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Keeping the temps down in Summer


420SA
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Thought I'd start a thread where we can share our methods on keeping our temps down on our indoor grows.

 

With these heatwaves flying around every possible measure is needed before making the expensive investment of an AC

 

Feel free to share your methods :-peace

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You can get them at most places like builders or game for about R1000 for a proper unit. They look like portable ac units and sold as air coolers not air conditioners. You can also diy them really easily , Google has many vids. I have even modded mine with peltier thermal chips to keep them a bit cooler. They pull about 70w for the big units and with the thermal chips mine pull about 140w and run about 7 degrees cooler than ambient .

Cheers

GLO

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This is the biggest problem with indoor gardens in South Africa. Our damn ambient temps dont favour indoor growing temps at all.

 

Swamp coolers in my opinion are a waste of time. Ive been trying to get mine to drop my temps like you say reaf but dammit it is so minimal.

And when it counts in flower where you need LOW temps, the humidity they put out can cause mayhem in a garden (PM, Botrytus...)

 

Growing in a room with temps reaching +35degc isn't ideal at all... but its doable.... Ive done it. But the results will be way less than a controlled room

 

So now we are left to save our money to buy an air con... But then thats out of reach to a lot of people with them starting at R4k+-

 

So the next best option is to keep the root zone as low as possible. (18-22 IDEAL) So with any kind of Hydro system, you would be using a water chiller for an aquarium @6k+- or like us peasants use frozen 2L coke bottles, replacing them as often as they need to be replaced. So that then requires lots of deep freezer space.

Or you could do a DIY on a office water dispenser, or a chest freezer, by making coils inside inside the freezer compartment and running a small pump, so as to run the reservoir thru the "freezing" piping. This should lower your temps a couple degrees depending on what you surround your piping with... IE; Ice, dry ice, A water bath with salt and iso?...

 

If anyone on this forum sells aircons etc.... please come forward...

 

Awe:-peace

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Yea unfortunately swamp coolers have there issues and only work effectively if you with a low humidity. Running your cab at 35 is also risky as it will cause stress and my cause hermies. 

 

Have a look at peltier thermal chips if ypu are a handy guy it's easy enough to make a nice water cooler for hydro.

 

Unfortunately growing indoors in Africa in summer is a problem and for me there 2 schools of though , either bite the bullet and get AC or try diy to just try keep temps down below 33 ( would never let my room go above that). I have done the diy thing and have successfully brought my temps to 29 from 32 , it's all I need atm but cone winter when  AC units are on special I will get one

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Definitely a problem in SA, especially as this is the hottest summer in 50 years.

 

Try switch lights to run at night, 8pm - 8am which will help by a few degrees. Veg you can run lights from 5pm - 11am skipping the hottest part of the day. 

 

Have good ventilation to change the air as fast as possible, and a big must for me is air cooled hoods. Couldn't imagine trying to run bird wings at this time of year. I have put intake fans in my grow too whereas in winter I can just do a passive intake. So I am pumping fresh air in.

 

You can also dim and raise your lights during the heat of the day. Everybody wants to give their plants full power but there's no use pumping a 600w on full when the plants are being destroyed by heat. On these extremely hot days dim it to 400 or even 250 and you'll see a huge difference. Once the sun goes down you can crank them back up and give the plants more light.

 

I bit the bullet and bought a 12000BTU portable air con. It's making a fantastic difference, had my flower room on 28.5 yesterday where it would normally hit 36/37 minimum. That's running during the heat of the day, I actually just changed over this morning to have the room run through the night rather so that should bring me down even more.. As Reaf says, 27 is an ideal temp. The downfall of AC is that you need to vent it through a hole or window and when your girls start stinking it can be a problem as the AC vent's that air. I haven't thought about how I will deal with this... I am going to have to deal with it if and when it happens. At full power mine runs at 1350w so you can expect a jump in your elec bill.

 

Another problem I found with good extraction and ac is you can lose that cool air fast, to solve this I have put my extractor on an analog timer which has 15 minute slots. I run it 15 on and 15 off during the 12 hours of lights on. At lights off it runs constantly for the next 12 hours. This gives the AC a chance to actually cool the room without the cold air getting sucked straight out. As I said above I am pumping fresh air in too so my plants are getting enough of that. 

 

The Ac cost me R5299 but it's either that or forget about growing until May which I just can't do.... I'd spend that 5299 on buying bud in no time if I didn't grow my own.. 

 

In flower plants just cannot sustain temps of 32 and up unless you have strains that can tolerate a bit of heat but even then if they survive you are killing your yields and quality. I have had 2 failed grows due to heat stress. Long spindly growth, small little buds and clawed leaves... both started when temps went over 32 and stayed that way for a couple days.

 

For Veg I have been able to get away with 33 - 34 but even then growth has slowed down and I'm getting some browning on my leaves. It's really not ideal but I can't get another ac right now so I have to just accept it.

 

It is most frustrating, while I love summer I am also watching the weather and shouting and swearing when I see anything above 30.

 

Good luck to all.

IMG_5204.thumb.jpg.a1b09ee2f62c8b56f9abee51867a6897.jpg

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  • 1 year later...

Okay I know this topic has not been touched for a while,

I saw a very interesting DIY thing. i have no idea if it will help. I know I will be trying it as soon as the Temps pic up again.

1x 25L bucket

3x PVC piping ( About 20cm in lenght )

1x Normal wind fan on top of bucket

dry ice

This will allow you to make a small "aircon" at low cost will coll the room down and not lift the humidity at all.

 

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  • 1 month later...
  • 2 years later...

Just remember, dry ice is Co2...carbon dioxide. Be carefull how you use it. In small quantities it might be beneficial for the plants but you could inadvertently creating an atmosphere with reduced oxygen.

Sent from my SM-A500F using Tapatalk

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