVER COME BACK! And I hope that between this thread and the VPD thread that co2 growers can figure out the issues they are having. As for me, I am hoping my Crockett Family Farms Clementine blows up with the added co2 :)

@Seamaiden maybe worth a sticky given the number of times I've seen this issue or similar issues?
Glad that worked for you. Is that the LP version and you keep the Propane inside the room?
Thanks
 
noob12345

noob12345

20
3
So glad I found this thread, Been suffering purple leaf stems, striped main stems and slow growth/rooting and low yield for 2 grows! Found this, go vented 24hours ago, problems gone or going quickly!
 
Judaz

Judaz

476
93
Yup. I’ve had this same issue with the burners. So I’ve switched to co2 tanks. Got much better results but the best results come from a hybrid setup. Co2 tanks, injecting fresh air at a very slow rate and exhausting the room 3-4 times for 10 min during the light cycle. At the dark cycle running the exhaust for 12 hours Where your room is sealed and you exhaust every few hours to burp the room out. There is something in the fresh outside air that plants like. Because when I don’t inject the fresh air at a slow rate I still get good results but not the best results. My best results have come from the hybrid system.
 

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