crayonwaxy
Member
This is going to be a bit lengthy, so I apologize. Thanks in advance to anyone willing to read through this and provide feedback.
To give you an idea of what the room looks like, ill start by explaining what the room looked like before, and after it was prepared to grow in. It started out as an extra room to a house. It shares a single common wall with the house's laundry room (this has been sealed off as there was a bit of a gap (6 inches or the heighth of a very small slab of insulation.) The room was unfinished so all of the beams holding the room together are showing. There has been a few major heat issues with this room and I am wondering if anyone has any insight to this. Here is the things that have been done. There are plants inside at the moment, but looking to do some quick renovations in-between crops, and more than anything want to prepare for next summer's heat. Ill start with a few things I did and how well they worked out for me.
1) Cover the window with a piece of plywood. Cut 2 holes in it 8 inch in diameter (thats the size of our cool tubes, and conduit.)
2) Painted all surfaces (except ceiling, and floor) thick with Kilz.
3) Made a failed attempt at making a fairly good vapor barrier/seal for the room using black visqueen plastic sheeting. (this failed miserably, keep reading to find out more.)
4) Put up reflective mylar insulation from the end of the cement (which goes up about a foot from the ground on the sides of the room, sort of code for a basement) to 4 feet up from that (as is the size of the mylar.)
The original plan was to have the light cooling system make a full circuit in the room through the cool tubes and then back outside. The fan being used is a 740cfm eco plus 8''. The AC we were planning to use was vented out by adding a t connecter to the out circuit of the light ventilation. The reason for doing this was the original plan was to run a C02 rig in the room. This did NOT turn out to be the case. As the room was being built it was quite warm in there, it was the heat of the summer, and the room was certainly NOT staying at a temperature that would be good to grow in (fluctuating between mid 70's at night, and 98 with 60-75% relative humidity during the day even after setting the timer to start the AC hours before it should have needed to [6-7am.]) This was with NO LIGHTS! Yikes!
Spent a few days trying to patch up holes in the visqueen plastic, and around the door frame, etc. Filled in lots of spots with expandable foam to make sure that it was as sealed as I could possibly get from outside. The AC just could NOT cool the room, as a matter of fact it became a few degrees warmer with the AC running.
Color me confused because I would think that for an 8x10 room a 12000btu AC should have been plenty to cool that space (as it cooled my 800 sq foot apartment entirely to 72 degrees at all times without breaking a sweat.) However I could tell it was TRYING to cool as after leaving it running for upwards of 18 hours it had completely filled up the 5 gallon bucket I had placed under the drip area.. No good.
So i take the AC to my local hydro store, and trade it in for an eco plus 4'' and some duct fittings that I needed. Also traded in my C02 rig for some soil components I needed (using subcool's soil mix.) A buddy of mine was nice enough to give me a 4 inch can filter which I am using with the similar sized fan.
Things have cooled down a bit here (near Portland Oregon) but there are still some hot days abound. Can't wait till summers over, hopefully Ill need to throw some heaters in there! Anyways, the setup thats currently running is as follows.
The 8in 740cfm fan is taking air from inside the room, blowing it over the lights (2 8in cool tubes each running 1000w HPS' and venting outside.
I currently have the 4in fan (not sure of cfm) taking air in from outside and blowing it through the 4in can filter.
I adopted some ladies from a friend of mine who's power got cut off unfortunately. I was able to get them in the room in time so they shouldn't have been stressed too bad. 12 2.5 ish foot tall plants that had JUST ever so slightly started to show signs of budding. Threw them under 18/6 and have been letting them veg since (about 2 weeks or so now.) They are looking great. Temps in the room are staying in the range of 65 at night being the lowest and 89 degrees being the highest. Im going to be throwing these ladies into bud in the next 2 weeks or so, as they are most certainly ready.
I know that was a long read, but if you actually got through it I have 2 questions.
1) Why the hell did my 12000btu AC not keep cool an 8X10 room?
2) Any tips to help me keep my room cooler now that I no longer have the AC (would a window mount work better perhaps? The one I was using was a standalone with a tube to vent outside.)
3) Since my hopes of using C02 are now gone, how much more fresh air should I bring into the room (fan in inches and cfm please.)
I am pretty sure that this could end up being a KILLER space, but with the problems my partner and I have been having im concerned that heat will forever be an issue (at least during summer crops, Oregon keeps it nice and cool the rest of the year.) I will post pics of the room, and the babies in a few minutes. Thanks to anyone who is willing to read this and respond, I know it was long.
To give you an idea of what the room looks like, ill start by explaining what the room looked like before, and after it was prepared to grow in. It started out as an extra room to a house. It shares a single common wall with the house's laundry room (this has been sealed off as there was a bit of a gap (6 inches or the heighth of a very small slab of insulation.) The room was unfinished so all of the beams holding the room together are showing. There has been a few major heat issues with this room and I am wondering if anyone has any insight to this. Here is the things that have been done. There are plants inside at the moment, but looking to do some quick renovations in-between crops, and more than anything want to prepare for next summer's heat. Ill start with a few things I did and how well they worked out for me.
1) Cover the window with a piece of plywood. Cut 2 holes in it 8 inch in diameter (thats the size of our cool tubes, and conduit.)
2) Painted all surfaces (except ceiling, and floor) thick with Kilz.
3) Made a failed attempt at making a fairly good vapor barrier/seal for the room using black visqueen plastic sheeting. (this failed miserably, keep reading to find out more.)
4) Put up reflective mylar insulation from the end of the cement (which goes up about a foot from the ground on the sides of the room, sort of code for a basement) to 4 feet up from that (as is the size of the mylar.)
The original plan was to have the light cooling system make a full circuit in the room through the cool tubes and then back outside. The fan being used is a 740cfm eco plus 8''. The AC we were planning to use was vented out by adding a t connecter to the out circuit of the light ventilation. The reason for doing this was the original plan was to run a C02 rig in the room. This did NOT turn out to be the case. As the room was being built it was quite warm in there, it was the heat of the summer, and the room was certainly NOT staying at a temperature that would be good to grow in (fluctuating between mid 70's at night, and 98 with 60-75% relative humidity during the day even after setting the timer to start the AC hours before it should have needed to [6-7am.]) This was with NO LIGHTS! Yikes!
Spent a few days trying to patch up holes in the visqueen plastic, and around the door frame, etc. Filled in lots of spots with expandable foam to make sure that it was as sealed as I could possibly get from outside. The AC just could NOT cool the room, as a matter of fact it became a few degrees warmer with the AC running.
Color me confused because I would think that for an 8x10 room a 12000btu AC should have been plenty to cool that space (as it cooled my 800 sq foot apartment entirely to 72 degrees at all times without breaking a sweat.) However I could tell it was TRYING to cool as after leaving it running for upwards of 18 hours it had completely filled up the 5 gallon bucket I had placed under the drip area.. No good.So i take the AC to my local hydro store, and trade it in for an eco plus 4'' and some duct fittings that I needed. Also traded in my C02 rig for some soil components I needed (using subcool's soil mix.) A buddy of mine was nice enough to give me a 4 inch can filter which I am using with the similar sized fan.
Things have cooled down a bit here (near Portland Oregon) but there are still some hot days abound. Can't wait till summers over, hopefully Ill need to throw some heaters in there! Anyways, the setup thats currently running is as follows.
The 8in 740cfm fan is taking air from inside the room, blowing it over the lights (2 8in cool tubes each running 1000w HPS' and venting outside.
I currently have the 4in fan (not sure of cfm) taking air in from outside and blowing it through the 4in can filter.
I adopted some ladies from a friend of mine who's power got cut off unfortunately. I was able to get them in the room in time so they shouldn't have been stressed too bad. 12 2.5 ish foot tall plants that had JUST ever so slightly started to show signs of budding. Threw them under 18/6 and have been letting them veg since (about 2 weeks or so now.) They are looking great. Temps in the room are staying in the range of 65 at night being the lowest and 89 degrees being the highest. Im going to be throwing these ladies into bud in the next 2 weeks or so, as they are most certainly ready.
I know that was a long read, but if you actually got through it I have 2 questions.
1) Why the hell did my 12000btu AC not keep cool an 8X10 room?
2) Any tips to help me keep my room cooler now that I no longer have the AC (would a window mount work better perhaps? The one I was using was a standalone with a tube to vent outside.)
3) Since my hopes of using C02 are now gone, how much more fresh air should I bring into the room (fan in inches and cfm please.)
I am pretty sure that this could end up being a KILLER space, but with the problems my partner and I have been having im concerned that heat will forever be an issue (at least during summer crops, Oregon keeps it nice and cool the rest of the year.) I will post pics of the room, and the babies in a few minutes. Thanks to anyone who is willing to read this and respond, I know it was long.
