I just ordered my grow cabinet. its a metal storage cabinet w/ double doors. Its 3' wide 2' deep and 6.5' tall. 39 cubic feet. i have a 175w mh to put in there . My question is concerning ventilation. I was thinking of using 2 of these fans http://www.buyextras.com/su12acfan.html for exhaust and use a passive intake? would that work and are these the right fans . any suggestions are welcomed . Thanks. Peace!!!!! ps this is for mothers only no flowering will be done in this cab
Those fans are good for circulation, but not near as effective for exhaust...ALso these fans are not designed for continuous duty
I forget the name of the companie, but for like 15 bucks you can get a little 70 cfm squral fan. Would probaly do a better job.
to answer ur question no. i wrote something on fans...run a search for a thread containing "manometer" it should come up. those fans wont move nanywhere near their rating if there restricted even a little bit. they might work if you put one on the intake and one on the exhaust but u'd need to be sure that the rest of the box is well seald to get the desired effect. Good luck man Happy Growin' *EDIT* its called "a little ditty on cooling ur lights" but yeah search for manometer this and that are the only two
G G's right. Those are hardly worth the money. They'll never move the volume of air you'll need running a MH in an enclosed steel cabinet. First and foremost lights are most important. After that ventilation is next in line. No sense hooking up a nice cabinet and light and then cooking your plants due to poor ventilation. Spend a few extra bucks. Even in-line booster fans (which aren't great) will move more air than those for near the same price. Goblin said it right though, any restriction and the volume of either will drop immensely.
well I was thinking of going with those types of fans cuz I was comparing it to the bloom box. I do want to mention that the 175w mh is a mini system with the ballast built into the reflector and it does have air cooling capabilities. so how should i go bout venting this cabinet. cool the hood seperatly? $$$ is not an issue so give me some suggestions on what i will need to purchase to keep temps reasonable. thanks !
Well if you are going to be using it for mom plants then you'll have the light on at least 18 hours a day. You'll need to install a thermostat and a decent exhaust set up. A Dayton blower or PowerVent or Vortec inline fan come to mind but there are many options to choose from. Check out some hydro sites and see what they're selling. Then Google it and you'll probably find a better price on Ebay or somewhere else. You'll need a speed control for the fan which you can Google for a "router speed control" which is what I use and it works great. Reason being is you probably won't want the fan running wide open in the metal cabinet cause it will generate noise (may or may not be an issue for you). Also will have to mount the fan if directly to the cabinet on some rubber bushings to dampen the vibration and noise. If you shelve the fan inside and duct it to the cabinet intake/exhaust just make sure it is secure and again mounted on a rubber mat or something. You can always go with a cool tube as well which will only add the addition of a Pyrex bake-a-round tube. I assume you're using an HID light so that may be a good option. Once you got your exhaust and light set up you should be good to go. However as time goes on you will find ways of tweaking it to get it just the way you want it. P.S. Thermostats I use I get from AFC Greenhouse Controls online. They're heavy duty and work great for not too bad a price. Again there's sure to be other options but that's a starting point for you.
I've actually built one of these for a friend. We used a 400W light a cool tube pulling air out the cab that used 50CFM bathroom fan from homedepot and a another 50CFm bathroom fan hooked up to the top pulling the other air out and with a passive intake. We thought we might need a bigger fan but it seemed to work out the temps stay constant around 78-80 *F with the lights on and 12" over the plants. Works great actually so far any way we built it about a month ago tested it a few days with no plants to monitor temps and such after that we through the plants in there and everything seems good right now and with that damn thing lined with mylar when you open up one of the doors its like opening the gates of heaven nothing but reflected light blinding you!
Yea pretty much we ended up having to go get an emergency blanket from walmart and hanging it over the door so when you open it the blanket blocks a lot of it. Cause the blankets are just really then mylar and when you hold it up to the 400W you can see through it but its like looking through sunglasses or really more like looking at a solar eclipse with those glasses.
Would this be a better option? http://www.hydroforlessinc.com/ViewProductDetails.asp?STechID=12&ProductID=58&thisPage1=6 If so, do i use it to cool the hood only or should i duct it to one opening of my hood and exhaust the cabinet and the hood at the same time? thanks
Yeah, that would definitely be a better choice. That thing even looks high quality. Think I might need to pick somethin up. I would try it through the hood first. Kind of kill two birds with one stone. Is it possible to set the light up with the ballast outside of the box, or on a top shelf. That will create some unwanted heat. If venting the exhaust through the light doesn't give you enough ventilation try picking up one of these and use it on the intake. They look pretty cheaply made and all but they are pretty cheap, and can hook up to 4" tube easily. http://cgi.ebay.com/4-IN-LINE-EXHAUST-FAN-hydroponics-grow-light-lights_W0QQitemZ120017969797QQihZ002QQcategoryZ43555QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem Remember to mount the intake low, and exhaust as high as possible. Here is a little bit bigger squirrel fan for about the same price. http://cgi.ebay.com/Dayton-Blower-265-CFM-Exhaust-Fan-Hydroponics-HPS_W0QQitemZ250016960870QQihZ015QQcategoryZ3186QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem Best of luck to you.
get a sguirrel cage fan from lowe's or home depot..more cfm and it would only take one in the top of the closet to vent heat effectively. You can place the smaller fans at the bottom for intake fans to help cool faster. you can make a light trap and drill holes in the bottom of the cab for a great cool air intake. use a snuggle dryer sheet that has already been used for a filter over the holes. And either hang mylar or paint it white in there, which is the best thing. hope it's made outta aluminum and not steel lol, cause if it does get hot in there it will remain hot for a lot longer time after the lights go out.
