Alright, I've busted out the Paint and gone to town in designing a grow space. I'd love any input from you folks! This will house a 400 watt switchable HID, two bubble buckets, and a reservoir. The cabinet will be in a (very old!) detached garage with a cement-slab floor. For this reason, water spillage containment (below the level of any electronics, mind you) is not high on my list of priorities. The back of the cabinet will only be a foot from the thin wooden walls, so the ventilation runs will be easy and most importantly, very short. They will not even have any turns, except for the loop inside the cabinet attached to the end of the cooltube. (I assume a loop like that is necessary for adjusting the lamp height.) The passive intake holes and active exhaust hole would both open out onto the same exterior wall of the garage, vertically separated by, say, 6 or 7 feet. I'm not sure if I need 6" or 4" tubing (cooltube is 6") - 6" is probably simpler, because I've locally sourced a 6" 250cfm inductor fan for $40 (the db200). I haven't researched fans enough yet, so I'm not sure this would be enough for my needs. If the extension cords for all my devices are long enough, I would prefer to have the power strip outside the cab, on the shelf with the ballast. If not, well, then the strip is secured to the adjustable shelf, I guess. Timer would go on the outside. Before I get started wielding powertools in an enthusiastic and inept manner, I thought I'd offer up my plan to the scrutiny of this great community of experts. Please don't hold back. What aspects of my design are sensible, and what aspects suck? Cheers!
I was wondering which side I should put my intakes. I was thinking of intakes on bottom left and exhaust from the top right. My cab is 30" wide so I also thought I could space two or three intakes along the bottom.
Looks good so far, a couple suggestions I can think of since I'm also working on my cabinet.. Make sure you take into account pollen, dirt and bugs with your intakes, since they won't be pulling "clean"(I use the term loosely) indoor air. Even if pulling air from the interior of the garage, you'll still want to filter the incoming air. As for the tubing, as a rule more ventilation is always better. Go with the 6". You'll thank yourself for it. Your lamp will run cooler, allowing you to place it closer to the canopy. More light for plants. Everybody's happy. Also, that fan won't work. With the restriction from the carbon filter, you wouldn't get enough airflow. You need an inline duct fan, not an inline booster fan. Here's what I'll be getting as an example. Any inline duct fan will do, as long as it has a 6" flange (or whatever size your ducting is) and enough CFM. After that, it's all about how much you want to pay. Link - HTGSupply Hope I helped, it looks good so far, just do yourself the favor of getting down to the smallest little details about the cabinet so you cover all your bases before you begin, and you'll be set!
I just received my 4" HTG fan/filter combo. I'll let you know how it works out. Your space is bigger than mine so the 6" is a far better choice.