ac vs dehumidifier

[Sockfilter]

Nice Thread for sure, I'm also prior HVAC and in a high humidity area.

Although I use small tents, I choose to use a small window unit a/c, that is really installed into a window. The biggest questions that raise in my mind are these"

Where can you install either as both will generate heat that will need to be addressed? The dehumidify will have to be in the grow area and pipe out the rez, otherwise standing water in the grown room will just add to the humidity..

Very limited as to where you can install a wall shaker, however a split system would address the heat issue as well as the condensate, but more money.

Since my tents are arranged close to my window and wall shaker, I just run some aluminum 4" clothes dryer flex ducting to the intake of the tents from the exhaust of the wall shaker, with proper exhaust, I have created a decent temp/RH for my little area.

Your grow area is much bigger OJH so more options/situations to weight out.

Good Luck Brother..

[Sockfilter]

oldjarhead100. Slang for little A/C window unit.. If I am not mistaken you are in a basement which would mean your location is probably a bit cooler than mine, so heat generated from a dehumidifier may irrelevant for ya and I must agree that a properly setup dehumidifier may be your best option when weight out install complexity and $$..

[Chefbjy]

I've heard them called wall bangers too. 😉

[Sockfilter]

Chefbjy yeppers, lots of slang, heard of the lovely swamp coolers..lol, not sure they have a place in cannabis cultivation, unless you are in a 0% humidity area..lol..

[hycheese]

I think I will have to go with a dehumidifier even a 5k ac would be to big for my room its around 400 sq, feet thanks all for the input . I just love all the knowledge thats available on this forum and the people are so willing to share it really is a community of growers with experience in everything else as well lol

Is 400 sq.ft. the size of your cellar that you have the 6'x10' room in? is that just a dirt floor? What are the actual Temp & Humidity?

I made my house too tight on my last remodel and suffered from 80% humidity year round as I was also over a dirt crawl space. I tore up my flooring and put heavy plastic sheeting down, insulated then refloored.

I am still suffering from 60%+ and am planning on installing a Heat Recovery Ventilator (HRV) soon. They exhaust stale wet air and bring in fresh dry air via a heat exchanger so as not to lose all the money spent to heat/cool the house.

I also installed 4 mini-split heat pumps so I can zone control for optimal efficiency even then I cannot lower the humidity to an acceptable level without dropping the temperatures to a meat locker.

The dehumidifier I bought for my 10'x10' grow room will pull a pint an hour as will most small window air conditioners but they will only do that while it is cooling the room which may only be a few hours a day. My dehumid unit draws 300 watts which costs me about 10 cents every 3 hours that it runs, the window AC costs about 10 cents every 2 hours it runs.

[oldjarhead100]

My room is 6' wide and 10 long it has a concrete floor inside the room and my rh is running between 65 and 78 percent, down from 90 by turning the exhaust fan on 24/7 one wall is just sheet rock so I can go threw it if needed . I have a 4 inch inline fan for fresh air but its unplugged the exhaust fan pulls in enough fresh air with out the 4 inch fan running . My RH is high from watering everyday till run off I vacum all the saucers ,some are still wet hence the high RH when this grow is done I will redo the drain system,

[Sockfilter]

Good Morning OJH, Agreed, if RH is this big of an issue, any standing water will just add to the issues, regardless if runoff or condensate collected from a dehumidifier, definitely need to brainstorm getting that standing excess H2O out of the grow area, preferably automated..lol

[oldjarhead100]

Thats the idea ,I have a drain system in place but used 1/4 inch tubing it was absolutely to small.

[Sockfilter]

Oh yeah OJH..

I came to coco ass backwards than most, having run several 4'x'4 flood and drain tables in 20'x15' flower room, 40gal rez for each and all hydroton, totally automated. Way too much overhead so dialed it way down to 2 little 2'x4' tents, thinking coco is a GREAT in between (hydroton vs. soil) that I can easily manage with hand watering due to my crappy research and thinking that I would only need to water 1x daily.

Now that I have figured out I freaking CAN'T drown my coco girls and that they actually VERY much like to get fed damn near ever 4hrs (in flower, small pots, 60/40 coco/perlite, yeah I am starting to wonder why the hell I went coco. haha

Not Much room in my little tents, so thinking time to upgrade, just so I can have room to automate..lol

Oh the obstacles we will try to overcome for out love of not only the plant, but also the therapy of just cultivating our precious girls..

[Californiakid]

We have different conditions, much different needs. My room is in a garage that can get over 105°f. The larger ac unit is a necessity here. Sometimes I feel like its about the trip to get things the way we want, do we ever get it just right? Tweek this here and add that there...
Have a great day oldjarhead100 !

[Redwasp]

Nitro Lemon Haze.

[BillBates]

Thanks, Red.

[Redwasp]

By the way that strain does better at monster cropping than any other strain ive tried.

[Redwasp]

Well I had to get dehumidifier. The basement had gotten to 70% humidity due to it raining everyday for a week. One tent was 77%. So got a 70 liter (edit 70 pints) dehumidifier (my basement is over 2500 feet so needed a big one.) So far in an hour its back down to 51% and the tent is 55%. Gonna see how low it will go after 24 hours before i change any settings. Have the runoff going to the sump pump so it will only require periodic cleaning.

[BillBates]

2500 sq.ft.basement ..... aaahhh, high class problems

[DankwingDuck]

I don’t have a 2500sf house ..... I think I hate you a little rn 😉

[Redwasp]

Lol. The city i live in has a very low cost of living. Everything here is cheaper. But we pay for it dealing with crime and horrible politicians. I know everyone has bad politicians but we thought we had bad ones until we got the ones we have. Bad enough that we are seriously thinking about moving even farther south.

[Redwasp]

Its actually bigger than that. But housing is very cheap where I live. In most other places a house that goes for 100k here would be over 500k or more.

[Toripony]

I'm struggling with humidity, too, here in the Pac NW with my grow room in the garage. So far I've managed some control with merely increased air flow. Have been trying to decide between a "real" dehumidifier (one with a compressor) or A/C and whether to treat just the room or the entire garage from which I'm drawing intake air (have 130 CFM of exhaust installed). The responses above concur with my conclusions... any A/C unit in the room will be too powerful and would be unusable in winter in my environment and thus wouldn't help with humidity. Like Hycheese, I'm looking at one of the small ($110-140) dehumidifiers. Not too big because it will add some heat to the room which I'm hoping my exhaust fans will handle. I may end having to have both, at least for the summer months. Like everything else so far with this grow room in the garage, it seems to take 2 opposing devices to recreate one ideal mother-nature environment.

Hope you'll let us know how the A/C works out for you? Is your room inside your house? That seems like it would be easier??

[oldjarhead100]

Its in the cellar it maintains 70 pretty good except for the winter then it maintains 60 lol