Hello everyone! I have always wanted to grow but never tried it because of job and family concerns. Thanks to prop 64, I've decide to stop supporting the cartels and grow my own. This all started for me a few months ago when I was cleaning out my garage. I was going over some of the extra building materials I had on hand and it clicked. "Hey I can legally grow weed now and I have most of the materials right here in my garage!". So i put aside 2 sheets of cabinet grade plywood, a box of CFL bulbs, some cheap light fixtures, and a pile of 1x2's and (thinking that I already had everything I needed) I started to build. The project had to go stealth when I told my wife what I was doing. Countless dollars and hours of research later, and it is done. It has been a work in progress but it is finally up and running. I know it is far from perfect, but I think it is capable of keeping shit alive. I am already planning my next build and I have a few ideas on what I can improve upon. Before I get started on box #2, I wanted to get some feedback from some experienced growers, on how I can make my next box better.
Let me start by telling you the conditions in which this box was designed around. I live in central Cali where it gets cold in the winter (not quite freezing, but close) and hot in the summer (110+ and I am not planning to grow during June-Sept). The box needed to be housed in an outdoor shed with minimal protection from the outside temps. It also needed to be relatively quiet and absolutely no smell. The agreement I have with my wife is basically an out of sight, out of mind agreement. As long as she doesn't see, hear or smell it, I'm free to pursue this hobby. The box also needed to be small. The shed I am growing in is only 3'x6' and still needs to house some other garden tools. So here it is!
I did not design it to look like a refrigerator but it worked out. The box is on caster wheels and measures 5'H x 3'W x 2'D
I originally built the box 4'H and stuffed the fan and everything inside before I realized that was not going to work and built the top 12" to house the fan and carbon scrubber. Behind the intake air filter that you see in the pic are two 4" holes. The exhaust is just a 4" dryer duct fitting. All caulked and sealed.
In the top compartment I installed an iPower 4" 190 CFM fan with a carbon filter. There is also an outlet which I wired directly to an extension cord that comes out the bottom of the grow box. The outlet powers a surge protector which powers everything in the box. The whole box is insulated with 1" foam insulation panels that have reflective foil faces. There is an Inkbird itc-308 temp controller that I have running two small 200 watt ceramic heaters to battle the cold. The buckets are sitting on a raised floor with 2" holes drilled throughout to promote better air circulation. It is also removable for easy clean up. Underneath the floor I installed plastic sheeting and sloped it to the center into a small drain hole.
For my light fixture I decided to go with CFL's mainly because of height limits. I made a fixture out of 1" PVC and added two 90-watt 5000K bulbs and twelve 27-watt 6500K bulbs for a total of 504 watts or 84 watts/sq ft. I also have all the same bulbs in 2700K for flower.
The last picture shows the heater set up. I ran two 4" 90 degree duct fittings from my air intake, pointing down at a 45 degree angle. I foil taped the heaters in place to mix the hot air with the cool intake air.
I have also installed two seven inch air circulating fans, a wifi camera, a digital temperature and humidity monitor and a soil moisture meter.
So there it is. So far, it has been in the 40's and 50's here and the box has maintained temps between 72-79. RH has been 40-65, but mostly in the 40% range. I have 10 clones that are on day 11 of veg. I am not really sure when I will flip them or how I will flower (SCROG or just let them loose) but I have some ideas. I am a contractor by trade so the easy part (for me) is over and the hard part (keeping plants alive) is just beginning. Please see my other thread if you have some time and give me some feedback on my SCROG planter box. This is my current plan but I am not sure this will work the way I think it will. I am waiting for some feedback before I make that call. Thanks for reading and click the link below if you have some soil growing/SCROG experience. I could really use some feedback!
https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=338697
Let me start by telling you the conditions in which this box was designed around. I live in central Cali where it gets cold in the winter (not quite freezing, but close) and hot in the summer (110+ and I am not planning to grow during June-Sept). The box needed to be housed in an outdoor shed with minimal protection from the outside temps. It also needed to be relatively quiet and absolutely no smell. The agreement I have with my wife is basically an out of sight, out of mind agreement. As long as she doesn't see, hear or smell it, I'm free to pursue this hobby. The box also needed to be small. The shed I am growing in is only 3'x6' and still needs to house some other garden tools. So here it is!
I did not design it to look like a refrigerator but it worked out. The box is on caster wheels and measures 5'H x 3'W x 2'D
I originally built the box 4'H and stuffed the fan and everything inside before I realized that was not going to work and built the top 12" to house the fan and carbon scrubber. Behind the intake air filter that you see in the pic are two 4" holes. The exhaust is just a 4" dryer duct fitting. All caulked and sealed.
In the top compartment I installed an iPower 4" 190 CFM fan with a carbon filter. There is also an outlet which I wired directly to an extension cord that comes out the bottom of the grow box. The outlet powers a surge protector which powers everything in the box. The whole box is insulated with 1" foam insulation panels that have reflective foil faces. There is an Inkbird itc-308 temp controller that I have running two small 200 watt ceramic heaters to battle the cold. The buckets are sitting on a raised floor with 2" holes drilled throughout to promote better air circulation. It is also removable for easy clean up. Underneath the floor I installed plastic sheeting and sloped it to the center into a small drain hole.
For my light fixture I decided to go with CFL's mainly because of height limits. I made a fixture out of 1" PVC and added two 90-watt 5000K bulbs and twelve 27-watt 6500K bulbs for a total of 504 watts or 84 watts/sq ft. I also have all the same bulbs in 2700K for flower.
The last picture shows the heater set up. I ran two 4" 90 degree duct fittings from my air intake, pointing down at a 45 degree angle. I foil taped the heaters in place to mix the hot air with the cool intake air.
I have also installed two seven inch air circulating fans, a wifi camera, a digital temperature and humidity monitor and a soil moisture meter.
So there it is. So far, it has been in the 40's and 50's here and the box has maintained temps between 72-79. RH has been 40-65, but mostly in the 40% range. I have 10 clones that are on day 11 of veg. I am not really sure when I will flip them or how I will flower (SCROG or just let them loose) but I have some ideas. I am a contractor by trade so the easy part (for me) is over and the hard part (keeping plants alive) is just beginning. Please see my other thread if you have some time and give me some feedback on my SCROG planter box. This is my current plan but I am not sure this will work the way I think it will. I am waiting for some feedback before I make that call. Thanks for reading and click the link below if you have some soil growing/SCROG experience. I could really use some feedback!
https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=338697
