Hey Guys...
Gypsy here...
Potenza, you say your english is not so good... what is your language?
OK.. so I have built my own tent, and I am very happy with the outcome...
I have some spare time so I will try to help you guys out the best I can...
First.. here is an illustration that should help most of you understand the IDEAL setup, vent and cooltube wise...
Thanks to
Al B. Fuct
So as you can see, the air that passes through the cooltube NEVER mixes with the air from the tent...
If you use the scrubber fan at the end of your exhaust as the pick up for the cooltube, you are running HOT AIR over the bulb... and decreasing efficiency...
Can you do it? sure! will work? sure... but it is not the best way to set it up...
What happens whan you don't want the exhaust on, but the light needs to be on?
The correct way is to have the cooltube on a dedicated fan, with a timer to keep the fan on for an extra minutes after the light goes off....
Your intake and exhaust are totally separate from the light cooling...
With that, you can set up a thermostat and have your exhaust (with filter) and intake (if you choose to have active intake) and you can just set the temperature you want and the fans will work accordingly to keep it there...
You are spending lots of cash on this nice set up.... do it right.. you will be rewarded by years of trouble free grows...
Do it half ass and you will be constantly having to ... fiddle with it...
My two cents...
Here is what I built... sorry for the hijack... but I think it is relevant....
Cheers,, and hit me back with your thoughts...
Gypsy...
Quote:
Originally Posted by
GypsyBush 
Hi...! yes... I'very Hi...!
A while back (10 days or so) I ordered a new light... a 600 Watt HPS w/ a 8" cool tube... ... so I could have one light over the four trays I intend on having..
I wanted to order a Grow Tent as well, but the cash was a little short that day... not wanting to wait this long again for shipping, I decided to go get some supplies and build my own... (with the help of a good friend... Thanks!!!
)
Soooo, I just thought I'd post about how I spent part of my day yesterday...
Went to WM... picked up a "wardrobe"... air pumps & stones... Industrial Strength Velcro... and 4 plastic containers...
Then I went to "L" and got a few more things... 4"in-line duct fan (exhaust) @ 80CFM... some 4" ducting... a 4" ducting wall adapter... and some heavy duty tape...
Then I went to a gardening supply store and picked up some 6 MIL black/white Panda Film, but I had to buy a freaking roll of it... 1000 sq Foot roll... yeah.... ok... and I found these neat little zippers... probably $1 from China, but I paid PREMIUM, let me assure you hehehe, what a rip off... I needed them so I got them... and they were very easy to use... if only they were a better zipper... I hate cheap, flimsy shit that you know won't last... especially when you have to pay a lot for it...
Oh my other beef with the zipper is that you NEED 2 to make a door... all of the pictures showed what I needed... but you can't make an effective door with just one... everything I said before... just doubled the price... rip off....
So I guess a few pictures of the assembly are in order...
This is not a tutorial... I am not a teacher and I don't have patience to explain anything to anyone unless the person is willing to pay genuine attention because they are really interested...
With that said, I would be glad to answer questions here on this thread (please do not PM me ABOUT THIS)... just make sure you are asking a relevant, specific question... Thanks...!
So Yeah, it is pretty easy, if you have the patience to deal with a very large piece of plastic that needs to be folded neatly several time...
I still need a piece of thin plywood for the bottom, the cardboard looked good for the pictures, but it's not permanent...
I put little velcro tabs, attaching the frame to the panda film...
I had to make an extra section to cover the back of the zipper, as it is not light proof, and to make sure, I ran a strip of velcro lenghtwise, to make sure light cannot go in because of the zipper...
I'll take a better picture of the thermostat, but it is just a regular cooling thermostat... you set the temp and it lets power go to whatever it is you are running...
Kinda like a timer..... but instead of turning on and off with hours and minutes, it is controlled by temperature...
So I can have the fan kick at ... say... 75F...and when it gets below 75F (+- a few) it shuts off....
Passive intakes should do it... but it would be easy to add at any point...
I know I will not get true 80CFM out of this fan, but I have a small tent...
true 80CFM would circulate the entire airmass 3.3 times every minute...
I bet I am still getting full volume transfer every minute... I got 24 cubic feet of space...
Well, it's time for me to go and enjoy some torture at physical therapy...
Be good boys and girls... and remember "Always Drive Rowdy...." lol...
Gypsy....
When the light gets here, it will have 8" holes on the sides of the tent for unrestricted blow by ventilation... provided by a 265cfm cage fan (not an in-line blower...
Quote:
Originally Posted by
GypsyBush
Damn... and I still got the joint...
Ok... so I will start pretty much where I left off... with one overlapped picture to illustrate a change....
I decided to change the exhaust flange because I found one that will block the light a little better than the previous... and I think it looks slightly better...
...and a little fan to ... "..stir it up, little darling stur it up..."lol
Oh! I was wrong about the fan all along... it is a 170 CFM in line blower...
I have always been scared of cheap plastic timers on anything more than household lamp... so... here we have a real timer... that probably won't catch fire, melt or be overloaded...
Of course we gotta know what we are feeding our plants, so here we have a HANNA Pronto TDS/PPM meter.... everything to keep my ladies happy...
The thermostat will kick the exhaust fan ON when the temperature inside raises to what the user sets it to...
This power strip will be used for non-ballast/non-timed/non-heat generating items such as the circulating fan and 9 watt CFL (just in case I need a light and don't need to fire up the BIG GUNS...)
Everything else will be staged outside... airpumps, ballasts, transformers... etc...
And here is the whole strip with the goodies....
... and last but not least....
I really wanted to use some of the "neoprene" medialess "disks"... but there were none to be had in this town...
So, again, I found something that works at a fraction of the cost....
I wanted to get away from absorbent foam once the seedlings grow a bit, to avoid stem rot...
So this closed cell foam is perfect, even if I have to tape or glue it once the thin seam busts...
It's perfect for what I am doing...
Well boys & girls.. it's been fun so far... but I am not finished.... soooo... I will get busy again and check with you guys a little later...
Take care...
Gypsy...
... anyone...
Quote:
Originally Posted by
GypsyBush
So this is what I came up with for the timer...
there is a 5' cord that will plug into the wall...
and a 3-way splitter, to feed the light, cool tube fan and anything else I want to run on the same schedule...
So... how am I doing this far...???
.
