Hi All, I have a few concerns about my veg area which is a 2x4 cabinet that is 3 ft high and in an upstairs room in my house. It's fairly hot where I live averaging over 100 these days and since it's the upper story things tend to get hotter up there. I have 4 T5 bulbs in there which is also contributing to the heat as well. I have a small AC in the room so it's pretty easy to keep the room temp comfortable and with enough fans etc...i can keep the cab at about 80 degrees most of the time. The bigger problem is that when I close up the cab at night (12:00 AM light off) I just cover it with a heavy moving blanket but the lights turn back on at 6:00 AM, I usually don't get to it for a few hours and by that time it's can get up to 86-90. I have 3 6" fans inside the case and one is right in front and practically mounted to a 6" intake duct. the other two are circulating air and are low as to push up the heat . Above my lights, I have an exhaust duct with a 6" in-line fan on it that moves 250 CFM sucking the hot air from the light upwards and out. normally during the daytime when the light are on I just have the front open or I hang a strip of mylar which leave some room at top and bottom for circulation but even that brings up the temp. My first thought was that I need to get something lighter weight to cover the cab at night figuring a lighter weight fabric or something wouldn't retain as much heat. but light-weight and opaque to block the light makes it a hard thing to find. I'm wondering if i were to take some green plastic (say a cheap plastic table cloth or double up a green sheet) and put that over at night it would help reduce the heat and the green light coming through would not bother the plants. Could that work? I've been reading around and I see people that cover a flashlight or headlight with green plastic to enter their flower tents after dark so why not a full green "door" The other thought I had was to have some glass cut the size of the box and affix it just a few inches below the T-5s to separate them from the plants and make it easier to that exhaust to pull the hot air from the lights. The only other thing I have considered was taking two 180 LED UFOs from my flower tent and switching them with the T-5s since they're probably cooler. That would leave my flower tent with a platinum led 300 and (2) T-5 fixtures 4' with two HO54 bulbs each (of course i'd switch those to a red spectrum. I figured I could hang the T-5 slightly to the sides of the plants to penetrate the lower parts of the flowering plants if I went this route. My flower tent is in the basement which stays quite a bit cooler. Any thoughts or ideas would be great! I'll follow up with some pics from my phone Thanks in advance, Troy
Here are a few pics of the setup... Here's the full view...AC on the left and tower fan are pointing toward the box. The dark right corner to the right of the box is here the intake duct is and it's very cool in that corner. overview of the box....two 6 inch fans on the right side blowing slightly upward (one is blocked by the plants.) the one on the right is drawing intake from the room. From here you can see how maybe a slice of pane glass under the light might bock the heat and let it be sucked out more effectively because of the smaller area. The 4" duct on the left is just an old one that I stuck into the AC vent for the central air and covered around it with blankets. Not sure it[s doing anything but figured it couldn't hurt since the air is on most of the time these days. Here is the exhaust duct from inside the box....you can see it's positioned right above and between the two dual T-5 fixtures. <article><blockquote class="messageText ugc baseHtml" style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial, Georgia, TimesNewRoman, Times, serif; line-height: 1.4;">Here's the the exhaust duct from the outside top of the box...this vents to the outside though a window along with the AC. Not sure if any of this helps but thought I'd throw them up anyhow.</blockquote></article>