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A few thoughts on Low Humidity Control

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    A few thoughts on Low Humidity Control

    I'm at week nine on my first grow and have been a member here for about a month so I don't claim to be an expert but I read here a lot and have noticed that many are having issue with low humidity which is common most everywhere in the winter. Nebula addresses this in her tutorial section but only offers a satisfactory solution for a whole room, not just a small grow space. Summer of course is another subject when it might be too high in some places. I'm in the hills in AZ @ 4000 ft and my RH outside right now is 20%. My grow cabinet is outside on my enclosed but drafty, unheated sun porch so I planned ahead for humidity control.

    I looked at several models of room humidifiers and was not impressed as they required constant refilling and were just another item taking space in the 10 sq ft cabinet. Then I found a reptile fogger by Evergreen Pet Supply. I keep it outside on top of the 5 ft tall cabinet because it has a 5 ft x 1 in. tube that I run through a small 1.25 inch hole and direct right over the top of my plants. You can see the very fine mist (fog) coming out of the tube. My circulation fan spreads it around the 50 cf cabinet. I plug this in to an Inkbird IHC 200 RH controller that has 2 electrical outlets and a remote sensor with a 5 ft wire that runs through the same hole as the fogger. I plug my exhaust fan in to the other outlet. Now I can set the RH I want to run, plus or minus 3%, and the fogger quickly brings the humidity in the cabinet up to level then shuts off. However the humidity will continue to rise after shut off but the other outlet to the fan turns it on which now starts to bring the RH down plus or minus 3% of setting. This cycle happens over about a 15 minute period and keeps my plants in just the right range.

    Now you might think I have to fill the fogger all the time but this is the part that really surprised me. It holds 2 liters of distilled water and when I tested it in an open room without the controller it used all the water in 24 hours at it's minimum setting on the tank. I committed myself to buying a lot of distilled water as these will gum up quick with tap water. Now here's the surprise....I filled the tank 6 weeks ago when I set this up; it's been running 24/7, and there is still 20% of the original filling left in the tank. I have not added any at all! I'm thinking this could work in any size tent or cabinet with a little fine tuning. About $80 total for the fogger and controller is not bad to eliminate any RH worries. Damn, I wish I got paid for reviews!

    I know that Nebula reviews these posts as she has time in what must be a very busy schedule so I hope this one catches her eye so she and Sirius can do some testing on this. Could help a lot of growers! If anyone has a direct connection to them, please bring it to their attention. Thanks
    Grow # 3 50/50 S/I Critical Mass photo fem
    Seeds drop in water 1/8/2022

    Medium: FF Coco Loco plus 30% Perlite in 7 gal cloth bags
    Space: 30x48x62 DIY cabinet lined w/space blankets
    Lighting: Bloomspect SS1000 Quantum board x 3 - 300 watts actual draw
    Soil Supplements: Worm Castings, Crab Shell, Oyster Shell, Neem and Karanja Meal, Volcanic Basalt Dust (for minerals), Recharge root micros. Grow 3 is with reconstituted super soil to which I've added several additional minerals and supplements. A more complete list based on Cackamas Coots super soil recipe can be found in my Auto Toka thread
    i don't grow plants anymore, I grow soil that my plants can thrive in!
    My filtered tap water runs over 7.5 pH but the soil microbes
    make pH correction unnecessary
    Ventilation: Vipospar 4" Exhaust Fan w/RH controller, 12" Carbon Scrubber
    8" bottom intake fan, 6" clip on fan, 6" heater as needed
    Cabinet on screen porch. N AZ @ 4000 ft.

    My salute to all who have served
    Semper Fidelis!

    #2
    They do lurk around and you can tag people using @
    but you could also pm them directly and they’ll respond, very approachable, I’m sure they are busy but they mostly only chime in on topics when issues happen so a message is always better.

    Comment


      #3
      My humidity here is 25% and both my vegging grow and my flowering grow are doing fine. I usually don't worry about RH too much. You don't want high humidity while flowering anyway.

      Comment


        #4
        Very true kingfish frankly i prefer it 25-35% which is what i got now.
        Smoke Ganja create Peace Respect Nature don't trash the Planet

        Soil grower with coco/perlite mixed in
        indoor/outdoor grower
        1 36"x36"x66" tent- Viparspectra P2500
        1 3x3x6 tent- used in late spring for seedlings both veggies & weed. I have 2 viparspectar 450r for that tent.
        I use a t-5 & 54watt CFL for seedlings
        Sometimes i use plastic sometimes i use fabric grow containers
        Currently using fish/guano during veg growth & FF Grow Big 6-4-4 teens to bloom. Once i see pre-flower i switch to
        Age Old Organics Bloom 5-10-5

        Comment


        • TOKABIGONE
          TOKABIGONE commented
          Editing a comment
          I'm happy that lower humidity works well for you kingfish and SoOrbudgal, but as a newbie, I'm going by GWE specs for RH and that's working too. As I said, I read a lot of people expressing concern over this issue so anything I can offer to help, I will do. I learn here and from experience so I offer back what I can in return. That is the point.

        #5
        I live in the desert to and with a swampcooler/evaporated air conditioner my rh is around 50% even in the winter I run a small portable unit in my lung room like now it keeps the temperature down in the mid 60s and rh up just a little because the rest of my house is dry rh is in the teens in the day and 20s at night especially if I have the pellet stove burning. Works great for me
        TENT 1 4x4 SF7000
        s silver haze... strawberry haze...
        .. gg4 and cheese berry auto thrown from the auto hut
        TENT 2 2X4 SF2000
        2x Thundersuck... og Jimmy... flo.... blue cheese
        TENT 3 2X4 SF2000 + 2 113w blurples
        3 gallon pots all autos
        Weddingcake..2 red Gorilla girl..2 cinderella jack

        All growing in living soil using Earth Dust
        👇my one n only journal👇
        https://forum.growweedeasy.com/forum...oh-and-journal

        Comment


          #6
          It's good info that is given TOKABIGONE as you are finding out. Each has there own ways that work for them my environment is dry do to my heating.
          Smoke Ganja create Peace Respect Nature don't trash the Planet

          Soil grower with coco/perlite mixed in
          indoor/outdoor grower
          1 36"x36"x66" tent- Viparspectra P2500
          1 3x3x6 tent- used in late spring for seedlings both veggies & weed. I have 2 viparspectar 450r for that tent.
          I use a t-5 & 54watt CFL for seedlings
          Sometimes i use plastic sometimes i use fabric grow containers
          Currently using fish/guano during veg growth & FF Grow Big 6-4-4 teens to bloom. Once i see pre-flower i switch to
          Age Old Organics Bloom 5-10-5

          Comment


            #7
            When I first started I tried to monitor my humidity. From what I saw it stayed between 30-45% and I didn't have a good way to adjust it anyway. It didn't seem to be hurting anything where it was so I just stopped monitoring it. To this day I still don't watch it.

            Comment


              #8
              TOKABIGONE This sounds like a cool idea. Nebula and I already have a couple of reptile foggers, so we'll definitely try it out on our current tester plants. 👍

              Comment


              • TOKABIGONE
                TOKABIGONE commented
                Editing a comment
                Good deal, SiriusFourside, I think the key here is to use a controller that has two outlets so it can control both the humidifier and the exhaust fan to keep the RH within a narrow range. Of course the lung room must be cooler and dryer than the grow space. Thanks!

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