Heat Issues with My Closet Tent Grow

Hello all, I am in need of some advice.

I am growing in my tent for the first time and am having some serious heat issues. I would consider my ventilation to be more than adequate,a 400 CFM inline fan venting through the attic and dumping outside.

I have a single panel open to allow for passive intake. (This panel has a fan blowing from the outside pulling air from the closet.) A interior fan to move air around the tent as well. I leave the closet door open so the tent can draw in fresh air from the adjacent room which stays at 72 F. I also have tried to drive the humidity up using the sponge method, by no luck their either. My humidity never really breaches 40% and will typically stay much lower.

With all of this I am still reaching temperatures FAR outside the acceptable rage, up to 95 F.

What can I do?

I am only using 4, 23W CFL's to veg currently how am I ever going to flower with my 43 watt CFL's?!?

I have recently switched from 24 hours of light to 18/6 so the lights stay off during the hottest part of the day.

Here are some pictures showing my setup.



Any suggestions would be very appreciated, If I can't get temperatures down this is going to get really disappointing very soon.

its because the thermostat is measuring the temprature of the bulbs at such a close range.

put your hand on that bulb..its hot. no amount of airflow is going to change that. try moving them lights up about 4 inches and see if that makes a difference. the ambient heat that is coming off the bulbs is not the actual temp of the cab.

you can always rig up a air cooled hood if your that concerned but as your plants get bigger and them lights need to be moved up the temps at soil level will drop for sure

also i would suggest maybe rigging some sort of "hood" to reflect all that light your losing to the top of the tent.if you put a aluminum throw away pan above them bulbs it will reflect alot of that light back down to the plants and you can move the lights up and still get good lighting to them.

the plants look good. one of them appears to have some minor burns from the lights but otherwise look fine. if you leave them lights that close to them they will be dwarfed, i know everyone says to "Keep CFL's as close as possible to prevent stretching" but they are far past the point where a little stretch will hurt them and is actually good for them to stretch a little bit. really you just want to prevent a first born seedling from stretching because the top will become too heavy for the stem and it will slump over and die. thats not going to happen to yours man they are pretty established now.

Thank you so much RetiredMatthebrute for the advise.

I have placed my reflector hood back on and raised the lights a decent amount. Lets see if that will help. I will report back. Here are some pictures of the updated setup.



Crossing my fingers now.

It has been setting a few hours now in the previous configuration and it seems to be settling on 90 F. The humidity has gone up at least to a solid 35%

Still concerned.

i would say that 90 is perfectly fine for veg. maybe supplement in some co2 if possible. people say 70-80 is ideal, but at 85-90 with enough light, enough water and enough co2, this is the temperature range where photosynthesis is most rapidly taking place.
build your own yeast co2 generator for under 10 bucks, it might help. google search it.

no dont raise your cfl's they need to be 1-3 inches away from the plants!!!! if they are looking like heat damage then definitely move an inch or two away, i have 8 42 actual watters surrounding one plant literally half an inch away from any given nug, the ambient air says 90 but there is no way it is with my fans and my plants aren't transpiring any differently. its not like they are baking in it, if you feel warm air coming from your tent through your exaust then you are fine, if your plants are growing fine then don't worry too much about it bro if anything get an intake fan thats weaker than your exaust fan, should put all your worries behind you =D

i also bought these to help get them literally as close as possible

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0053P1FPQ/ref=oh_details_o00_s00_i00

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0057UHB6Y/ref=oh_details_o00_s00_i01

cfl's aren't meant to be overhead lighting for grows, they give off 360 degrees with little light penetration, i surround my plants with the light and they grow dense fatty nugs

Thanks for the advise all, I hope I'm just being a protective parent right now and my girls stay healthy. The one on the left has continued to yellow a bit, I hope it's not from overwatering. I transplanted them out of solo cups into 3 gallon smart pots the day before yesterday, so I am assuming that is the main culprite.

I know one thing, I will be going straight to the smart pots next grow. The solo cups did not do me any favors. I lost a fair amount of roots when transplanting, and that was while I was making a concerted effort to being delicate with them.

Just got home to check temps. Sitting at 88 F, both of the girls are looking healthy enough. The new growth on the left plant that has been yellowing all seems to look healthy.

Thank you all for the help, and advice.

If you are worried about heat, add more ventilation and/or floor fans. My simple answer. K.I.S.S.

Worried yes, but I don't think I can get to much more ventilation. I'm using a 400 CFM inline fan venting outdoors through the attic. I'm starting too consider trying an LED for the next grow because right now 4 23 watt CFLS are on the border of being to hot. I don't even want to think about my 42 watt CFLS I've bought for flowering. :/

BTW K.I.S.S is typically ALWAYS my M.O.

I have 380watts right now of cfl and they are about 1-2" away and my temps are 80. You need to get a bigger exhaust to push more out. Also try putting a bowl of ice cubes. It will lower your temps and raise your humidity

Hey everyone,

I found a solution to the heat issue that was plaguing me.

I placed a box fan in the back for a higher air intake. Since the grow tent is decently close to the wall, it wasn't drawing in enough air through passive induction alone. I needed a fan to push more air into the tent. Once I did that the internal 400 CFM inline fan had some air to suck out.

Air circulation ended up being the cause of the heat issue.

I learned a lesson, make sure you have as much air coming in, as you do going out. Or at least enough to supply your exhaust system.