Advice on Sealed Rooms Please????

[MichaelVick]

Hey guys. I'm building out a new room and trying to decide how to manage the environment. I would love to have some advice from people doing sealed rooms SUCCESSFULLY. Please pipe up if this is your preferred style.

After talking to my local shop they want me to seal my 12' x 13' flower room and use a 24,000 Btu mini-split to cool the room which contains four 1k HIDs (not air-cooled), a commercial dehumidifier (60-100 pint) and a Co2 generator (propane gas). Since the room has very limited access to outside ventilation (involves cutting exterior walls) they are recommending this approach.

What do you guys think???

I've always just pumped in/out lots of fresh air from outdoors which works fairly well for me in the fall, winter and spring but my new room makes ventilation difficult (only allows venting to the rest of the occupied house, not outdoors). I am hesitant to do a sealed room only because my attempt in the past didn't go so well. Humidity was up around 65-75% and quality suffered. It was also very hard to keep my rez temps down. Just seemed a lot more complex with the higher air temps that are recommended. Not exactly sure what the problem was.

Anyone have advice on how to run sealed rooms properly? Any pointers or checklists would help. Do you EVER need to exhaust the room? I'm getting differing answers to that question. What levels of Co2 should I run?

Thanks for your help as always...

 

[Storm Shadow]

Doggie Door?

 

[overbudjet]

I suppose that you are in hydro since you mention the rez temp issue.2 ton Split A/C should do the work (Good tread for finding the heat load of your room)https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=95259.For Co2 burner go with a water cooled one less heat(if you have cheap acces to H2o).For dehu i will go with at least 100 pints,i use a 75 in my room 2.4k and it barely make it!No exhaust for me,Running C02 at 1200 ppm
R/H day around 60% night 45%,if you are concern by rez temp.buy a chiller it will make your life a lot easyer.If you use U.C. or R.D.W.C.
you will need a lot of Dissolved Oxygene(KEY of these system)in your water so big air pump or maybe water fall (better I.M.H.O.)

 

[myiqis55]

with CO2 the room stays sealed. gotta keep your Co2 in! and that 24000 btu will cool that room fine

 

[HUGE]

I have a very similar setup. 17x12 room 4k aircooled hoods. Santa feel advanced 100pint dehuy. All works well together but where I live it gets well above 100 in the Sumer and the 2.5 ton A/C I have can't keep the room cool on the hottest days so I have to turn on my second A.C. 2 ton to help. But when it's 100 or less outside the 2.5 mini split can handle it. If I were you I would step up to a 3 ton unit and you should be good to go.

 

[TribalSeeds]

If I could get Michael Vick in a sealed room Id leave him in there with my dog and stuff his shorts with chicken!

 

[Floridian]

How come I keep having to post reply?

How come I keep having to post reply?

Used to be I'd get the right screen and just say what I was going to say.Now I have to title all my posts?O man I feel the pressure dont do this.I have a hard time dealing with change.And yea I'd wish a zombie outbreak on that motherfucker

 

[irobot sd]

It all sounds good! 2 ton should dump the coldness in that room. I would only maybe say not to do the co2 burner. If its 12x13 with 4 lights hanging there isn't much room for a burner. I am saying this from experience. With a good 12" to 20" clearance on all side of a burner leaves it smack dab head height in the middle of a room with 8' ceilings. Consider co2 tanks and thats less heat to cool and since you're sealed should be simple.

 

[sherm]

How are you running an ac unit in a sealed room with the co2? Is it being run in cycles or on constantly? I have hot summers here as well. How would this affect the co2?

 

[pezthetoker]

A two ton should cool the room great. As iron it said I would opt for tanked gas if it as option. If you click through some threads some people have had issues that seem to be related to using propane burners, plus the room is not too large anyways. You never need to vent, so long as you never run out of co2. The other issue with sealed rooms is humidity during lights off. When your lights are running, your Ac dehumidifies the air as a side effect of cooling.. So humidity is not as much of a problem. When your lights go out your humidity will skyrocket, so your best option for the most control is a dehumidifier. Good ones are a little pricey. A quest 110 would probably do well in there. Beware shitty dehumidifiers. Some companies rate their "pints per day" using different temperature and humidity levels.. So it can be a bit deceiving. You will need a good controller for your co2, and one for the humidity would be nice if you want really good control. You will need a couple co2 tanks and a regulator also. Doing the mini split yourself can lead to problems too. It should really be installed by an hvac guy because they are supposed to pull vacuum on it. To do it right yourself you would need a few tools. How much of the room are you planning to light? I would a light less than the whole room and use movable reflective walls or curtains to keep all the light in the area where your plants are. Use the area with no plants for your reservoir and dehu. Use reflectors with No glass if you want the best production. Have fun.

 

[pezthetoker]

And I would run co2 between 900-1200 somewhere.

 

[FlowerFarmer]

Advice here is spot on. Not much else to say. Your shop must have some decent knowledge behind the counter.

I like generators, but they do add additional humidity to the room and I have had trouble cooling 4k + generator and dehuey. The dehumidifier does kick on at times even with the AC cooling the lights... at least in my tree room. I'd go up to 3 ton.

Tanks may be a safer bet, but just more of a hassle in my opinion. Sometimes regulator solenoids stick and fail and then you've just dumped your tank. Propane tanks are everywhere for $20 refill. (they should be ran outside for safety concerns)

Sante Fe classic for dehumidifer.. has built in control. I'm playing with a DriEaz 1200 too right now, but needs it's own humidistat. It's rugged and self pumps so it doesn't need to be lifted somewhere up off the floor to drain.

Go with simple Co2 controller if you do the generator. Simple ON/OFF to maintain set-point of 900ppm. Drifting no higher then 1150 or so. I like the SPC-1 from GreenAir, but they are hard to come by now a days. The blueprint compact digital co2 controller seems to be working well so far at a friends. You don't want any of that FuzzyLogic stuff unless you go bottled gas nor do you want any environmental controller.. the AC and Dehumidifer takes care of things just fine independently.


There have been some people with concerns of ethylene buildup from improper combustion with a burner. Make sure your flames burn clean/blue. I believe this stems from burning too much too early before the plants are creating enough o2. I haven't personally had any issues w/ a sealed room. Some recommend venting at night. Bottled gas avoids all of this and is safer in my opinion. A auto changeover between tanks would be super convenient though.

Hope that helps.
Just my 2c.


PS - I don't aim for higher air temps. I'd still suggest 78-82F or so. Too many people use co2 to convince themselves that their excessive temps are optimal.

[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Humidity was up around 65-75% and quality suffered.[/FONT]

Unless your talking about mold I don't think the humidity was the cause of your quality issues. High humidity is preferred for much of the plants life and can be the key to higher yields...It is only reduced to prevent bud rot and powdery mildew typically around week 6+ of flower. High Rez temps-- then yea. I can see that. That is your culprit.

 

[pezthetoker]

Good advice flower farmer. The im only reason I like having a controller for the Dehu is to set it a lot lower at night. As you said the plants grow better with some humidity in the day, but at night is when the problems happen so you can have your dehu run non stop once the lamps are off. If you are using a sentinel, blueprint, autopilot or any of those full controls to do it, you have to turn fuzzy logic mode off for the co2 when using a burner. That is an option on those controls, just have to turn them to generate so they will not click on and off fast. They are also convenient for keeping track of max/min stats of your environment. They will control your dehumidifier separate day/night to keep a very controlled environment so long as you don't need more than 15 Amps for your dehu

 

[Granger2]

Why on Earth would you choose the name of a sorry assed low down motherfucking bastard for your handle? -granger

 

[moses wellfleet]

fuck Michael vick!... low down dirty animal abuser!

 

[J-zee]

Michael vick ? Really? If ur looking for advise , the only advise i gave for u is change ur name.