Carbon filter still smelling

Heres some other info if anyone find this post for some quick edjumacation

https://www.thcfarmer.com/community/threads/buying-the-correct-fan-speed-controller.60640/

Also found this here on RIU
https://www.rollitup.org/t/speed-control-for-inline-fan-no-hum.176647/page-3

II. Know More About Your Fan
AC fans use many types of motors but three types are important to us cabinet-bedroom size growers, shaded pole induction motors, permanent-split capacitor (PSC) motors, and AC-DC Universal motors (Brushed Motors). For a list of motor type based on manufacturers, see numeral III. Shaded pole induction motors are simple single phase motors known for low starting torque and long duty cycles. PSC motors are also single phase motors but unlike shaded pole motors, PSC motors use a capacitor to help them start. AC-DC Universal motors are general purpose motors found in many household appliances like power drills and vacuum cleaners; their short service life makes them an unattractive option for fans. There are other types of AC motor that have been used for ventilation purposes, but aside from shaded pole, PSC, brushed motors, and three phase motors (which are beyond the scope of this course), ac motors are unable to be speed controlled without serious modification and/or risk.
There are primarily two ways to control the speed of these motors, voltage control and frequency control; see numeral IV for more information.

III. Fan Manufacturer List
This information is relevant as of march 2009 but always be sure to double check by contacting your retailer or fan manufacturer! Using the wrong type of control with your equipment puts the fan and your controller at risk. This section is always in need of additions and corrections so if you have anything to add, post it or send me a P.M. and I'll be sure to include it.

Permanent-Split Capacitor
-Dayton squirrel cage blowers (Generally PSC motors, but they also make a shaded pole version)
-S&P Mix-Vent TD line
-Grainger squirrel cage fans

Shaded Pole Motor
-Vortex
-Can-Fan
-Valueline
-Elicent
-Active Air

IV. AC Speed Control Methods

Voltage
-Rheostat (Old dimmer switches): Poor choice, excess power converted to heat.


-Triac (New dimmer switches): Poor choice, inherent problems with triac controls risk fan lifespan.


-Triac w/ Snubber circuit (Fan speed controllers, Solid state controllers): Good choice, snubber circuit removes most of the risk to the fan. Still not the best because it can cause some motors to hum.


-Capacitance level control (No hum fan speed controllers, 3 speed controllers): Good choice, only limited by the discrete speed choices, no infinite control.


-Variable autotransformer (Variac): Better choice, continuous sine wave of a lower voltage (unlike a triac which chops up the sine wave to acheive a decreased voltage) allows fan operation with no hum.



Frequency
-Varable Frequency Drives (VFD, AFD): Best choice, complex circuitry senses changes in the motor allowing it to vary frequency of the AC source as well as the voltage which maintains a constant torque, unlike voltage regulation.


V. DC Speed Control Methods
DC speed control is much simpler than AC speed control. In order to lower the speed of a DC motor we must lower the voltage, this is accomplished in various ways. Linear voltage regulation relies on resistors, and diodes to remove the excess voltage as heat. Pulse Width Modulation sends bursts of energy to the fan and the averaging effect results in a lower net voltage and reduced energy use.

kingtitan said:

That controller if its is ETL certified will say either on the back with a sticker or the wording directly molded on the plastic that says for use with brush motors only. Google images you can see these things melt.

Honestly people can do what ever they want, ill always give best practice advice.I am not the gambling type and I take no risks, I have nothing to gain, I am not selling anything just giving knowledge =). stay safe and stay high.

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Well I just searched a few ways and the only warnings I can find are forum posters but with no links or proof of the danger. They all just say fans will burn out or burn the house down.

I do understand how the fan works. And I don't like to turn the cheap controllers down too much as then they don't seem to work as smoothly.

But if they work. And the fans are not burning out or hot. I don't see the danger.

And my hyper fans have a controller built in but are supposedly "chip"controlled and have a more limited range of adjustment.

Please link some proof that I am in danger.

MichiganMedGrower said:

I have been using hydro farm and speedster controllers with active air inline 4" and 6" fans for almost 4 years continuously now.

No hot fans or controllers. In fact the little analog light timer for my t-5 lamps on the power strip is slightly warmer than the hydro farm speed controller next to it.

If they were so dangerous the companies selling them would have liability issues. I have never heard of a case. Not that that means there never was one.

Click to expand...

Those cheap controllers are not good for brushless motors. I'm not sure of a fire risk but its hard on the fans and can cause extra wear and noise.

Inline fan manufacturers normally state something about it in their website.

If you look at the controller description on Amazon and other sites they often say not to use with brushless motors.

whitebb2727 said:

Those cheap controllers are not good for brushless motors. I'm not sure of a fire risk but its hard on the fans and can cause extra wear and noise.

Inline fan manufacturers normally state something about it in their website.

If you look at the controller description on Amazon and other sites they often say not to use with brushless motors.

Click to expand...

Ok. I am aware of all that. But active air states to use only their controller and I have had no problems. And I tried a speedster with the other one I needed for intake and like I said they all still work fine.

I have only used 4" and 6" fans. Is a higher power larger fan more dangerous when pulsed this way?

And I still have not found an incident online from one.

MichiganMedGrower said:

Well I just searched a few ways and the only warnings I can find are forum posters but with no links or proof of the danger. They all just say fans will burn out or burn the house down.

I do understand how the fan works. And I don't like to turn the cheap controllers down too much as then they don't seem to work as smoothly.

But if they work. And the fans are not burning out or hot. I don't see the danger.

And my hyper fans have a controller built in but are supposedly "chip"controlled and have a more limited range of adjustment.

Please link some proof that I am in danger.

Click to expand...

Yeah I hear reaching near 30% is always a no no due to the excess heat and the fan probably hums (even with snub) and vibrates.

If its working for you, stick with it. You are correct that many just "say" without any proof, the concept is sound and the energy usage can be easily seen with a kill a watt device. The excess energy dissipates somewhere, reminds me of that movie where the spray that gets rid of poop (where does it go?!).

I did a fair amount of research before choosing my controller. I will see what I can dig up but I tend to clear my history a lot on my browser. The hydro farm snub type "activ air" or speedsters were 50+ bucks shipped and the variac on ebay was pretty much the same. No brainer for me.

I honestly dont think you are in "danger", at least you have the intelligence to think about these things and actually tested by feeling the controller for heat! As much as I like RIU there seems to be alot of cool dudes with alot of misinformation on the site, lets start off newbies on the right foot with the right knowledge.

MichiganMedGrower said:

Ok. I am aware of all that. But active air states to use only their controller and I have had no problems. And I tried a speedster with the other one I needed for intake and like I said they all still work fine.

I have only used 4" and 6" fans. Is a higher power larger fan more dangerous when pulsed this way?

And I still have not found an incident online from one.

Click to expand...

Of course active air says to only use their controller. They want you to buy their controller.

It could be more than that. I'm not sure how their motors are built.

I wouldn't recommend using the cheap rheostat controllers on brushless motors.

kingtitan said:

Yeah I hear reaching near 30% is always a no no due to the excess heat and the fan probably hums (even with snub) and vibrates.

If its working for you, stick with it. You are correct that many just "say" without any proof, the concept is sound and the energy usage can be easily seen with a kill a watt device. The excess energy dissipates somewhere, reminds me of that movie where the spray that gets rid of poop (where does it go?!).

I did a fair amount of research before choosing my controller. I will see what I can dig up but I tend to clear my history a lot on my browser. The hydro farm snub type "activ air" or speedsters were 50+ bucks shipped and the variac on ebay was pretty much the same. No brainer for me.

I honestly dont think you are in "danger", at least you have the intelligence to think about these things and actually tested by feeling the controller for heat! As much as I like RIU there seems to be alot of cool dudes with alot of misinformation on the site, lets start off newbies on the right foot with the right knowledge.

Click to expand...

I agree with just about all of that.

Except my controllers were $20 each. And the fans blowing air is louder than the hum produced by the rheostat.

whitebb2727 said:

Of course active air says to only use their controller. They want you to buy their controller.

It could be more than that. I'm not sure how their motors are built.

I wouldn't recommend using the cheap rheostat controllers on brushless motors.

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It's not more than marketing. You are right. In fact the speedster is nicer than the active air matched one. So I'm sure they lose much business to them.

And I am not recommending just telling my experience. And my experience is only with active air 4" and 6" green online fans and the hudrofarm and speedster controllers and I never really leave them on very low speeds. They pulse and hum too much at those levels.

Likely why hyper fans only adjust down to 35%

It's the saying that the house will burn down from my ice cold fan and controller running at half speed that bothered me. I don't see any credible info on fatal failure.

MichiganMedGrower said:

It's not more than marketing. You are right. In fact the speedster is nicer than the active air matched one. So I'm sure they lose much business to them.

And I am not recommending just telling my experience. And my experience is only with active air 4" and 6" green online fans and the hudrofarm and speedster controllers and I never really leave them on very low speeds. They pulse and hum too much at those levels.

Likely why hyper fans only adjust down to 35%

It's the saying that the house will burn down from my ice cold fan and controller running at half speed that bothered me. I don't see any credible info on fatal failure.

Click to expand...

I can turn my ventech all the way down with the variac I use and no hum.

MichiganMedGrower said:

I agree with just about all of that.

Except my controllers were $20 each. And the fans blowing air is louder than the hum produced by the rheostat.

Click to expand...

Canadians get stiffed on everything online, shipping, exchange rates, warranties =)

MichiganMedGrower said:

It's not more than marketing. You are right. In fact the speedster is nicer than the active air matched one. So I'm sure they lose much business to them.

And I am not recommending just telling my experience. And my experience is only with active air 4" and 6" green online fans and the hudrofarm and speedster controllers and I never really leave them on very low speeds. They pulse and hum too much at those levels.

Likely why hyper fans only adjust down to 35%

It's the saying that the house will burn down from my ice cold fan and controller running at half speed that bothered me. I don't see any credible info on fatal failure.

Click to expand...

To be fair, if my house burnt down or caused a fire, insurance found out and I got nothing, have kids, wife, and out on the street or in jail, it wouldn't be my first priority to come post warnings about that. Some might, but not many. I have been in large grow rooms where the guy had 10 of these speedsters hanging on the studs. Maybe no ones house actually burned down? but I know that these things can melt from the heat generated, hell when I was 6 years old in the 80's the rheostat in the dining room even smoked, triggered the breaker and the thing would not turn anymore.

whitebb2727 said:

I can turn my ventech all the way down with the variac I use and no hum.

Click to expand...

Of course with a proper variac. I have no need to do that. Even the Titan fan speed controller with 2 pre set speed settings available for day/night is just like a speedster. I plant to get one so I don't have to manually turn down the fans during lights out in winter.

kingtitan said:

Canadians get stiffed on everything online, shipping, exchange rates, warranties =)

Click to expand...

I hit "like" but I really mean I don't like that Canadians are charged more.

kingtitan said:

To be fair, if my house burnt down or caused a fire, insurance found out and I got nothing, have kids, wife, and out on the street or in jail, it wouldn't be my first priority to come post warnings about that. Some might, but not many. I have been in large grow rooms where the guy had 10 of these speedsters hanging on the studs. Maybe no ones house actually burned down? but I know that these things can melt from the heat generated, hell when I was 6 years old in the 80's the rheostat in the dining room even smoked, triggered the breaker and the thing would not turn anymore.

Click to expand...

Again. I am not suggesting anyone do anything unsafe with electricity.

I do disagree about negative reviews. When people are unhappy they tell everyone they can. It's when they are happy they don't bother as much.

I was a sales manager for over 20 years. This is a general rule of sales. And why customer service is so important.

And the things get sold out every year. Wouldn't there be some complaints if they were dangerous?

I am not finding much negative but hum.

A couple things could be going on here.
1. A leak between the fan and the filter will draw unfiltered air into the fan.
2. A fan that is too small will not be able to maintain negative pressure in the room.
3. Your filter may be worn out.
4. You may be drawing air through your filter too fast (as others have mentioned).

Keep in mind that the CFM rating of your fan is based on an unrestricted system. Once you place restrictions in the system (mainly your filter and your ducting) the CFM will go down. What works for me in a similar size room is a 440CFM Wisperline with Presh 8x24.

If I were you, I'd do this (in order).

Make sure your fan and filter would theoretically work in your room volume.
Check for leaks between the fan and the filter.
Make sure you have an oscillating fan in the room to mix things up.
Move the filter up higher.
Check for negative pressure. Do it on a windy day, using smoke as you crack your entrance door. Look for leaks in the system.

If non of that works, then you are into spending money.

Yes, If you are using a rheostat for motor control, then it is essential to understand that all types of DC motors could be speed-controlled, but somewhere a small amount of AC motors are controllable with rheostats. To get more information, you can also visit reliance electric motor.
Thanks.