Let's Talk VDP ! best Grow Room/ Tent Design and Equipment for a stable VDP

Going to redesign my grow area for VDP and was hoping those of you that have been doing VDP for awhile could chime in with their expertise. So how would you design it?

for starters regulating proper temperature in a room reliably starts with having proper insulation to control the climate with in the grow room some people are a fan of spray foam but i still like fibre glass batts for the added sound proofing as i dont like hearing the fans or equipment when outside my room. the next big thing is sealing the room properly dont be cheap with the accoustic sealant when installing your vapour barrier also purchase the plastic boxes that go behind your receptacles and junction boxes in your grow room this will also improve the seal. the next big thing is having insulated doors with a rubber gasket that goes completely around the door that way you get a 100% seal like a fridge when the door is closed. all these things will give you an advantage to controlling the climate inside the room. you can buy all the best equipment when it comes to climate control but if your room is poorly built your just going to be fighting the external climate outside of your room which is a waste.

For full control you need to be able to lower/raise temps and rh independently from eachother, you need machines to do this (ac, humidifier etc).

If youre extracting any air you should make sure that you can extract from the top and the bottom; bottom extraction preserves rh and temps higher while providing airchange.

Your first step: buy measuring equipment for VPD; i think both pulse and trolmaster have gear.

Was thinking about getting this Ac Infinity Controller the 69 pro + Supposed to start shipping on the 9th so 4 more days. Same thing as the 69 pro but the plus has 8 programable ports instead of the regular pro's 4 ports. then i would need 4 ac adapters one for Heat one for AC and dehumidify and humidifiers would each get one. Was going to hook one the AC Infinity Dimming adapters into my light so it can dim and brighten for added Temperature Control. Not sure if that would even be needed but that's one of the adapters selling points. Going with a AC infinity 6 inch fan so that will take up anther port. Then a couple AC Infinity canopy clip on fans for the last two ports.

Rocket Soul said:

If youre extracting any air you should make sure that you can extract from the top and the bottom; bottom extraction preserves rh and temps higher while providing airchange.

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So have two fans going out on on top one on the bottom and program the controller to decide which to use based on environment variables? sounds a bit more expensive Or do you just switch one fan between the top and bottom vents ?

JavaCo said:

Was thinking about getting this Ac Infinity Controller the 69 pro + Supposed to start shipping on the 9th so 4 more days. Same thing as the 69 pro but the plus has 8 programable ports instead of the regular pro's 4 ports. then i would need 4 ac adapters one for Heat one for AC and dehumidify and humidifiers would each get one. Was going to hook one the AC Infinity Dimming adapters into my light so it can dim and brighten for added Temperature Control. Not sure if that would even be needed but that's one of the adapters selling points. Going with a AC infinity 6 inch fan so that will take up anther port. Then a couple AC Infinity canopy clip on fans for the last two ports.
So have two fans going out on on top one on the bottom and program the controller to decide which to use based on environment variables? sounds a bit more expensive Or do you just switch one fan between the top and bottom vents ?
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No, just putting your extraction duct higher and lower, but it may be impossible in a tent, used to open space.

@JavaCo which tools you would need to achieve a optimal VPD is very dependent on the climate of the growroom youre growing in.
I do monitor my VPD and can achieve quite optimal results by using a dehumidifer most often, ymmv as beeing said above.

Nowadays i would only use electronic grow devices which i can integrate in homeassistant as its the most versataile solution without any restrictions or bindings to any manufactorer nor any chinese cloud involved, endless possibilities, and way more reliable then a china cloud solution.

The 69 pro, can be also integrated in to Homeassistant allready if i read right, while you can simply do all you want and more then the 69 pro can do with some simple rule sets in HA.
Handling VPD is very easy in HA, simply take a Zigbee or BLE Humidity / Temp sensor (10-20$) and youre ready to go, there is pretty much all hardware you can imagine avaiable for this ecosystem, its not pricey either.

Simplest to use in HA is the vpdchart.com provided card, very easy to use and teach you all you need to know in a short time.


kinda looks like this then,(this is at night).
Good luck.

for proper vpd you need to be able to control and adjust three things: air flow above/below canopy, temps, humidity

everyone has a different method depending on their circumstance.

take a look at what your current environment is vs where you need to be at, then go from there

can be accomplished without expensive sensors/apps. just temp/rh gauge, fans, and humidifier with rh dial

best of luck

@cobshopgrow Thanks For that awesome info home assistant looks great already have a 12 dollar temp / humidity sensor that should work with HA. So i am saving money already. Put the Controller 69pro+ on hold right now was hoping they would update their combo deals since I need a new fan also. But so far they haven't added it. For My conditions most of the year I would have to add heat and humidity to get into the proper VDP zones. AC and humidity for 3 or 4 months. Pretty Rare to have to run the dehumidifier had to this summer though lots of rain. We average 30% humidity here.
Any other Controllers out their that will do what the 69pro+ does?

i would simply try to use the HA itself as the controller with some rules you setup.
you prob. will aim for a target temp anyway, lets say 28C room, leaftemp is usually 1.5-2C lower.
so you integrate your heating in some way.
electric heater with a smartplug, a radiator can be steered with a zigbee thermostat f.e.
quite a lot ACs can be integrated too in HA.
for the humidity similar aproach, prob. humidifier by a smart plug is the easiest.
then you setup your automations in HA.

you can simply setup several conditions if needed, like set a certain speed for your inline fan if heating is on f.e., or a certain min max percentage the inline fan needs to run before takin other actions.
ideas come over time and a bit trial and error will get you there for sure.
good thing is there is hardly some you cant integrate in to HA and setup a automation for it.


for the AC infinity stuff i found this on the quick.

as said, i have no overview of their proucts.
on a quick look i havent found how they deal with the leaftemp, they may skipped it? (bad).
if they skipped it, i would go with the vpdchart.com calc or base your vpd on this below anyway

no real need for their controller exept the fanspeed setting which may can be achieved cheaper anyway.

btw. i could get away with a non controllable inline fan so far, i would use its speed settings if i could, but it have no interface.
as its used as a scrubber only, steering the whole room have way more effect anyway for me.

Decided to go with Home Assistant. adding 4 plugs to the 69pro+ would have costed 80 dollars they want 20 dollars a pop for those. Bought 4 15amp smart plugs for 23 dollars. So pretty big savings with that. Bought a 19 dollars 300 watt dimmable smart plug and that will be used for the fan. The 405 cfm 6 inch Ac infinity fan costs 120 dollars Decided to go with a 8 inch 40 dollar fan does 430 cfm. Going to cost me 20 to 30 dollars more for a 8 inch carbon filter but still going to save around 50% over the 6 inch fan. Got a bit stinky the last go so it is time for a new filter anyways. Only thing I havent found smart yet is some meanwell driver dimmers might be out of luck with that one. I was going to wire a couple of these into my light. Might still be a way to get it done . So if anyone knows Of any smart dimming for meanwell type drivers please chime in .

JavaCo said:

Decided to go with Home Assistant. adding 4 plugs to the 69pro+ would have costed 80 dollars they want 20 dollars a pop for those. Bought 4 15amp smart plugs for 23 dollars. So pretty big savings with that. Bought a 19 dollars 300 watt dimmable smart plug and that will be used for the fan. The 405 cfm 6 inch Ac infinity fan costs 120 dollars Decided to go with a 8 inch 40 dollar fan does 430 cfm. Going to cost me 20 to 30 dollars more for a 8 inch carbon filter but still going to save around 50% over the 6 inch fan. Got a bit stinky the last go so it is time for a new filter anyways. Only thing I havent found smart yet is some meanwell driver dimmers might be out of luck with that one. I was going to wire a couple of these into my light. Might still be a way to get it done . So if anyone knows Of any smart dimming for meanwell type drivers please chime in . View attachment 5327477

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Do you have a link to that to that 300w dimable smart plug?

Rocket Soul said:

Do you have a link to that to that 300w dimable smart plug?

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Yeah it is amazon prime though, might cost more for non primers https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09DT173R1?ref=nb_sb_ss_w_as-reorder-t1_k0_1_4&amp=&crid=37SSHLKVIGZYM&sprefix=kasa&th=1

Some weird specs though 300 watts incandescent and 150 watts LED. The fan i have only uses 60 watts so not a issue for me

sounds like a plan, you for sure took care that the ordered smart plugs are compatible with home assistant ill guess.
regarding the dimming smart plug, it might be difficult to steer a fan with it.
no clue if you ordered a AC brushed or DC brushless Fan now but both can give problems with a trailing edge dimmer.
decades back i tried to dim a a normal AC inline fan with a trailing edge dimmer and it wasnt the best experience, dim range was low and it wasnt running well, also fan broke after a short time using it like this.
The newer DC brushless fans prob wont dim at all with such a AC dimmer, the internal AC/DC converter will work against it.

if you can solder, you can use a esp32, esphome and some optocoupler and resistors to create a meanwell pwm dimmer compatible with HA, there is some to find on the internet, i remember that the ledgarderner guys where in to it.

I have the dimmer hooked to a cheap 12 year old ac 6 inch Duct fan I have been dimming for years. Works fine when you first set up the Dimmer Switch in the app you can set a minimum dim point I don't like dimming a fan lower than 40 %. so when setting the dimming to 0 and the fan stays on 40%. So safer than the manual dimmer i had on the fan before and much better resolution. Electrically the fan is still sound but the bushing is pretty much toast so it vibrates badly and needs replacing. Going with the same type just 8 inch this time. They are brushless AC motors. I used to do electrical work so i have a box of dimmer switches only one had the specs to dim the fan.
Yeah all Kasa /Tp link plugs switches and the dimmer. But made the mistake of getting the kasa 2k video doorbell thinking it would integrate into home assistant so i can use the motion detector to turn on outside lights, but no such luck. From reading a few threads in the forum looks like most video doorbell makers are dicks about letting them work without using the makers app. Might be a way to get the video if using the add on Scrypted not sure about the motion sensor though. So that part is turning into a pain in the ass. Might just grab a couple sensors I know will work and call it good.
looked on the LEDGardener forum found a sp32 dimmer for meanwell Cheap DiY but you add all the parts up it is almost 50 dollars more than a driver itself. lol Not too worried about it right now but it would be nice to set up a safety to if the temp gets so high it will dim the lights so the plants don't burn up. But in 12 years I Have never needed it so not a high priority.
Might be switching to the Kasa Matter Plugs with power measurements when they come down in price they are more than twice as much as non power measurement ones. Would be nice to Log how much power the whole grow takes.

have to correct myself, therea re 3 types of motors, AC brushless, and DC brushed and brushless, was a bit sloppy, mixed the 2 "worse", sry, btw lovin my BLDC brushless, very silent , needs very little power.

great you got a dimmer which will work for your fan and can be integrated in to HA, thats all whats counts, seems you have a good overview there, 20y ago there was hardly any good cheap dimmer.

if youre only after a motion detector, why not using a of the shelf sonoff or else? use them myself, 10 bucks each, operates on a coincell over zigbee.
.." just grab a couple sensors ", seems you plan that anyway if i got it right.

for the plugs i do love the zigbee ones too as they do mesh network, draw little power and are very easy to handle in HA.
Matter will prob still take a bit till its envolved enough, but will be good prob, so far zigbee is a lil more plug n play.
one can use matter and zigbee in parallel anyway with f.e. the sonoff 3.0 usb stick.
i use nous zigbee smart plugs with power measurement, works like a charm, W readings are fine, i wont missthat feature anymore.
i saw similar ones on ali for 8 bucks each, also incl. measurement.
zigbee or matter is prob sensefull for plugs as a normal wlan network does have its limits, 254 max.

for the esp dimmer, i havent looked at ledgardern for longer, but it shouldnt be 50 bucks.
a esp and some optocouplers plus resisitors, is not 50.
the 10V are allready on the dimm wires, they just "just" need to be PWMed.
there is more info here on the page, just too lazy to look it up atm.

oh info for you too, i bought a 5 in 1 controller tuya zigbee wifi smart led dimmer it might serve as a meanwell pwm dimmer as far i saw, not much specs given.
its prob just some simple low side fet switching with a unknowen pwm freq.
will test and report.
these are 13 bucks on ali plus some power supply.

That sounds promising I will check those controllers out.
Going to test my soldering skills out with some Sonoff S31 they have energy monitoring but lots of people are taking them apart soldering in a usb to TTL adapter and flashing tasmota on them so they work with HomeAssistant. After clipping a coupon i got them for same price as i got the non power monitoring smart plugs. Should be a fun project.

i will let you guys know, so you dont need to spend any before knowing, not much data given on these as said.

i did flashed some of my older gosund smart plugs, similar as the S31, with tasmota by using a USB UART.
but its no joy, ok for a few units, but not a dozen plugs, needs some tight soldering skills or a printing a adapter + pogopins etc.
also you would need to calibrate each unit, not the case with the newer zigbee/matter plugs.

ended up in ordering the nous on ama as i didnt want to wait.
prob same i could have get on ali for almost half the price, 7-8 bucks each, a zigbee smart plug with power monitoring.
need the mentioned sonoff zigbee 3.0 stick (which does matter too btw. but needs flashing.. give it some time), but with the stick, its just a "matter" of clicking a button and plug it in for zigbee, autodetect does the rest @Rocket Soul for the stick as the plugs, youll just need to sort the stuff like tray 1-4 .

Found a zigbee 0 to 10 volt dimmer that will work with meanwells. Was leaning towards getting a zigbee hub for the sensors I want to get anyways so this might just seal the deal. https://www.ebay.com/itm/304829797367?hash=item46f94593f7:g:YAgAAOSwa5tkSzP~&amdata=enc:AQAIAAAA4OlrrNE2vg90O2yXEh1wsQYQLJL/kLD3uKOeC86LggzLl+X/87oZOGaSP9C0h6iKOfA2gYMmmVnUvP5tX0sTdF/D7MFfC6iEYivjC5E7CNBzqdjiihR4k8HA7kHmejC23KDnXDgbRwZNtbLfWi8Oha3oOWZrJCNnDgJMB/wOFCLCjcWPqA6Ql+zSy6Lcs8aWvu5iw1OtBp0XwhhBtvk+TbiuttLQ3w8Vxvjqz7WenOeLGpvX4zp/2VMXdgzhG0byljsGnBnZWjkC+5sA1FEj+lYS+34wzK982CRwtwL0lj4p|tkp:Bk9SR7Di6oLWYg