Lighting confusion and tempeture

ok so im about a 8 days into it and it seems to be going good. i am having trouble understanding the recomended time to give the plant light in the veg state. ive been reading grow journals and some say they do 18/6 hrs per day for light in the VEG state. ive been doing 24 constant. is that bad? which is best?

and im doing a stealth grow and i cant seem to keep the temp down. right now its at about 85 but somtimes it gets upto 90. they look fine tho. ive got a fan blowing cool air into the intake fan and a exaust hole at the top. any recomendations?

and im using 4 27 watt 5600k 1400 lumens per light cfls for 3 plants.

I always do 18/6. I've tried 24/0 and 18/6 yeilds better results. The plant grows and stretches durring the night cycle.
The heat sounds a lil too high. don't let it go into the 90's too much. It will stress the plant. I keep my indoor in the upper 70's durring the day and the lower 70's at night. They are mostly indica and they like the cooler weather best. Are you using bag seed, do you know what kind of plant your growing?

As Shylas said, giving the plants some sleep will yield better. I've had to cut back my clone lights from 24 hours to 20 simply because the plants couldn't thrive without being able to sleep a little. Sleeping allows the plants to straighten up and get into a routine. It sounds like you have a good intake, however is there ducting/tubeing thats pulling in cold air from the outside? And if so, are you running your lights primarily at night? Doing both of those things will dramatically decrease your temps.

I don't even have an exhaust on my growbox with a 600watt HPS, but I have a powerful intake pulling in cold air so temps are never above 75F in a 24-hour day (although I air cool my light which isn't a problem for you using CFLs). If you're pulling in fresh air, maybe you need a better fan, shop around for anything like a Vortex fan. What is the size of your growroom? That will determine how powerful of a fan you need to cycle fresh air consistenty.

Finally, you can always make that hole at the top a little bigger and get a computer fan, or something of the sort that will actually pull the air out of the growbox, instead of using the hole as a passable exhuast which you're doing now.

well im definatly gonna get a timer now that yall recomend it. but my grow box is stealth so i have to keep the light coming from it as minimal as possible to keep it from being suspicious. (living with parents durring summer in between college). but the box is cardboard. its about 15"x8''x15''. i have it upright like an old computer. my intake fan is a 12v 4'' computer fan near the bottom. im in texas and my actual room is like 77 degrees anyway. so idk. heres some pics.