Morning RIU fam. I’ve been reading this forum for a very very long time but this is my first post. Awhile back the wife and I sold our house to find a bigger one. The home we sold had a pretty nice 16’ x 4’ space that I divided into two rooms in the back of the garage for my grow space. Our new home didn’t have space so I divided a plan. Build a HUGE garage with an attic.
So I did. Fast forward, the attic space I created above my garage was 7’6” tall at the peak inside. It was 26’ long and just over that wide with the roof tapering down to a 14” knee wall on both sides. My plan, to successfully build my grow room in that space, free from prying eyes and out of sight from the kids.
Disclaimer, I am in a legal medical state, with a current medical card and authorized cultivator. Kids, don’t try this at home…..
Sorry, I don’t have any pictures before I started the grow room, writing up a post was the last thing on my mind. Before I started any framing I insulated between my 2x12 rafters with R19, with reflectix foil insulation on the inside of the fiberglass insulation. I pushed all of it in the rafter cavitie 3/4” creating a breathable space before hanging drywall. I framed the walls with 2x6’s 24” oc, ran dedicated 220 20amp for my lights, dedicated 220 20amp for a/c and 110 20amp for everything else. Then filled it with R19 also. I covered everything with 1/2” Sheetrock. Caulked in EVERYTHING, taped, mud, and finally priming with two coats of drywall sealer/primer with mold protection.
While I waited for the walls to cure I realized the attic would get really warm during the day. To fix this, I placed reflectix on the bottom of my rafters, when I built the garage I engineered in extra attic cooling, I have 16 continuous eve vents, with ridge vent at the top. This elementary 90 something percent of the radiant heat from the roof entering the attic. The attic now stays less than 10 degrees over the outside ambient temp.
Next was to install heating and cooling. For this I used a 16,000 but heat/cool window unit I already had. A bit over kill, but I will have four lights plus my vegging area. Once I’m up and running it’ll be close. Because we are in an upper scale neighborhood, and because garages aren’t normally conditioned space in our region I went with a more clandestine approach to everything. The back wall of my grow room is 3’ from the outside garage wall, so I could build a box around my a/c and vent all the heat out the eve with a 10” fan, again slight over kill but that’s me. I over kill everything. Works great and lowered attic temps even more. Temps are now 7 degrees below ambient on sunny days. Lower than that on cloudy days.
The finished grow room is 8’ x 10’ with 7’6” at the peak tapering down to 5’ knee walls.
Right now I’m nursing a few plants back to health that were neglected by a friend. The end plan is a 6 bucket recirculating too feed. It’s my go to when I’m not running ROLS IN 20 gallon fabric pots. Right now temps hold very stable. The true test will be in the winter.
Questions, comments……………
So I did. Fast forward, the attic space I created above my garage was 7’6” tall at the peak inside. It was 26’ long and just over that wide with the roof tapering down to a 14” knee wall on both sides. My plan, to successfully build my grow room in that space, free from prying eyes and out of sight from the kids.
Disclaimer, I am in a legal medical state, with a current medical card and authorized cultivator. Kids, don’t try this at home…..
Sorry, I don’t have any pictures before I started the grow room, writing up a post was the last thing on my mind. Before I started any framing I insulated between my 2x12 rafters with R19, with reflectix foil insulation on the inside of the fiberglass insulation. I pushed all of it in the rafter cavitie 3/4” creating a breathable space before hanging drywall. I framed the walls with 2x6’s 24” oc, ran dedicated 220 20amp for my lights, dedicated 220 20amp for a/c and 110 20amp for everything else. Then filled it with R19 also. I covered everything with 1/2” Sheetrock. Caulked in EVERYTHING, taped, mud, and finally priming with two coats of drywall sealer/primer with mold protection.
While I waited for the walls to cure I realized the attic would get really warm during the day. To fix this, I placed reflectix on the bottom of my rafters, when I built the garage I engineered in extra attic cooling, I have 16 continuous eve vents, with ridge vent at the top. This elementary 90 something percent of the radiant heat from the roof entering the attic. The attic now stays less than 10 degrees over the outside ambient temp.
Next was to install heating and cooling. For this I used a 16,000 but heat/cool window unit I already had. A bit over kill, but I will have four lights plus my vegging area. Once I’m up and running it’ll be close. Because we are in an upper scale neighborhood, and because garages aren’t normally conditioned space in our region I went with a more clandestine approach to everything. The back wall of my grow room is 3’ from the outside garage wall, so I could build a box around my a/c and vent all the heat out the eve with a 10” fan, again slight over kill but that’s me. I over kill everything. Works great and lowered attic temps even more. Temps are now 7 degrees below ambient on sunny days. Lower than that on cloudy days.
The finished grow room is 8’ x 10’ with 7’6” at the peak tapering down to 5’ knee walls.
Right now I’m nursing a few plants back to health that were neglected by a friend. The end plan is a 6 bucket recirculating too feed. It’s my go to when I’m not running ROLS IN 20 gallon fabric pots. Right now temps hold very stable. The true test will be in the winter.
Questions, comments……………
