Well N A, The Tankless Water Heater is the Bomb!

PPM4 is kind of a piece of crap. It uses a semicinductor sniffer which is about a 2.00 part. All of the others use NDIR infra red sensors whch is the current state of the art in detection. Plus you never know what your actual numbers are. You could be overshoothing to 3000ppm and never know it.


Go on ebay, there are always PPM3s, PPM3 knock offs or telaire based units, digigros etc for just a little more than the ppm4. I have a digigro and popped the relay in it. they sent me an upgraded version at no charge that has the external relay.

Budley is right. You want one that tells you why the ppm actually is. You can't set the range on that other one

My digigro is set at 1300 and 1500 which I'm fine at. i also have their telaire ppm 3 type which I have never changed from the default settings of 1200-1500. So I guess adjustability isn' a big deal for me. The one unit has an external relay and was made for my watercooled burner. Worked perfect. I only mention them as they really helped me get my water heater set up and running when no one else would.

budleydoright said:

Go on ebay, there are always PPM3s, PPM3 knock offs or telaire based units, digigros etc for just a little more than the ppm4. I have a digigro and popped the relay in it. they sent me an upgraded version at no charge that has the external relay.

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how do you go about putting a relay on to somthing like this ? I saw a few but they could only hold a small amp load and for the pump I guess i'll be at least 3 or 4 amps. that was one of the main resons i liked the cap-4 it has a 10 amp load.

My unit has a 10amp mechanical relay in it. It is basically spliced into a normal 3 prong extension cord and the controller sends the 24v coil voltage to it.

I have seen a DIY on another forum somewhere. this is a good thing to be able to build as much of our equipment draws an inductive load that exceeds the 15 amp resistive load rating on most timers on the market. There are actually very few timers on the market that can safely runm a 1k hps. Using one is playing russian roulette. I put 30amp relays on all of my lights.

Would love to build a remote trigger and stop trying to get my timers all synched with one another. Then again I think I'm done fucking with my room anymore. Man it's nice when it's all nice and automated. Favorite purchase has to be the condensate pump. Haven't emptied a dehu in 5 months

well i emailed the guy on ebay who sells the digigros at 11;15 last night and this morning had a resopnce from him. pretty sweet so far. He said they do the digis with an heavy duty relay for the same price as w/o and also offer the telaire/ ppm-3 with relay for 279. thats like 50 buck less then the repackaged cap one. Now if I just had 400 bucks laying around i could get this shit ordered and be ready to roll . I do want to try and finish this round w/o co2 hopefully I can avoid the heat of summer long enough, so i can make a comparison of with or without.

one more question for both of you, how much water do you actually run thru the heater on average day or week? just woundering about do a drain to waste instead of recirc. Of course not really waste it would be reused in the yard or kids pools ect.

That heater for $105 is battery powered FYI in case you didnt know. I would prefer drain to waste too myself. Would be easier, cleaner and cooler. If it only uses like 20-30 gal a day would be no big deal.

I dunno man, I'm going to cry foul on drain to waste. First it will likely use somewhere in the order of 50 gallons a day. The second thing is that fresh water is an extremely limited and precious resource. Dumping 1500 gallons of water down the drain is pretty lame when you think about it.

Indoor cultivation has an enormous carbon footprint, increasing the amount of resource use when it can be eliminated for around $60 seems, I dunno, irresponsible?

I'm not trying to demonize you or tell people what to do but it's something to think about.

Hey duke, sInce your on track to use co2 soon I though I might pass along that many co2 users don't just crank 1500 all the time as it's not really needed and I have read in several places it can reduce potency and delay maturity in the final weeks. Here is my general co2 schedule:
Clone: none
Early veg: 800
Mid to late veg: 1200
Flip till two weeks till finish: 1500-1600
Last two weeks: 600

From what I gather the different ppm's are mostly a function of what the plant can absorb given it's metabolism and size. It's about availability not cconcentration. Just like nutrients a plant doesn't absorb more because there is more. Not sure what the deal is with potency as certainly plants that go 1500 the whole time are certainly potent. But high co2 will suppress ethylene production. Ethylene is an important compound for fruit ripening. I do need to research it's ties to flower and resin production though

legallyflying said:

I dunno man, I'm going to cry foul on drain to waste. First it will likely use somewhere in the order of 50 gallons a day. The second thing is that fresh water is an extremely limited and precious resource. Dumping 1500 gallons of water down the drain is pretty lame when you think about it.

Indoor cultivation has an enormous carbon footprint, increasing the amount of resource use when it can be eliminated for around $60 seems, I dunno, irresponsible?

I'm not trying to demonize you or tell people what to do but it's something to think about.

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if you live in the irhgt water shed, and your not treating the water with a chemical, it will run to waste back into your own water supply.. but totally in most cases it would be sent to water treatment plants and such..

and on the co2 thing, there is some speculation about decreased potenency BUT most people that use co2 say they see nothing of the sort. and the sped up growth and meto rate my more than make up for the toxity that is also caused.. speculation mostly..

and finally, don't run to wast, use it as a 2ndary hot water source for your house.

cerberus said:

and finally, don't run to wast, use it as a 2ndary hot water source for your house.

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Impossible to do. Well not impossible, but technically difficult. You would need some kind of expanding pressurized bladder or something. I mean, you have to have somewhere for the hot water to go as it passes through the generator. If there is not a tap turned on somewhere then there is no space being made available for the hot water.

I was think so what if the water in said resivior is hot Its not really cooling any thing anyway all i need is to have the water avalible to activate the burner in the generator. the exhaused burnt gasses is what im concerned about collecting. That being said how would it matter it the res water temp was 60* or 90*? It would still pass throught the generator and be pruducing waste co2, would the exhaused gasses just be warmer air?

On a side note I was thinking of mounting the unit out side of my grow room then ducting in the exhausted air/co2 , thus eliminating some of the heat put off by the burners. would that significantly lower the co2 output too?

Once again thanks to all of you guys for helping me and others work thru this setup.

Cool set up. Yeah a friend of mine uses that same thing & he heat's his Hot tub with it... Saves money on the not running the tub.

It would probably lower the co2 a little bit. To be quite honest, it doesn't put off much heat at all. I can hold my hand over the exhaust for as long as I want. That, and it only runs for maybe 2-3 minutes at a time. The other issue you need to think about is that in order for the units to vent properly, you typically can't put an elbow or any horizontal run of pipe off of the exhaust. You will impeded the flow of heat/gasses to the point that it will not work right. Something to that extent, the manual was very clear about exhausting requirements and restrictions. Long story short. Bury the rez outside and mount it in the flower room. You will be fine.

Fucking love the hot tub idea though. That sounds money!!!

legallyflying said:

Impossible to do. Well not impossible, but technically difficult. You would need some kind of expanding pressurized bladder or something. I mean, you have to have somewhere for the hot water to go as it passes through the generator. If there is not a tap turned on somewhere then there is no space being made available for the hot water.

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well you attach it to your standard tank water heater, and use its old tank res. as your secondary rez. I know a guy that runs a double wide this way, I don't. so I don't know the details and honestly a 50 gal. drum barried makes the most since. I'm just saying it can be done..

how do you get to the 55 drum thats burried under 2' of dirt? i assume that the water will evaporate over time. and thats gotto be a big ass hole those drums are like 2 foot dia and 3 feet tall so youhave to dig a 2x3x4 hole. my back already hurts just thinking about it.

what about adding a duct booster to the vent pipe??

hell maybe I'm making this way harder then it needs to be.....but I'm fuckin laaaaazzzzzyyy

There's no shame in using the old co2 bottle. I went back to it from a WC unit.

i couldn't amagine haveing to go to the welding supply house (about 15 minutes from me) 3-4 times a month. when i can get propane for the same price and it available everywhere.

do any of you see a reason why the water coming to the unit (from the res.) couldn't be hot. since you both have these units maybe you can see somthing i dont?