DIY inexpensive grow tent

Now that I've got my first grow behind me, and know for a fact that it works, I figured it was time to contribute. I decided that I was simply not willing to spend the prices people ask for grow tents. I wanted a 48"x48"x90" +/- grow tent for a decent footprint and plenty of headroom. That size will easily run $90-100 USD or more. This seems stupid, so I made my own. I didn't take pictures during assembly, and I didn't take it apart to do a proper guide, but I think it's simple enough that I can answer any questions that come up.

As far as I know, nobody has posted anything like this. Just something I came up with, so here it is.

Here's what I did:

1. I based this entire build on a snowmobile crate. They already come in the dimensions I wanted, they're free, and they make the project nearly effortless. You can also get PWC (jet skis, etc) crates from dealers if snowmobiles aren't a thing where you are. No guarantee on dimensions.
   
   *The crate will probably be broken down to separate sides. Grab 4 sides that are the same dimensions (the pile isn't always in order!), plus tops and bottoms if you want a ceiling and floor. I happened to be placing this on a cement floor with a drain in a room that could be blacked out, so I skipped these as unnecessary complications in my situation.
   
   
2. Get enough Panda-film (henceforth PF) to make your 4 walls (plus ceiling and floor if applicable.) A 10'x25' covered all 4 walls with extra left over.
3. Cut an old milk jug or two into squares big enough for staples or screws. These provide a washer of sorts to prevent the PF from tearing.
4. Wrap 3 of your walls with PF from the inside. Staple / screw it along the edges with the plastic washers you made. If you start at the top and work your way down, it'll stay fairly tight even without an extra set of hands to help stretch it. It would probably work better if you had the hands, but not essential.
5. Re-assemble the crate so it is standing up with the PF on the inside, with the 4th wall having no PF at all. This will be your door. If your crate was built like mine, there will be one side that is designed with overhangs that you can use to screw it together. If not, scrap lumber can solve that easily.
6. The door has a couple of options, depending on how crafty you are and how budget you want to be. As you can see in the pictures, I simply made two overlapping flaps of PF. (Technically, the outer layer isn't PF, it's the plastic the crate was wrapped in from the snowmobile factory.) Alternatively, you can simply stretch the 4th side tightly and use a tarp zipper door.
   
   *Having run the entire grow with the flaps, I can tell you that it works just fine, but I'll probably switch to a zipper door for the next grow.
   
   
7. Pick up a single 2x3" piece of dimensional lumber (90-96" long). This will form a very effective brace across the top to hang lights and equipment from. If you dado it out to drop over the frame as I have and simply drop a screw through each dado, it'll be rock solid and never move. I think I could probably hang from the frame with no problems.
   
8. Go inside the tent and mount some scrap lumber / plywood on a wall across the snowmobile crate frame to hang a circulation fan.
   
   *At this point, you'd also want to hang exhaust / intakes if you were using them. With no roof on the tent and running a single 600 watt HPS with cool tubes, I didn't need anything other than the circulation fan to maintain temps and humidity where I wanted them.

9. Start growing!

I started out with three 5 gallon DWC buckets (2 plants and a reservoir). They had no problem filling out the tent completely. Ultimately, the roots grew so solid in the buckets that I decided to switch to the black and yellow 17 gallon totes shown, and just kept the 5 gallon reservoir bucket to fill and drain the totes. The buckets were built directly from Rumple's guide: Lets Build a Bubble Bucket *Step by Step*

I ended up with 9 ounces from my first time ever growing MMJ, from 2 plants. I didn't end up using the SCROG screen I built. Probably a future thing.

Ultimately, for just the "tent", I spent $25-30 on a 4x4x8' tent. Even adding $10 for the zipper door, you're looking at about $40 before lights and exhaust vents.

If you have any questions, or if anything needs a clearer picture, let me know and I'll do my best.

 

I'd have to pay for those. I paid nothing for anything but the Panda on this one. Plus, some people don't feel that CPVC is strong enough, or whatever. I don't care how people choose to do it. I just had a few people voicing interest in this when I mentioned that I had done it, so I posted it.

 

Yup, that's why I specifically mentioned PWC crates in my original post.