So i have decided to upgrade from my cfl's to a 150 watt hps cooltube in my cab. My flower cab is 22"wX15"d6"h. I am running a sog flowering when clones get a good set of roots. I am about to go buy everything i need to make my cool tube, and going to order my light/ballast from econolights, using the 150 watt vapor, and remote wire the ballast. Im concerned with keeping temps under control, and would like to keep the tube cool to the touch so i a plant touches it, it doesnt burn. Im unsure of what size cfm fan to get. I plan to spend between 50-100 dollars give or take a lil. I want to do it right, and would rather go overboard and have to attach a speed controller to slow it down if needed. any one have any suggestions? I have an extra 4inch inline duct bootser fan that i could us as an intake if i wanted for the cool tube, or just use a big exhaust fan and pull air out of the cab thru the light and out the cab. Thank guys!
i'm in the same boat as you haha, the fan thing really is odd, from what i hear though, for hid it's ft2 x (10-12) and for cfl it's ft2 x (5-6). 68-82 cfm should be just fine for you then. PC fans may be a good option, there is also this need little fan called the td-100 that people have been talking about, seems like it's really neat. May be a bit overkill but http://www.hvacquick.com/spfnconfig.php?fm=td
I have seen that td-100 fan, and have been thinking about one of these, but not sure if i should go with the td-100, or if i should go up and be really safe and get the td-125 or td-100x. anyone got more info on these, are they worth it, and how loud are they?
Save your money and buy a vortex or a can-fan. IMO if you can stick your finger in it and stop the blade while smiling its garbage CFM ratings are a joke, I could write a novel but my wife would kill me for "pounding" on the keyboard at this hour in bed.
anyone else got any thoughts? I would like to get a vortex but they seem a lil spendy, but i've heard nothing but good things about them. If i do fork out the money, should i go with the 4in or the 6 in? The hurricane glass that i will be using for my cooltube will be 5inches, so either would work, but want the best, would rather have it right the first time than spend even more money trying to cool off my cab and light.
I run a CANFAN 6", remember you can also add a carbon filter on this circuit if you get a decent fan. You will also need a "router speed control" google that. Best of luck...
Have you thought about simply tossing in a couple extra CFL to make up the difference? 150W HPS is pretty energy inefficient. For starters, it actually uses about 200W of power due to transformer loss, and when you take that into consideration, the 150W HPS is only ahead of the CFL's by less than one extra CFL bulb. If you check the link in my signature it's all there. Anyway, for CFL users looking to upgrade to HPS; I recommend the 250W HPS (about 300W of power actually used). If you can't swing 300Watts of power for the lights, I'd just stick with CFL until you can. Good Luck!
i have seen some really amazing things done with 150 watt hps in small cabs in a few grow journals of people pulling great numbers with them. I also plan to add at least two cfl's for extra side lighting, probably two 42 watt 2700K. I would go with a 250 watt hps but i dont know if i could keep it cool, and also can find any for a really good price like the 150 watt ones. if anyone has some suggestions to a good and fairly cheap 250 watt light/remote ballast so i could put it in a cool tube. thanks guys!
You might want to consider getting a 175 MH instead of the 150 HPS. I know Hortilux makes a 150 watt HPS conversion bulb that runs on a 175MH ballast. Not sure about a 150 watt MH conversion bulb, never seen one of those.
I dont really need the mh for veg, i have a mother/clone/veg cab that im using cfl's, and plan to put more in for more light when i upgrade lights in the flower cab. I like the idea of the 175 watt MH ballast with the conversion bulb....can you find 175 watt hps bulbs? also anyone got any thoughts on the inline fans?