Ice Boxes...?

Hydro Innovations Ice Box

Finally, a safe and very efficient way to water-cool your entire grow room! It consists of a high-quality heat-exchanger with a strong molded plastic housing. One side of the housing is designed to install over a 6" air-cooled reflector duct flange, and as an option the opposite side can be attached to 6" air ducting (depending on inline fan placement). Air from your indoor garden is either pushed or pulled through the reflectors with an inline fan and then passed over the Ice Box heat exchanger. Cold water is circulated through the heat exchanger, cooling the air before it exits right back into the indoor garden area. The longer the tubing the higher the pump. But you don’t want to use too high of a pump, due to the fact that it may not allow adequate time for the water to chill. If humidity is an issue in your room, you may want to put the reservoir outside the room.

1/4 HP minimum chiller size is recommended per 1000 watts.
600gph-900gph pump needed depending on the length and size of the tubing.
Approximately 250 cfm of airflow is needed to properly cool the fixture.
Several units can be daisy chained together using one fan, only 250 cfm is needed though all fixtures.
For maximum efficiency we recommend one Ice Box per reflector.
Allows you to keep a sealed room and helps keep pest and pathogens out of the room.
Keeps CO2 in the room instead of exhausting it out.
By running the water approximately 20 degree colder than your environment it can reduce the cooling load or replace your a/c unit.
Can be wall mounted with optional wall mount kit that includes the bracket and ducting coupler.
Manufacturer: Hydro Innovations



thats the Manufacturers sales add... seen them at the hydro store seem to work ok was in a green house area + i dont know if it had a chiller hooked up to it...

Only person i have heard mentioning them are dig Hap...

even if it dont chill if it just negates the heat off a 1000w bulb that means.... No more aircooling no more ducts running everywhere. no more a/c needed no a/c exhaust....

Down sides are need a chiller and a fan to push the air to each ice box.... and water lines will be running through the room....

i would like to know what if any peoples expierence that they have had with these... thanks in advance....

U need 1/4 hp chiller for EACH icebox unit($150), to cool each 1K lite, per manufacturers info. So to cool lets say 4 lites, u need a $1000 chiller. (Total $1600 so far for 4 lites) Besides the vortex fan to pull/push air thru the lites, u also need a massive waterpump that's on ALL THE TIME and a large reservoir of chilled water in the room. The chiller has to be close to the hoods for more efficiency, the manufactuer recommends pumping to the chiller than to the lights. But the chiller is not supposed to be in the room, cuz it gives off all the heat...hmmm. I'd like to see an operational version, that works out all the kinks, cuz there's quite a few

yea but i was limited by my girl to cut out 2k of my rooml... so me only running 2k now mean i would only need 1/2 hp cooler 2 ice box's and a 500cfm....

I have a 1/4 cooler hoping it will do two adequately and so many fans its unreal... so all i would need is 2 ice box's and MAYBE another 1/4 chiller and that will mean i can romove all the ducting totally seal my room and not run my portable a/c anymore.... for my situation may be a good move.....

it only recommends that the chiller/rez be outside the room if there is high humidity and heat..... if you have your room setup right with this setup it should negate both those variables...

bump no one?

wizberry said:

u also need a massive waterpump that's on ALL THE TIME and a large reservoir of chilled water in the room.

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wouldnt the pump only be on whenever the chiller is on? there is no need to run it 24 hours a day when the lights only need to be cooled for 12. and if you insulant your res or use a cooler i'm sure the chiller wouldn't be on all the time either...

the ice box is water chilled so it gets water pumped through it..... the chiller does also and that is automatic dependign on water temps so the pump runs 24/7

A possible way I could see this working is to run your chiller (maybe in a hot room/area) off to the side w/ a rez. Then u could run ducting from your lites to the chiller area. Daisy-chain a few Icebox units together w/ an 8" vortex fan pulling.

Temp is reduced, u don't need a big-ass pump, and there's no water near the lites. There's a good diagram the manufacturer put out w/ a daisy chain setup...if I can find it, I'll try to post the link.

PoopyTeaBags said:

the ice box is water chilled so it gets water pumped through it..... the chiller does also and that is automatic dependign on water temps so the pump runs 24/7

Click to expand...

right... but the ice box only needs to be running while the lights off. you could solve automation problems by putting it on the same timer your lights are on.

link to IceBox manual... I was checking out Diagram 3 w/ the daisychaining.

somebody041, I think ur right...u could save energy by putting it all on a timer. Then for the last couple weeks, crank it up at nite to get those "purple bud" temps?

http://www.hydroinnovations.com/support.htm
whoops my bad

Sorry to piss on Hydro Innovations cornflakes but...

What a huge stinking pile of baloney that dingfod is pfeeeewww !
Sheeesh if you want to cool the lights with cold flowing water, why not just run water cooled lights arrgh !

imnsho, an indoor growers money is much better off spent on decent air ducting and air conditioning / air handling for the grow space, than blowing it on a silly box attempting to cool down a vented hood.
A good air conditioned room can also support additional lights...the best real bang for the bucks !

If you're going to drop the cash for a chiller, then put it to good use cooling the reservoir I say.

wizberry....a massive pump is only required on large setups. A smaller setup can be run off of a mag 7 pump or equivalent. It is true you do leave the pump running 24hrs though, and you should also leave the chiller on as well. You don't want to turn off the chiller in between cycles for the same reason that you don't turn off your a/c when you leave your house, it actually uses less power maintaining the correct temperature than trying to bring it back down to operating temperatures after being off for 12 hrs. When the lighting is turned off there will be very little heat introduced so the chiller will barely run, just like your a/c at night.

There aren't any kinks to the system, it's actually fairly simple. The chiller can be setup on a separate loop than the Ice Boxes and in this way you would need 2 pumps...one that would circulate from the chiller to the res and then another pump from the Ice Boxes to the res....OR the system can be run off of one pump in this way the water can be run from the reservoir and then outside to the chiller, then back to the Ice Boxes before draining back to the res. The chiller does not need to be close to the Ice Boxes, water can be pumped from anywhere.

TeaBag, the chiller must be located outside the garden no matter what. All of the heat generated by the lighting is absorbed in to the water and moved away from the garden and is released out the back of the chiller. The heat must be released somewhere and if it back in your garden you have wasted you time.

somebody041, the pump must stay running as long as the chiller is on and since the manufacturer recommends leaving the chiller on then the pump would need to stay on as well. Great suggestion on insulating the water lines and the reservoir, that definitely is important, it will also keep these items from condensating.

10k said:

Sorry to piss on Hydro Innovations cornflakes but...

What a huge stinking pile of baloney that dingfod is pfeeeewww !
Sheeesh if you want to cool the lights with cold flowing water, why not just run water cooled lights arrgh !

imnsho, an indoor growers money is much better off spent on decent air ducting and air conditioning / air handling for the grow space, than blowing it on a silly box attempting to cool down a vented hood.
A good air conditioned room can also support additional lights...the best real bang for the bucks !

If you're going to drop the cash for a chiller, then put it to good use cooling the reservoir I say.

Click to expand...

do you have any *actual* experience with the icebox? cause if you don't and you're just speculating then i don't think you're helping anyone by posting that. why not let people who have used the icebox chime in whether or not it works... i'm sure they have a better idea than you.




cotyledon... it sounds like you are very familiar with the iceboxes. one thing i cannot seem to get a clear answer on is if the icebox can be used when you have a separate system for aircooled lights. I draw my air in from another room and dump it outisde. would the icebox still be useful to someone in my setup or is it mainly for sealed rooms?

do you have any *actual* experience with the icebox? cause if you don't and you're just speculating then i don't think you're helping anyone by posting that. why not let people who have used the icebox chime in whether or not it works... i'm sure they have a better idea than you.

Click to expand...

Actual users or actual company spamers / distributors ?

Yea I'd be interested in hearing from anyone who has one and what benefit it gave them over a properly built air conditioned room. Just pumping air through a ducted hood and out of the room is more than sufficient, especially in an a/c'd room. I gave my not so humble opinion...now lets hear otherwise.

somebody041 said:

cotyledon... it sounds like you are very familiar with the iceboxes. one thing i cannot seem to get a clear answer on is if the icebox can be used when you have a separate system for aircooled lights. I draw my air in from another room and dump it outisde. would the icebox still be useful to someone in my setup or is it mainly for sealed rooms?

Click to expand...

ice box gos on at the end of the light therefor you cant blow it outside... check the pic above....

I maintain very large chiller systems for a large university, I saw this product awhile back and could not beat it for the price. Properly sized chiller, pump and right number of IceBoxes beats a professional chiller system for a fraction of the cost. This is the second mod to make comments saying I was a manufacturer or distributor spamming, does my knowledge on how to set up chiller systems and use this product insult moderators intelligence? Is there a chief moderator that can take care of this?

The main reason for going with IceBoxes instead of a water cooled light tube style light system is the fact that I all ready own and have invested a rather large sum of money in super sun 2 reflectors, the boxes work with my existing fans and hoods, a much better deal.

PoopyTeaBags said:

ice box gos on at the end of the light therefor you cant blow it outside... check the pic above....

Click to expand...

yeah but you can attach ducting on the other end of the icebox so one could still include an icebox in their seperate air cooled light system. but would this still produce the same cooling effect? my question is still unanswered...

somebody041 said:

yeah but you can attach ducting on the other end of the icebox so one could still include an icebox in their seperate air cooled light system. but would this still produce the same cooling effect? my question is still unanswered...

Click to expand...

since you dump outside the room using a icebox will just cool the other room not sure what the point of that is but i might be reading what your trying to do wrong....

Me? Love the idea. I ran these "Big Boy" water cooled units for yrs.



This Ice Box looks to just be a mini, and less optioned, version of those. I can imagine them being VERY useful in at least a few different configurations.

I don't see a water chiller being necessary btw if you're able to freely run tap water to waste. That's how most guys run the big units...just tap water. Your local may vary.