DIY Scrubber Help Please

[Bentus]

Hello all this is my first post.

I've been trying to comprehend the "how big a scrubber" formula from the DIY scrubber post and my brain is really starting to hurt. If anyone could please help me that would be great.

I have a 449 cfm fan and would like to use a 6" inner core with an 8" outer core. I either need a 24" core or 27" I can't figure it out.

If it matters my grow area will be roughly 36 cubic feet with 208 watts of cfl's.

Also, once I know the height of the filter, should I cut my hardware cloth a little larger to make up for the cap, reducer, and hose clamps? Seems if I were to cut my hardware cloth at 24"(or 27") the area of exposed carbon will be lesser seeing as the hardware cloth has to be wrapped around the caps and secured.

 

[Bentus]

please, some one help me

 

[FreezerBoy]

Something isn't adding up. You've a huge fan with a gigantic filter in a relatively small, seemingly under lit garden. While 24 inches sounds like gross overkill for the garden, it's a good size for your fan. While much larger than the garden needs now, it will accommodate larger lamps later. Until then, it should last a much longer time.

 

[Bentus]

Thanks for the reply FreezerBoy.

I went with the 6" fan so i could throttle it back as needed, and maybe use it in the future for a larger area. I was worried about the 4" being able to move enough air. At first I was just gonna do the Stanley BlowerFan series of mods but it was going to be a decent amount of work to set it up properly and I really don't want to screw it up and get busted.

And yea the filter is going to be enormous in relation to the size of the grow area...I've been sitting here looking at all the parts on my floor for days trying to figure exactly what I need. I've been reading up on growing for the last 6 weeks and there are so many formaulas and variables and opinions it can get a little overwhelming when I'm just trying to keep things simple.

I've got 8x 26w CFL bulbs for veg and flower. I only plan on growing 2 plants at a time. That gives me 104w and 6800 lumens per plant, is that really considered underlit? I thought it was going to be more than enough.

Any way I just wanna grow my own weed. If I've seriously miscalculated what I need please tell me now while I can still return stuff.

 

[FreezerBoy]

My problem is that you gave cubic footage rather than square footage. You're about twice the volume of my cab in which I run a 250 and know a 150 is too small, let alone 104.

Multiply square footage by 50 watts for minimum light requirements.

Run through this for some basic understanding on fan needs Ventilation 101

Because of CFLs limited penetration, Check out LST and ScrOG
LST-Bushes are better
ScROG Links

While I feel you're in overkill with the filter in terms of the garden size, it matches your fan size. A filter "too small" for the fan will fail prematurely. If you think you'll NEVER increase your wattage or space, you might consider a smaller fan/filter. If you think you may someday move up to HIDs or increase wattage, I'd keep it.

If you're doing the DurbanPoison DIY, I just built one and it work's great.

 

[Bentus]

Well I guess I started running into problem earlier than I thought. I was told by another member I needed 200+ cfm to correctly vent and scrub my area.
i really wanted a Vortex in-line fan which only come come rated at 170 cfm (too low) and 450 cfm ( higher than required), so I had no other choice than to get the larger 6" 450 cfm fan. I didn't realize at the time that the scrubber would be the size of a torpedo.

So yea, I really think my ventilation at this point is overkill for 2 plants. I initially had intended on having a 2'w x 2'd x 3't veg/flower chamber in a ngb style cab but when I started doing all the math, everything started getting larger and larger for some reason.

Also, initially I wanted this setup to be small and stealthy, it seems its getting very large and loud. I was fine having a little-too-big fan so I could dial it back a bit and cut down on noise but fuck, I'm building a monster =/

Maybe I need to start over from the beginning, here's what I feel I need:

*1/2 - 1 ounce a month to remain self sufficient

*cfl lighting for veg and flowering (dunno why, just like the ease of using cfl's, may switch to HID in the future if I dont get the quantity/quality i'd like)

*Hydro. Seems like it would be easier for me (personally) to maintain, although the air pumps are rather noisy...but soil seems so slow...

*Scrog. No issues here, fully understand it.

*Cabinet grow. I cant dedicate and entire room or closet so it has to be disguised as a piece of furniture. Most likely a cabinet in my bedroom closet, fairly close to my bed so noise will be a big concern.

*Carbon Scrubbed. I have neighbors so there cant be any odor.

*Quiet. It will be located somewhere in my bedroom and my place isn't very big. I'd like to be able to sleep at night and avoid any "what the hell is that noise?" questions from guests.

*Veg/Flower in one chamber. Right now I dont need to do the whole perpetual harvest strategy, just back to back grows for personal consumption. I really really liked Yukons cabinet but it seemed like vegging had to take place in a whole other area as the one side was designed for moms and clones. I'm starting with seed so I don't have these requirements yet. I'm perfectly fine with going from seedling -> vegetative -> flower -> harvest all in one compartment.


I've been cramming my brain full of info from all of these posts for so long now i'm starting to get frustrated lol. Read all the how-to's and people's personal designs and I just cant find something that seems like it would work fo me. Not that my requests are so unique.
Now don't get me wrong, I posted here because I knew something wasn't right and I knew I needed some criticism but i'm at the point where i'm very very far off track and reallly need some advice. Or someone just throw me a link to someone who has done something similar, that works too.

Bentus

 

[FreezerBoy]

At 2x2, 200 watts is fine. Enough smoke is subjective but, my 250 CMH has me buried to the point of being uncomfortable.

If there's an exhaust in the room, there will be exhaust noise in the room. Period. Your choices are: move it, mask it or pin it on a patsy. If you can't put the fan or exhaust duct in the attic and you don't care to mask it with a louder noise, muffle it as best you can and put it next to an aquarium or computer server etc to take the blame for the noise.

My old axial was much louder than my new S&P. However, because the axial sounded like a beat up old freezer, it was pure stealth. S&P is an advertisement, now my freezer makes non freezer noises. I'll probably put a small axial underneath simply for the mechanical whrr that sounded so perfect before.

 

[Bentus]

Whats the size of that freezer, something like 2'x2'x4' ?

 

[FreezerBoy]

22"x29"x54" with 250 CMH

A 76 cfm axial was good for cooling and a DIY odorsock but, it couldn't handle a true scrubber. My current 8 Mile at 3 weeks FAR outstank my Destroyer at harvest and quickly killed the odorsock so I had to upgrade.

Note the S&P 100x (135-110 CFM switchable) is pretty quiet. It could easily be slept through. But the noise will be there. No one notices the lion roaring at the zoo, the noise belongs there. Lion roars in the bedroom, everyone notices. Wrong sound, wrong place. If you can show them the noise (freezer, aquarium etc) the noise disappears.

 

[Bentus]

Yea youre absolutely right, just never thought about it that way.


It's funny, the first time I came across the stealth cab concept immediately thought of a refrigerator. Good size, insulated, full of fan and compressor noises, but I dont have a garage or utility room to hold the "beer friidge" so I'll have to come up with something else. Maybe the aquarium is the best way to go.