TrevorLahey's Low Budget Growing Part 5: "The Ghost and the Darkness"

I have an idea of what iso is (I’ve used it before)…but what is methyl hydrate?

Edit: I dont know what iso is…I know what alcohol is…but not sure what makes it iso

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isopropyl alcohol typically used for disinfection

methyl hydrate = methanol

Alcohol that you drink = Ethanol

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Awesome!!! Thanks for the lesson boys!!!

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Is denatured alcohol safe to use for making qwiso. I know its pretty much pure grain alcohol with stuff added to make it not taste good or not safe for human consumption. Im in the states and i am having a hard time finding a product that is listed as methyl hydrate.

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That’s because in the US, Methyl Hydrate is sold and marketed as Denatured Alcohol. AFAIK it’s an identical product just look for the 99.8% stuff or higher.

It is definitely not safe for human consumption, and neither is Isopropyl, naphtha or even high proof ethanol. That’s what we are doing when we purge/evaporate it away, theres nothing left in the end product or at least in any harmful amount.

So yes it can definitely be used to make QWISO, but I think we need a new name for it since theres no ISO in it, and somehow QWMeth just has a bad ring to it… bahaha

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Hey check out this cool shot of a bleeding Dark Spark.

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Looking dark and frosty as well :heart_eyes:

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That’s such a cool shot!!! Did that happen from a temperature flux?

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Thanks! I usually see this when a plant is very mature and the media has dried out. I think it’s the plant trying to self hydrate as I always notice that after a day or two of dry media the flowers all become very damp as if they are pulling the remaining moisture into them. And with it comes these blobs of sap.

This sap is incredibly sweet and taste the same flavour as the bud it comes from. I ate too big of a blob off of this plant here and it was so sweet it made me pucker and everything lol.

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Instead of Maple syrup you could make dark spark syrup MMMMM.

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Well where to begin…

I’ve been making many adjustments over these last couple weeks trying to see some improvement in my shitty plants and while I apologize for not sharing the journey with the community I’m happy to say I got things back on track and learned alot from my experience.

I started feeding my plants in the Bridgelux tent every day with a good healthy runoff (like 1 or 2 gallons runoff per plant) and they bounced back just in time to throw a bit of energy into side growth.

I had also been struggling with things being too cold and humid in here so I came up with the simple solution of shoving my drivers into the intakes of the tent and voila!! Free heat!! Temps went from 18-20C to 24-26C and 65% RH… big difference!

And in the Mars SP250 tent I had harvested the worst looking plants I ever grew (my fault not the light) and moved in my freshly started seedlings about 3-4 weeks ago for the next run. Taking everything I just learned in the other tent into consideration I started doing the same and feeding them every day to a healthy runoff. This got tiresome real quick as I had to take all the plants out and prop them up in totes and wait for them to stop dripping before moving them back into the tent.

Something had to give, so I’m just finishing up building a top feed recirculating irrigation system.

I found a 42"x20" under bed storage tray and well…

It’s not complete I have a big reservoir that is painted and drying before I can hook up the pump.

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Looking great all around :+1: I’ll be interested to see how you like the TFR setup. Looks like it’s off to a good start!

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My old system was basically same as this but 2x2 and I always had success with it. Only reason I went to hand watering was because I couldn’t wrap my head around a way to make it work in a 2x4 until now lol

I want everything to finish up so I can get a fresh start.

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I am so freaking happy to see that you’ve got things turned around! Yes! Excellent!

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Curious what you used in your 2x2 as far as what your pots were sitting on…

I run 2 2x2s and try a new method every time pretty much, and I haven’t found a good under bed storage or drip pan that fits well…

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I actually got my hands on some 1/8" stainless steel and built a tray from scratch for the old 2x2 cabinet, with a drain hole in the middle. The tray sat on ledges so the reservoir that was located below, could be freely moved.

For a tent I would find a tote close to 2x2 and do the same thing, and make a ledge or something for the tray to sit on. Then another tote underneath as a reservoir.

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Looking good Trev. I am glad you found some solutions. Why do you think it is necessary for such a lot of run off?

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To prevent nutrient buildup. The plant doesnt use all the water or nutrients that get added, alot is evaporated off, leaving the nutrients behind.

They get built up pretty high over just 2 waterings if not watering to runoff. I was finding after the second watering, the EC of the runoff was very high, 2.4 at one point. I am aiming for 1.8EC so I just kept feeding at 1.8 until the runoff is the same as what’s going in. I had to throw out a lot of good nutrient rich runoff too which sucks.

In the new system it will automatically water them many times a day and recycle the runoff to ensure what’s in the coco is the same as what’s in the reservoir, and then all I need to do is adjust the reservoir as needed.

For the Bridgelux tent I still plan on running the Blumats next run since the container size is considerably larger, but instead of feeding to runoff every other day I’ll just use pH’ed water every few days to flush out any build-up. At least that’s the plan.

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Yeah the waste of nutrients was what I was thinking about :worried:. Just seems excessive but at least you know what works :+1: Is it a problem with this type of coco, you didn’t have this much of a problem with your other mediums. I like the recycling idea it will definitely be more cost effective :slightly_smiling_face:

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The only time I didnt have this problem in coco was with my old top feed recirculating system from the old cabinet. So that adds even more to the smoking gun theory.

I did a living soil run a couple runs back and while it didnt have this specific issue, it still had nutrition problems. I’m always struggling with plant nutrition.

I had to spray the reservoir down with a healthy coat of rocker guard to black it out, and its still a little wet 24hrs later… and not 100% effective at blocking out all light. Gonna have to accept that the reservoir will have a few small light leaks. Maybe have to run pool shock to keep the diatoms at bay.

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