Cardboard dry box ventilation?

first, my question is, how much do i want the fan to pull?

i tried to searching for someone who had a setup like i have, and maybe i was just using the wrong words, but i couldn't exactly find the info i was looking for. most of the setups were dedicated rooms with string ran across the sides, or a wood or cardboard box, sometimes with shelves inside.

i have a small 8" fan with what kind of resembles aluminum ducting that i cut and folded out big cardboard boxes. i have the fan on one end that's blowing outwards like an exhaust, pulling the air through the other end of the box. it's about 10' long, a foot tall and about the same wide. i have strings running back and forth through the middle part of the box, a few inches apart, to hang the buds from. lots of space between the buds.. i'm terrified of mold, but i don't want to over-do the ventilation. i couldn't find a cpu or hardrive fan in time, which is the only fan i've seen used on drying boxes, hence the big 8" one.

65-70 degrees F, 34-40% R/H, basement.

my concern is over-drying the buds. i want to give them about a week to dry. i have the fan on the lowest setting and angled poorly so as to reduce it's effectiveness or performance. there's enough air flowing through the box to pull the flame from my bic lighter slightly, but just that. that's about the only way i can describe how much airflow there is.

i'd appreciate your guys' input, and if what i'm talking about doesn't seem to make sense, please tell me to put the pipe down and i'll try to explain better. hah

any thoughts? this is the end of the second day the buds have been drying, and they're about where i would want them to be. still moist but def a bit dryer. at this point it's probably safe for me to assume the ventilation is fine, but i just thought i'd pick some of your brains. ...which didn't turn out.

also, i put a Vaportek EZ-Twist housing and disk in the exhaust of the dry box, and i've yet to smell anything from the drying buds until i open up the box. just a heads-up, in case somebody finds that useful.

johnnyballs said:

any thoughts? this is the end of the second day the buds have been drying, and they're about where i would want them to be. still moist but def a bit dryer. at this point it's probably safe for me to assume the ventilation is fine, but i just thought i'd pick some of your brains. ...which didn't turn out.

also, i put a Vaportek EZ-Twist housing and disk in the exhaust of the dry box, and i've yet to smell anything from the drying buds until i open up the box. just a heads-up, in case somebody finds that useful.

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Just takes a little time for people to respond here sometimes. I dry mine in cardboard boxes with strings run across them. At one end of the box I cut a fist size hole near the bottom and the other end a fist sized hole near the top. I lightly close the lid flaps and leave the ceiling fan on. Not much air flow but enough to keep it from molding. 70 f temp and my house is like yours with around 40% r/h average. In 3 days the smallest buds are smokable and in 1 week its ready to move to jars and its all smokable and sticky icky. After I put it in jars I remove the lids for a couple hours everyday until when I open the lid I only smell spicy dank and none of the green grass smell. Good luck, I think you're on the right track.

hey man, thanks for the info. yea, i know it takes a while for people to respond sometimes, but as i'm sure you can imagine, time seems to move a lottt slower when you're waiting for something. time also seems to slow down when i smoke. hmm.

i have enough stash to last me until after curing, so i hope i won't be tempted to rush. i'm also currently drying and curing the clippings from this last harvest; trying to make rolling paper out of them. there's another thread where i b.s. like i know what i'm talking about. haha.

another quick question, and it's probably going to be an opinion-based answer, but is there any benefit (assuming mold is not an issue) to drying the buds even slower before curing? i would think that as long as the entirity of the bud is consistently dry, at a certain point, they're simply ready to go. for example, an oz of bud dried over one week (let's just say there was more ventilation or less r/h, or more heat) vs. an oz of bud dried over two weeks (equally dry, just dried over a longer period). there are so many discrepencies and different answers.. but i'm looking for first-hand experience, if possible. tia

I also use a cardboard box. With string runners. I load the box close it and put a plastic bag over it. open once a day for up to five days. when the small twigs snap and the larger ones bend and snap I put them into jars. box is around a qp when dried.

Well it is said that the best way to dry bud is to make it take as long as possible drying without producing mold. Personally I've never tried that but its supposed to make it a smoother smoke. The cardboard box is what I have used since my first grow. It worked great for me so I just went with what I knew worked. Maybe I'll experiment with drying and curing after I feel I've mastered growing. I personally am not satisfied with the quantity I'm getting but the quality is top notch ( thats mostly due to TGA genetics, not my expertise).

The hang dry is the ez part when they go in the jars the fun starts. I just got into my last jar from the last harvest it's been in the jar for about 8 weeks. By far the best of the lot.

thanks for the replies guys. so it's the end of day 4 of drying, and i have to admit, the buds are much more dry than i wanted them to be. the first couple days were fine, but yesterday things got a lot drier, quicker than i expected. of course the smaller buds were the first to dry. i had to put them into jars.. already. on the up-side though, i took a big whiff (or ten) and at least they smell nice. it's a really sweet smell, not so much dank, and doesn't smell like my lawn after i mow it.

i've never dried using a box like this before. the only other drying i've done was just strings ran between walls in a room with an oscillating fan on low. maybe if the humidity was a lot higher or i had a much less powerful fan this would have turned out well. i think i'll remember this box for next time, but i'm deff. getting a smaller fan. i still have 2/3 left to harvest (waiting for sativas is like watching paint dry), but i'm tired of spending money for the moment so i'll wait to buy another fan. i'll just have to do something about this one. maybe put it on a timer?

Are the twigs snapping? If so you should put all of them into jars and seal them up. they will be wet or at least damp again the day after you put them in the jars.