Water Cooled Grow Rooms

dajackel12 said:

Hey,

I'm pretty new to this and I'm wondering if anyone can advise me, I'm looking to cool the exhaust air from a grow tent as i'm a little concerned over excessive heat in the house. I've been looking at ways to do this but just need some advise to see if i'm on the right track. I've uploaded my grow room plan and I'm wondering if its possible to use a icebox to cool the exhaust air? If it is possible then can someone advise on what sort of chiller I would need to run the ice box. I'm not a big grower and i'm planning to grow in a house so excessive noise,electric usage and heat are a concern so I'm not sure what sort of system to look at.

Thanks

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i'm glad to help bud but that plan is confusing. not sure what you are trying to do or what some of the things are. how many lights do you have? what are those circles? why do you have 2 carbon filters and 2 Ona blocks? that's some serious overkill. you only need 1 carbon filter if it's sized right. if you wanna run a chiller then you need a reservoir for the chiller. you don't just hook it directly to the ice box. can you give more details and a better plan? i can draw something up for you but i need a lot more info.

this is how we do it!

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Hey buddy,

Thanks for the quick reply, Sorry about the design plan, it is abit confusing but basically I'm looking to start a home grow in the UK in bedroom. I have concern with excessive heat and odour so I was planning to seal the bedroom and then use a grow tent inside it so the heat and odour can be controlled properly. The odour is something i was worried about hence I thought 2 carbon filters would definately do the trick. The circle were meant to be the plant pots lol.

I've not brought any equipment yet but I was planning a grow in a 3m x 3m grow tent with about 5-6 600w lights and 1 intake intake for the fresh air and 1 outtake for the exhaust. As the exhaust air will be hot I was wondering if it could be cooled by an icebox and cooler system? The reason I wanted to cool it is so that the house doesn't look suspicious with excessive heat build ups, my local area does have one of those choppers that fly by now and I'm abit paranoid about thermal/Flir etc.

I've been advised to vent all the hot exhaust air to the basement so that it can be dissipated around the house evenly as to not to draw attention but I thought i would learn about watercooling the air as a backup

I hope this is more informative and I hope you may be able to advise me if the icebox and chiller would work for my situation or is it more for commercial large scale growers?

thanks

dajackel12 said:

Hey buddy,

Thanks for the quick reply, Sorry about the design plan, it is abit confusing but basically I'm looking to start a home grow in the UK in bedroom. I have concern with excessive heat and odour so I was planning to seal the bedroom and then use a grow tent inside it so the heat and odour can be controlled properly. The odour is something i was worried about hence I thought 2 carbon filters would definately do the trick. The circle were meant to be the plant pots lol.

I've not brought any equipment yet but I was planning a grow in a 3m x 3m grow tent with about 5-6 600w lights and 1 intake intake for the fresh air and 1 outtake for the exhaust. As the exhaust air will be hot I was wondering if it could be cooled by an icebox and cooler system? The reason I wanted to cool it is so that the house doesn't look suspicious with excessive heat build ups, my local area does have one of those choppers that fly by now and I'm abit paranoid about thermal/Flir etc.

I've been advised to vent all the hot exhaust air to the basement so that it can be dissipated around the house evenly as to not to draw attention but I thought i would learn about watercooling the air as a backup

I hope this is more informative and I hope you may be able to advise me if the icebox and chiller would work for my situation or is it more for commercial large scale growers?

thanks

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my pleasure to help man. i have a couple suggestions and a couple questions too.

first of, 5-6 600w lights is way to much for a 10x10 tent (3 meters is about 10 feet). that would be too much light and also wouldn't leave you any room to get around in the tent or for other equipment if you filled it with plants. ideally i would do 2 rows of 600w-1000w lights on either side of the tent.

seems to me like you plan on using just air intakes and exhausts to cool the tent. with that much light i'm pretty sure it's not gonna be possible for you to cool it with just active air intakes. you are going to need to get some type of a/c unit and probably a dehumidifier as well. hence, the extra room needed in the tent for equipment and to move plants around. you want to be able to reach all of the plants. filling the tent with plants will make it really hard to water ans to get to the ones in the center.

what you are talking about doing with the tent inside of the room is called a "lung" room. you are basically using the room as a lung for the tents. in your design the air in the room is going to get so hot that eventually it won't be able to cool the inside of the tent. you'll just be pulling hot air into the tent. 1 ice box would cool the exhaust on 2 00w lights but you'd still need to find a way to cool the ambient temps of the tent and the heat created by the other equipment inside the tent like the dehumidifier and Co2 if you are adding that. there are a couple ways to do so; portable ac units or chillers. chillers aren't only for commercial size grows. i used a 2hp chiller for a pair of 8x8 tents for a few years.

ideally i would just seal the tent completely and use a small window chiller with 3 ice boxes. 2 to cool the lights and 1 to cool the rest of the tent. if you have a window in the room that you are putting the tent in then all you do is hang the chiller in the window and from outside it looks just like a window a/c. then just seal up the sides and you should be fine. i'm not sure how cold it get's where you are but as long as you don't get below freezing you should be fine. then you put the chiller reservoir in the room with the pump and run the lines into the tent. then all you need is a dehumidifier inside the tent.

for the smell, all you owuld do is use a carbon filter (CAN 50 would be plenty). hang it from the roof in the middle of the tent. pull air through the filter, then through the 3rd ice box and out the fan. just hook the fan up to a thermostat controller and you won't have any issues.

hope that makes sense. let me know if you need a drawing.

Hey, Thanks again for the reply

Yeah I was thinking about cooling the grow tent with the intakes and exhaust only before, with the intake air coming from another room with the windows open so fresh air will be coming through then the exhaust going to the basement. I think your right that my method won't be able to cool it properly. I would be extremely grateful if you could do a quick drawing for me with your method so I can do it that way.

thanks

dajackel12 said:

Hey, Thanks again for the reply

Yeah I was thinking about cooling the grow tent with the intakes and exhaust only before, with the intake air coming from another room with the windows open so fresh air will be coming through then the exhaust going to the basement. I think your right that my method won't be able to cool it properly. I would be extremely grateful if you could do a quick drawing for me with your method so I can do it that way.

thanks

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can you give me the dimensions of the room that you are putting the tent in. also, the location and size of the windows, doors, and any closets. just draw it up in microsoft paint or something. i just need to know the shell size.

Hey mate,

Sorry for the late reply, I've made a very basic shell of the room with the dimensions and i've uploaded it with this.

hope this is helpful

thanks

Hi,
This thread has been amazing and the main inspiration for me to switch to water cooled. I have a question for those already water cooling, about a diy water cooled dehumidifier (just using cold water, no compressor or machines apart from your chiller)
I am currently switching my setup to be a water cooled sealed unit. I have all the equipment (Sentinel chhc-4 controlling it all), it is a tiny box 3foot x 3foot x 5foot with 1 x 600w light in there. The light has its own air feed and I have the option of venting to a lung room or outside. Since the box is so small I can not fit split units and huge dehumidifiers in there so this is why I am going water cooled. I got really lucky with a second hand chiller and ended up with a monster 1hp chiller. So I want to have this as my air cooler but also as my dehumidifier. I will have 2 x 100 litre res [thats about 26 gal] (possibly upgrade them to 250 litre res each [66 gal]), one will be set 10F above due point and the other will be set 10F below due point. All the feed in and out of the cold water will be insulated as well as the res itself. I have two PC radiators which are 14 x 5 inches each with 3 PC fans on each radiator which should work for cooling the room down as the light will have its own air feed so these radiators are only cooling the radiant heat etc inside the box.

My question is, does anyone currently use their water cooled water to dehumidify like I want to, if so I'll have a look at your grow journals to see how you do it. The makers of the ice box also do a dehumidifier but I can not find too much information about it and definitely can not source it anywhere in Europe. My two options are
1) Use another PC radiator, which have lots of fins on them so have a greater surface area for condensation to build up
2) Get copper coil and make some spiral design or something similar, which has less surface area but should allow droplets to start forming and snow ball more condensation as it runs down the pipe due to gravity.

Then other questions I have are
1) Is it best to constantly run the below due point water through the tubing/radiator, I read before that dehumidifiers cycle between being on and off to build up condensation and then let it warm up so drops form (not sure how true that is)
2) Should i have a small pc fan pointing at the coil/radiator to encourage droplets to fall or would this just encourage the moisture to return back to the air? There is constant air movement in the box anyway so it wouldn't be stagnant without a fan on it
3) I know it is best to have your heat exchangers up high as heat rises, but what does humidity do? I guess it falls so is it best to have this dehumidifier lower down?


As you can see these are all theoretical questions which can only be answered in practice, the only problem is that i can not find anyone else who is doing it this way. So even if you just have an answer to one of the questions above then I appreciate your response, and before it's said I know I'm crazy for doing water cooled in such a small space but its a genuine medical grow in a country who's laws are very outdated. So putting aside the best medicine possible, water cooled / sealed is also the safest heat signature / smell wise.
Thanks

dajackel12 said:

Hey mate,

Sorry for the late reply, I've made a very basic shell of the room with the dimensions and i've uploaded it with this.

hope this is helpful

thanksView attachment 2444726

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honestly bud, i don't see how you are fitting a 10'x10' tent in there. you don't have enough room. maybe if your door opened outward and was on 0.5 meters wide. even then you would be blocking the windows with the tent and if you are going to get a chiller then you are going to need access to the windows. i think you should consider a 5x10 tent and 2 1000w lights. that's plenty for a new grower. unless you are handy with electrical and construction (or can pay someone to do it); then you could build a room out of 2x4's and drywall or plywood. that's what i would do but i have construction and electrical experience.

here's what your room would look like with a 5x10 tent in it. let me know what route you decide to go and then i can get more detailed with the drawing and add the lights, plants, chiller, fans, etc.

Hey mate

Thanks for the reply, Yeah your right, i think the 10x10 would be too big, I was just measuring the room again and visualizing and it's going to be huge. The 5x10 you got on the design seems much more realistic for a new grower like me. That looks good!

dajackel12 said:

Hey mate

Thanks for the reply, Yeah your right, i think the 10x10 would be too big, I was just measuring the room again and visualizing and it's going to be huge. The 5x10 you got on the design seems much more realistic for a new grower like me. That looks good!

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in that case i would do 2 600w lights in the bottom corners. figure that each 600w will cover a 4x4 area. that give you 2 feet in the middle and 2 feet in the front of the tent for equipment. grow smaller plants on 4x4 flood trays. that way you don't need a saucer per pot. just prop up the trays a foot or so and put a drain fitting in one end. then just angle them slightly toward the drain fitting. that way when you water, any excess just pours into the tray and down the drain fitting into a small bucket you have there. you can also clean out the tray easily by just dumping a bucket of water into it. great way to keep the room clean.

i would veg the plants maybe 2 weeks and then put them into flower. keep them under MH light for the first 2 weeks of flower to eliminate stretch. even use veg nutes the first 2 weeks of flower. the plants are essentially still in the veg stage anyway. if you keep the plants small it will basically be a SOG grow. you will get more efficient yields. i think on a 4x4 tray you could easily fit 16 plants in 3 gallon pots. just keep them lollipopped and trimmed nicely.

you'll have enough room on the side of the tent to stick a 1hp chiller in the window and a small reservoir on the floor. keep the chiller reservoir small, maybe 20 gallons. they work more efficiently that way. then just get yourself a good pump and 2 ice boxes. you won't need any a/c if you put an ice box on each light. the excess heat in the room will be covered by the exhaust from the ice boxes cause they won't be working as hard keeping 600w lights cool.

Hey bud,

Great advise there, thanks for taking the time out to help me out on this, I really do appreciate it mate. I'm going to start in the next few days and do a journal. I'll post the link up here for it. Thanks again mate!

Ok i cant get my room temp down at all, i got 4 8" ice boxs, 1/2hp chiller and a 30gallon res that i insolated, i can get the water temp down to the low 60s but when the lights come on the room gets to low 90s, then the res temp jumps to high 70s. I got 4 1000watt lights in 8" air cooled hoods, sealed room

Smokingblazer said:

Ok i cant get my room temp down at all, i got 4 8" ice boxs, 1/2hp chiller and a 30gallon res that i insolated, i can get the water temp down to the low 60s but when the lights come on the room gets to low 90s, then the res temp jumps to high 70s. I got 4 1000watt lights in 8" air cooled hoods, sealed room

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You need at least 1/4 HP of water chilling per 1000 watt light so you would need at least a 2 HP water chiller.

Great! Well guess im ot running this room now lol! Out of money

berkman858 said:

You need at least 1/4 HP of water chilling per 1000 watt light so you would need at least a 2 HP water chiller.

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Is'nt that 1hp not 2hp

Smokingblazer said:

Is'nt that 1hp not 2hp

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Yeah you are right, my math skills aren't so great when I am baked.

Anyone interested in a brand new 1/2hp active aqua chiller, lol need to upgrade lol

Smokingblazer said:

Anyone interested in a brand new 1/2hp active aqua chiller, lol need to upgrade lol

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If you are CA I may be interested.

berkman858 said:

You need at least 1/4 HP of water chilling per 1000 watt light so you would need at least a 2 HP water chiller.

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Hah! Good one. I didn't know that, but at the last minute I changed my mind from 1/10 to 1/4 hp. Good thing. I have 1000 w Light.

Everything has to be insulated. I even have these foil, bubble wrap panels I use to keep radiate heat off surfaces, like the top of the chiller to shade it.

I've got it now so that everything illumiated except plants will refect and not absorb the heat. I have a water cooled light and that gets the 80% the actual heat. The glass is cool to the touch. But, 20% is IR and we don't want that to heat anything but air that is to be exhausted. So, with air cooled lights, 4000 w, you are still dumping more than 1/2 the heat into the room.

It is a bit of plumping job for water cooled lights.

berkman858 said:

If you are CA I may be interested.

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Ya, hour north of sac, i just posted it on craigslist in a bunch of places