Has anyone tried to make a DIY "cool tube" for a T5 fixture? i.e. Quantum T5 BadBoy's

Anyone who believes the "T5's have no heat" stuff... Go ahead and surf elsewhere...

So, I have 2 fixtures (8 bulbs units) that without ventilation in the room can raise the ambient temperature several degrees.
T5's have low heat relative to HID - yes, but as for "no heat" no that simply isn't the case...

So I'm wondering what others might have come up with. Some simple enclosure to surround/encase the fixture and then hang
this 'outer' enclosure.... and I'd assume a simple piece of glass on the bottom...

Anyone tried anything even remotely like this? Someone doing CO2 in a sealed room with T5's for instance....

Anyone?

Not a peep huh RIU? All the DIY crowd I thought for sure someone would have tried to rig up something.

I'll be thinking this further... My heating challenge might be easiest to solve if I can somehow fashion up
an enclosure - glass bottom? - and then put some flanges on each end...

Any uber DIY'ers got ideas on this?

Get some flat thin gauge steel and make a tube the size you need. Rivet or duct tape it together. And use air conditioner ducting and adapters to vent it. You may need a larger fan though. And when all is connected, cut a hole in the bottom and attach plexi to allow light through. Use weather stripping and duct tape(REAL DUCT TAPE) to seal it. You shouldn't need a lot of air movement to keep it cool.

New Grower: I've been using T-5's on a couple of grows for the last year so I'm far from an expert but I haven't had a heat problem. I suppose without ventilation it could be a problem but you have to balance everything in your growing environment. Light of any kind is a heat energy unit so you need some ventilation. I have a 4" Can Fan in the ceiling of my 2' by 4' by 6 1/2' tent and if it's zipped up there's a complete air exchange about every four minutes so heat isn't a problem. My temperature/humidity gauge usually reads a high of 73 and a low of 68. If it's open I still keep them under a fan. We also keep the surrounding room ambient temperature adjusted to between 68 at night to 78 in the day.

How close are you putting your Bad Boys to the tops of your plants? I use the 'back of the hand rule' to judge light height and it has worked well for me. I keep my lights, (four tubes T-5's), about two to three inches off the tops of my plants. The manufacturer recommends 6" to a foot but I found that to be too far. The back of the hand rule says, "Hold your hand, back side up toward the light, at the level of the tops of your plants and if it feels hot raise the light."

My original background was with Aerogardens, (The self contained table top growing system), and they recommended maintaining 1" to 2" light height, and it worked fine for me so I figured I could cheat a little on what my T-5 fixture manufacturer recommended. Also, if you have your lights too close you're likely to see 'veining' in your leaves. You'll see yellowish green leaf tissue between darker green veins. But that's when the lights too close, not necessarily too hot. Too hot from the lights can usually curl and cook them. Have you consulted your fixture manufacturer? I hope that helps. HSA

The key here isn't the T5 and an expectation of no heat... rather I have no ventilation and had considered doing CO2...

So when you look at how some rooms are setup to be sealed and the bulbs are air-colled via hood or tube... well... that
just isn't the same option in our fluro camp... They make a few air-cooled models which were more $$$ but I don't recall
them being sealed like you'd get with a HID hood...

So the natural course of thought became... enclosure for the fluro fixture and draw air across... same dealio...

The key to my challenge is to get ventilation - period - and this was just one more way of doing things that I thought about considering...

diy kewl toob for cfl ??? they dont even heat up sry didnt bother to read all dat

zo0t said:

diy kewl toob for cfl ??? they dont even heat up sry didnt bother to read all dat

Click to expand...

very witty. take out the obvious retarded spellings and self-proclaimed troll statement in your sig and you mightve had something.

in my cab i have a glass shelf that can be raised and lowerd, my cfls sit on top and they do get hot, i have a fan in the top section where the bulbs are exhausting the hot air, the bottom of the cab underneath the glass doesnt go above 70 degrees and the air from the bottom is sucked up thru the gaps around the glass shelf, works a dream

So what ever came of this? I'm interested in doing something similar with my t5 fixtures.

For a cool tube you would just loose too much light with glass someone I know got ducting cut it in half and and put it onto of the bad boy hooked the two piece to the half with another ducting and sucked all the heat out that way

A ventillated,heat sinked floro ballast will run a cooler bulb.

Never mind, I GOT THIS!
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I tested it with an inline duct booster(4"), and a 265cfm squirrel cage blower...obviously the blower kept it cooler, but the duct booster did ok as well. The acrylic was warm, but not hot enough to burn my hand.

I used ThermOpan fire resistant cardboard on top, sealed with duct tape and putty tape(rope caulk). The original plan was to use a 3" air pump, that fell through, so I'm back to 4".

To hold the plexiglass, I used angle steel, but my next version will use industrial strength velcro as I need it to be easily removable for changing bulbs when it comes time to bloom.

Material list v1.0:
Duct tape
Putty Tape/rope caulk
ThermOpan cardboard
Arcrylic/ plexiglass
4" docking collars(1 for intake, 1 for exhaust)
4" Inline fan/blower
4" flex ducting
Angle iron/steel
sheet metal screws

I'll update when I'm done with velcro version.

Loss of good light with the glass you dont need the glass cuss you will still have negative pressure if the cardboard up top is sealed properly

Good one tho

It would then stink up my neigborhood...I can't afford more fans and carbon filters, and the heat coming directly off the bulbs raises my mini tent from 70 to 110. This is the best I can do for my setup.

Google DIY Walmart zen carbon filter I made two of them with the ducting and two 120 mm fans for under 60 I will post you the supplies that I used when I get home on my computer