1000 watt mh in a 22cf freezer

Skizzle

Member
Hello everyone!
I converted a 22 cubic ft upright freezer into a grow box. It's not super stealth but I can lock it and as long as no one pokes around too much, it appears to just be a freezer. Anyway, my whole setup is mounted vertcally, and I'm exhausting it through the bottom via a 6" 435 cfm valuline inline fan and out through my apartment chimney. My cooltube is positioned directly above the inline fan and directly above that I will mount a charcoal filter if I ever get the heat issue licked. I know a 1000w cooltube is a bit much but I got a smoking deal on it and couldn't pass it up, guess it's not such a good deal if I can't use it lol. I would much rather go with a smaller light setup now, because the heat it produces is unreal (which if I manage to beat, I will be using as a heating source in the winter). Not quite ready to give up just yet, so I was wondering if anyone had any ideas as to how I might cool this mofo. If you think this is waaaay overkill, I'll submit.. Intake is coming through a 6" hole on the lower left hand side of the freezer (wall side so it's not immediately visible) and it pulls really hard but the inside temp is still over 100 degrees. I should mention that I live on the 3rd floor and I keep my apt set at 80 degrees because my ac runs nonstop if I set it any lower..would buying a portable ac unit and positioning near the intake work? Or should I directly pipe ac through the cooltube? If it can't be done, then I'll just fill the box with cfls or try and trade this for a smaller light system which is probably the best idea.....

Thanks in advance!
 

coast2coast

Active Member
just a few thoughts from my point of view...

Regardless of how much air you put through that cool tube, the light energy is being absorbed by the walls and plants... when its absorbed by the walls it has nothing to do but turn into heat... A freezer by design is meant to transfer as little heat energy from the outside to the inside where its nice and cold... so it has a ridiculous amount of insulation... So all of that heat energy is being stored up in the lining of the freezer.

So basically whats happening is no matter how fast you exchange the air out of the freezer the walls of it are going to be hot as shit. Also with the ambient temp of your apartment already at 80 degrees, youve just made an easy bake oven. There are solutions to all this but IMO its going to end up costing you more to run it than its worth.

The only way I could see this even possibly working is to hook up an a/c unit (and a very powerful one at that) and pump frigid air into this setup, mind you that a/c will probably never turn off as Its trying to fight the heat of a 1000w HID light in a small ass space.

What I would do Is either redesign your grow area, or trade/sell off that 1000 watter for some other equipment. Or just use that freezer as a cfl veg area and use the 1000w for flower, which would be great, but I dont know your limitations.
 

coast2coast

Active Member
Just to give you an Idea about heat, I have a 700w of light running in a 12x10 bedroom with all of the a/c running into that room... the a/c is a 2 ton unit made for around a 3 bedroom unit and with outside temps hitting just below 100 degrees my grow room has gotten up to 85 degrees with the thermostat set at 65-70 degrees.

HID's will great large amounts of heat that need to be dealt with.
 

Skizzle

Member
Thanks for the quick response, that makes a lot of sense, I never thought about the walls absorbing heat, I figured the white would reflect the light but even if that was the case, the heat the light produces would still be absorbed...I guess I'm going to have to take the easy route and get some smaller gear to grow with... I would love to flower in my closet because I could easily vent it into my ceiling but Im wary of that because I wonder how often maintenance gets up in those areas.
 

coast2coast

Active Member
yeah I thought about doing the same, but at the same time right after I considered it the cable guys came to install a new system and had to get up into the attic to run the new lines... if you cleaned the air before it went into the attic you should be fine and they should notify you that they'll be up there, but its still a risk...
 
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