Can I vent smell outside instead of using carbon filter?

Hello I am going to use a 4x4x7 grow tent down in my basement. I will be using a 400 watt hps/mh light. I was thinking of running 2 4" dryer pipes through the wall. One would be for my light to exhaust the heat I would be running a squirell cage through it to send the heat outside. But then I was wondering :Can I vent smell outside instead of using carbon filter? I could just stick another pipe through the wall for it. I live in the country and it is very windy here so smell should dissipate quite fast. The lowest my basement has got in the last week was 61 degrees and with winter coming on the furnace is in the basement and usually keeps the basement at a comfortable level with heat just coming off of it. The exhaust is a suncourt inline duct fan not sure of how much air displacement it makes. Any suggestions would be great. I couldnt find much in the archives on this so hopefully someone will have some ideas on this. Also when the lights are off will cold air come into the tent. I will be growing Red Dwarf auto so light will be on schedule of 18/6. The pipes would also be coming out under my porch so admissions of heat and smell should be hidden.

If this is a legal grow then you shouldn't have to worry too much. If it isn't, I would use a carbon filter and vent it outside. Might be a bad thing to have it vent by the porch if for some reason the sheriffs come out to your property and knock on your front door.

Warm Smelly air travels a lot farther then one thinks...be careful!

mjjbabel said:

If this is a legal grow then you shouldn't have to worry too much. If it isn't, I would use a carbon filter and vent it outside. Might be a bad thing to have it vent by the porch if for some reason the sheriffs come out to your property and knock on your front door.

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Yeah I didn't even think of that. Cops coming to your door while dank air's being exhausted would not go well..I'd invest in a carbon filter just to be safe if I were you.

Yeah I have scrapped that idea also. On a good note I set up my tent 4x4x7 with my 400watt hps/mh and im running a small squirell cage through my light and venting into another room. After 4 hours of being on the inside temp only got to 68 degrees the low in the basement is 51 so i think that the inside temp will be fine.

Hi Everyone, I have an issue and was wondering if someone could help me with some info that is related to this original post and about carbon filter and odor.

I have a 4 x 4 x 7.5' tall, home built, grow box using superior material. It has no light or air leaks. I'm proudof this set-up as it is doing so well.

I am going to add 2 feet to the length of it to make it 4' wide x 6' long and 7.5' tall in the end which may make a difference in the answer to this question.

Right now it is 4' x 4' x 7.5' and I have a 4" hydrofarm inline centrifuge exaust fan that leads to a carbon filter on the outside of the box. The inlet is a 4" hole with a new reinforced hose ran to just under my window for fresh air(this works very well). It had no smell at all for the last 2 months and now its starting to smell(not because its ready to flip to 12/12 either). It's still in vegetation and hasnt started to smell any different than before, a good semi-strong smell. Now that there is some problem somewhere, there is enough to smell what it is throughout the house, subtle but its smelling it up. Why? I bought some new 4 inch reinforced hose instead of just aluminum that I was using in case there were a few small holes(cats, although I couldnt see light leaks but even a tiny hole over a few hours could stink up a home). That didnt fix it either. I was told that if you push too much through the carbon filter then it wont be able to filter all the smell out(basically overworking it) and it will push some smell past the charcoal filter anyway. I am trying to figure this out. I am more than likely going to just exaust everything right outside my house that I bought but I dont know if I should still use the carbon filter if I do that(another question) if someone knows how to do this.

Any suggestions for my problems? Do I need to change the filter at all. I read that the charcoal lasts for 1 year and the hoses are fine with no holes(no cats anymore anyway, thank God, old roomates). I think that my problem is that the inline bloere exaust is pushing too much air through the filter at a time. I am thinking of going to buy a regulating timer for when the temp gets up to 80*F it kicks the exaust on until it cools it to around 68*F ? (Maybe somewhere in there, not sure on the temps really yet) Another question if someone knows that one. That would serve 2 fold purposes, well 3 really. It would, maybe & hopefully, get my odor control handled. It would quiet down the fan, I wouldnt hear it as much and I might save a little electricity unless it spikes when it turns on(the centrifuge fan). Thats 3 benefits there already .

I am going to extend the length 2 feet today making it a 4' x 6' x 7.5' tall as the plants need the space(not sexed yet). Maybe this will help with the amount of air pushing through the filter, maybe not. Maybe its just a lame filter but it worked fine before. Now it's stinking. I cant wait to get out of this little cabin and in to a nice home that I just bought. I cant wait.

Please HELP!!!!!! I really don't know what to do with this issue except what I have done. I thought the cats had to have punched a couple holes into the old aluminum hose which would have solved my problem but I gotta keep trying, huh?

Anybody have this issue before? Am I pushing too much air with the 4" inline exaust fan for the small area? What am I to do? If I just exaust outside, it will put out a white cloud of moisture because I live in Alaska and 80*F going out to 0*F makes a big, smelly, white, exausted moisture cloud. I don't know at this point. I'm kinda stuck. I hope that useing a timer for the temperature to turn on and off when it reaches the right levels and that adding the extra 2 feet helps as well. Right now that amount of add on to the set up will give me 1/3rd more space then I have now. I will switch to a 600 Watt MH from my 400 Watt bulb now also because of the increase in size. I have 3 supplemental T-5 lights on the sides and a couple of the Aerogro 32 Watt bulbs going all for under canopy when its ready.

Any and all help is appreciated. I'm not a know it all. Please help if you for sure know how I can handle this or fix and try to perfect my set-up. Thank you all in advance. Also please help even if your guessing and think something will work, Thanks Fam. Peace J

ONE WORLD- ONE LOVE. PEACE Captain J

Wow that was a long post for a simple question. I've been told to pull the air trough the filter, not push. I have a 4" combo that works great. Maybe that is the problem

Michelangelo00 said:

Wow that was a long post for a simple question. I've been told to pull the air trough the filter, not push. I have a 4" combo that works great. Maybe that is the problem

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Yes, when you pull through the filter it takes care of more of the smell than pushing... you can push through it, but you might have to slow the speed of the air in order for the carbon to scrub correctly.