10 x 10 Grow Room

Hello Fellow growers! I am looking to make a 10 x 10 room made inside the basement. I plan on putting approx. 25 plants inside. Probabaly afghani because the potency and high resistence to mold. I have grown 1 real grow before. a closet grow. But mold eventually got to it. I learned my lesson. I NEED a humidity monitor and dehumidifer. anyways... I would like to run 6 400 watt lights. i assume I will need an ac unit to cool this room as it will be hot hot hot! but how does one keep a steady temperature with a ac unit? Is there some sort of device that would automatically turn on the ac when thje room reaches above set temp? Im starting from scratch. any advice/ suggestions would be perfect. This is the only way I can think of to support myself and my father as he is getting old and wont be able to work forever. Thank you everyone!

prolly could get away with running 4-600s... as far as AC... i know the standup in house model I had had a temperature gauge built in and when it got above whatever temp it was at it turned on.

6 400w lights seems like a waste to me. why not go with 4 600w lights? much more efficient. plus, if you are growing plants that are going to be taller than 2-3' then a 400w light won't give you the penetration that a 600w would. plus, 4 600's will give you better coverage as well. 4 600's will cover about 64sq.ft. while 6 400's will only cover about 54sq.ft. also, 4 600's will use the same amount of electricity as 6 400's but you will need less fans, hoods, etc...

most a/c units have thermostats on them. they also dehumidify when the compressor is working so you won't need that big of a dehumidifier. a 30 or 50 pint dehumidifer will be fine. it will be more for when the lights are off and the ac doesn't work as much. make sure you get a dehumidifier with a drain to waste option. then you can have it drain into a large garbage can or bucket. that way you aren't having to empty the bin all the time. plus; you can actually save that water and use it to water your plants. just keep the filter on the dehumidifier clean. that water is very close to RO water. usually has a ppm around 15-25 which is very low.

if you are going to be running that many lights do yourself a favor and get a light control box or build one. this will allow you to pull 1 line from the breaker panel to power all of your lights. you might even want to think about running the ballasts on 240v power cords. much more efficient. it's also a lot safer; you could also hook the box up to a small high temp/hot strike box that will prevent your bulbs from firing during power outages and will shut your lights off just in case the temps get to high.

there's a bunch of other stuff too. not sure how much you are putting into this and how much you already know.

Thanks for the tips. When you say most acs have thermostats, i plan on using a window ac. Which as far as I can see it doesnt have a thermostat, is there a way to control a window ac to keep temps even?. And should I keep the dehumidifier running constantly, on a timer, or??? I am going to do some reasearch on the light control box and high temp box.

If you don't have a digital AC with a temp setting. I'm guessing you have a window AC that you have to turn on and off. That's what I have. So I can turn it on high and when power turns off and on so dose the AC. If that's what you have use this for it.
http://sunlightsupply.com/p-11566-el-500-fan-control.aspx
Saves me power and tons of aggravation trying to deal with temps daily.

And the dehumidifier question depends on your unit. Mine turns off if I have it on a timer so I have to leave it on. But lucky me I don't realy need it till mid flower. Humidity stays around 29-60. Mid flower it gose crazy high.

freakin awesome warlock thank you

so at mid flower or when humidity goes up you keep dehumidifier running constantly? is there a such thing as too low of humidity?

Yes. I'm to low right now. I'm 29% in veg. Going to add my humidifier tonight. 60-80 good for veg. Just good keep temps down so no mold. But in flower you want 40-60 max. I like 60 in veg and 40 in flower myself.

My dehumidifier has settings it it turns coils off when not needed.

Im assuming all dehumidifiers turn off auto matically when humidity level reaches set level...

So as scoobydoo said that he would go with 4 600 watters instead of 6 400 watters. How about going with 2 1000 watters for a 10 x 10. would that work? I am just trying to make this as simple as possible. Honestly I get very overwhelmed.

Nope. Some just have settings on how hard you want them to work. My last one had high/mid/low only. Didn't work well for what I needed so got a new one for 200 bucks.

2 1000 will work. I think he was trying to match your said 2400w. For that I would go with 4 600's too.

any dehumidifier you buy should have a digital control setting that allows you to adjust the humidity levels in the room. also get yourself a thermometer/hygrometer and place the probe under the lights on the plant canopy. this is where you want to measure the temps and humidity in your room. you may need to adjust the thermostat or humidistat on your units to compensate for differences in the actual plant areas.

2 1000w lights will not cover a lot of space. basically a 10x5 area which is cool but less than 6 400's and 4 600's. that leaves you plenty of room for other equipment and to work and move plants around. you aren't going to get 25 plants under them unless you are growing really small plants and in that case 1000w lights would be a waste because you don't need the intensity of tose bulbs to penetrate the canopy.

there is a lot of great info and people on this forum. just gotta learn how to access it. the whole setup phase is sometimes overwhelming but you have a few guys here who've got a lot of experience in it. feel free to ask whatever questions. if you give me an idea of the room layout i'll mock up a floorplan for you and give you a list of items to think about purchasing. i'll even help you get the electrical laid out as well as try and help you with grow style and nutrients.

we'll get you growing some monsters soon enough...

I'm going to have to disagree here. Just because the room is 5x10 dosnt mean he will be using the full 5x10. I have a 14x7 and only use 12x7. Without that unused area I wouldn't be able to walk around taking care of the plants. Basically leaving them on there own. And if you can't look at each plant daily you have risk of bugs and mold on back plants. Reason is you can only see what is close. And what would happen if you have a problem? Getting back there could break branches. I've been there. It sucks. That's why I leave 9square feet for each plant. Sounds like alot but but think of it as 1 square foot on all sides. So that said I might not getting a clear pic of how the grow will go. I'm still saying 2 1000 will work. But like the idea of 3 or 4 600's

Warlock1369 said:

I'm going to have to disagree here. Just because the room is 5x10 dosnt mean he will be using the full 5x10. I have a 14x7 and only use 12x7. Without that unused area I wouldn't be able to walk around taking care of the plants. Basically leaving them on there own. And if you can't look at each plant daily you have risk of bugs and mold on back plants. Reason is you can only see what is close. And what would happen if you have a problem? Getting back there could break branches. I've been there. It sucks. That's why I leave 9square feet for each plant. Sounds like alot but but think of it as 1 square foot on all sides. So that said I might not getting a clear pic of how the grow will go. I'm still saying 2 1000 will work. But like the idea of 3 or 4 600's

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pretty sure he said the room was 10x10. think he said the room he has now is 5x10. i also said it was cool to go with 2 1000's but that 4 600's would still leave him plenty of room; basically 40% of the room free.

your wicked cool dude. to take the time to actually really help me. thats awesome. And pretty rare to find someone that is willing to go out of their way to help someone else. THANK YOU SO MUCH. help is exactly what I need. Fucking beautiful plants, are they yours? I am very confident that I can and will grow beautiful plants. I have before, but the mold got to them, I believe it was downey mold. But I will NOT let that happen again. It was a closet grow. 4 huge plants in a 4x2 closet, I used foxfarm ocean forest potting soil with fox farms big bloom, grow big, and tiger bloom.... NOW I am looking to lay out plans for a big 10x10. I will build a frame and use drywall then paint with flat white. Then I will need to set up the lighting. 4 600 watt hps. This is what is conflicting with me now. Running 2400 watts to a regular 115 v outlet which wont be able to handle that as I read. It would have to be super duty like a 220. I am no electrician and I have no idea how to overcome this....So far on my list I have, carbon filter, temperature control(for ac unit) temp/humidity monitor, Soil, Nutes, Dehumidifier w/ drain, I already have ac unit, 165 cfm fan.

right now i dont have a room. not currently growing...a little outdoor but thats it(3 small plants). and thank you warlock your right, thta reminds me, I definetly will have to leave some space in there so i can tend to the plants. tha

ScoobyDoobyDoo said:

pretty sure he said the room was 10x10. think he said the room he has now is 5x10. i also said it was cool to go with 2 1000's but that 4 600's would still leave him plenty of room; basically 40% of the room free.

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I know where your coming from. Some people dont read it like we do. After the last few days I think we see this room 2 different ways. Without a full floorplan we can only go by the detentions said. It started 10x10 then went to 5x10.

And for the op's last post low power? You can cover a 10x10 using 4 600's. But you need 2 light movers. 10/1 would be best. IMO