I'm trying to decide on the best size of a small cube of some kind in which to grow and flower a few diesel ryder fems. My friend wants a little personal every so often and needs a discreet little box which runs quiet.

Are CFLS the only real way to do this or should I just get a 150w HPS? I was looking at 250w Enviros... blue for veg then switch to red for flowering. I heard I could get a 150w didi ballast for a hps from Screwfix for cheap so it might be an option... just size is the main issue.

I was originally looking at around 50cm cubed with a 4" carbon filter and an 8cm pc fan on the intake running at 5v.

Then running a small nft system rather than soil.

What does everyone suggest? I've saw the micro growing diaries of blab etc and they're impressive but as i'm going to be dealing with auto flowering dwarfs for height issues I feel maybe some extra suggestions would come in handy!

I've seen the pc grow box's etc and have considered it an option... but limits the floor space slightly and i'm not sure it'd work great... if it would he definately wouldn't mind a pc looking box. .

50cm isn't very high, when you take into account the pots/nft system and room for the light.

Not really did a micro grow so I'm not much help I'm afraid, I think it would be nice to consider a low powered HPS but may pose more problems than using CFL's. There are some grows on here done with just CFL's and they look alright, but the yield would probably be more with a 150w HPS or something.

Best of luck with the project.

HPS every time.

Maybe especially for a micro grow. - those enviros are huge.
Curiously I don't think I've seen an HPS grow on here under 250 watts but I've seen creative things done with small (vertical) HPS lamps in other places.

Unfortunately very few of us can get away without a proper duct fan and carbon filter.

hi mate i would recommend going with some cfl's if your going to be using pc fan's for extraction,however you could probably use a 70w hps if you would be willing to upgrade your ventilation?

chris p makes a good point in saying that an nft system would take up even more of your already little space,and your point in saying that a pc grow might be too restricting on floor space might not nessacerily be true as you can buy server case's that are pretty big?

just my thought's on the matter anyway, i'm a noob with a cfl grow myself.

there's a speaker box grow on this site somewhere that a russian guy did, it's incredibly small and quiet i'd imagine,he would just lst 1 plant to fill the box, it was so stealthy that he managed to hide it from even his spouse if i remember correctly!!!
i'll try and dig out the link for it.

Well... I think I might head over to the local screwfix and see if they have any in stock. I think i may increase the height to say 58-65cm... The lowryder 2 pack I have says height is between 25cm-40cm where as the diesel ryder says 46-60cm... hmm.... . I can pickup a ballast and sylvania 150w hps for £40 from screwfix so in terms of financials probably more cost effecive than enviros... i'm just not sure how much heat i'm going to have in there. Could I seal the light ballast etc off at the top of the box with horticultural glass and a couple of through fans on each side to take heat away from the bulb? Of course I won't be able to get the light much closer but in those kind of dimensions I don't think it will be that much of a problem having a fair few watt of light per square foot. .

Speaker box sounds impressive . Thanks for the advice... i'll have a proper 4inch carbon filter and fan.. the pc fan was just for intake.

A 150 watt lamp will make near as damn it 150 watts of heat . It doesn't matter whether it's HPS, fluorescent or LED - or a quartz Halogen security light..

It's just that some of them will grow you a bit of cannabis....

I end up lighting my tall plants from the side, so you could stick it vertically.
(though I think that's a problem with some lamps)

Sort the smell, then you'll have sorted the air supply, and a side benefit is shifting all the waste heat.

I could consider a 70w hps I suppose... same price as the 150w though! . But is a 70w hps better than a 125w/250w enviro... i'm imagining a 150w hps would beat both? I dont really know how much heat the sodium will give off... is my idea of horticulutural glass in a makeshift cooltube across the whole top of the box viable with a 150w hps? I imagine i could get some fairly killer buds with temp controlled with that much light per foot.