Safety of venting hot air through old chimney?

Hi guys,

Recently i have been having concerns over my grow room heat production.

The grow is in a 2.4 x 1.2 m grow tent with 2 x 600w parabolics, and a 6inch ruck extraction fan with acoustic ducting.

At first the hot air was being vented back into the room, but when the second light was turned on, the temps reached 90F+. The only option we realistically had was to put the ducting up this old chimney.

It looked like it was blocked up, i.e had a metal thing over the entrance and not really any draft from it, however, the heat went straight down to 75-85 depending on outside temps.

However, there is constantly police choppers flying over the area, usually multiple times a day, and this got me thinking about them being able to detect the heat from the extraction (it may be venting into the loft of straight out the chimney, we really don't know), this is especially a concern in summer when it's rather unlikely for someone to be having a fire on the go...

So yea, what are you guys opinions on this?

well i don't know about this but i would imagine they might have a hard time getting a warrant dew to "heat coming out of the chimney" but you never know.... the only other place i can think of that might be better would be the crawlspace, if you have one.

I would think if they are looking that close they already would have a reason to come in anyway just icing on the cake

Wow, a heat signature from a chimney. You're SOOOOOO busted!...... lols

yeah, not all police choppers have heat cameras. and most police departments cant afford more than one helicopter, if at all. that chopper is expensive to keep in the air, and has more important things to do than fly around all day looking for growers. if they were interested enough in you to be scanning your house with heat signature cameras, you're pretty much busted already.

Thanks for the reply's guys, but i forgot to mention, i'm from the u.k.

They can and do get warrants here simply from heat/infra-red signatures.

The police fly round my city and many other u.k cities specifically looking for growers, there is even a documentary showing the police busting many grows around my area and flying over looking for em.. this is why i worry.. because not only am i unsure whether the heat is going out the chimney or being vented into the loft (whole roof may show up on the flir), but also, who would have constant heat, and no smoke, coming out a chimney during summer months?

Spetznaaz said:

Thanks for the reply's guys, but i forgot to mention, i'm from the u.k.

They can and do get warrants here simply from heat/infra-red signatures.

The police fly round my city and many other u.k cities specifically looking for growers, there is even a documentary showing the police busting many grows around my area and flying over looking for em.. this is why i worry.. because not only am i unsure whether the heat is going out the chimney or being vented into the loft (whole roof may show up on the flir), but also, who would have constant heat, and no smoke, coming out a chimney during summer months?

Click to expand...

Dunno if it will make you feel better but a dude i know from the army lives south of london...he told me that 95% of the fly overs are looking for stolen cars and crime type shit and they cant see in your house anyways..unless you have a huge heat sig..i wouldnt worry alot..the chimney is a good idea. If your worried still you can buy heat reflective mylar that will hide most of the heat sig. FLIRs arent magical..the hadjis in afghanistan even know a blanket over them will hide most of their sig....just fool the tech ! lol

IF they are picking you up,, you'll not know until it's too late.

I do the same thing and vent through the chimney.
Using aluminum duct, by the time it gets to the chimney it's basement temerature.
Winter time, many have heat on, hot water heaters and such on the chimney and it would seem normal. I doubt they'd be putting a lot of effort into finding you unless there is something else going on.
Summer (when most heat is off) that's when you may want to be concerned. That's when I added an extra 20 ft. To cool the exhaust.
That was before I got the MMJ card. Now it runs that way because it was madeup that way originally and no need to change it,, works great.

Hope it helps with ideas.

how often does london really have fog?

3 months a year?

1 month?