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oxana
i am the fun guy

Registered: 12/14/08
Posts: 258
Last seen: 2 years, 1 month
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flow hood contaminated with flying bugs
#19406429 - 01/12/14 12:19 AM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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so the shitiest thing just happened to me. i just discovered all my spawn master quarts and a dozen five quart spawn bags are contaminated. now i know my aseptic technique is excellent, ive been doing this for years at low rates of contamination. and the contams were located on top of the grains in my masters but away from the agar wedges i dropped into the jars.
so i got to thinking, and i recalled a few weeks ago i saw a flying bug sitting on the face of my filter on two different occasions. i vacuumed them off thinking no more about it. so i went to my filter today and saw that their is this very fine debris on the spun glass media. looking at the debris with my jewelers loop i noticed a few round egg like particles and this black debris that i think might be bug shit. also as i was looking at the filter i stired up one of the flying bugs that was on the floor. looks like this filters shot and i will be replacing it.
one thing worth noting. is i leave the filter on 24/7 on low(in an attempt to keep the air in the tent cleaner. and it keeps the tent at 75F and the filter it self at around 83f(room temp is 71F. i believe the elevated temperature of the filter may have made the tent lab and my filter into an ideal environment for these bugs.
my tent lab
 the flying bug in my prefered state
 normal room temp
 lab temp
 filter temp
Edited by oxana (01/12/14 12:39 AM)
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oxana
i am the fun guy

Registered: 12/14/08
Posts: 258
Last seen: 2 years, 1 month
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Re: flow hood contaminated with flying bugs [Re: oxana]
#19406460 - 01/12/14 12:29 AM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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in order to solve the problem here are my plans
1 clean the tent. 2 order a new filter 3 hang no pest strips "pesticidal" in the room and in the tent until my new filter arrives. 4 discontinue running the filter when not in use. 5 build an air tight cover to put over the new filter so when its not i use bugs cant mess with it.
what do you people think?
Edited by oxana (01/12/14 12:30 AM)
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Chimaira
Seasons in the abyss



Registered: 09/08/13
Posts: 212
Loc: Eastern United States
Last seen: 3 years, 10 months
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Re: flow hood contaminated with flying bugs [Re: oxana]
#19406464 - 01/12/14 12:32 AM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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Perhaps by leaving the filter on continuously it has let it draw a little moisture. That and the heat making it an idea incubating area for eggs?
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oxana
i am the fun guy

Registered: 12/14/08
Posts: 258
Last seen: 2 years, 1 month
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Re: flow hood contaminated with flying bugs [Re: oxana]
#19406465 - 01/12/14 12:32 AM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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buy the way this isnt the first time my filter has been fucked up. the first time i took the fan off the top and my cat thought it would be nice to sleep inside my filters plenum. filter went straight into the trash luckily it was a 12x12 inch filter and i got to upgrade to this. i think i may upgrade again.
Edited by oxana (01/12/14 12:54 AM)
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oxana
i am the fun guy

Registered: 12/14/08
Posts: 258
Last seen: 2 years, 1 month
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Re: flow hood contaminated with flying bugs [Re: Chimaira]
#19406467 - 01/12/14 12:33 AM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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its pretty damn dry in my lab room about 30RH. i think the bugs just really dig the warm filter.
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Mo_Mo
Stranger

Registered: 12/08/13
Posts: 8
Last seen: 1 year, 5 months
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Re: flow hood contaminated with flying bugs [Re: oxana]
#19407038 - 01/12/14 06:03 AM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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Try spraying with a 1/10 bleach solution.
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RogerRabbit
Bans for Pleasure



Registered: 03/26/03
Posts: 42,214
Loc: Seattle
Last seen: 1 year, 4 days
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Re: flow hood contaminated with flying bugs [Re: oxana]
#19407040 - 01/12/14 06:06 AM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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Bugs aren't the problem. It's all that crap you have stacked up on top of the hood. Clean that shit up and spray the whole table, flowhood box and the face of the filter with Lysol or alcohol before every use.
Dust settles on and around all those boxes of gloves and are then carbureted into the flow of sterile air. Get rid of that table with a crack in your work space too. RR
-------------------- Download Let's Grow Mushrooms semper in excretia sumus solim profundum variat "I've never had a failed experiment. I've only discovered 10,000 methods which do not work." Thomas Edison
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lil_demented
Loner will lone

Registered: 09/11/06
Posts: 6,146
Last seen: 2 months, 2 days
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Re: flow hood contaminated with flying bugs [Re: RogerRabbit]
#19407371 - 01/12/14 08:43 AM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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I'd set a piece of glass over the table so I'd have a surface that's easy to clean.
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oxana
i am the fun guy

Registered: 12/14/08
Posts: 258
Last seen: 2 years, 1 month
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Re: flow hood contaminated with flying bugs [Re: RogerRabbit]
#19407978 - 01/12/14 11:42 AM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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Quote:
RogerRabbit said: Bugs aren't the problem. It's all that crap you have stacked up on top of the hood. Clean that shit up and spray the whole table, flowhood box and the face of the filter with Lysol or alcohol before every use.
Dust settles on and around all those boxes of gloves and are then carbureted into the flow of sterile air. Get rid of that table with a crack in your work space too. RR
interesting. so if i clean the lab up. and start spraying the face and box with alchohol im good. you dont think having bugs running in and out of the filter screwed it up permenantly? excellent.
i wonder why my contam rate was so low until i started seeing bugs. maybe it was a coincidence and the dust had finally started to build up at this point.
also i dont work on the plastic table. i work up on a piece of elevated stainless steel. is this a problem?
thanks for your help again RR. it would be sweet not to have to build a new filter.
im going to go clean now.
Edited by oxana (01/12/14 11:45 AM)
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fractaldill
Cultivator in Training

Registered: 08/31/13
Posts: 909
Last seen: 9 years, 10 months
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Re: flow hood contaminated with flying bugs [Re: RogerRabbit]
#19408116 - 01/12/14 12:20 PM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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Quote:
RogerRabbit said: Bugs aren't the problem. It's all that crap you have stacked up on top of the hood. Clean that shit up and spray the whole table, flowhood box and the face of the filter with Lysol or alcohol before every use.
Dust settles on and around all those boxes of gloves and are then carbureted into the flow of sterile air. Get rid of that table with a crack in your work space too. RR
Whats wrong with the crack in the table? could you just cover it up?
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cronicr



Registered: 08/07/11
Posts: 61,436
Loc: Van Isle
Last seen: 2 years, 1 month
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Re: flow hood contaminated with flying bugs [Re: fractaldill]
#19408124 - 01/12/14 12:22 PM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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maybe it gives an area for crap to sit in
--------------------
  It doesn't matter what i think of you...all that matters is clean spawn I'm tired do me a favor
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bodhisatta 
Smurf real estate agent



Registered: 04/30/13
Posts: 61,890
Loc: Milky way
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Re: flow hood contaminated with flying bugs [Re: fractaldill]
#19408131 - 01/12/14 12:23 PM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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if he was using it where the crack was it would make turbulence. Also moving air creates low pressure Bernoulli's principle. That's why a LFH has the hood, and usually some other partitions that keep the laminar air flow isolated(IE stay laminar) to work in.
Edited by Trusted cuItivator (01/12/14 12:23 PM)
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fractaldill
Cultivator in Training

Registered: 08/31/13
Posts: 909
Last seen: 9 years, 10 months
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Re: flow hood contaminated with flying bugs [Re: bodhisatta]
#19408140 - 01/12/14 12:25 PM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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Quote:
bodhisatta said: if he was using it where the crack was it would make turbulence. Also moving air creates low pressure Bernoulli's principle. That's why a LFH has the hood, and usually some other partitions that keep the laminar air flow isolated(IE stay laminar) to work in.
You just gave me some ideas :p
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oxana
i am the fun guy

Registered: 12/14/08
Posts: 258
Last seen: 2 years, 1 month
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Re: flow hood contaminated with flying bugs [Re: fractaldill]
#19408614 - 01/12/14 02:32 PM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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so i just cleared out my tent. their was some seeds the tarp floor so i shook the tarp off. i sanitized all the walls and the tarp floor with a heavy mistin of sanstar at label rate of 6ml per quart.
im going to let it air dry.
part of me hopes i dont have to replace the filter so i can save a few bucks. and the other part of me want to replace the filter with one thats only 6" deep this ones 12" deep and it makes it heavy as hell since the plenum needs to be the the same size or bigger then the filter. also this filter is only 99.97% at 0.3 microns. i have a feeling the extra 0.02% wont hurt with a 99.99% filter.
either way i think if im going to be spraying my filter with alcohol frequently i will need to replace the wood as its MDF. and MDF expands when it gets wet.
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oxana
i am the fun guy

Registered: 12/14/08
Posts: 258
Last seen: 2 years, 1 month
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Re: flow hood contaminated with flying bugs [Re: oxana]
#19410073 - 01/12/14 08:37 PM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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so i finished cleaning my tent.
i wiped every part of my tables with 70 iso and put them back in the tent. i sprayed the wooden box and face of my flow hood with lysol. and i wiped down my stainless steel work platform with alcohol as well. i also added a piece of lexan to put over the crack between my tables below my work platform.
its looking really clean. theirs no more clutter and im going to keep it that way.


my prefilter is a charcoal dust filter pad and 3 hepa filters siliconed together


heres a picuture of a job well done
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bodhisatta 
Smurf real estate agent



Registered: 04/30/13
Posts: 61,890
Loc: Milky way
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Re: flow hood contaminated with flying bugs [Re: oxana]
#19410082 - 01/12/14 08:39 PM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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that should help immensely
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oxana
i am the fun guy

Registered: 12/14/08
Posts: 258
Last seen: 2 years, 1 month
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Re: flow hood contaminated with flying bugs [Re: oxana]
#19410095 - 01/12/14 08:42 PM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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do you think i should make some petri dishes and open them in front of the hood for 30 seconds?
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Citric


Registered: 03/19/04
Posts: 4,490
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Re: flow hood contaminated with flying bugs [Re: oxana]
#19410140 - 01/12/14 08:53 PM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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Quote:
oxana said: do you think i should make some petri dishes and open them in front of the hood for 30 seconds?
Can't hurt, and given recent results I'd recommend it before just diving back in feet first. I would do multiple ones and in intervals, not all at once. Do one, label it #1. Let run flow hood run for a minute, do another, ect.
Looks a lot better, and much more professional as well.
-------------------- Self Healing lid tek ** Update 10.17.17 ** Mini casing pictures: Pins to harvest Cup O' Shrooms Magash: I noticed my contams were in the shape of fingers Hyphae: Yes "Loss of moisture from the substrate" is not a casing trigger. My final Grow!
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oxana
i am the fun guy

Registered: 12/14/08
Posts: 258
Last seen: 2 years, 1 month
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Re: flow hood contaminated with flying bugs [Re: Citric]
#19410212 - 01/12/14 09:12 PM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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hey citric your "last grow" really motivated me to step my game up when i read it.
ill give it a shot
ive been kind of as slob lately as i just moved. getting better though
Edited by oxana (01/12/14 09:14 PM)
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Citric


Registered: 03/19/04
Posts: 4,490
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Re: flow hood contaminated with flying bugs [Re: oxana]
#19410248 - 01/12/14 09:22 PM (10 years, 1 month ago) |
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Quote:
oxana said: hey citric your "last grow" really motivated me to step my game up when i read it.
ill give it a shot
ive been kind of as slob lately as i just moved. getting better though
I'm glad you either learned from it or gave you motivation/inspiration, that was it's purpose. I only ever logged a few things out of paranoia, so figured my last hoorah I could give a little back 
Good luck!
-------------------- Self Healing lid tek ** Update 10.17.17 ** Mini casing pictures: Pins to harvest Cup O' Shrooms Magash: I noticed my contams were in the shape of fingers Hyphae: Yes "Loss of moisture from the substrate" is not a casing trigger. My final Grow!
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