Humidity is KILLING my AC Unit

[hwy420]

My room dimensions are very difficult to detail, but I have around 400 cubic feet of grow space with two 600W lamps. I have a 8" CAN Fan w/ .38 Special Can 50 Filter and adjustable fan speed dial about half speed 400CFM's.

I got my auto-evaporative Portable 'dual hose' AC Unit hooked up, and temps were great 75 & holding for the first 24 hours; then I noticed the AC Unit started leaking water at the bottom at an alarming rate (filling a small bathroom trash can within 24 hours), and my temps started going up & up to 80-90 degrees. My AC Did not stop running and my humidity held at around 50-65%.

Would a de-humidifier help ? I'm thinking about buying two 50-60 pints b/c I know there is tons of humidity in the room. I've been looking on retail store shelves home inmprovement stores for the past 2 nights and they are sold out of DEHUMIDIFIERS everywhere due to the amount of rain we have been having lately. I found one on cregslist, and am meeting a man today.

I'm thinking I have too much airflow and from that excess airflow, there is too much evaporation from my hydroponic growing chambers by my 600W lights.

How much CFM air flow should there be in two 6" magnum xxxl cooled reflectors with 600W lamps?

 

[Straight up G]

Try Ebay it never lets you down, are you sure the A/c doesn't have a de-humidify function that is currently activated as many do and may explain a lot..

 

[Jerry Garcia]

Can you drain your water into a larger receptacle, like a 5-gal bucket?

Is your a/c actually an air conditioner and not an evaporative cooler? If so, you should just invest in a real portable a/c...5,000 btu at least. They effectively cool and dehumidify at the same time. Probably a better solution than adding a second unit to your room...

Edit: I don't know how much cfm you need for your magnum xxxl huge-o reflector, but my little 6" super sun II requires a minimum of 250 cfm.

 

[hwy420]

Try Ebay it never lets you down, are you sure the A/c doesn't have a de-humidify function that is currently activated as many do and may explain a lot..

Yes, my AC Unit has a dehumidifier that automatically evaporates the water out the exhaust hose. It's a Delonghi PAC L90 (Most 'dual hose' portable AC units perform this way without an option). My AC Unit is 10,000BTU and hasn't stopped running, and starts dripping water out of the bottom of the housing (where it's not supposed to) and it appears there is so much humidity that it cannot evaporate it fast enough nor cool it below 90degrees. My AC Unit should not be running constantly at 1100 Watts, for a 400Cubic ft room that has only two 600W bulbs. I'm told I need 3000BTU's of cooling per 1000W, and I have 10,000BTU's. There's simply too much humidity in the room for it to dehumidify it by itself. I think I need a stand alone dehumidifier to quit working it so hard.

Can you drain your water into a larger receptacle, like a 5-gal bucket?

Edit: I don't know how much cfm you need for your magnum xxxl huge-o reflector, but my little 6" super sun II requires a minimum of 250 cfm.

Yes; I could probably get a larger bucket. The problem is that I should not be draining anything from my port ac unit that has an auto-deumidify function & an auto-evaporative function. It's supposed to evaporate it out the exhaust hose. My AC Unit is being way overloaded. How can I prevent the huge amounts of humidity to begin with?

 

[kotten148]

It sounds like you ac might be freezeing up that's all idk though man

 

[hwy420]

It sounds like you ac might be freezeing up that's all idk though man

I'll keep any eye out on it for ice forming;

How do normal Air Conditioning units that are subject to 100% humidity react? Air Conditioning units dehumidy air by running hot/humid air over cold copper coils. (Have you ever noticed condensation sticking to a cold glass of icewater?) The cold copper attracts the water molecules, which stick to the copper and run down into a drip pan which is designed to inject that water into the exhaust hose. If there's 100% humidity passing over those, the cold coils aren't cold enough to actually

What would happen to an AC Unit constantly barraged with 100% humidity?

 

[growlegal]

Do you have both hoses vented to the outdoors?

 

[hwy420]

Do you have both hoses vented to the outdoors?

Yes, but they are going into my attic and they are not spaced very far apart. I'm going to add about 10 ft of ducting on the exhaust hose and put it in the middle of my attic, so my intake hose doesn't bring in 90% of already exhausted air. Thanks for asking; It's definately something I need to fix.