Hello fellow ICMaggers, I am in the planning stages of my first perpetual harvest grow. I will be using 8 x Phillips PL-L 50W/3000K CFL's, and 3 x 120mm computer fans for ventilation. The wood that I will be using will be 1/2" thick, except for the base (dark blue in the design images) which will be made from 2x4's.
Below is my cabinet design. But first, some background information: I've been spending the last couple weeks reading up on dr.bud's perpetual grow method. For the design of this cabinet, I drew inspiration from dr.bud's original perpetual harvest grow cabinet, and his newer perpetual harvest setup located here. I also borrowed heavily from Thundurkle, redgreenry, and Anti's work, located here, here, and here respectively.
This is the second iteration of my grow cab design. After having created the mockup of my first design, I had a lot of concerns regarding ventilation. I re-read many of the articles that I consulted before starting my design process, and realized that I made many stupid mistakes because I didn't pay enough attention to what people have already said
.
Anyway, I re-did my design with these new insights in mind, and I decided that my design was ready to share with you guys. I still have a some concerns that I would greatly appreciate advice on. Also, if anybody spots any thing that should be changed that I haven't noticed, please advise.
And without further ado, I present to you, my stealth flowering cabinet design.
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This is a complete view of the cabinet. It's dimensions are roughly 4' x 2' x 3'.
Here is a front view of the cabinet. Flowering room measures at 48.5" x 26.5" x 24". The area that houses the lights is 2" tall (more details below), and the top part of the cabinet where the fans and other electronics will be located is 6" tall.
The fresh air intake is at the bottom center of the cabinet. The hole measures 6" x 8", giving me 48 square inches of intake space for the flowering room. The two diagonal pieces of wood (orange colored) serve to separate the light and flowering room cooling. The small space it creates for exhaust measures at 2" x 26.5" (labeled Flower Exhaust Hole 1 for clarity). Sitting right about that is another exhaust hole for the flowering cabinet which measures 3" x 8" (This is labeled Flower Exhaust Hole 2 in the top view of my cabinet design).
You can better see the layout of the two flowering room exhaust holes in this picture (I forgot to label the exhaust holes in this picture, I'm terribly sorry).
The hole in the center of the cabinet (towards the top) is where the fan which cools the flowering room will sit. I am planning on creating a DIY round carbon scrubber which will be attached to the fan.
Here is the back view of my cabinet design.
The air intake for the lights is in the back of the cab, each hole measuring 1" x 19". Both areas where the CFL's will be are going to be cooled with their own 120mm computer fan. You can better see the holes where the computer fans will sit in the top view of the cabinet (located below).
I plan on separating the lights and the flowering space with two pieces of glass per section (each half will contain four lights). The partition in which the lights will be is 2" high.
The exhaust holes for the whole cab measure 3" x 10" each, giving me a total of 60 square inches of exhaust space.
This is the top view of my cabinet.
Here you can see the the airflow of the flowering room and light exhausts. The fans for the lights sits right above them and exhausts directly into the 6" tall part of my cab.
I apologize for the bad coloring, but the orange walls shaped like a rectangle is where the fan and carbon scrubber for the flowering room will sit. I added this to my cab design to help with light leaks and to separate the exhaust of the lights and flowering room. The fan will also exhaust the scrubbed air from the flowering room into the 6" tall space.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
That is a complete run-down of the design of my cab. I still have a few questions regarding ventilation and woodworking (I have never done any woodworking before). I apologize if my questions are stupid, but I want to make sure all the small details of my cabinet design is good.
Question 1: The fans I will be using to cool the cabinet measure at 120mm, that is roughly 17.53012 square inches of ventilation space. I've read that the intake holes should be double the area of the exhaust fan area. My intake holes for the lights both measure at 1" x 19", giving me 19 square inches of intake. Will this be alright? I figured that since I'm splitting my 8 lights into groups of 4 and cooling each with one fan, I could get away with running my fans on a lower speed, and having less intake per side. Will this be alright?
Question 2: What do you guys think of the flower room exhaust? I had to partition the lights into two sides for maximum light space, and to keep the cab as small as possible. It's a little hard to explain, but basically I didn't have space to fit the flowering room exhaust fan parallel to the ground because of the size of the lights. This is why the flowering room exhaust is perpendicular to the ground, and sitting above the actual flowering room so that the carbon scrubber would fit. And because I wanted to separate the lights from the flowering space with glass, I came up with the two pieces of diagonal wood, creating two exhaust holes. Flower Exhaust Hole 1 = 53 square inches, Exhaust Hole 2 = 24 square inches.
Will the difference in exhaust hole size put too much additional stress on the one fan exhausting the flowering room?
Queston 3: Woodworking question: When building the cabinet, do I apply wood glue, wait for it to dry, then add screws? Or would I screw the screws in while the glue is still drying?
Anyway, that's all the questions I have for now. I apologize for being a little long-winded in my explanations. Any additional comments/suggestions are greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Ryminol
Below is my cabinet design. But first, some background information: I've been spending the last couple weeks reading up on dr.bud's perpetual grow method. For the design of this cabinet, I drew inspiration from dr.bud's original perpetual harvest grow cabinet, and his newer perpetual harvest setup located here. I also borrowed heavily from Thundurkle, redgreenry, and Anti's work, located here, here, and here respectively.
This is the second iteration of my grow cab design. After having created the mockup of my first design, I had a lot of concerns regarding ventilation. I re-read many of the articles that I consulted before starting my design process, and realized that I made many stupid mistakes because I didn't pay enough attention to what people have already said
. Anyway, I re-did my design with these new insights in mind, and I decided that my design was ready to share with you guys. I still have a some concerns that I would greatly appreciate advice on. Also, if anybody spots any thing that should be changed that I haven't noticed, please advise.
And without further ado, I present to you, my stealth flowering cabinet design.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This is a complete view of the cabinet. It's dimensions are roughly 4' x 2' x 3'.
Here is a front view of the cabinet. Flowering room measures at 48.5" x 26.5" x 24". The area that houses the lights is 2" tall (more details below), and the top part of the cabinet where the fans and other electronics will be located is 6" tall.
The fresh air intake is at the bottom center of the cabinet. The hole measures 6" x 8", giving me 48 square inches of intake space for the flowering room. The two diagonal pieces of wood (orange colored) serve to separate the light and flowering room cooling. The small space it creates for exhaust measures at 2" x 26.5" (labeled Flower Exhaust Hole 1 for clarity). Sitting right about that is another exhaust hole for the flowering cabinet which measures 3" x 8" (This is labeled Flower Exhaust Hole 2 in the top view of my cabinet design).
You can better see the layout of the two flowering room exhaust holes in this picture (I forgot to label the exhaust holes in this picture, I'm terribly sorry).
The hole in the center of the cabinet (towards the top) is where the fan which cools the flowering room will sit. I am planning on creating a DIY round carbon scrubber which will be attached to the fan.
Here is the back view of my cabinet design.
The air intake for the lights is in the back of the cab, each hole measuring 1" x 19". Both areas where the CFL's will be are going to be cooled with their own 120mm computer fan. You can better see the holes where the computer fans will sit in the top view of the cabinet (located below).
I plan on separating the lights and the flowering space with two pieces of glass per section (each half will contain four lights). The partition in which the lights will be is 2" high.
The exhaust holes for the whole cab measure 3" x 10" each, giving me a total of 60 square inches of exhaust space.
This is the top view of my cabinet.
Here you can see the the airflow of the flowering room and light exhausts. The fans for the lights sits right above them and exhausts directly into the 6" tall part of my cab.
I apologize for the bad coloring, but the orange walls shaped like a rectangle is where the fan and carbon scrubber for the flowering room will sit. I added this to my cab design to help with light leaks and to separate the exhaust of the lights and flowering room. The fan will also exhaust the scrubbed air from the flowering room into the 6" tall space.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
That is a complete run-down of the design of my cab. I still have a few questions regarding ventilation and woodworking (I have never done any woodworking before). I apologize if my questions are stupid, but I want to make sure all the small details of my cabinet design is good.
Question 1: The fans I will be using to cool the cabinet measure at 120mm, that is roughly 17.53012 square inches of ventilation space. I've read that the intake holes should be double the area of the exhaust fan area. My intake holes for the lights both measure at 1" x 19", giving me 19 square inches of intake. Will this be alright? I figured that since I'm splitting my 8 lights into groups of 4 and cooling each with one fan, I could get away with running my fans on a lower speed, and having less intake per side. Will this be alright?
Question 2: What do you guys think of the flower room exhaust? I had to partition the lights into two sides for maximum light space, and to keep the cab as small as possible. It's a little hard to explain, but basically I didn't have space to fit the flowering room exhaust fan parallel to the ground because of the size of the lights. This is why the flowering room exhaust is perpendicular to the ground, and sitting above the actual flowering room so that the carbon scrubber would fit. And because I wanted to separate the lights from the flowering space with glass, I came up with the two pieces of diagonal wood, creating two exhaust holes. Flower Exhaust Hole 1 = 53 square inches, Exhaust Hole 2 = 24 square inches.
Will the difference in exhaust hole size put too much additional stress on the one fan exhausting the flowering room?
Queston 3: Woodworking question: When building the cabinet, do I apply wood glue, wait for it to dry, then add screws? Or would I screw the screws in while the glue is still drying?
Anyway, that's all the questions I have for now. I apologize for being a little long-winded in my explanations. Any additional comments/suggestions are greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Ryminol
