Aircon in hot humid places?

Looking for help here, as I'm a newbie grower with big problems.

I'm in Asia, in one of those countries where drug use carries massive penalties. I don't read the local alphabet, and gardening is not a popular pastime. As you can imagine, it's not easy to set up a grow room!

I'm moving to a new place, and want to set it up properly. Tiled floors, plastic ceiling tiles, and cement walls. I figured that after disinfecting I can paint the walls with gloss oil-based paint, and maybe do the ceiling too. How does that sound?

The big problem is climate control.

I'm using flourescent tubes, lots of them, and have had reasonable success. But it's 30 degrees celsius outside today and humid as hell. With the ballasts for the lights radiating heat like crazy my existing room reached 38 degrees recently. I've turned off as many lights as I can without killing the guys, but they're still too hot and now not getting enough light to grow. They're looking pretty sorry for themselves.

I don't see any alternative to airconditioning. Will that work? Has anyone ever tried it? Air con needs to recirculate the air in the room to cool it, but I need to pump air in to keep the CO2 up.

I'm growing Brasils and Mangos from KC Brains. Seed orders keep getting intercepted and I'm not going to try again. (It's one of the reasons I'm moving too.) I don't want to order a book for the same reason. All my info comes from the web and a lot of it is contradictory. What temperature and humidity should I be aiming for?

Also, a friend just brought me a testing kit which as a bit unreliable. I'm pretty sure the pH of the water is 8, but the nutrient readings are all over the place. I managed to find an electronic pH meter in an aquarium store, but no EC meter anywhere. Is it worth buying the pH meter? How can I get the acidity right anyway?

Heeelp!

Last, my new place has a big south-facing balcony. Assuming the tropical storms don't kill the plants, what else should I worry about? It's nearly the middle of summer, and we're barely getting 14hrs a day of sunlight.

Many thanks in advance for your advice.

 

hi my name is lizie i joined the list a few days ago. hmmmm. It sounds like living in asia is pretty ttough with reguards to setting up your own growroom. with reguards to tempriture and humidity its best to keep the room bitween 70 and 75 c this is what i keep coming back to when i look up information on the net. its best to be safe with reguards to spending money on seeds on line its better to be caushious than to go steeming on in there. try not to restrict your plants light. they may die and i'm not sure you want that. sounds like you should try and get your hands on a good ventalation system but again do your research b4 you go making any desitions. also i would replace that meter you have what you want is an acurate reading not guess work so it will be worth it. hope i have tried to answer your questions and i hope its helped.

 

You can use an air conditioner but the hot air needs to be vented outside. You could also purchase a dehumidifier. Ideal temp is between 70 and 80. I like 78 if its possible to be that exact. Humidity of 40 to 60 is normal.

 

Just to let you know, your use of "aircon" totally gave away the country you live in. Good luck avoiding those guys dressed in brown that call themselves police.

Oh, and find a generator as brown outs are quite frequent...

 

There realy isnt anyway to cool it down without an aircon or a swamp cooler with lots of ice.
outside ventilation is scary, not only the smell gives you away, but the heat comming off the vent.
with those concrete walls and if you run your lights at night you should be ok, even if gets over 80, its not ideal but its ok.
family or freinds in more tolerent countries an order those seeds for you.
good thing is that bewteen f2 seeds and clones you wont need to order them often.
if your soil is too acidic potash will bring it to a nutrel ph, and dosnt do much of anything else. for your water? well that will read a little high if thats how your feeding your girls. if its a problem you should rethink what fertilizer you are useing and make sure you are keeping the water good and aireated. batpoop and fish emultion tea is a goood safe choice.
green days to you
outgrow your goverment

 

that's strange the police uniforms are blue in the uk .ak.a the pigs in blue. mabey i miss understand you or something lol

 

wasn't refering to your post... refering to the original poster. In the country he appears to live, they wear brown and are totally useless.

 

UK at the site of your name hints at where your from.

 

Thanks.

I'm not worried about venting outside. I'm on a rooftop and there's no-one very close on any side. But just venting isn't a lot of good, because the air coming in is already very hot and humid. 80F=27C. The outside temperature, the temperature of the air coming in, today is 30C = 86F, that's before the lights heat it up even more. I'm managing to keep the temperature down to about 32C right now = 90F, but it's a struggle and involves leaving all the doors and windows open. It's not even real summer yet, and I can't do that when the big storms hit.

I ordered aircon yesterday, don't see that I have a lot of choice. The aircon recirculates the air in the room, and ventilates the heat outside, not the air and smells from the room. It can also regulate the humidity. Yeehaw. How much fresh air do I need to pump in as well?

My first clones died. Too hot. Now I'm trying to regenerate a bunch of sick plants in this heat. A couple of them might pull through but the others are destined for compost, I think. And there's no point getting people overseas to buy seeds for me. They still have to send them by mail, and they'll still get intercepted. Luckily the only person who knows about this is going to Amsterdam in few weeks. Any suggestions on the best seeds to bring back?

Guys, I do appreciate your advice. But everything everyone is saying is what I already read on the net - written for people in the USA or Europe. I need to adapt to local conditions and was hoping for some suggestions from people who can advise me on other ways to reach the desired ends.

if your soil is too acidic potash will bring it to a nutrel ph, and dosnt do much of anything else. for your water? well that will read a little high if thats how your feeding your girls. if its a problem you should rethink what fertilizer you are useing and make sure you are keeping the water good and aireated. batpoop and fish emultion tea is a goood safe choice.

I'm afraid this doesn't help me much. For starters, pH8 is alkaline, not acidic, and I can't just go out and buy stuff like that anyway. As I said, there are no gardening stores here. And the few sources of fertilizer I have found write everything in an alphabet I can't read.

So, what common household products can I use to manage the pH? Is there anything I can buy in a normal supermarket that will help my plants? Can I use a EC meter to ensure that I don't overfertilize, or do I have to let a local into my little secret to make sense of the labels for me? My problem is not a shortage of basic information, it's in finding ways to deal with being miles away from the sources you all have access to.

I found some american fertilizer, Schultz Bloom Plus 10.54.10, but they don't have any high N stuff. Just yesterday found a supplier of 'plant-prod', which is Canadian. It's labelled as evergreen and cedar fertilizer, 30.10.10 and also contains micronutrients. They've stuck a local label over the top, and I can't read much of the info on the back, but it says it's good for acid-loving plants. There's a product info page online, but no mention of what it does to the acidity. Anyone any experience? http://www.plant-prod.ca/product_e.php?id=355&category=78

I leached the plants with fresh (pH8!) water four days ago to try and flush them out, as I figure they're probably overfertilised right now. They're taking forever to dry out, due to the humidity, but can someone please advise on what to do the next time I water? Keep it fresh, or add ferts? Add natural products? How much?

Also, they're in ten litre pots (waste-paper bins with holes cut in the bottom for drainage) right now. I just read something about 15 litres being the ideal size. What do you guys use?

And icedtealady, nice guess. I'm not going to comment on the accuracy though. I was at the airport yesterday and there were prominent signs about drugs and the death penalty. Let's not play this game, eh? I've only got one life, and would hate it to be on your conscience.

 

aww... sweets.. they wear brown in lots of countries, not just yours. I know lots of hard core growers/dealers in your country who get around the cops by paying them off... if thats an option. Hell... i paid them off on more than one occasion, and it wasn't all that expensive. On the bright side, everything is cheap in your country, even the cops!

Hang in there, and I do still, strongly, recomend getting a back up power system. Having Air Con is great, but it won't help you when the power goes out for 3 days (like it does sometimes!)

 

I'm growing in soil, btw. The label on the bag says 'potting soil' in English and foreign. There's only one brand available. It has white lumps of something in it. Should I mix it with anything else?

 

oops thats what i get for not editing
the white things are prilite, there just there to hold in water.
you realy need to keep your ph nuterel, even if you have to buy distilled water, that alkiline is not gonna cut it.
you are spritzing those clones regularly arnt ya?

 

With an airconditioner you could have a sealed room. But you would need supplementary co2. You can order all the nutes ph adjusters or anything else you need of the net.

 

trust you to live in a country whaere the penalty for growing a little bit of weed is death! you said some of the stuff you got is in a language you don't understand. what is your furst language if it isn't english? i'm not up on thoes things lol !

 

he could tell you what his first language is, but the EVERYONE would know where he lives... which could lead to his death if a) the police in his country were hip to the hip forums or b) the government in his country was hip to the hip forums, which they aren't.

Basically, he is paranoid, but all the power to him... in our areas of the world the cops don't shoot you in the head for having some dope on ya

 

A healthy sense of paranoia is a good thing.

 

Oddly enough... i'm not really. When I lived there such a think was common. Unless you were a traveller from another country, there often weren't a lot of questions asked. Shoot first, questions later. Its a pretty odd country. Not saying they wouldn't take a bribe (please note my earlier posting) but not everyone in this country has enough money to pay them off.

 

Closest I came to being locked away for ever was in Equador. We had a local girl travelling with us ( looking after our needs) one night we asked her to leave the next morning we were raided by the police. They went straight to the stash (coke and weed). I had been smoking stone all night and was feeling mighty paranoid anyway. As I couldn't speak a word of Spanish and the pig kept running his finger across his neck indicating I was going to get my throat cut I was none to happy. Fortunately my friend could speak the lingo and quickly paid them $1000. We left the hotel half dressed and went into hiding untill we could catch a plain out of there. Found out from another hotelier a week later the police were searching all the hotels looking for us. They had taken our passport numbers and obviously were after more. As we had done a travellers check scam to make back some money when I finally caught the plane out I was more than a little relieved.

 

a buddy of mine just bought a climate control kit from a company named Growtronix. you might want to look into it. sounds like it maybe able to help you with controling your temps and humidity. all the stuff is computer automated. it all is reasonably priced and i too am looking into getting some of their stuff. i hope this bit of info may help, try lookin at the web page, www.growtronix.com.

best of luck with your situation i hope everything goes well.

 

Your balls are very large and possibly made of a high-grade metal like titanium.