Question for the CFL closet grower?

How do you guys deal with heat build up?

there is generally little to almost no heat buildup. all you need is normal vetalation your plant needs to survive and an ocalating fan and that will do the trick

Oh, that's not true... 100-200w of CFL lights, because of their required proximity, can seriously raise the temps... But, you're pretty much limited to fans, as suggested above.

I have 3 42 watt Cfl's and 2 20 watt Cfl's and I have to keep my door cracked. Closet is 2x6x10. If the door closes for more than 20 min the temp shoots up from 80 to 88. I have 2 large fans in there.

my bad i dont deal with it in any particular way such as with hps set ups. i dont pay any attention. i figure as long as i got the extra cash for the electric bill i will continue to keep the air conditioner running during simulated daylight hours.thats enough for me

CFL heat is fairly easy to control with fans.

i have 6 42 watt cfls, with just ventilation, and my grow room is air tight, i have no oscillating fan and have never had heat issues.
https://www.rollitup.org/grow-journals/34120-daves-aerogarden-grow-pics.html

I'm using approx 200 watts worth of CFL bulbs and my temps are normally between 73 - 76F with and the humidity is normally around 45%. Every now and then I just turn on a ceiling fan to circulate the air a bit and that is all.

Bulbs are usually kept approx 2'' from the tops of the plants.

I got two fans on my plants most of the time and open the door every here and there and everything looks good so far and mist them once daily.

In my closet, I actually found that a fan blowing straight up and away from the grow was significantly more effective than blowing the fan into the grow or the lights themselves.

Something to think about when figuring out your closet temps.

wbd thats actually what i have set up. Works great

Yea thats true! I still got my clothes and junk on one side and a grow on the other. Im burnin 4-27wt. 55k CFL's and one circulation fan pointing up from the floor. It keeps it cool atleast by 5-7 degrees and maybe more. Im growing 3 from good greens.

yep-all you need in my opinion is 2 pc fans-one 4 intake and one 4 outtake, and one ocsilaiting fan

Fans have a cooling effect but if the ambient temperature in the room is too high you will have a problem. I keep the room at 72 and the closet, with door ajar and fans, stays about 77.

thats exactly what i do. get those stems flexing a little bit too so it definitely helps strenghten your plants as well. great idea for closets

wbd said:

In my closet, I actually found that a fan blowing straight up and away from the grow was significantly more effective than blowing the fan into the grow or the lights themselves.

Something to think about when figuring out your closet temps.

Click to expand...

You could throw in 26 watters instead of the 42's during really hot weather. Sounds like me, you might not have an air conditioner and it's the general temperature of your rooms that the problems and not just the CFLs.

A closed space, intake and outake is the best way i would imagine, or a really open concept grow room with fans. Everyone here has really good advice about using fans.

What I ended up having to do was install this special fan into my window that costs 30 bucks. It has two 7" fans and is meant to seal into your windowsill, creating suction in the entire room. this fan lowered the general temp in my room and conveniently blew the cool air constantly coming in right towards my closet. Mostly any major harware store has em cheap.

I've used a single clip fan blowing right on the lamps... my temps are a little high: 82-84, but everything seems to be doing okay? The room does have a central AC vent nearby. Here's my result running those temps.