Simple Q's

So I have a Secret Jardin 4x4x6.5 Dark Room II. I have a 600W HPS digital ballast (adjustable) and all the bulbs you could ever need thanks to a donation from a friend. 6" carbon can - unsure what it's rated exactly but I see all over the place

Here is my Carbon Filter http://www.jonsplantfactory.com/Can-Filter-2600

How big and what type of fan do I need to move air through it effectively (I believe 400CFM but I could be wrong)? I have 2 fans, one was purchased to move air through the reflector and light (250cfm induction) and an Axial AC fan that I was supposed to use (according to hydro guy anyway, I wanted something a bit bigger I forget what they're called but they have a bigger fan than they have entry or exit. He also said it didn't matter if it pushed or pulled through the filter, this seems patently absurd, but he was somewhat opinionated and I'm not gonna argue with the guy too much he does, at least according to him, have a lot more experience than I do.

Anyway I tried to setup the fan to pull but it's not realistic to do and to get a nice seal (with my skills and tools anyway, I could duct tape it to all hell but I'm not sure how well it would stay it's fairly heavy and somewhat awkward shaped and doesn't very easily fit into my 6" flexible ducting). I abandoned my plans to grow normally and instead opted for a vertical setup. Will be taking back reflector. Anyway using the induction fan, as I could not jerry rig the other fan to my liking I did a dry test run and was running very high temps IMO. 82F on the floor and 92F in the ceiling of the tent. The induction fan wasn't pulling hardly anything (I tried to make the ducting clean and as straight as possible). The other fan clearly has more juice but it doesn't seem suited to what I'm trying to do unless someone has a good idea for someone without a lot of decent tools. It's like a giant computer fan. I prefer something cleaner TBH anyway and I don't like to skimp. Do it right the first time.

I can take back this fan too if need be, I'm going to use the induction fan to blow air at the bulb from below sitting on some little pieces of wood. Anyway I took off the carbon filter and my temps went from bad to excellent (72-7 with the 250 induction acting as my exhaust with a passive cool air intake from outside (modest temps, will remain that way for at least another 4 months, I only plan on one crop).

Gonna run 4x special tomato strain Illing Weilds F3 in 7 gallons and 2x Herimato in 5 gallons. Should be lots of room. I had the carbon filter hanging very cleanly with 150lb fishing test and a bunch of little rivets and some duct tape just for extra insurance, was really happy until I saw how poorly the induction fan performed and how frustrating it was for my limited resources and perhaps creativity to get this other fan hooked up. Running coco, hoping for good results.

Ran my water, it's PH'd @ 6.8 and 10 PPM from the tap in the city. That seems awfully incredible, but I have always really liked the tap water at this place so I guess it really is excellent. That's near RO quality is it not? I'm hoping it will make my life easier down the road in terms of nutrients. Gonna try to jerry rig a CO2 setup.

Any ideas on how to hook up the Axial, is it going to be enough? Model: RAM1738B2-C XFan or should I take it back and get a better fan (suggestions?). Seems like 400CFM would be a good number if not a bit more (to me, based on my rudimentary calculations). I dunno why I listened to this hydro store guy TBH but w/e.

wow......."War and Peace"

Blah, stupid Firefox update screwing with this site and my ability to use the enter key...

Long story short, any ideas how to jerry rig the XFan Axial AC fan model: RAM1738B2-C to my carbon filter so it will pull and to do it clean? Or should I take it back and get it replaced.

One other question - how do you guys handle your res with hand watering? How long can you keep a res (I have an Igloo cooler) without it having issues? I know hydro guys say a couple weeks but I have no bubbler so I'm thinking maybe just using it as a basin with a bit of waste water (which I don't want but maybe someone has an idea to fix that?).

Is XFan a computer fan?

so........what you're saying is you didn't exhaust enough with carbon in line.........right? you either need to increase fan output, or maybe increase intake. you could invest in a cool tube, also. isolate your light. keep us posted, and for Pete's sake.............break up the info into easier to chew pieces. keep us all updated. good luck, man

http://www.amazon.com/Vortex-VTX600...YTLG/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1326277330&sr=8-2

Best fan for a 6'' carbon filter IMO

Dank Hands said:

Is XFan a computer fan?

Click to expand...

Basically oversized. I actually don't think it's really a computer fan as the motor is somewhat bigger proportionately compared to most computer fans I see. Pretty heavy duty. It is designed the same as a computer fan in terms of it's bracket, fan and motor placement however. It does not fit into the 6" ducting very well (I couldn't get it to fit at all but I got somewhat frustrated) at all due to a large protrusion where the power is hooked up.

That's a nice looking fan and exactly the kind of thing I was thinking! Thank you!

scroglodyte said:

so........what you're saying is you didn't exhaust enough with carbon in line.........right? you either need to increase fan output, or maybe increase intake. you could invest in a cool tube, also. isolate your light. keep us posted, and for Pete's sake.............break up the info into easier to chew pieces. keep us all updated. good luck, man

Click to expand...

Exactly what I'm saying, yup. It didn't break up properly due to noscript acting strangely with this website. I had to allow one of the ad partners. Pretty fun though overall so far... the most interesting thing I have learned so far though is my water is almost perfect out of the tap and I'm on city.

Another couple question

I grabbed canna coco and the canna coco line of nutrients (all 4 parts they recommend) and also some calmag. I don't see any calcium in the nutrient solutions I have purchased and I am quite sure my water has almost none (looking at lab results from the water company calcium is a low % of salt content) but I don't want to use too much magnesium (or of anything) as there is magnesium in pretty much all the other solutions to some degree. Thoughts? I guess that's one of those things where you just have to read the plant probably. Hopefully they like it.

Also, any ideas on how much warmer my temps will get with plants vs w/o assuming all other things being equal? Not an easy question probably as it will depend on variables in the plants as well I guess, but I'm sure some of you experienced guys might have a ball park?

If the ducting doesn't fit take it back they make some real good inline fans that can pull some air. im running a hydro farm fan but its still real hot under my 1000 watt. If you live in the city you may have to leave your water sit out for a day. Does it have chlorine in it?

Yeah it has some chlorine. Fill up my igloo the day before watering and then add nutrients, no problem. Do they make 7" ducting? I know they make 8" but I have a 6" carbon filter. I'm off to frig with the ducting and fan some more I guess.

Thanks for the help.

Yeah it definitely won't fit. Gonna take back the fan tomorrow. Fortunately it's not needed quite yet. Hoping my seeds sprout in the next day or two.

they make a duct reducer that will go from 6 to 8 if the grow store doesn't have one the hardware store should

look into an ro system for the future you will have to supplement with cal mag if you do btw

My water from the tap is 6.8 PH & 10 PPM. RO seems like a waste of money for me at the moment, no big deal waiting a day. I've got some Cal Mag as my water has none in it to speak of (based on lab results).

Update - so the solution to my problem was relatively simple, as far as fan mounting, and I feel like a dunce for not thinking of it sooner, I managed to get the flexible 6" to fit around just barely on the edges. Just used some contractors tape to seal it up good. Working pretty well, the fan is decent and I figure the carbon can will do better with more reasonable CFM as a vortex will probably pull a legit 400 or so unless I get a controller which would be too much to make the carbon filter effective I think. Purely my hypothesis and I have this setup going. It isn't perfect however. I'm finding fairly large differences in temperature from the top to the bottom of the tent.

When I had just the 250cfm with no carbon can attached running through not quite straight ducting (so probably 50% efficiency I figure based on what I've read) for a good solid 3 hours or so I managed to keep temps 74-76 pretty uniformly in the tent. I then turned off the fans just to see what the temps would be like w/o. Didn't take long to hit 90 at the top and 80 at the bottom. So I turned the 250 cfm back on and it only ever went back to 82F or so up top and 75 on the bottom. Now that I have the can installed and the other fan pulling air (the Axial AC) temps hit around 82 (high for my liking) up top and as low as 65 below (large variance! I realize this is partly due to ambient temperatures). I also added some flexible ducting to the intake to make it closer to the window than it had been previously (it was passive in one of the Jardin intake sleeves) - I did this because the night was somewhat warm and temps got up to around 85 degrees up top and 75 on the bottom, the upper temperatures were too high for my liking and I really want to get the temperatures more evenly balanced. This could prove very difficult however given my source of cooling is in large part the outside air.

Should I be overly concerned, any ideas on getting the air moving inside the tent better? I currently have the 250 CFM fan blowing from the ground (sitting on some pots for now) up towards the bulb and I also have a couple clip on mini fans on the roof blowing down - counter productive? ]

Also I am in the process of building a cardboard wall tonight, I have some really thick drapes and the addons the make them better insulated but I think a cardboard wall will work even better and I can run the intake through it (perhaps up higher so the air isn't as cold and it would be less obvious).

In other news I have my first sprouts starting to show through the coco. In a couple days I expect to see a couple of leaves and man I'm pretty excited! Sorry the picture is not great quality I don't have a great camera or lighting in the room (other than the bulb you see in the picture ).

Anything else inside the tent I can do better you guys think? I have the carbon can hung (and light partly) with 150lb fishing lures, seems to work really well.

I take it from the lack of responses my plan is relatively reasonable and probably that I won't ever get perfect control of my temperatures with the volatility of the outdoors to contend with and no fan controllers or intake fans to play with.

Current temps: 65.9F on the bottom 81.9F on the top. I assume that having plants in there will actually help with this temperature difference and it might work out quite well in the end, but I'm not certain having little experience setting up rooms. My only real experience comes from maintaining plants in friends grow rooms (tomatos etc).