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My girlfriend's cab... need suggestions!!

DiscoBiscuit

weed fiend
Veteran
realistic, my cab is similar to yours. Check it out and see if you get any ideas. The link is in my sig. Nice cab, btw.
 

realistik

Member
You want the hole/duct/fan/exact location where air is leaving your grow space, to be as high as possible. You could have your exhaust hole halfway down the cab, but if it has a pipe/duct leading up, inside the cab, to nearly the roof, then you achieve a similar effect, although you are then fighting heat trying to push it down. Heat rises and exhaust at top is the first rule in the book.

I don't know how tight it will be with these square pots, but you may want to raise your intakes to just above the top of the pots level.

I really like how you photoshop your ideas bro, makes sense! Keep it up :yes:

Yeah you're right about the vent needing to be up top.. and I'm going to move the intake up.. which brings me to a question.. do I need an open hole for passive intake.. or some sort of grill?

realistic, my cab is similar to yours. Check it out and see if you get any ideas. The link is in my sig. Nice cab, btw.

Man I've actually stumbled across your grow in the past.. I knew it looked familiar! It looks very clean, and suprisingly simplistic. I like the way you did your cooltube, where did you get your glass? is it one of those bake a rounds? or a candle holder?
 

DiscoBiscuit

weed fiend
Veteran
Thanks man. It's a bake a round. A candle or hurricane chimney would work just as well, IMO. A pc fan blowing on the bulb would probably work just as good as the tube, maybe even better. Because of the tube I lose 5, maybe 10% of the light.
 

realistik

Member
Yeah, I don't really have a choice but to use the tube... Since I'm going vertical in each bay.. with the plants surrounding it.. they will be free to grow all around the light..

I'm planning on having a 120mm fan rated at 140 cfm pulling air out of the tube. The open end of the tube will be connected to duct work that's connected to a round vent in the floor, allowing air to flow right through the tube.. considering it's only 70w.. I shouldn't have too much heat to begin with, from what I hear..
 

ScrubNinja

Grow like nobody is watching
Veteran
you want your intake as low as possible so there is no dead spots and that the cooler air flows thru your plants then up and out the box

This is true bro. I just suggested that in case the pots are blocking the intakes.

do I need an open hole for passive intake.. or some sort of grill?

You can have whatever you want for intake but an open hole is going to let light in pretty easy. I think elbows would be your least restrictive way to do it, but they have their own drawbacks. If the rear where the intakes are is going to be up against a wall or somewhere that otherwise isn't a highly lit area, I would suggest my light trap, or a modification of it if you're dealing with a highly lit area.

You can use a purchased light trap but I haven't read one person describe them as freely flowing yet, or mention any kind of figures and I'm a figures kind of guy. With mine you can easily work out exactly how much it will block the flow, and thus it can be built to accomodate that (one third) blockage. If you choose to try it and need any help with the numbers, I'm glad to help, but it's pretty basic stuff and all in the thread. Peace.
 
M

mrred

click on that new angle on light proof vents above ^^^^^^

there a post about how to make a vent with just wood too

this is my unfinished box, sorta haulted since i havnt got the ballast to work yet, but its 14x14x19 on the inside, heres how my light trap looks atm. going add a hepa filter and maybe some strips of board to cut off more angles of the light if it dont work good enough.

It doesnt matter i have holes on the ground because i was going to use a metal screen for the pots to sit on a inch or so above the holes
 
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realistik

Member
Well the cabinet is caddy cornered.. and it isn't a high traffic room.. I am installing a 120mm hole that will have a chrome grill on the inside of the cab, and a black filter on the outside of the cab.. this should cut some light down, but I just feel like it's not going to be noticeable behind the cabinet, down near the floor.

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grouchy

Active member
The most important factor is if light is going to make it inside.

If you are running your 12/12 cycles opposite of each other this may be an issue. It would not be hard to build a light trap and then you won't have to worry about it. That would suck if they kept going hermie on you and seeding up the whole lot.
 

realistik

Member
If you are running your 12/12 cycles opposite of each other this may be an issue. It would not be hard to build a light trap and then you won't have to worry about it. That would suck if they kept going hermie on you and seeding up the whole lot.

Well I guess I'm going to construct something.. probably just a vent out the back angled down.. or build one of scrub's louvers.
 
S

silent_lemon

this is what i do for light tight vents...
(actually i lied, i do many things for light tightedness, but this is just an idea)

drill 2" holes at the very bottom of the cabinet, back front, sides, doesnt matter. as many as you need.

then, get those black trays that all hydro shops sell. theyre raised 2 inches or more, often. putting those next to the wall, or as many as needed inside the cabinet will not allow light to pass UP into the space above the tray(the plants) if youd like even more reassurance, get one of those louvers that point in a direction, then screw that over the outside to make it look professional, and angle it away from the lightsource outside of hte cabinet.

case in point:

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(the crack on the left is where the ac comes in, i just cinched the cord between the wood panels, and then gaffer taped over it enough to make it light tight. too lazy to drill a decent sized hole for the 3 prong plug then making sure it's light tight with insulation around it. bs, KISS please
see that hole in the very front on the front door of the cabinet?
there are more of them now, and when the cabinet door is buckled up, they allow air to pass thru and the trays keep the light back, because theyre fully opaque. i know my shiat, it's basic, but it works like a wall.

that's my version of drbud cabinet, those fans are attached to a thermosensor that turns the fans on at 80F... no point IMO as those noctua scythe fans are so quiet i wouldnt mind them being on all the time...but i guess it saves on an iota of energy once in awhile... lol
 
IMO a ScrubNinja style light trap would be the better option. its easy to figure the airflow and it doesnt take up much room at all. plus it has a nice clean tidy look to it. not to mention the kiss formula aplies to it also. just my :2cents:. peace.
 
N

noone4u

If i had that cabinet i would move the center divider over hlafway into one of the chambers. Then i would put a shelf in the smallerchamber 3/4 of the way up and the bottom would be for mothers the top for clones. I would use floros in both mother nd clone chambers. This will leave you with a flowering chamber that is 50% larger and you could put both cooltubes in there. this will save you from rasing and lowering plants in a perpetual style grow being one HPS could be set lower for the younger side of the grow while the other HPS would be set higher for the older growth in the CAB. Just my two cents do with it what you will.
 

realistik

Member
Silentlemon and red.. Thanks for your light trap suggestions.. I'm going to engineer something that is pretty much a combination of everyones ideas.. lol.. It will come later, but first I need to get my light installed (well purchased first)..

noone4u I like your idea.. but I have a PC grow that I'm doing my seedlings/vegging in (and planning for some clones, or I might build something).. Right now I'm pretty dead set on a 70w HPS mounted vertically in a cooltube in the middle of each area.. 4" pots will fit all around the tube.. I doubt I'll have the room for a round scrog around the cooltube, but we'll just see what happens..
 

realistik

Member
I wonder if leaving the bottom part of the vertical cool tube open would be adequate ventilation for the entire cab?

When my fans get here Wednesday I'm going to check temperatures and see if I even need to go ahead with the tube being connected to a floor vent... and having a whole separate exhaust..
 

grouchy

Active member
You would need to scrub the air going through the tubes if you did that. Could you leave the top of the tube open? That way you could pull the hot air from the top of the cab out the bottom.
 
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