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3.A.M
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Registered: 10/17/22
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Grow tent questions
#28473327 - 09/18/23 05:14 AM (4 months, 8 days ago) |
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Hi guys, finally getting my act together and setting up a small tent, trying to go the cheapest route for the time being and hoping what I’m planning will work, thought I’d offer it up for critique. Thinking a passive intake top left of the tent with an inline exhaust fan bottom right and possibly having a small tub next to the intake with a pond fogger, does this in its rough form sound like it could work? obviously barring small details like how often to run timers etc as I’d need to tune that in. It’s only a small tent about 5ft tall and about 3ft wide/deep.
If I really have to then I’ll go with an external tub with fogger and fan forcing moisture into the tent but I’d like to avoid the extra effort if possible, at least until I’m sure my local temps don’t destroy my grows, shits about to get real in my part of the world temperature wise unfortunately. On that note, if I were to freeze a large block of ice each night and place it into my water reservoir with the fogger, would that lower the temperature inside the tent? Cheers!
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seagu

Registered: 03/03/18
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Re: Grow tent questions [Re: 3.A.M]
#28473365 - 09/18/23 06:19 AM (4 months, 8 days ago) |
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Yea your air flow plan will work great. I did that before. What you will want to do is hook up your pond fogger into the intake. A 1 or 3 disc in a 5 gallon bucket outside your tent will work great. I used a 3 disc. So because I had the exhaust(4"inline) always on, low speed, it would pull the mist in through the passive intake every time the pond fogger turned on. No active fan needed to push the fog in. You will Need a circulation fan inside. A cheap 4" computer fan will work.
I have thought of ice in the buckets and such, But never went with it... I installed AC instead.
-------------------- Plan to win or you are planning for failure. Don't let anyone tell you you can't do it. Just figure out the solution. Even if that means banging your head on a wall until the solution oozes out of you.
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3.A.M
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Re: Grow tent questions [Re: seagu]
#28474180 - 09/18/23 07:40 PM (4 months, 7 days ago) |
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Sweet! So you reckon better to have fogger externally rather than just next to the intake hole on the inside? Haven’t run the fogger yet but was hoping it would drift down over everything then have the exhaust on a timer to vent co2 whilst also bringing in fresh air
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Quicksilverdream
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Re: Grow tent questions [Re: 3.A.M]
#28474322 - 09/18/23 09:31 PM (4 months, 7 days ago) |
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Sounds like you're off to a good start.
To clarify, the setup you described has the humidification source on the top shelf of the tent next to the intake right? I'm assuming the passive intake you're describing will basically just be a small hole cut into the plastic covering?
A few thoughts:
- Like the other commenter said, put the tub with the pond fogger outside of the tent. This will make it easier to refill the tub, clean it when it inevitably gets gross, and you'll also avoid the admittedly small risk of the tub tipping over or something else random like that.
- With the fogger outside, you'll need to use some flexiduct to pipe the mist into the tent. It's good that you have the exhaust at the bottom, since you can then duct the mist in through the top of the tent and like the commenters already said, you'll be able to forego an extra fan for pushing the mist up the duct and into the tent because the exhaust should be powerful enough to pull that mist through. The other plus to this is that your humidity should be very even throughout every part of the tent since it's coming in from the top and being sucked down past every shelf layer before being pushed out by the exhaust fan.
- Where are you exhausting to? Unless you're only gonna have like literally 2-3 blocks in there at a time, you should really exhaust that stale sporey air outside so CO2 doesn't buildup in your room. Alternatively, if you are only gonna do a few blocks at a time and can't exhaust to the outdoors at all, you'd probably get away with slapping a filter on the exhaust fan to catch the spores and then just exhausting the CO2 directly into the room your tent is in. This will work a lot better if you have a window or something that you can open to let that CO2 out and prevent it from building up more and more.
- I'd put the humidifier on an interval timer (my preference) or a Inkbird humidity controller and just keep the exhaust fan on at all times since you're growing oysters and they're greedy as hell for oxygen.
Cheers and good luck
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deadmandave
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Registered: 02/16/10
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Just my two cents, for years I had my humidifier on the outside of my tent and ducted in. I recently switched and put the humidifier inside the tent and here's what I learned:
Without ducting the humidifier is way more efficient. Swamps our my fc way faster
Does get a little grosser faster.
Runs out of water quicker.
Less ducting to to clean
Definitely need a fan blowing at the mist to get it off the surface.
Anyways, I'm happier with it inside the tent because of how much more humidity it is generating. I use a 3 disc for a fc which is 140 ft³
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3.A.M
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Registered: 10/17/22
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You guys are awesome! Really appreciate the input, I was literally at the hardware store when I checked my phone and saw the first response so just went ahead and bought a tub with gasket and pvc to pipe into the tent, I didn’t even consider that the exhaust fan would draw the humidity in if the fogger was external And deadmandave, a 3 disc seriously manages a tent of that size?! Think I went overkill with the 6 disc I bought “~” Cheers fellas! Oh, and yeah, easy to vent outside, probably shouldn’t point it at my neighbours though.
Edited by 3.A.M (09/19/23 12:25 AM)
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seagu

Registered: 03/03/18
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Re: Grow tent questions [Re: 3.A.M]
#28474589 - 09/19/23 05:47 AM (4 months, 7 days ago) |
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The shelf on the right is small FC I had that is like what you are putting up. The pic is after I took the plastic off because I built the bigger FC shown on the left before covering in plastic. But you can see in the center the humidibucket and PVC pipe. When I had it on the smaller FC like what you are building I didn't have the shorter extension piece nor the straight pipe on the top. I just had the 1 PVC pipe and elbow. But as you can see you would have more FC room to fruit more mushrooms if you have it outside such a small FC.
And if you look in the center of the bottom of the window you can see the inline exhaust fan hooked up to pink foam board insulation going outside. I now have a much bigger FC space and I pipe it outside and often stand next to where it pipes out with no problems. It is faced to the ground. But the point is I don't get any problems from the spores even while standing next to the exhaust. Though I am not sticking my head into the exhaust or anything like that. So your neighbors won't have any problems even if you faced it towards them. 
A 3 disc will power both of those FC's in my pic. Some of what effects the size of the FC that a humidifier will power has to do with the temperature. Higher temps hold more water. So it takes a significant more amount of water to produce fog in higher temps than in colder temps. For example in the winter months you could power a larger FC easy with fog so thick you can't even see the wall 8 feet away nor the shelves 2 ft away with a 3-6 disc, but once spring and summer hits you would need a 9 or 12 disc for the same FC space. Which is why I now use an XL 12 disc. But my current FC is larger than what you are building. And your 6 disc will definitely power your FC. Even a 3 disc would have.
Currently I do have my humidifier inside my FC. Because I was messing around with 2 3 discs to produce more fog without the PVC. And because i have the space. Though I do plan on moving it outside my FC eventually because my XL 12 disc produces crazy amounts of fog. Though I still have to figure out how to make it super easy to clean the PVC pipe without producing drip points.
-------------------- Plan to win or you are planning for failure. Don't let anyone tell you you can't do it. Just figure out the solution. Even if that means banging your head on a wall until the solution oozes out of you.
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3.A.M
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Registered: 10/17/22
Posts: 848
Loc: Oz
Last seen: 1 hour, 46 minutes
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Re: Grow tent questions [Re: seagu]
#28474601 - 09/19/23 06:18 AM (4 months, 7 days ago) |
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I like that setup seagu, and with what you explained about temps effecting fog density I’m def glad I got the extra discs now
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volleyshroom
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Registered: 05/14/23
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Re: Grow tent questions [Re: 3.A.M]
#28477749 - 09/21/23 02:58 PM (4 months, 5 days ago) |
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I set up my first fruiting tent a few months ago, a 3'x3'x7', and have a similar setup to the one you're describing. I have an external humidifier tote with a 9 disc fogger with its own ducting and it's been more than enough for my 65-78 F space. I went with the 9 disc because I plan on eventually scaling up to a a larger tent. For airflow, I have an intake and exhaust fan that run on an interval dependent on what I'm growing and quantity of blocks in the tent. I've found that I could get by with just one fan, either exhaust or intake depending on whether you prefer running negative or positive pressure, but having both gives me a little more control. Send me a PM if you want to talk about it! I'm always looking for ways to improve my fruiting chamber too.
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Qenwi
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Registered: 04/15/23
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Sounds good i might try you setup soon
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volleyshroom
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Re: Grow tent questions [Re: Qenwi]
#28494612 - 10/06/23 04:25 PM (3 months, 21 days ago) |
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Tell us how it goes! A few other observations and tidbits I've learned from my fruiting environment:
- Clean your tent on a regular basis. Don't think you're impervious to mold! Stay on top of it. - I'd prefer to have my humidifier directly in my tent than ducted in so as to not provide another place for mold to grow. Keeping the ducting clean isn't challenging, but it's yet another regular maintenance task that you can add to your schedule. Additionally, humidifiers are more efficient when in the tent as some of the moisture in the air will accumulate on the surface of the ducting. Once I get a bigger tent, my humidifier is going inside. - In a tent with such small volume, conditions are far from stable. Just being in the same room as the tent can raise the CO2 from 500 to 1000 PPM relatively quickly, depending on what kind of ventilation there is. Most species don't mind, but some Hericiums can be very picky.
- If you're trying to save money, you can get by easily with one exhaust fan and no intake. As long as the rated CFM is higher than the volume of the tent, there are configurations that will result in plentiful FAE. I like the control and streamlined air exchange of having both fans, though.
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