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HELP! To hot or to dry

J

Jeezusjuiicee

New member
Lol classic problem here. I just want to know Wich one I should choose. So if I run my ac the humidity drops to like 15-20% cause of where I live. But if I run my humidifier the temp goes to like 87°f .So should I let it get hot and stay at about 40-50% rh? Or should I worry more about the temp and let it dry out in there? Haha it's a tough choice for me (1st time grower)
 
Is there any reason you can’t run a small humidifier and the A/C unit at the same time?

Just for clarification: are you saying that your humidifier is generating a bunch of extra heat?
 
For my first grow which just ended, I kept both running at the same time keeping 75F@40% in flower mode. My next grow will probably be kept around 80F@50% to save some money and to compare growth at different temps/humidity.
 
Well yea when I run my ac the rh starts dropping. Ac's pull moisture out of the air to create cool air. I don't have a swamp cooler. I did already try running both and they just fought eachother
 
I may have misread your post, I thought you were running a dehumidifier which would definitely put out some heat - about 300 watts or 1000 btu's worth for a small one. A humidifier would probably only use 1/10th that.

I use an old style 5000btu window unit controlled by an Inkbird ITC-308s with remote sensor bulb above the canopy to cool the entire 120 square foot room then use a 30-pint dehumidifier to keep it at 40%rh. Or in your case, if keeping the temps at 75F drops the humidity to 15%rh then I would use a cheap humidifier to boost it to 40% or so.

You never mentioned at what temperature you were at to achieve 15%rh. Also what type of AC do you have? As a general rule, AC's do not dehumidify as a function but rather a byproduct of cooling, once cooling is achieved it no longer cares what the humidity is. Even though some AC's may have a dehumidification setting it generally just subcools the room to attempt a happy medium for a residential human environment only.
 
Oh so if I get the temp right and the AC isnt pumping so hard the humidifier would probably work better? I did only test them both at the same time when it was pretty hot and humid in there so the AC was working hard. It's an 8000 BTU LG unit that stands in the room. And my humidifier is a Vicks 4.5L it runs for like 2 days on max tho it works amazing
 
And the humidifier on max looks like someone vaping haha so it pumps good. Got it to 60% in 8 hours from 20% and the room is about 25 square feet
 
That 87 deg and 40-50% humidity isn't that bad for vedge.
86 I believe, is the magic number for when it is hot'r than is good for life processes( think Dangerdan explains why) so 87 isn't terrible. The 40-50% Humidity is still a little low for seedlings( great for flowering though), but again, not that bad.
My greenhouse has ranged 40-110 deg and 30-80% humidity before, and I still manage to grow some good bud, not ideal, but my girls have at least survived these indignity's!!

Climate control can be tricky to figure out, but it is WELL worth it, and can make for happier, healthy plants, and a better harvest.
 
Alright thanks man! And yea I was thinking about how easy it will be to flower I just open the window lol! Cold and dry especially in the winter (Canada) I appreciate the info my dude 😎
 
Jeezusjuiicee , are you saying the room with both your AC and humidifier is only 5 feet by 5 feet? also, you mentioned that you have an 8kbtu portable AC, is that a single tube or dual tube vent system? Just know that a single tube vent will suck in a fair amount of your already conditioned air for condenser cooling and blow it outside which can make for a difficult task when trying to control both temps and humidity in such a small area.
 
250** hahaha that would be tiny. Maybe even 200 sq ft. But yea it's a single tube that goed out the window. Do the window sitting ac's work a bit different? I didn't know they made ACs with 2 tubes! And I did a real long good test yesterday. Every time my ac kicks on it brings the temp down from 86 to 83ish but it will always drop the humidity by 3-5% so yesterday I started my ac and it was 38% humid. It would go from 38-35%RH everytime the AC kicked on. So it's do able. Today I'm gonna get the RH TO 60% Before I start my ac. Sorry this isn't important to you LOL but yea that's how it's going!
 
The main difference between a window unit and a single vent portable is how they handle the condenser cooling air. In a window unit, the condenser end sits outside of the room and only uses outside air to cool it, this means all the air it cools stays inside. It also means it has to work a bit harder because it is using hot outside air.

A single vent portable only has an exhaust vent so that means it has to scavenge inside air to cool the condenser then exhausts it outside along with a portion of the air you just paid to cool. Using the cool inside air makes the unit appear more efficient but then chucks it outside anyways.

I believe they do this for 2 reasons, 1 for ease of installation and 2 for a higher fake efficiency number, but it also seems they have to increase the nominal size from 5000btu to 8000btu to achieve the same amount of cooling because they are using 3000btu to cool the condenser.

Lastly, these portables can throw your entire balanced room out of kilter when they start bypassing your conventional exhaust system. In a system where you have a humidifier/dehumidifier that it is too close to the portable, all the goodness they created will be sucked straight out of the room by the portables back/side vents.
 
Shit I should have got a window unit! But like you said ease of installation. I didn't want to cut a peace of wood to fit above the window unit and there heavy. Oh and when the sun goes down I move it into my bedroom so a window unit was out of the question haha! I originally bought this just to have an AC long before I started growing Haha. But thanks man I'll only use the AC if it's going past 90°f!
 
Portables serve their purpose as being able to move about or not to breach an entire window, but they are only designed for creature comfort and not for "you can hide your weed in here".

My local Krogers sells window units for $99 or a yard sale one can be had for $25. Now that you know what you are up against you can plan accordingly.
 
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