AC competing with the exhaust?

G

gnosh

Active Member
Sorry to be such a noob with tons of questions...

Portable ACs can be used in rooms that are exhausted right? I know it will be competing with the hot air brought in from outside, through the intake fan, and also with the air being pulled out through the carbon filter.

I guess my real question is are they effective enough to drop all the cash on one?

12 x 11 x 10 room...
 
If you are going to get a portable a/c then get a dual hose unit. Set both hoses up to intake and exhaust air from outside of the room. Get rid of your air intake as you won't need it. Exhaust your carbon filter back into the room. You don't need to turnover the air in your room with fresh air from outside; especially if you have a Co2 generator. If you feel you need to for some reason then continue to exhaust your filter and just use the passive air that comes into the room. A portable a/c will more then handle this if it is a quality unit. If you need the cooling in your room then you have no choice. I would seal your room though instead of having all that air flowing in and out. You create problems with outside air coming in (spores, pathogens, bugs, etc...).
 
My rooms almost the same size as yours. I'm running a closed co2 enriched environment and my temps were getting up to 95°. I bought a 12k BTU dual hose portable and the sentinel evc2 environmental controller. It turns my AC and exhaust fan on and shuts the co2 off. I would close up the intake cuz that's just going to defeat the purpose of the AC.
 
I have two of these rooms side by side, one just isn't finished yet. First room, not finished but sealed, has an intake hole in the wall with a filter on it. It also has the intake fan for the second room, pulling air from the first room blowing into the second (pulling air from outside through the filtered intake hole)

Second room is setup with Carbon filter hooked up to a fan > 3x 1k lights > Booster fan > Vent through ceiling to roof vent. I do not have a Co2 generator and didn't want to buy one.
 
gnosh said:
I have two of these rooms side by side, one just isn't finished yet. First room, not finished but sealed, has an intake hole in the wall with a filter on it. It also has the intake fan for the second room, pulling air from the first room blowing into the second (pulling air from outside through the filtered intake hole)

Second room is setup with Carbon filter hooked up to a fan > 3x 1k lights > Booster fan > Vent through ceiling to roof vent. I do not have a Co2 generator and didn't want to buy one.
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Setup sounds messed up. You shouldn't push air through your hoods. Duct booster fans are shit anyway. Pull air through your 3 hoods and carbon filter. Room isn't "sealed" if you have those vents in there. A sealed room is no in or out vents.
 
phillipchristian said:
Setup sounds messed up. You shouldn't push air through your hoods. Duct booster fans are shit anyway. Pull air through your 3 hoods and carbon filter. Room isn't "sealed" if you have those vents in there. A sealed room is no in or out vents.
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I will change it pulling through the filter > Lights > push out the attic...
Sorry I meant sealed as it had to pull air from outside. Wanted to use the free air outside instead of having to buy and power more equipment.
Anything else? Carbon filter should still be on ceiling to pull out hot air correct?
First room I plan on turning into a mother/cloning with T5s maybe one MH, Second room will be my veg and flowering room.
 
With that many lights in line and only 1 fan I would try and make the entire ducting run as straight as possible. Keep your carbon filter right next to the hood. Make sure you have a good inline fan too.
 
phillipchristian said:
With that many lights in line and only 1 fan I would try and make the entire ducting run as straight as possible. Keep your carbon filter right next to the hood. Make sure you have a good inline fan too.
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Changed to pulling through the lights and lights are now set up in one line.
When I started building my grow room I was doing it with the help of a couple people, they were very anti Co2 along with my local hydro store. Said it left a bad taste in the buds and was just more money when the air outside was free. So the room has been set up to pull air from outside, I never would have imagined the heat issues.
If you have any more advice please keep it coming. Trying to figure this all out on my own now and on a budget...
 
gnosh said:
Changed to pulling through the lights and lights are now set up in one line.
When I started building my grow room I was doing it with the help of a couple people, they were very anti Co2 along with my local hydro store. Said it left a bad taste in the buds and was just more money when the air outside was free. So the room has been set up to pull air from outside, I never would have imagined the heat issues.
If you have any more advice please keep it coming. Trying to figure this all out on my own now and on a budget...
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I really don't have any other info to make suggestions upon. If you have any other questions feel free to fire away or private message me. I'm happy to help.

As far as Co2 goes, whatever person told you it makes buds taste crappy is an idiot. It has no effect on taste. I agree though that you don't need it. Get your temps under control and dial your grow in. When you can get through an entire grow or 2 without any major problems then look into addiding Co2. You really need you plants to be at maximum health for Co2 to be a benefit to you. If your plants are struggling or you have problems every other week then they can't use all that Co2 you would be pumping in there. Get everything dialed in and then look at Co2.
 
When you buy an AC make sure you have a plan to drain it. A lot of them also dehumidify, and the water is usually stored in a pan. I have mine elevated and my water drips out through the exhaust. I really don't have a humidity problem since when I water plants it balances it out. Just throwing that out there do you can prepare before you buy. Good luck!
 
SmokeyMcSmokerton said:
When you buy an AC make sure you have a plan to drain it. A lot of them also dehumidify, and the water is usually stored in a pan. I have mine elevated and my water drips out through the exhaust. I really don't have a humidity problem since when I water plants it balances it out. Just throwing that out there do you can prepare before you buy. Good luck!
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I thought I had seen that most of the new portable a/c units have an evaporative coil in them so that you don't need to drain them? Not 100% sure though since I've never owned one.
 
The one I got for $249 from lowes doesn't, but I got a cheapie for my little room. I did see one for more with no need for drainage. Just mainly wanted to make him aware of it to keep an eye out and prepare accordingly. They do make the ones you are talking about, so you are correct
 
SmokeyMcSmokerton said:
The one I got for $249 from lowes doesn't, but I got a cheapie for my little room. I did see one for more with no need for drainage. Just mainly wanted to make him aware of it to keep an eye out and prepare accordingly. They do make the ones you are talking about, so you are correct
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Do you have to actually manually drain yours or does it come with a tube like dehumidifiers do?
 
It has a little drain type your supposed to keep it plugged then drain into a pan when full. I elevated mine and put drain tube draining constantly into the exhaust ducting. It is sloped downward and goes outdoors draining water with AC exhaust output. Works great if you have that option.
 
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