My new PC-sized growbox

siu 3d · Mar 24, 2011

Hi there all, I just got my latest project up and running, a mini grow box, made out of an old PC case, containing 92 watts of CFLs. I have yet to properly build the ventilation system, its just running fans with no carbon filter at the moment, as the plants don't smell bad yet.

I'm growing some Jack Herer seeds, they're about a month old, and just started 12/12 2 days ago. I had some issues with Thrips and nutrient lockout, but I've since flushed and fed them again, and applied tobacco tea, so they've really picked up.

I don't have very good soil at the moment, so I might end up re-potting into larger pots soon (once I've figured out how many females I have. Also on the agenda is some new flowering nutrients...

Anyway, enough jibber-jabber, here's some pictures, foo's!

The setup:

There's a 120mm case fan intaking (right), and 2 92mm ones extracting air on the left (That is, until I sort out an extractor that's beefy enough to pull through a carbon filter)

The 3 plants, just before they were switched to 12/12:

KroNik224 · Mar 25, 2011

you vegged them for a month then thrown in a little box?they gonna stretch right out of that case.they look ok tho

siu 3d · Mar 26, 2011

KroNik224 said:
you vegged them for a month then thrown in a little box?they gonna stretch right out of that case.they look ok tho

I don't think so, they're in small pots, and they could more than double in size and I'd still be able to fit them in here. Or at least... so I hope

Infected-Mushie · Mar 28, 2011

Personally, I'd get those lamps sideways. You'll have much more room to grow.

ScrubNinja · Mar 28, 2011

Good work my man. I agree with mushie, although if you ended up with 2 fems, I would leave one bulb pointing down between the plants to fatten up the lower stuff when they get taller, and have the other two horizontally mounted.

siu 3d · Apr 6, 2011

Well, today, I finally got stuck in and made some big changes to my cab (...if you could call it that)!

The lights (3 fixtures only now) are mounted horizontal at the top. I'm going to be training extensively from the next grow on, to utilise what little space I have. Maybe even build a screen. Would more light be preferable to my current set-up, or is 69w sufficient for this space and more past the point of diminishing returns? I can probably handle the extra heat of another 23w bulb. but space in the cab will suffer.

Here's what it looks like presently

I've almost finished building the exhaust unit, I have yet to put the activated charcoal/pantyhose sock in the plastic part of it, and get some light proofing (matt black paint), but it's exhausting well now and letting the fan flow freely as.

Here it is at the moment...

I'm thinking of getting a far more powerful 120mm ac powered fan before filtration is necessary.

Another thought was to maybe stack 2 high-cfm pc fans- any suggestions on this front? I want reasonable quiet and decent flow through a thick carbon filter. High cfm is unimportant, but it'd have to push SOME air through 2-3 inches of carbon.

As for the babies, two turned out to be boys, of which i took a clone off the toughest and healthiest to get a little pollen off down the track. I also cloned a couple bottom branches off the girl, which I'll probably pop straight into 12/12 once they have roots

Spot the hair!

siu 3d · Apr 10, 2011

Well, it's apparently been 18 days since i switched to flowering!

This plant is a slow developer, it's finally beginning to develop pistils, but still going pretty slow in bud development terms... She's had a trim, and unfortunately also a brush with the bulbs.

I've got 2 AK seeds germinating also, I'm going to put them in, straight into 12/12, as soon as they're properly popped out of their soil. I'm also considering getting a second case so I can do a more perpetual sort of thing, or at least without huge delays...

Here's the girl now, she looks a hell of a lot better than previously, though i think there may be slightly too high N in the soil/feed, because of the clawing/darkness of leaves

kips0n · Apr 11, 2011

looks very nice

can u show your box in other site? i need to see it at back and front.

thanks a lot! and i will keep watching

siu 3d · Apr 12, 2011

I'll get some photos of the whole thing tomorrow for anyone interested.

I just added some carbon mat material out of an odorsok to the exhaust, it seems to kill what little smell the single plant creates.

It's all looking lush as, but I can't get photos until the lights come back on.

sm0k4 · Apr 12, 2011

2-3" would be overkill in there. I use about half an inch in my filter and I'm flowering two plants in a pc case. It eliminates the smell. Get a plastic fan grill that comes apart with a smaller piece inside a bigger piece. They make them for the standard PC fan sizes. I just put my carbon between the plastic pieces and its held in by black filter material that I cut out to fit on the bottoms of the filter halves. Its a little messy to install, but just bolt that on the fan. Before adding the last bolt, squish the carbon around and compact it to eliminate air gaps. Then fill it the rest of the way. I also used weather stripping on all my joints to create a good seal.

siu 3d · Apr 14, 2011

@sm0k4, i'd be really interested in using one of those, I use carbon cloth at the moment, but i have some AC sitting around. where do you purchase the filter? preferably for a 120mm...

Here's some shots from today:

a sprout!

And here's some images of how it looks from the outside. it's kinda a work in progress, it's slowly getting there, I've gotta get some black duct tape and paint to make it a little more subtle, but it sits amongst other pc stuff and another case, so it's well hidden.

Tuco Ramirez · Apr 14, 2011

Looks nice. You've got me interested because I'm building a PC growbox myself. Is there by the way any difference in the noise levels between ac and dc fans?? I suppose they are quite the same... although so far I have used only 120mm dc fans in my grow cabinets. No experience in ac fans. :tiphat:

siu 3d · Apr 15, 2011

Everything's looking lush today!

@tuco, ac fans are generally higher powered, higher rpm fans, that tend to make a bit of a scream. DC powered computer case fans are far weaker, bother in cfm and static pressure, but they're a lot quieter and use less power. PC fans can be stacked to give them more "push" or static pressure, to get through a heavier filter.

Supernatural · Apr 15, 2011

siu 3d said:
PC fans can be stacked to give them more "push" or static pressure, to get through a heavier filter.

That kind of goes against what I think I know about axial fans. I would imagine that with a bit of distance between the 2 fans the static pressure would improve somewhat but my thinking seems to be: more axial in parallel for increased flow rate but same pressure, more centrifugal in series for increased pressure head but same flow rate.

So you will have the 2 fans in series blowing into your little DIY carbon filter? I'm going to keep an eye on this one. I have a cab not much bigger than a PC for 1 or 2 plants and would love to get away with something small and discrete like this rather than a Ruck/Rhino combo.

sm0k4 · Apr 15, 2011

Supernatural said:
That kind of goes against what I think I know about axial fans. I would imagine that with a bit of distance between the 2 fans the static pressure would improve somewhat but my thinking seems to be: more axial in parallel for increased flow rate but same pressure, more centrifugal in series for increased pressure head but same flow rate.

So you will have the 2 fans in series blowing into your little DIY carbon filter? I'm going to keep an eye on this one. I have a cab not much bigger than a PC for 1 or 2 plants and would love to get away with something small and discrete like this rather than a Ruck/Rhino combo.

I have 2 80mm fans pulling through my small filter. In general, stacking fans increases pressure, parallel fans increase airflow. Distance doesn't have much to do with it. Separating the two fans by a duct would only weaken the flow. Not much, but some. I've been doing some homework on this while figuring out how to make my own micro scrubber.

My setup is:

Filter->Fan->Wall->Fan->

Arrows indicate air flow. Keeping one fan on the outside of the case just gives more room inside. Where I have my fans dialed in at right now, I get 85F as my max temp. With max fan speed its around 80F. Ambient outside the cab is 75ish. It does so much better than with 1 fan alone.

I use 80mm fans. With your cab a bump to 120mm pc fans would cool it through a scrubber. Make sure to get the highest pressure rated fans you can find locally or online. Scythe makes good PC fans, or Dayton makes good AC fans. AC fans generate more CFM and pressure than the DC fans in general, but with added noise and thicker fan (if stealth and space are a concern). It is doable with your case. I went through 4 different filter ideas before I found this one I like. Just takes R&D.

Supernatural · Apr 15, 2011

Cheers for that explanation. So I guess it took a bit of trial and error to get the filter depth and area too then. How often do you end up changing the carbon in your setup?

Moots · Apr 15, 2011

Nice setup man, will be watching. You ever thought of just running one plant, LST'd horizontal?

That way you could keep your container under that fan box, and then grow your main stem horizontally. It would save you space and increase airflow.

If you youtube pc grow case LST, that first video has a very clean nifty setup that uses a rack to train plants. He splits his plant into a Y, but you could do something similar but just train right to left.

The vids worth checking out either way. Mostly because of the nice hand grenade sized nug hes got at the end of the video.

siu 3d · Apr 16, 2011

Moots said:
Nice setup man, will be watching. You ever thought of just running one plant, LST'd horizontal?.

My plan was a scrog with 1 or 2 plants once I've established a good strain to clone off, and perhaps a second small cab to help out.

As for the filter design, I intend to make use of this carbon mat material form the odorsok, as it's compact and seems very effective. That being said, my exhaust needs to be re designed to fit a 4th and possibly 5th fixture/lamp, and still kill the smell effectively.

I very much like the R&D involved in building/maintaining a micro setup.

Peace all

siu 3d · Apr 22, 2011

Well, yesterday I mounted the 4th light fixture today. I don't have a bulb for it at the moment.

I'm still training the plant as it's a stretchy sativa. It's looking really healthy!

Here's some pics:

Peach out!

Moots · Apr 22, 2011

Looking good man. I am so far also enjoying LST. It's a great technique, but its also fun to shape a plant, almost like a high speed bonzai.

My lady has a very similar branching layout. It looks like you have a bare spot in the middle aswell. This is super helpful. I, like you have a short grow space. My most vigorous branch hit the box top the other day, so I just tied a bit of twine between it and the branch across from it, pulling the tall branch down a few much needed inches, and towards the middle. I later added a tie to the branch across, as the more vigorous branch was winning the tug of war.

I like that bracket you have coming off the pot. Looks like it makes the tying down a lot more clutter free as the plant grows away from the container, as opposed to tons of ties coming back to the pot.

Nice setup over all. Oh! Another quick suggestion, next plant you go with, cause no doubt this is gonna go well! If you grow the same plant shape, bend it so that one of the side branches is pointing directly up after the tie. That way you can train it to grow in the opposite direction and get another branch under that light right over top of the container. Might maximize your lighting even further. Of course a Scrog could do much the same with the wide canopy.

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