Building a Budget Grow Room

Once you have your first harvest, you can save money by no longer buying cannabis. You can then use the money you have saved to invest in a better grow room and accessories. This will help increase, and improve your next yield.

Building a budget grow room isn't as tough a people think. But there are some things you need to consider:

You need to have enough height: For your plant/s, the pots and medium, the lights, and a distance of around 18 inches between the light and the top of the plant.

Extraction and Air Flow: You will need vents for fresh air to be drawn into the grow room, and for old stale air to be extracted. You will also need space for a small fan.

Light Leaks: You will need to ensure whatever you use for your budget grow room, that there is no light leaking in, or out of it. Not only can the glow from a grow light expose your grow, but light leaks during the night cycle can revegetate, and even hermie your plants.

What to use as a Budget Grow Room

As long as it is big enough to fit a plant in it, you can use it. This goes for anything from an old PC tower, to a spare cupboard or closet or even a chest of draws.

If you have the space, it is highly recommended you buy a grow tent. But of course, this may not be an option if you are on a budget. So, it may have to wait. This is OK, many growers have been there, we all start somewhere. For now, you just need a space.

If finding a place indoors for a grow room is not possible, you could always consider growing cannabis outdoors. As a result, the costs of growing are massively reduced. You can learn to grow cannabis outdoors, step by step in 2020, by following the outdoors guides in this year's issues of Soft Secrets. Pick up your copy at your local grow shop now!

How Much Space you Need to Grow a Cannabis Plant

A general rule of thumb, is a minimum of 4ft² per plant. If you do not have this space, then you should consider "Stealth Growing". This is where you grow plants in a small space, in small pots and keep them short throughout their grow cycle by topping and low stress training.

Consider the height when building a budget grow room. You not only need to consider how tall the plant may grow, but how tall the pots will be, where the lights will sit, and, the distance between the lights and the canopy (top of the plants).

Adding all of this together, will give you a minimum of 3ft that you need to work with. 4-5 inches for the pot, 1ft, for the plant, and then space for the lighting. The space for the light will depend on what light you use.

Lighting for Your Budget Grow Room

If you have very little height in your grow space, you should not use HID, or LED lighting. This kind of lighting is powerful, and should be kept at around 18 inches from the top of the plants at all times to prevent light bleaching and burning.

Instead, if height will be an issue, you should try using CFL lighting. CFL's are cheap, and very efficient. You may even have some spares around the house you could use to get you started.

Your plant will use light to make food for itself via photosynthesis. So, it is important to use the best lighting possible. CFL's will do in a worst-case scenario. But, if it is possible, using HID, LED, lighting is recommended.

Lighting for Your Budget Grow Room

If you have very little height in your grow space, you should not use HID, or LED lighting. This kind of lighting is powerful, and should be kept at around 18 inches from the top of the plants at all times to prevent light bleaching and burning.

Instead, if height will be an issue, you should try using CFL lighting. CFL's are cheap, and very efficient. You may even have some spares around the house you could use to get you started.

Your plant will use light to make food for itself via photosynthesis. So, it is important to use the best lighting possible. CFL's will do in a worst-case scenario. But, if it is possible, using HID, LED, lighting is recommended.

HID Lighting

If you have the height required to give the plant and light 18 inches of space, then you should use HID lighting if you afford it.

You will need around 50w per ft². The initial investment isn't too high, but the running cost can become expensive. Using HID lighting will bring you the best yield at the lowest initial price. This is the most common light used for indoor growing. But as the technology improves, LED lighting is starting to take over HID.

LED Lighting

It is easy to find cheap LED lights online. But most of them are not very good for cannabis growing. This can give LED lighting a bad name as a whole, and some growers are put off by LED growing. Over the last couple of years especially, LED lighting technology has improved massively. Thought this has improved the quality of the lighting, and reduce the price, LED lighting is still expensive, and out of the price range of most budget growers.

You may find LED light for very cheap online, but they will not be good enough to grow your plant for their full life cycle.

When growing Cannabis with LED lighting, you will need around 35w per ft². The wattage that the bulb states is not always what you get. Be skeptical with LEDS, don't just buy cheap models. They will usually be a waste of money and you should go with CFL, or HID instead.

Extraction for your Budget Grow Room

You need to keep air moving in your grow room, no matter what the size! This needs to be taken into account when building a budget grow room. The plants need fresh air to breath, and it is vital to keep a good supply of fresh air to your plants.

Extraction

The air in your grow room needs to be exchanged between 20 and 30 times and hour. This will keep a fresh supply of air to your plants. You will need extraction! It can be mounted outside of the grow room if space is a problem, but extraction is something you can't ignore.

If you are growing in a small grow space, like a PC tower, or something under 1ft­­³, you can use PC fans to extract air out of the grow room. Any bigger than this, and you should use 4-inch extraction at least.

Intake

This can be done " passively". This means, you just need an open vent, for air to be pulled in. Air will be pulled out of the top of the grow room, by your extractor. This will create "negative pressure" in the grow room, and air, will then be pulled in, through another vent.

Passive intake will do fine for small grow rooms. You won't need to use active intake unless you are having trouble maintaining temperatures.

Active intake is when you have 2 extractors in your grow room. One which blows air into it, and one which pulls air out of it. Having passive intake reduces the workload of your fans, and also gives you more control of the environment in the grow room. If you can afford active intake, it is recommended, but if not, you will be fine with one extractor pulling air out of the grow room through a carbon filter

Carbon Filter

Something you really can't afford to skip! You need to be able to control the smell coming from the grow room. Even one cannabis plant will be very pungent during flower, and if the smell isn't controlled, then you increase the risk of being caught.

If the wrong people find out about your grow, you put yourself in danger. This is the case even if you grow legally. Safety should be your number one priority; you must have a carbon filter to help keep your grow room a secret.

Spraying air fresheners and perfumes to cover the smell will not be an option. Those sprays will get onto your flowers, and effect the flavour, and quality. The only way to control the smell effectively, at a low cost, is by using a carbon filter and extraction.

Reflective Walls

When you grow cannabis indoors, you need to try and make use of the light as much as possible. Reflective walls will help you get the most out of your light. Light will be reflected off the wall and onto the plant, which will then be used by the plant to make food. Every little bit extra is good, and reflective walls are an important part to a grow room.

Some growers will start off using tin foil on the walls of their budget grow room. This doesn't work well. You are far better off painting the walls of the grow room bright white. Not only is this a cheap way to have reflective walls, but it is far more efficient that tin foil at reflecting light.

Final Notes on Budget Grow Rooms

No matter what, growing cannabis indoors will cost some money, you cannot do it for free. You can minimize costs, but you will need, extraction, a carbon filter, and a decent grow light, unless you plan to grow outdoors.

It is much easier than you think to start a cannabis grow. All you really need to start are seeds, some soil, and a good light to put then under. You can then upgrade lighting as the plants get bigger, and get them a proper grow room when you have more money.

The most important thing to do is start! If you have been thinking about growing your own cannabis for a long time, but never took that step, now is the time. With cannabis growers forums like Percys Grow Room, it has never been easier to grow your own. You can get the help you need, step by step, and get the best results out of your grow.

Join the community, and ask for advice when you need it. There is always someone there who is happy to help, and plenty of guides for you to read too.

Thanks for reading, get some seeds, and start your grow. You can be up and running, growing your own for less than the price of half an ounce of street weed. All the guides you need are here on Soft Secrets.com, and of course, you can always ask for help at Percys.

See you next time!