Help with design

[Dsmile]

Hi all!

 

Firstly I'm not a beginner at growing but I worry and panic a lot and fuck things up continuously and preventing myself doing something in the middle of a grow, that I'll later regret seems too much of a challenge.

I've just pulled down my grow because I accidently pressed extra buttons on the timer whilst adding a second exhaust (which probably wasn't needed) 2/3 weeks into flower

 

I have a spare bedroom with a the boiler and an awning window, annoyingly.  At the moment I have a 150x200x200 and I am venting through a hole I made in the ceiling inside a closet and out the vent which I guess was for the oven hood or bathroom exhaust fan, neither work and nothing was connected, had to get bloody starlings out at they were coming in to nest. I'd love to vent out the window but I struggle to come up with ideas because it's an awning window facing directly into neighbours property and the main road, also the window seal is 'blown' and it condenses up. 

 

My current system is an RDWC 6(+1) x 33L buckets  and 2x 60 storage boxes with 1-1/4" pipe and Ice line, I have a hailea HC 300A chiller(outside tent) and a portable AC(unused) available. I Think this might be a bit much and might get better results keeping it to 6 plants, possibly all 60L totes, with space at the entrance for an AC in 1 corner and chiller in the other(if chiller inside the tent is ok?), with the head bucket (will I be able to keep it a 33L bucket for space? Its the same height) in the middle, as is I cannot get inside the tent if I fill it, and I try to scrog. here's a picture of my recent failure for example...

What do you think?

 

 

I Currently have 2x 6" exhausts on and 8" and 6"CF and a 4" & 6" Intake with Diffuseairs (pictures above), I think this might be a bit overkill/unnecessary and my tent fails to suck in with pressure.

 

At the moment its ridiculous with the amount of cables and ratchet rope everywhere.

 

Interested to see if anyone has any ideas on how they'd utilize the tent for rdwc,  pictures of my last failed grow in gallery.

 

Thanks

 

[zen-ken]

Tidy up bro.....the cables are everywhere.

Keep the chiller outside the tent....I have a HC 300A and the bloody thing kicks out a lot of heat.

Keep the AC outside and use one the small intake fans to make a scoop and connect to it loosely.

You must have negative pressure! or smells will get out....get them on speed controllers or restrict the intakes.

Header pot outside the tent ?

 

How are your temps? what lights you got there? 

 

the additions to your system could have upset the balance.....lets see them

 

[Dsmile]

@zen-ken Yep had a hard time getting the cables all into the same same times and the rail has 5 connectors on it, had a real hard time getting it any tidier without tilting the lights, not sure if there's some trick to hanging these rails but I find it a pain in the ass because it doesn't keep its shape which makes it a pain to level.

 

Yeah the chiller really does put out more heat than I was expecting but I don't think i'd go without it since getting one, its made handling root issues so much easier, it warms the room up quite a bit and I did look over the internet to see if anyone came up with a diy design to vent from it, I was thinking about boxing it and venting from the box with a constant 12v fan. but really if I don't 'need' to, id prefer the less hassle .

 

When I used my AC last I cut some foam to fit the vent where it cools, cut a 4" hole and ducted to a low duct port. I could probably get away with venting the heat from it without a CF if I have good enough negative pressure on the tent and it's outside, but with the chiller and the lights I'm worried about the additional electricity costs, if I check my usage with the provider it shows well above average usage, i'm prepayment also.

My head pot is inside the tent, I covered it with white reflective sheeting and if I reduce my numbers to 6 plants again I should have plenty of room at the front of the tent for myself to manoeuvre. like this...

 

 

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This is the S&P 6" with an 8" CF  and a silencer

(the smaller fan is a 4" rvk intake sucking from under windowsil)

 

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The silencer (black duct) is then connected to a metal Y piece (that you can't see as it's kinda inside the port), the Silver ducting is from the 6" rvk and 6"CF

 

 

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6" rvk/CF oppsite side of tent (above entrance) to the S&p

 

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Then from the metal Y piece, this mess goes across the ceiling, into that cupboard and out a hole i cut in the ceiling to the loft, still in ducting out the hole for the  kitchen/bathroom ventilation

 

I'd love to get rid of 60% of this and just vent from the window

[zen-ken]

Sorry bro....didn't see this for some reason.

 

The six pot design looks good....three connectors out the header ?...Venting from two different places (nice)...and like you say nice access and space for a decent circulation fan when needed.

 

I need to remake my RDWC as it looked great on paper.....not so much in the space  the problem with my 3 tote system with header (and something to consider) is the draw on the middle tank is always higher than the draw on the sides. (its a Rush RDWC)

The fucking great 3inch elbows soon even out the water but its worth considering when designing a new system ime...Im going back to individual totes and less plants as well.

 

Smash out six trees brother  keep the system nice and uniform...Have you read badbillybobs rdwc build guide? some good ideas there.

 

RDWC is best and easiest done with clones (obviously from the same mother)....the variation in seeds of most suppliers and the thin bandwidth for feeding don't make for easy bedfellows imo.

 

 

You sound like me....I lose my rag with it if its not perfect and then really regret it after when Im buying fucking mylar bags of PGR at silly money  

[zen-ken]

You could always put the CF's on the floor and draw the heat through the plants (obviously not sure what your temps are). 

 

Would give you more headroom 

[Dsmile]

@zen-ken sorry, I haven't logged in a while and just saw your reply, i haven't seen his guide but I'll take a look.

 

Got gas and electric EPC srart of next week, nervous because no idea how invasive it is, at least after that i can get going again. Problem is my clones are just huge leggy plants after all this waiting, still good enough to scrog though but need to hide them. 

Any idea how much light would be enough to keep them from flowering? was thinking i could stick them in a box in the shed with an led camping light or something, not sure if its too little lumens though. only about 10 Watts 

[zen-ken]

On 11/06/2021 at 8:57 PM, Dsmile said:

@zen-ken sorry, I haven't logged in a while and just saw your reply, i haven't seen his guide but I'll take a look.

 

Got gas and electric EPC srart of next week, nervous because no idea how invasive it is, at least after that i can get going again. Problem is my clones are just huge leggy plants after all this waiting, still good enough to scrog though but need to hide them. 

Any idea how much light would be enough to keep them from flowering? was thinking i could stick them in a box in the shed with an led camping light or something, not sure if its too little lumens though. only about 10 Watts 

 

Its not about light .......it how many hours......keep photos in 18/6 and they will never flower.....just keep on vegging.

the only problem with low light is they will do poorly and require little to no food...not sure a camping LED will cut it, but it would hold them for a few days, sure. 

[Dsmile]

On 13/06/2021 at 1:07 AM, zen-ken said:

 

Its not about light .......it how many hours......keep photos in 18/6 and they will never flower.....just keep on vegging.

the only problem with low light is they will do poorly and require little to no food...not sure a camping LED will cut it, but it would hold them for a few days, sure. 

I just needed it for this morning, the guy actually forgot he was coming but made sure he got his ass here ASAP, didnt want to go through all this moving abd hiding again

[Dsmile]

 

This is more to scale for my tent size, Going to start assembling the system by the end of the week and i'm thinking like this,  am I wasting too much space and are the bends from the headbucket going to restrict flow or can anyone improve on the design at all? 

Think i'll hang a couple of diffuseair in there and have my portable AC ducted into the bottom right. 

Argos stopped stocking the strata boxes so i've had to order 60L black and yellow totes from homebase, hope they're going to be suitable, they look like the very popular ones used in the US tbh.

 

Can't decide what to do with venting to/from the window. Might set something up for intake but I think theres too much increased risk exhausting from there, so going to have to set up some long ass ducting again to the loft and somehow attach the A/C exhaust to it with a nonreturn  thing. 

I'll have an 8"CF with a 6" exhaust fan, think this will be enough for  a 150x200x200 space?

If anyones got any other idea for ventilation please let me know