Variety Grow - Perpetual, "Mini" ScrOG's, DWC in a Cabinet (First Timer)

jsgamber said:
I need to consider both. It's now winter in SoCal and I'm not so worried about air cooling since my ambient temps are now 63* in the garage. The 250w chamber water temp stay at 76* without me adding in ice bottles every morning to get them down to 66* only for them to climb back up by the next day. It's even harder in my 400w chamber to do the same especially if I'm traveling.

Looking back it's probably why I never got really nice white roots like everyone else did. I never had issues with algae, pH or nutes (nute burn), in the water so I know the insulation around the res is doing fine. It has to be self sustaining.

After reading that thread, the fridge works perfect for a single small reservoir. But I want to cool nine separate reservoirs so I don't think the small fridge will have the power to keep up. But the AC unit I've been messing with certainly would! The coils get super cold and by using a copper pipe bender can easily immerse it into a large ice chest full of water.

Now buried inside that thread was somebody talking about using the cooling pan from the fridge and using it to cool the air in the chambers by redirecting the air intake to blow across the pan or better yet sit in front of a circulating fan inside the chamber itself!

I'm setting up an experiment today to test the cooling theory out by putting the open fridge in the 400w chamber and blow a fan into the fridge to move the air around. I'll have pics. Any guesses on what the result will be?

Lastly regarding immersing the cooper cooling coils from the AC unit into water. What are the concerns with doing this? All I could find in that thread was that it's not good to do but I don't know why.
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i have a feeling that may work, and work well. i am curious of the power usage though with the door open, even in the closed environment. but your paying the bill, so I'll deal with it :-P but running the air over the cooler somehow before it goes into the cabinet may be more efficient like you said above. if you cool your air enough you may be able to manage the rez temps more effectively also. let us know your results buddy :clap:
 
Been fiddling around all day. Realized I had to find a way to remove the heat from the back of the mini fridge. So I rigged up a boot around a small 9" fan made out of the bottom corner of a large green trash bag. I also used the other part of the trash bag to separate the the back of the fridge from the front. Now the test is on! :)

IMAG0019.jpg
 
so how did it go? you could maybe holesaw or jigsaw you a hole into the refrigerator the diameter of your duct work and have your intake draw air from the refrigerator, and use an insulation boot to extend where the refrigerator draws air from so it doesnt lose much energy at the main intake. does that make sense? if not I will try and do something up for you in paint tonight when I get off work.
 
gumball said:
so how did it go? you could maybe holesaw or jigsaw you a hole into the refrigerator the diameter of your duct work and have your intake draw air from the refrigerator, and use an insulation boot to extend where the refrigerator draws air from so it doesnt lose much energy at the main intake. does that make sense? if not I will try and do something up for you in paint tonight when I get off work.
Click to expand...

Check this out.

I solved the heat issue with the back of the fridge with some clever ducting. I also isolated the heat side from the cool side as well as turned off the intake fans to the chamber so as not to exhaust out the cooled air. After making these changes I had the chamber down to 82* with the mini fridge set to MAX. Not bad at all considering that before setting this up, the chamber was at 94*.

Just for the hell of it I turned the fridge down to MED and went to bed. This morning temperatures are down to 75*! :D YES! So now I've set the fridge down to MIN just to see how low I can go. I'm going to put a reservoir of water in the chamber and see what this does for water temps! Who knows this may be my grand solution!

No matter how good this looks I'm going to reserve judgement. ;)

It appears I can't have continuous air intake in the chamber because all this does is flush out whatever air I get cooled! So it looks like I either need to put my exhaust fans on a cycle timer so I can cycle in fresh air every 30 minutes or so (more research) or start looking at CO2?

So the final design? First separate the fridge box from the coils and compressor. Next, mount the setup on the outside wall of the cabinet and route the cooling pan into the chamber. Then all I need to do is aim a fan at the cooling pan (just like my experiment) and that should do it!

What am I missing this time? :-P
 
Bad ass man. It sounds like you have it down to some adjusting. Way to get creative to solve those temp issues.
Daniels

BTW I think you're just missing the clones.
 
jsgamber said:
Check this out.

I solved the heat issue with the back of the fridge with some clever ducting. I also isolated the heat side from the cool side as well as turned off the intake fans to the chamber so as not to exhaust out the cooled air. After making these changes I had the chamber down to 82* with the mini fridge set to MAX. Not bad at all considering that before setting this up, the chamber was at 94*.

Just for the hell of it I turned the fridge down to MED and went to bed. This morning temperatures are down to 75*! :D YES! So now I've set the fridge down to MIN just to see how low I can go. I'm going to put a reservoir of water in the chamber and see what this does for water temps! Who knows this may be my grand solution!

No matter how good this looks I'm going to reserve judgement. ;)

It appears I can't have continuous air intake in the chamber because all this does is flush out whatever air I get cooled! So it looks like I either need to put my exhaust fans on a cycle timer so I can cycle in fresh air every 30 minutes or so (more research) or start looking at CO2?

So the final design? First separate the fridge box from the coils and compressor. Next, mount the setup on the outside wall of the cabinet and route the cooling pan into the chamber. Then all I need to do is aim a fan at the cooling pan (just like my experiment) and that should do it!

What am I missing this time? :-P
Click to expand...


That is a neat solution to your problem..How did you come to think this up? STELTHY :leaf:
 
Danielsgb said:
Bad ass man. It sounds like you have it down to some adjusting. Way to get creative to solve those temp issues.
Daniels

BTW I think you're just missing the clones.
Click to expand...

You know what? Those clones were the first time I ever tried to grow pot for real (other than the times you throw seeds in the garden and none of them ever start). But here's the cool thing. It's a 'bucket list' thing for me because for the last 25 years I've always thought of what it would be like if I could grow my own weed and have it anytime I want it. I'm a cheapskate and a chicken-shit (?) ;) for not wanting to go to downtown Santa Ana to score weed on the street. So I'd get an eighth from my real bro each of the two or three times a year we'd see each other and nurse that for 5 weeks!

Now that I'm MMJ for Schleraderma and Depression and I've stabilized at a quarter per week vaporized (and hopefully soon to have some post new year Kannalua) :) it is a bit different. In many ways I have the means to buy from a dispensary. But there is something spiritual about growing my own medicine! And again there is that damn bucket list thing.

So you know what? I really do miss those clones. And that is why I must continue on my quest.....

How many of you still remember the first time you smoked your OWN cured weed. I think I watched many of you harvest your first crops just in the short time I've been here. But guess what. I still have that cherry to pop! But one thing I've learned as an old guy...

"Can you name an amazing arrival, of any type, in your life and can you think of one where the journey wasn't the real treasure?"

peace
 
Touche - me too. But it's close. You don't know how much I enjoyed watching my wife when she was pregnant and the anticipation of the arrival for 9 months, preparing the nursery, choosing names. It was all wonderful! :)
 
So after a few days of testing and tweaking the results are in. I set up the 400w chamber on a 12/12 cycle. Lights on the high temp is 85* and lights off the temp get's down to 63* (the mini-fridge doesn't shut off). Garage temps are sitting around 69*. Water temps don't exceed 68* in my test reservoir (starting at 65*) but the temps still rise so I may have to still look at water cooling for the summer months.

My 250w chamber is doing just fine at 78* without any added cooling and it runs 24/0.

So today I'm going to start prepping to crack some seeds. I'm going to use 1" rockwool cubes so I need to get them soaking in 5.0 pH water.

Then I'm going to start cracking open the mini-fridge and see about mounting the cooling pan inside the chamber and heat coils on the outside.
 
LOL. I'm sitting here with the TV on and that Geico commercial came on. "...do you know what makes me sad? YOU DO you jackwagon. Let's get on over to mamby-pamby land and get some self-confidence in you, you crybaby! :lol: :lol:

Okay after talking about teenagers, and realizing I have girls, and I hate boys, so why the fuck am I going to go through all of the trouble of trying to keep boys away from girls, and then think I'm going to grow from seed? WTF was I thinking????

Stay tuned people because I have set out a goal that I will be in flower by Wednesday if not sooner! :idea: :idea: :idea:

I'm going on a shopping trip so I'll be back. :D :D :D
 
I hear clones!! Hey cruzer101 said casey jones and blue dream is some great stuff. He grew both in his greenhouse this summer, great yielders and GREAT smoke!

Can't wait to see what you get, oh boy!!
 
jsgamber said:
LOL. I'm sitting here with the TV on and that Geico commercial came on. "...do you know what makes me sad? YOU DO you jackwagon. Let's get on over to mamby-pamby land and get some self-confidence in you, you crybaby! :lol: :lol:

Okay after talking about teenagers, and realizing I have girls, and I hate boys, so why the fuck am I going to go through all of the trouble of trying to keep boys away from girls, and then think I'm going to grow from seed? WTF was I thinking????

Stay tuned people because I have set out a goal that I will be in flower by Wednesday if not sooner! :idea: :idea: :idea:

I'm going on a shopping trip so I'll be back. :D :D :D
Click to expand...
Good to hear. I mention clones and you can get a great selection in Cali. Excited to hear what you pick. You can always start a bean or two after you're perpetual.

gumball said:
I hear clones!! Hey cruzer101 said casey jones and blue dream is some great stuff. He grew both in his greenhouse this summer, great yielders and GREAT smoke!

Can't wait to see what you get, oh boy!!
Click to expand...
I've smoked that Blue Dream and loved it. Wish I got more than a 1/4. Wonder what he'll pick.

Daniels:leaf:
 
Just got back home. Have to go to out for a bit to get one more thing. But I have some new babies!

Gumball you are freaking me out. I just picked up 2 Blue Dream ($9 each) and four Skywalker OG clones ($5 each). It was 10% off on clones day at my dispensary. I was smoking Blue Dream last week and also picked up some Blue Dream hash today too! :)

I'll fill you guys in on the other purchases in a bit! :D
 
Here are my new flowering reservoirs. 2 gallon Coleman stackable beverage coolers. They have removable spigots which give me all sorts of ideas for water cooling if needed. I also bought a sheet of 2" thick solid foam which I plan on replacing the lids with. The new lid will be cut rectangular and then I will support the screen on top of that. Four of these will fit in one chamber. Oh and they only cost $8.99 each. I also plan on wrapping the outside with reflective tape. Pretty cool huh?

jsgamber-201548-albums-first-grow-perpetual-scrog-ette-dwc-1x250wmh-2x400whps-picture1316299-imag0021.jpg
 
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