I've been trying to come up with a fairly stealthy way to build a growing chamber without spending quite the money that's involved for something like a phototron. This is my first venture into growing, so I'm trying to compromise functionality with price. I'm only planning on one plant, so here's what I'm planning... To make a growing enclosure, I'm going to be using a large metal contractor's trash can (one of the huge metal ones that you see outside of people's businesses, and on farms). I figure this will give more than enough room for plant growth, plus aluminum is good at heat dissipation. And if god forbid some sort of fire would start inside the chamber, the metal might contain it for a few minutes at least. I'm going to angle grind 3 holes on one side of the can, and two slightly larger ones on the other. I'm putting 3 80mm fans on side one for air intake, and 2 100mm fans on the other for exhaust. This way airflow will be constant across the plant, plus a positive pressure will be kept inside of the enclosure to help provide resistance to contams and bugs/pests. The intake fans are going to have dust screens on them (like on an air conditioner), and the exhaust fans are going to have improvised activated charcoal filters on them (two pieces of cheesecloth, and activated charcoal sandwiched between). The inside of the chamber is going to be spraypainted a matte white. For light, I'm going to mount a 400 watt HPS to the lid of the trash can. This way when I need to work with the plant I can just remove the entire lid, with the light, and move it out of my way. I'm considering getting a 400 watt MH conversion bulb for vegetative growing, but I think that might be reserved for round 2. For now I think I might just stick with the HPS. The ballast will be plugged into a timer for the light cycles, which will be plugged into a fused power strip (OR a UPS with power conditioning if i can get my hands on a junk one from work). I'm considering adding a thermal sensor extension cable on to the ballast just to further reduce fire hazards. Also plugged into the power strip will be the fans. I want the fans to keep running whether the light is on or off. They'll be wired into another switch, so that I can manually shut them off if needed. Right now I'm using bag seed since if I screw up, it won't cost me any money. I'm also planning to use soil as my grow medium. If anyone can give some advice to improve the design, please do. I tried to cover all of my concerns with the design, and I'm about to start gathering materials. Thanks guys!
As of this AM I hav 3 sprouts, and I'd like to get them under lights asap. Anyone who can help m at all with my first post, I'd really appreciat it.