Temps lights on & off.

Just a quick question,When my light is on my grow room is in the mid 70s, when lights are off it can dip into the 50s. This is because my room is in the unheated basement.Just wondering if this is to much fluctuation. If it is no prob to ad a heater,just wasent sure if I needed to.Also growing in hempy buckets if that makes a difference.

below 60 can be a problem (but it will bring out the purples in a plant late in flower)but be careful about heater placement- i just burned up a plant cause I added a heater when temps started to drop & I got sidetracked for a few days.

I'm experiencing the same issues. I timed my lights so lights off is during the day time(when its presumably hotter). I'm toying with the idea of shutting off my exhaust during lights off and having a space heater hooked up to a thermostat controller that when it gets to 78 it stops heating. Then when it drops to 70 to kick back on.

firsttimeARE said:

I'm experiencing the same issues. I timed my lights so lights off is during the day time(when its presumably hotter). I'm toying with the idea of shutting off my exhaust during lights off and having a space heater hooked up to a thermostat controller that when it gets to 78 it stops heating. Then when it drops to 70 to kick back on.

Click to expand...

Firstly, I'd like to say, AWESOME avatar! It'Saul good man lol

Secondly I have to say that I do the same schedule. I run lights on from 6 PM until 6 AM and it does wonders to heat itself. My temps stay pretty stable around 75-78 during lights on and 68-70 lights out. Thats in a cold basement during the Michigan cold months. The basement is heated but not very well. The duct work down there is sorta haphazardly put together. The space heater plugged into a thermostat is grade A advice. It works extremely well.

Well I gues you got the answers, you need to keep the night time temperatures up. The lower the differences between night and day, the better off your plants are going to be, especially during flower. Increased temperature differences will cause the plants to stretch.

You can run a heater or if you have a humid environment, a dehumidifier can put out quite a bit of heat. I run a basement room and the dehumidifiers keep it warm at night.

silusbotwin said:

Firstly, I'd like to say, AWESOME avatar! It'Saul good man lol

Secondly I have to say that I do the same schedule. I run lights on from 6 PM until 6 AM and it does wonders to heat itself. My temps stay pretty stable around 75-78 during lights on and 68-70 lights out. Thats in a cold basement during the Michigan cold months. The basement is heated but not very well. The duct work down there is sorta haphazardly put together. The space heater plugged into a thermostat is grade A advice. It works extremely well.

Click to expand...

It's silus botwin! Sorry I don't have a play on words for your name. Hows that hot piece of ass that is your mother doing? Hahaha...

The basement I have isn't heated at all and I get down to like 61 degrees during lights off and thats with 30-40 degree temps. Winter hasn't even started here yet, we're still in fall. It's only going to get colder. Lights on im around the same 75-78, which is ideal temps.

I tried using the dehumidifier to get heat like legallyflying said but it didn't seem to help much, maybe a couple degrees. I'm running my mom light this weekend from like 9am-3am so I can see if it heats the room up a bit with the main lights off.

I hate the idea of dehumidifying air and heating air to only suck it right out through my exhaust. But I guess you gotta do what ya gotta do.

mountainboy said:

Just a quick question,When my light is on my grow room is in the mid 70s, when lights are off it can dip into the 50s. This is because my room is in the unheated basement.Just wondering if this is to much fluctuation. If it is no prob to ad a heater,just wasent sure if I needed to.Also growing in hempy buckets if that makes a difference.

Click to expand...

I'm growing with almost the same conditions. The lower temps will slow down growth a little bit, but will make for some nice colors. I would not add a heater, because I am a safety freak...

A 10-15 degree drop from lights on to off is preferred. Say 80 lights on. 65 lights off. The temp drop is needed to slow the plants transpiration rate down so it does use the carbs built up during the lights on. You want the plant to use them for growth wasting as few as possible transpiring.....

A heater isn't any more dangerous than running a toaster..it's actually the same thing, one just has a fan with it. I can tell you that cold temps can REaLLY cause stretch at night..but I already did so what ever.

Why are you exhausting during lights off? Maybe I misunderstood something? The other option is to frame a little grow room and insulate the walls, ceiling, and put some r5 rigid insulation on the floor and seal it all up good. It will help regulate temps and is also a good start to running a sealed room with co2. Then with some harvests and some can you can install a split ac that would cool and heat your room.

Probably looking at $225 to frame and insulate. Really depends on how serious you are.

legallyflying said:

Probably looking at $225 to frame and insulate. Really depends on how serious you are.

Click to expand...

Yep, probably the best way to go.

Thank you all for your suggestions. I think I will go with the space heater hooked to a thermostat. I like that it is automated because I cant go in basement during lights out to turn on a heater. I do have a wireless thermometer down there and the display unit upstairs I can see the temps but cant do much about it when lights are out..lol.

Most space heaters these days have a thermostat so you probably won't need to do anything special, just figure where you need to set it at

A cheaper route would be to get some electric heating pads that are normally used for muscle aches. I use these when the temps dip. I place under the pot on LOW heat. This keeps the roots and soil a tad warmer than the air temps and affects your ambient temps minimally unless you run exhaust at night.

But like mentioned already,lights should be on in the night hours. I run mine 8 p.m.- 8 a.m. Not only do temps even out more easily, but you will save a load on your electric bill... assuming that money matters

put a piece of styrofoam down on floor under pots. keeps plants much happier thru winter months!

Thank you for the extra ideas, I do run my light at night.8pm-8am. I have a cement floor in basement so I do keep the buckets off the floor.I have a wooden pallet with a plywood on top,no insulation under it. I run hempy buckets,so the overflow runs to waste( basement floor to sump pump) so anything under the buckets would get wet.

I use owens corning insulation board (the 2" thick pink sheets at home depot) to lift my pots off the floor. Cheap, easy to cut, light as a feather, good R value, mold proof. shit man, what more could a guy want?