Carbon filter outside the box???

Hi all

Can you use carbon filter outside of the box ar it has to be placed inside?

GreenUp

it's up to you and your situation. some are inside, some are outside.

works better and filter will last longer on the inside but if space is an issue it can be placed outside

Completely up to you, inside will clean more odors, but if it's a leaking problem in one small area and you want to keep the room itself smelling dank, outside would be a better place ... Air Exchange & Air Flow are very important factors that should always be considered to the highest extent your experience/funding/open space allows. The last indoor setup I had going, involved 3 Vortex 450 CFM inline fans, with two of them hooked up to carbon filters.

Fan 1 - Carbon Filter continuously scrubbing 450cfm inside the grow room

Fan 2 - This fan was drawing air from inside the grow room and pushing it out AT THE TOP OF THE GROW ROOM where temperatures are at their highest, and through a carbon air filter so that all air exiting the room was scentless

Fan 3 - This fan was drawing air from outside the grow room and pushing it in AT THE BOTTOM/FLOOR LEVEL of the grow room. Because it was drawing in fresh air, there was no need for a carbon filter on this fan. And if needed, you can always use ducting and run it wherever you want to draw your air from if something directly outside the room is not suitable.

You just have to make sure that you are always running Fan 2 at the same time as Fan 3, otherwise you can cause a negative pressure in your grow room and a lack of necessary gases for proper photosynthesis. The fans going in/out need to be the same CFM as well. Can't have one pushing or drawing more than the other. But honestly, this is the ideal setup you should aim for in the future when you have some grows under your belt.

Hope this helps! +rep if you like! =)

90% of carbon filters are designed to be placed inside the growroom.
Placing the filter outside the growroom and pushing air through it will as already stated 'shorten it's life span' .............. if your lucky.
As most filters are design to be placed IN the growroom .........so are the filters riveted joints and other points on the filters body. Pushing air through a filter the wrong way will more than likely over time cause the filter to fail, as air will pass through the body of the filter but may bypass the activated carbon via internal joints (designed for air movement in the opersite direction). This is what can give the impression of a shorter life span when infact the carbon is still activate it is just the air is not passing over the carbon.

Very nice info guys. Thanks for quick respond.
@Hillcrest: does air get filtrated passing through the walls of filter, or it just flows along the filter, let's say intake hole and comes out other side (exhaust hole)?
I have 1 exhaust fan on the top of the DR60 and other fan exhausting air from cooltube (through bottom hole in the tent) and 3rd one that brings fresh air from outdoor.
All of them are cheap bathroom fans - only 85m3/h efficient.
Would it be able to use 1 fan and 1 filter to exhaust cooltube and growroom air through the top hole of the tent with kind of duct Y-splitter?
I would get 1 stronger fan replacing two exhaust ones and that intake fan would stay as it is...

All replyes are welcome

yes that will work. it's what i am currently doing.i vent my entire room through my cooltube, and into my attic with 1 exhaust fan and a passive intake.

iampolluted>>> the air is exhausted from your growroom through cooltube only? Or you have another outlet for air? Is your filter placed inside or outside of your growroom/box?

Would you be able to throw some pictures up here?

mine is a little weird. i'm renting, so cutting holes in the ceiling wasn't really an option for me, but the closet i was going to use was 1/2 unfinished (no sheetrock on 1/2 the closet). this meant i had to get creative. so now, i have a 10" x 3.5" x 6" a/c duct (the rectangle with an elbow) cut into the ceiling where a ceiling stud was. into the 10" x 3.5" rectangle part of the vent i've stuffed my 6" ducting that is attached to my cool tube. the ducting doesn't fill the entire rectangle of the exhaust duct, but it fills most of it. all this is hooked to a 6" vortex fan from htg supply. the fan is stong enough to pull air from outside the closet into it, and through the cooltube and ducting keeping my temps the same as the rest of the house. i can post pics a little later, about to head out to work for a few hrs.

here's a cpl i found...the can fan was replaced last week. i don't have the carbon filter hooked up either, haven't needed it yet. i'd have to put mine in the attic but yours may be different.

Thanks iampolluted, but It isn't answering my question about filtering air from cooltube (one duct) and growbox (second duct) through one filter. I can imagine filter would have to bee placed outside growbox and air would be pushed into the filter. And there Ysplitter inside growbox with one "leg" for cooltube and other growbox air itself.
There is no other option possible with filter inside, right?
You have a nice set up there and I like your cooltube reflector. I'd say you may go without filter as you blow air out to the attic. Unless there are more vent holes from attic to other rooms

Nice setup there. Anyone with one filter and 2 ducts directing air into it?

ok i get what you're saying. there are a couple ways to run it. i think. you could run separate ventilation setups for both. vent your lights out 1 hole (a can fan could do it), and run your fan/filter out another. or, attach your filter to the intake of the cooltube and put your fan on the exhaust end of the duct. this will pull ALL the air from the box into the filter, through the cool tube and out of the box. like this.... closest thing i could find to a pic of what i'm describing.

Hi there

Thats good idea in deed. I would probably need good and strong enough fan to drag the air through filter and quite long duct (from top, where filter is>down to the cooltube and up to the exhaust again). I wonder what resistance carbon filters produce. Should I be worried about negative pressure inside the box if I install exhaust fan much stronger than intake fan? Bear in mind I also have passive intakes on the bottom of the tent.

you'll want negative pressure to suck all that shitty air into the filter. when i crack my door, the exhaust fan has enough pull to move my plants, which i thought was cool as hell. i don't know how big your room is but make sure the fan is big enough to clear it in 5 minutes or less depending on it's purpose. meaning if you are using it to vent bad air, you can run it in spurts, like if you were running co2, or if you're using it to control temps and vent, you might need it running 24/7 like mine. some filter manufacturers will tell you the reduction in pressure depending on length of ducting and fan size.

Most manufacturers of carbon filters say that for best results you should pull air through the filter rather than push air.

bigv1976 said:

Most manufacturers of carbon filters say that for best results you should pull air through the filter rather than push air.

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very true.....no need for the skunky goodness to go seeping through a screw hole or seem in the aluminum.

iampolluted said:

it's up to you and your situation. some are inside, some are outside.

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Sorry to jump on this post but I have my filter andcan outside my tent connected from the tent with ducting just wondering do I really need some to push the air towards to duct or just let it go through on its own that's all thanks

I don't think you can run two vents into one filter, something to do with negative pressure both would have to be producing pressure, if you shut one off it would vent back through the other, and if they weren't equal you might have issues too, not sure but I don't think it will work ?

Addlesee93 said:

Sorry to jump on this post but I have my filter andcan outside my tent connected from the tent with ducting just wondering do I really need some to push the air towards to duct or just let it go through on its own that's all thanks

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You want to pull air through the filter not push