Upgrading grow room, sealed, hands free, need help!

Hey guys gonna be upgrading my grow room here for the summer / long haul and want some advice on what to do. Maybe you guys can help me out.. I want this room to be completely hands off other than the waterings / trimmings that will need to be done on a regular basis. I am also trying to price it out. I am willing to go the extra mile to make sure I don't have to stress about room conditions at all, and to insure maximum yields.

First off, A/C costs are a premium here in the summer (110+ regularly) , so I need to convert to a sealed room environment. The room I am working with is roughly 11x11x8:

3-4k of hps / mh (haven't decided completely yet.. already have the equipment for 3k)
18k - 24k of Ductless minisplit - (need to buy and install) 1200 ish
Co2 (already have the tank / regulator) **** Need some sort of controller to maintain ppms at a constant level
Humid / dehumid *** need some sort of controller to maintain humidity at roughly 45 %
drain / water supply for humid / dehumid *whats the best thing to do here?

First off... these minisplits probably don't work with environmental controllers such as the chhc-4, or am I mistaken? If so I would probably just pick up one of those and plug everything (minisplit, humidifier, co2) right into that and call it a day. I am not able to get any good info on this so far tho.

If that doesn't workout however, I will probably have to just lean on the thermostat of the Minisplit, combined with an independent humidistat/ co2 controller...?

Am I getting this right? What would you guys do?

Hey bud, sounds like you are almost there. Couple things:

Those minispilts don't work in conjunction with your Environmental Controller. The best way to use them is just find the right temperature on the unit that will keep the temperature on your plants where you want it. Will probably be around 5 degrees colder than your temperature setpoint. If you can't control the cooling of your room from the environmental controller then it's really not worth getting one. Your a/c is going to be your dehumidifier during the light cycle so I would suggest just getting a 30-50 pint dehumidifier and leaving it on the other side of the room. Just leave it on 24/0. It will only work when it has to which will mainly be at night. A suggestion is to build a table for it to stand on so that it is a few feet off the ground. Then you can stick a 55 gallon garbage can or drum next to it and have the drain water pour into there. The water from a dehumidifier is around 25-45ppm so it is very clean and can be used to water your plants. Just make sure you clean the air filter once a week. If I were you I would just get a Co2 monitor/controller. I like the C.A.P. PPM3 just because it's digital, small, and easy to use. No need to get a big old box hanging in the room.

Just my thoughts man...good luck.

phillipchristian said:

Hey bud, sounds like you are almost there. Couple things:

Those minispilts don't work in conjunction with your Environmental Controller. The best way to use them is just find the right temperature on the unit that will keep the temperature on your plants where you want it. Will probably be around 5 degrees colder than your temperature setpoint. If you can't control the cooling of your room from the environmental controller then it's really not worth getting one. Your a/c is going to be your dehumidifier during the light cycle so I would suggest just getting a 30-50 pint dehumidifier and leaving it on the other side of the room. Just leave it on 24/0. It will only work when it has to which will mainly be at night. A suggestion is to build a table for it to stand on so that it is a few feet off the ground. Then you can stick a 55 gallon garbage can or drum next to it and have the drain water pour into there. The water from a dehumidifier is around 25-45ppm so it is very clean and can be used to water your plants. Just make sure you clean the air filter once a week. If I were you I would just get a Co2 monitor/controller. I like the C.A.P. PPM3 just because it's digital, small, and easy to use. No need to get a big old box hanging in the room.

Just my thoughts man...good luck.

Click to expand...

Sick man... will I ever need to be adding humidity to my room? If so should i get the cap hum-1 + an analog humidifier alongside the dehuey?

1337hacker said:

Sick man... will I ever need to be adding humidity to my room? If so should i get the cap hum-1 + an analog humidifier alongside the dehuey?

Click to expand...

Normally you are either 1 way or the other. Meaning you either need humidity or you need to dehumidify. The differentials aren't normally that large that you need both so I wouldn't worry about it. I have seen some guys add humidity to their veg rooms but you can do this with a cheap $20 humidifier from Target or Wallmart. In my opinion you want your flower room 45% or below. Obviously you run into other problems if it's too low (less than 20%). I like to keep my veg room at 60-65% as vegging plants actually thrive in more humid environments.

I just saw your thread and created an account to help you out. I too was looking for a controller for the grow room I'm building that would be able raise or lower humidy independently, and i found the Iponic 600 by link4. It will do everything you want, and you can do it from your cell phone.

5150man said:

I just saw your thread and created an account to help you out. I too was looking for a controller for the grow room I'm building that would be able raise or lower humidy independently, and i found the Iponic 600 by link4. It will do everything you want, and you can do it from your cell phone.

Click to expand...

I looked into those a while back but you can't hook up minisplit's, air handlers, or any 240v a/c. What's the point in dropping $1200 if your controller won't control the cooling. I'm running the Agrowtek GC-Pro right now. Test model I got from my distributor. You can actually hook up 2 seperate rooms with independent controls.

I find in a sealed room lack of humidity is rarely a problem.

Is noise an area of concern? I ask because I got a dehumidifier for around $90 at Home Depot that has been working for over a year (despite having to jerry rig the power cable after my then puppy chewed threw it). Works great manages from 45 - 90% humidity, but the fan on high is kinda loud, I'm sure you can find a $200 one that makes less noise. Another thing to keep in mind when purchasing the dehumidifier is how often do you want to dump it? Mine is a small 4qt reservoir I dump it about every 2/3 days depending on the weather, I believe they make 13qt ones obviously the bigger the reservoir the more room it'll take up in your room.

phillipchristian said:

Normally you are either 1 way or the other. Meaning you either need humidity or you need to dehumidify. The differentials aren't normally that large that you need both so I wouldn't worry about it. I have seen some guys add humidity to their veg rooms but you can do this with a cheap $20 humidifier from Target or Wallmart. In my opinion you want your flower room 45% or below. Obviously you run into other problems if it's too low (less than 20%). I like to keep my veg room at 60-65% as vegging plants actually thrive in more humid environments.

Click to expand...

Also running your flowering room at 45% or less will detour mites, they don't do well under 50% humidity, don't ask me why I know so much about mites... Azamax, Azamax, Azamax!!!