New Stealth Medicine Cabinet Design and Build

[DocCrow]

I have been wanting to get back into growing my own bud for a while now, and finally decided to take the plunge. I had grown outdoor in my youth with much success, and after visiting here and seeing the amazing work you all have been putting in I have decided to build my own Medicine Cabinet to supply my wife and I, as the cost of quality meds here is through the roof. None of my ideas are original, and I want to throw a shout out to all f you who have inspired me in this. Anti, Dr Bud, Blynx, TexMex, VerdantGreen, RedGreenery, ScrubNinja, and Thundurkel have provided most of my inspiration. Thank You.

I have a storage cabinet that will suffice to turn into V1.0. I will be growing as organically as possible, in a soil less mix. I am using LC's to start, but may move to coco. My method will be a perpetual SOG, we will see how many I can cram in there before I figure out #s.

I am using this thread to document my design and build. Please Please put up any ideas, questions, criticism, etc. That is why I am here. Well that, and I like to "pay it forward" and hopefully someone else can benefit from this as much as I have benefited from all of yours.

DocCrow

 

[MEGA956]

//I'll be keepin' an eye on this thread.

 

[DocCrow]

Here we go

Here we go

Ok Here is the goods



Overall design is shown with no doors. This will give me a little less than 3sq' for flowering on the bottom. The middle section is for mothers/ clones. The top is divided into 3 parts, drying chamber on the left, the middle will accept a carbon filter insert I am trying to figure out(more later on that I need some input) and utility on the right.

Lighting
CFLs 42w nothing groundbreaking here. If I can fit 10 into the flower chamber (possible but will be tight) that will give me ~9000 lumens/sq'. The flower chamber will have fewer bulbs in it, probably 6-8.
Ventilation
I think this is the key to a successful cab. I think I have it figured out here to successfully vent this thing without sacrificing too much interior volume to maximize my bud space. My lights will be sealed off from my flower and mother chambers with glass (not shown on design). Each growing chamber will have it's own lightproof vent (as designed by scrubninja), and will allow for 13sq" of airflow through it. If you look on the left side of the mother chamber you will see the duct work that I am going to build out of some sheet metal. It will draw the air from the growing chambers into the drying chamber upper left. The duct work will be 13"x1", and the upper chamber will have a light trap in it to prevent light leaks into the flower chamber. the air from the grow chambers will flow though the carbon insert and there will be a cpu fan. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835186079 over the single exhaust hole, vented into the utility room. The light chambers will each get their own intakes and will flow through the right side duct into the utility chamber and out the exhaust holes in the back. each hole will have its own fan. All inlets and exhausts will have prefilter material on the inside to help with light leaks and keep bugs, dust etc out.
In addition the veg room will have its own interior door to seal it off to prevent light leaks into the flower chamber.
MY QUESTIONS
Carbon filter insert
This is shown in the last pic. it will simply be a frame prefilter material covering the ends, and chickenwire or some other screen material over that for structural integrity, and filled with activated charcoal. there will be about a 1.5" airgap between the charcoal and the fan so the fan can draw from the entire surface area. HOW THICK SHOULD THIS BE? I am thinking 3" of charcoal will suffice and need only to be changed every 6 months or so.
IS my ventilation adequate? Especially for the drying chamber?
What ever you have for questions, suggestions, advice, criticism, ideas, etc PLEASE PLEASE post em up. That is why I am here. Don't worry about offending me or something like that I have thick skin (i used to be a Drill Sergeant and can take as much as I can give).

Thank You all in advance for your help.

DocCrow

 

[DocCrow]

Build

Build

Space reserved for Build pics Etc

 

[oldone]

Hi DocCrow and welcome to ICMag!

I have a much smaller cab and blow into a flat 376 square inch homemade filter and didnt have any smell issues at all. This might have more to do with my genetics more than anything. You can see it here:

The cab is designed to fit under some stairs.

I think you will have to experiment to get the correct thickness of charcoal. The more you have the harder the fans have to work = more noise, etc. Mine is about 1" thick. I had to install a baffle right over top of the fans so the wouldnt blast a layer of charcoal off.

Good Luck,
OO

 

[DocCrow]

Thanks Oldone. I think I will make the opening 2" that way I can make 2 1" filter cartridges and one extra frame. Than way if one doesn't do the trick I can take the empty "spacer" frame out and put the 2nd one in. It should work better that way to, since the extra space between the fan and the filter will allow the fan to draw more evenly across the entire surface area, which should help with airflow.

 

[oldone]

I tried to answer your PM with this:

Pick away, lol, but do so in the thread so I can invite my ppk buddies to help. I think your initial feelings are correct...it is so very simple.

I think you need more posts before the PM system will work.

Anyway, so you're going to "pull" through the filter instead of "push"?

 

[12ver]

Great looking cab!
I think your venting is going to only want to suck from the mom section. (least resistance).
if you look at Oldone's design it comes into his lower left, flows into the right, then out. one way flow. You have it sucking form both at the same time from one vent. I think you need to go from your flower to the mom, then out or you will only get air from the mom section mostly, especially with intakes in both chambers.I will be watching this I really like your overall design.

 

[oldone]

Just to clarify 12ver, you are quite right that my original design vented as you say.

I modified the cab so that both chambers have intakes but I can vary the openings (cleverly placed cardboard) and balance airflow by watching the temps.

I found that since its not often I have both sides working at the same time it was better for me to open/close intakes as needed.

OO

 

[DocCrow]

Anyway, so you're going to "pull" through the filter instead of "push"?

yes It should be easier on the CPU fan to pull instead of push through the filter, and should pull through the filter easier with the airgap between the fan and filter. here is a rough not at all to scale model

does this make sense? If the fan is right against the filter it will only draw through the small part right behind it. If there is a space it should draw across the entire face of the filter, allowing for more airflow.

 

[DocCrow]

Great looking cab!
I think your venting is going to only want to suck from the mom section. (least resistance).
if you look at Oldone's design it comes into his lower left, flows into the right, then out. one way flow. You have it sucking form both at the same time from one vent. I think you need to go from your flower to the mom, then out or you will only get air from the mom section mostly, especially with intakes in both chambers.I will be watching this I really like your overall design.

Thanks 12ver. I thought of this too, and my reasoning is that with the intakes all being equal, along with the tendency of the warmer air wanting to rise it should draw from both fairly equally, since with all of the intakes sized the same the resistance should be close to equal. Am I wrong? Does anyone else have any input on this? I am no engineer, but it is what I am studying once I start up school in the spring. Thank you G.I. Bill.

Oldone, I will def start a grow thread once this thing is up and running it will be awhile before I can get everything I need together to run a PPK setup and will post all my questions on there when the time comes.

 

[12ver]

That would solve the issue, variable opening in the mother section to balance the flow of air. Nice idea.

Just to clarify 12ver, you are quite right that my original design vented as you say.

I modified the cab so that both chambers have intakes but I can vary the openings (cleverly placed cardboard) and balance airflow by watching the temps.

I found that since its not often I have both sides working at the same time it was better for me to open/close intakes as needed.

OO

 

[DocCrow]

Changing things up a bit Thank to Oldone

Changing things up a bit Thank to Oldone

Well, after some deep thought on the subject (not too easy since I am currently abstaining from smoking to hopefully get a new job) I have decided to redesign my cabinet to accommodate a PPK system like no one has seen before. I will need to wait a bit as cash flow is low right now before I can scrounge up the necessary PPK equipment, and the necessary medium and nutes to grow. Until then I will just run batches 12/12 from seed in my cabinet to select my mothers I want to use. My big cabinet will house just my flower room and I now hunting for a sutable smaller cabinet just for mothers/clones.

As for today I am cleaning out my garage, and redesigning my cab, so I can hopefully get it built next week. Hopefully by the time I build it my beans will arrive.

I am super excited about this PPK setup. After reading through all of Oldone's grows and Imaginary Friend's and a bit of Delta9xs' I think this could be a home run, as my biggest concern was being able to take off on vacation, go fishing for days at a time etc, without worrying about my grow or trying to get my wife to babysit them. I will eventually get a bigger metal cabinet that I can make into a more secure uber stealth all in one version that will require minimum maintenance, and will be easily copied. My wife has MS and has a definite need for the Meds. Since she was diagnosed I have met many people here in my fair city that I would like to help get off of the black market. It is rough for these people especially living in a non-med state (with little hope for change in that here). This could prove to be a reliable turn-key system for someone to provide for themselves.

I will try to get a revised design posted up tonight. I hope to fit a PPK with a sufficient bulk reservoir to last 2 weeks hands off plus a drying chamber in this cabinet. that way I don't need to worry about having a carbon filter in my mom box, or making a separate drying box. I am also thinking about making it so I can attach a larger bulk reservoir that I can set on top of it for extended absences to save room in the cabinet.

Hey Oldone Im thinking I can fit 36 flowering lollpoped plantlets into this thing, and grown straight from seed once dialed in I can get 7-9 grams per cut. On a 9 week cycle that's 28-36 grams per week, given 9 weeks of flower. I don't think it will be that precise, as I plan to just have a batch of clones ready to go every week and just replace them as I pull them. grown in 3x8 "cups" I should be able to grow 18" "budcicles", once I get everything dialed in. IF you haven't then check out what Anti was getting in soil under similar conditions. For my PPK I plan on copying your most recent design but instead of one big pot in the center picture 36 of em over a 14"x27" area. I think I may need to make the bottom reservoir from scratch though, so I can maximize the number of plants and make it fit my cabinet perfectly. I can make it out of this http://www.grainger.com/Grainger/TIVAR-Sheet-Stock-2NHW7?Pid=search and just use standard woodworking tools/techniques (screws and caulking).

Well back to the garage to clean so I can get started. Thanks again Oldone for taking my carefully laid plans and making me realize there is a MUCH better way.

DocCrow

DocCrow

 

[DocCrow]

New ReDesign Plus PPK rough Draft

New ReDesign Plus PPK rough Draft

Here is my new cabinet design to accept Micro SOG PPK System



I did away with the Mother/Clone chamber in this cab. I like this as I wont have to worry about light leaks, and will just get a smaller box dedicated to Moms/clones. I found a perfect one that will double as a work bench on Clist for 35 bucks if the guy ever replies to me. It now is a flower box on the bottom big enough to accept my PPK, and allow me 18: of vertical space. The upper left chamber will house my bulk reservoir (probably a trash can or similar), my power supply, timers, and fan controls. The right middle chamber is the drying chamber with a carbon filter on the top of it. The upper right will house 2x120 mm 70 CFM CPU fans to draw the air out of the box. My flower chamber is vented into the drying chamber and through the filter. The lights will be vented through the utility chamber and into the fan chamber. Lights will be sealed off from the flower box via a piece of glass. It should still fit 10 42w CFL for ~9000 Lumens/sq'.

MY MICRO SOG PPK DESIGN


Pretty simple here. The PPK will be sized to fit the cabinet perfectly and will sit on a shelf with under drawer full extension glides on it so the entire thing will pull out easily for maintenance. It has 36 1.5" dia holes in it to accept my 1l PPK pots. I have to find something to use for these still, so this may change a bit. Anti has a thread on here where he was getting 7-14 oz per plant out of ~1l pots growing hand-watered pro-mix and FNB nutes under CFL in a Cabinet. If I can Just averare 7g per plant with 4 coming out every week perpetually that will give me 1 oz per week. That is plenty for me and the ol lady for sure as we usually smoke 1/4 of that. That is letting each plant flower for 4 weeks directly from freshly rooted clone. That is 9 OZ every 9 weeks from 2.65 sq'.

WILL THIS WORK? I don't know, but we are sure as fuck gonna find out.

DocCrow

P.S. I primed the cab today after cleaning my garage out. BOOYA!

 

[DocCrow]

Progress

Progress

Made some progress today. Picked up some lights, and a new cabinet that will become my mother/clone/storage box. This this is sweet, all steel, must weigh 100 lbs and got it for 35 bucks on craigslist! It will be perfect to keep ~6 moms, clones and store all of my grow shit. I am just gonna put a few t-5s in it with the ballasts mounted underneath it and call it good. my basement stays 65-75 degrees, so it should not need much ventilation if any at all if I keep the ballasts out of it.

Came home and puttered a bit on the Medicine Cabinet



I managed to cut my lights to fit, build most of the light box, get the lights 90% wired up, and made my duct work. I need to get this thing functional, because my mother just showed her first preflowers today (30 days from seed just sitting under a couple of cfls for now). I am starting to cut clones tomorrow, and hopefully will have buds by XMas. I am taking this plant and flowering it with as many clones as I can get, and by the time this first run is done I will have a new bonsai mom ready to go and my PPK built and ready to start going perpetual. This would be more fun if I had some smoke, but since the budget is tight I guess I will wait till I get a new job. Fuck.

DocCrow

 

[oldone]

Over in the PPK thread, you were talking about how to waterproof your ppk rez with epoxy paint or something and you wisely expressed concern over out gassing.

Why not use something to line it with? Like trash bag plastic or get a cheap inflatable kids pool...

OO

 

[DocCrow]

OO that's the ticket right there! I was thinking pond liner or something would be too messy looking, but I could use the plastic from a kiddie pool, or something similar, and seal the seams with aquarium grade silicone! I am scouring the www trying to find the cheapest parts I can for everything. I have found the pots for a quarter and the tailpieces for 50 cents each. That means with shipping I can get all 36 pots/tailpieces i need for under 50 bucks! I may have this built sooner rather than later. Well i need to get back to working on the cabinet first.

Thanks

DocCrow

 

[DocCrow]

Ok the cab is almost done, I will put pics up tomorrow night for anyone interested. Getting started on the PPK system too, but the mini tree pots are back ordered for a few weeks..... guess I will have to use something different to start. Beans should be here next week, so I need to get this running, I want to have some bud by XMAS.

DC

 

[12ver]

please post more pics and what kind of cab is that your starting with?

 

[DocCrow]

Ask and you shall receive.


I am 99% complete. I just need to put the light trap for the light intake on and finish light proofing it. There is a piece of glass that slides in the frame under the lights to seal it off from the flower chamber and allow for separate ventilation. Separate but equal. The fans are like 72 cfm each and hooked up to speed controls, when turned to about 75% they are dead silent. I am fairly pleased with how it came out. It will do for now. I definitely want to get a higher quality, larger cabinet in the future but this will get me going.

I should have it in the basement before football starts tomorrow, and I will get it fired up so I can check temps on it while loaded up with lights.

Oh ya the cabinet is just a cheapo walmart faux wood storage cabinet I bought for ten bucks off of craigslist.

Like I said, once my cashflow increases and I can afford it, I will get a bigger one, that I can fit everything in. This one only has my flower chamber, utility chamber and drying chamber. http://www.lowes.com/pd_313491-1281-KDE7848-09_0__?storeNumber=2522&Ntt=metal+cabinet&selectedLocalStoreBeanArray=%5Bcom.lowes.commerce.storelocator.beans.LocatorStoreBean%4019a619a6%5D&pl=1&productId=3032540&ipTrail=74.132.148.86&currentURL=%3FNtt%3Dmetal%2Bcabinet
This one would be big enough to keep everything in, and would be much easier to lightproof, and seal up. Plus it has a cool lock on it.

But I am unemployed right now, so $500 on a cabinet is out of the question. I watch craigslist like a hawk though, so if one pops up on there I will snatch it up.

I made another score this weekend too. A local grow shop is shutting down to move so he was liquidating his stock. Got some great deals on coco, rapi rooters, some nutes, and misc smalls that I need for my PPK, which is coming next.

Let me know what you think.

It is a bit rough, but i just wanted to get the damn thing together so I can get things going and start producing some buds. I have a mom sitting under a couple of desk lamps that I just cut a couple of clones off, and beans en route. Hopefully I can get a couple of zips by xmas. Also I need to start making my xmas gifts for this year.

Comments, critiques questions, etca are welcomed and encouraged. Especially critiques, I am here to get better.

Help me out.

Note: Projects like this are much more fun when you are baked.

They are also safer, the 3 times I cut myself today would have been avoided had I been properly medicated.

I haven't smoked in a month due to the lack of gainful employment.

Well, I guess I need to send my resume out some more

You dont get many marketable job skills when you are a Cavalry Scout in the Army for 8 years. Oh well I am going to school on your dime starting this spring. Thanks GI Bill.

I am rambling now. Later.

DC