Grow Box Construction

[berrydizzle]

How many plants you doing? You gotta remember I have 9 so if you have 2 or three yours wont smell nearly as strong as mine. Nice work with the duct tape btw.

[stratlogic]

Thanks berrydizzle. I was planning on having one, maybe two plants at the most. The box is only 2'x2' at the base. Do you think I can pull two off in there without being too crowded? Also, if those filters of yours were able to control the smell of that many plants, I don't think I should have to worry a whole lot.

[berrydizzle]

Its working well so far, didnt smell anything when I walked in my room after work tonight.

[TrickDaddy]

Can't wait to see the rest! I have been scouring the net for the past week looking for plans and I have to say there really is not that much out there!

I'm so glad I finally came across this site and your example. Thanks for taking the time and I have to say yours is the finest and most detailed example I have come across!

Having said that I have a couple of questions or suggestions! lol

Why did you not make the box multi-chambered i.e. Flowering main section and Veging/Cloning Section?

Also I may have somehow mounted the filter on top of the unit and had it force the air through the filter instead of sucking it out!

btw Where did you get those awesome little squirril fan? A electronics surplus store?

Also for that size cabinet I think I would have gone with 1 150w hps and another 150w MH.


Again thanks for the lessons and I will be attempting to start something similar this weekend!
Mine will be more wide than tall with one section on the side for the continuous light and the main section for 12hr flowering light. Just gonna go with 250w hps in that section and 24" fluorescent tubing in the vegetative box! The airflow will be pushed from the bottom of the small compartment and sucked back down the middle of the cabinet and then the same in the main box will be sucked out from the top providing another fan at the top of the main box exclusively for cooling the lamp and circulation of the main box as well!

[stratlogic]

Thanks TrickDaddy. I appreciate the kind words. pun intended.

I was planning on eventually making a cloning chamber towards the bottom because after I built it, I realized I did have the room to do it. I wasn't sure if all the other stuff would work out so I held off for the moment but it did so this may give me something to do when I'm bored since the box now is practically done. haha. I have an idea from from surfing online using a cool mist vaporizer for cloning underneath the grow chamber but thats a different thread on a different day.

As far as the filter, I would think that as long as the air gets passed through the carbon, it's getting filtered and you should be ok. I'm not sure though.

I got the fans at a place in Nebraska at surplussales.com for $15 a piece.
And the lights, I still had them from the last time I grew about a year ago and didn't want to but new ones. I was concerned about the heat generated from the 400w so I decided to get crazy with a custom a/c design completely independent of the grow chamber to counter that problem. I figured heat would be the only problem with using powerful lights in a small place. I am going to exhaust the heat from the light exhaust straight to the attic keeping my room and the plant cool. Or thats what I'm hoping. haha

The box you're talking about sounds pretty cool. Be sure to take some good pictures of your work, I'd like to see what you come up with. Your ventilation idea sounds pretty cool. I will definitely be looking forward to checking that out too.

[berrydizzle]

You always want to pull air through a carbon filter, not push it through! More surface area.

[TrickDaddy]

Originally Posted by berrydizzle

You always want to pull air through a carbon filter, not push it through! More surface area.

That what I was referring to!

[stratlogic]

I have wired the squirrel fans and tested them to confirm they were in fact working.

The next step was to make all the holes in the box airtight with duct tape. Especially around the filter to prevent any unfiltered air from escaping smelling the joint up.

I also taped the inside just to be certain no air can escape without being filtered.

All the holes and wires air taped up and the wires are secured to the box.

Here, I didn't have to cut the end of the power supply that connects to the squirrel fans because I got it to work without having to. It saved me a little time and the hassle of using any connectors.

I even taped the base inside and door jambs


One very cool feature about this particular power supply with the selectable voltage, it acts as a variable speed control for the fans! Sweet!


After I got the wiring of the fans done and made them airtight, I installed some CFL's that are only going to be used for the early stages of vegging. I picked up two cool socket splitters by mistake thinking they were the socket adapters for the outlets. Luckily I found a good use for them. I mounted two power strips on opposite sides of the box. I screwed extra screws to the sides of the box giving me the option of adjusting the height of the power strips later on if I need to.

The wieght of the two lights looked like a bit too much for the socket adapter to handle given how it is mounted, so I used some zip ties to secure the lights and prevent them from falling out.

[stratlogic]

Here is what the box looks like now. All I need is glass and intake holes for the grow chamber!


I was thinking of using the two daylight CFLs up top on the splitter and one CFL of the lower spectrum just below delivering a fuller spectrum. Is that a good idea? Any thought? Thanks.

[berrydizzle]

Dude, you fucking rock. This is so sweet. What you have built looks perfect to me. You created a complete growing machine by yourself. Its awesome.

[Lord Mong]

I did some reading and having the full spectrum can be very good....i was recently looking at a combined Veg/Flowering lamp 600watt....has an amazing write up!

+rep...fantastic construction

[Ozark Red]

Lord Mong has it goin on. You just gave me a great idea with hid lamp at the top hows that work out for heat and what size fan are you using.

[TrickDaddy]

Looks like she's pretty much ready to "Rock n' Roll" man!

[Medical Marijuana]

^you could start your own thread and take us through the process.

[TrickDaddy]

Originally Posted by Smokin.*****

^you could start your own thread and take us through the process.

Ok could do but I really didn't want to because most of what I will be doing stems from the original poster. Dont want to steal anyones show! I am still trying to figure out home to insert images?

I have upload a few iimages in the MY section. Thats as far as I can get!