Hey guys I was hoping that maybe someone could help me… today I opened my tent and found that there was condensation on 1 side of my tent(lights were on 18/6 cycle when this occurred) This is my first grow ever so I’m learning all types of new things along the way(good and bad lol) but my first instinct was to look at my pulse and see if something went wrong with temp, Rh, and dew. Everything looked normal to my knowledge so I couldn’t understand why there was so much condensation on just that one side. My tent sits in an empty bedroom and I have a window a/c in to help with temps. in the tent and bedroom(summer) The side that was wet sits closest to the window a/c so I don’t know if this has anything to do with that specific side being wet, but just thought I’d mention that… maybe that side was cooler then the other three sides of my tent? Idk? But a little about my grow, I run 640watt cob led timber grow lights and I have three 5 gallon smart pots in veg(week 2 1/2) I have a Honeywell evaporative humidifier for RH and I use the window a/c to control temps as mentioned. For air circulation I only have a lasko 48” oscillating tower fan and 1 small 6inch oscillating fan. I also have an AC Infinity Cloudline T8 in-line duct fan (passive) venting out the bedroom window. I was thinking about getting an additional fan to put at the bottom of the tent making an active intake because my vent flaps at the bottom of my tent open and I feel like that isn’t the best way since I have such a strong passive intake. I’m struggling with summer temps in Chicago when it gets to around 93 degrees or so I’ve notice so I maybe an active intake would help? I just thought I would mention all of that to see if that had anything to do with the condensation on that side of the tent. Here’s a screenshot of my pulse when I noticed the condensation. Again, I’m a rookie grower and I appreciate any of the help!
My guess is that your dew point was equal to the temperature coming out of your window AC - so that caused condensation. When dew point = air temperature (or surface temperature in this case), water will condense. Your AC is probably putting out air closer to 50 or 60F, and your dew point is above that - easy fix is just to point your window AC away from your tent a little bit.
Hey Peet, pointing the a/c away from the tent along with moving the tent so that it is not so close to the a/c fixed my condensation problem. But when one problem gets fixed it seems like another comes up… after moving my tent/pointing the a/c vent away, I now have trouble with high temps in the tent. I don’t know much about this as I am a new grower but I feel like I need more air intake to combat my high temps? I have an 8” in-line duct fan ducting out of the top of my tent but as far as bringing air back into the tent I rely on just keeping one tent flap open so that when my in-line fan kicks on it can bring that cold air in from the bedroom(window air conditioner) I also have one 48” lasko oscillating tower placed in the corner of my tent and one 6” fan right in front of the open tent flap. Any help would be great! Here is a screenshot of my pulse environment today when it was 93 degrees in Chicago…
Can you raise your light up any further towards the top of your tent? I raise my lights all the way up so there isn’t a lot of space for hot air to be trapped. You can always prop your plants up also if this is putting light out of ideal height. Just a idea
Hey I can certainly raise my light higher! This may be a newb question but… are the lights supposed to be high up? I’m new to growing but I thought the lights are supposed to be closer to plants instead of high up.? I currently have my lights at about 28” from floor and my tent is 70” tall so I certainly have room to raise them but I thought they were supposed to be low and raise them as the plant grows? Just a little about my grow… I run 640watt cob led Timber Grow lights. I planted on 5/30/20 and my plants all sprouted on 5/31/20. From 5/31/20 until 6/11/20 they were growing in 18oz solo cups and my lights were 36” from the floor. I believe that previous stage was my “seedling stage” and On 6/12/20 I transplanted into 5gal smart pots(is this technically when veg starts?) and then lowered my lights to 24” cause i thought you lower light and raise as they grow? Sorry for my lack of knowledge but this is my first grow ever and I’m just trying to learn from my mistakes early on
Hi, @Chiguy420. Welcome to the struggle…lol. I feel you. I’m not certain, but you make it sound like only 1 flap is open on your tent. I had to open a couple flaps on my 5x5 in order to get the temps down. The good thing is with the Pulse, you can try that and just refresh the page to see what impact it has. Also, light up a joint in your room to get a visualization of how the air is flowing.
One other thing…I don’t see any mention of the size of your tent…how large are we talking? Could make an impact on how much circulation you have going on with only those 2 fans you currently have. After my last grow in my 5x5, I went from 2 fans to 6 to greatly improve circulation. I’m running a T6 in my tent.
Oh yeah !!! Those COB’s are tent killers. Lmao. I had a phlizon 3000 in a 4x4 I had to get rid of it. It’s a horrible cooling design. Heat rises and they have the cooling fans sucking from the top so basically they are cooling a already hot COB with hot air:man_shrugging:t3:
Pull that thing closer to the top of the tent and prop your plants up if you have to! If that light is pulling 500+ watts from the wall don’t even worry about proving them up they’ll be fine. Those lens’ on those super focus that light. I don’t think you’ll have any thing to worry about. Your plant will let you know if you need the light closer
Hey sorry for not mentioning everything! I do only have 1 flap open, but I’ll open up another and keep an eye on the Pulse to see what changes, great idea thank you! Also, My tent is a 4x4 vivosun. I can take a picture of the inside of my tent to give you a better view of what it looks like in there? Is it ok to show plants on here lol?
Hey tommy thanks for your reply! I’ll raise my lights and see if that helps with the temp! They are 640watt but turned them down with the dimmer to about 40% light strength
Yeah…you can show your grow…no problem.
Also, what stage of growth are you in? If the highest temp you got to was 82.5, that’s not too bad. Personally I could live with that and would love that humidity. I’m in Florida, so pretty tough here. On the Internet, I see high temp thresholds of 75-85, so 82.5 seems okay…but it’s what you’re comfortable and ultimately what the plants like.
Ok cool, I will send a pic right now after this comment. And about what stage Of growth i Am in so something that has confused me… to my understanding there’s a seedling, veg, and flower stage. I see people veg for 4 weeks but does that include the seedling stage? Maybe you can tell me by this info… I planted on 5/30/20, they appeared above soil on 5/31. From 5/31- 6/11/20 they were win 18oz red solo cups on a light cycle of 18/6 with humidity around 74%. On 6/12/20 I transplanted into 5 gal fabric pots with the same 18/6 light cycle but now humidity is around 66-70% and I also began to introduce nuits but at less then half of what the fox farms nuits recommended. So, am in “veg” mode From 6/12/20 when my plants were transplanted or have I been in veg mode all along since my seedling sprouted? I just don’t know when veg actually occurs after the seedling basically…
People probably have a slightly different idea of when those transitions occur. Seedling is from seed to a couple/few nodes of growth. Veg is from then to when it starts to flower, and flower after that. Don’t sweat the exact transitions. Just make sure you’re environment is good for that stage of growth. I’ve found for me, the most critical is during flower, especially late flower when the buds are packing on weight. In my environment, that’s when the RH can really hurt me and cause mold in the buds to form. The timeline you gave sounds good. Since you’re in flower right now, your temp and RH are decent. It would be good to get the temp down a little, but you’re in an okay spot where I would be okay with it. Can you get your lung room (the room where the tent is sucking it’s air from) cooler to maybe knock the tent temp a couple degrees to get it below 80? Like I said though…not to bad currently, IMO.
One thing I see right off the bat is to mount your LED drivers outside the tent. That’s what I do to reduce some heat. Also, some dehumidifiers put off heat. Does yours? Or is yours one of those types that don’t have a compressor causing heat and noise?
Also, I’m assuming it’s just not in the photo you took, but I don’t see your inline fan.
What are led drivers? The lights came assembled like that all I did was just attach to ratchet straps. And I don’t have a dehumidifier in the tent cause humidity control hasn’t been a problem yet but I do have a small dehumidifier that I already purchased but have not used yet. Here is a better picture of the tent…
What is that device at the back, left of the tent? A humidifier?
The drivers are the silver boxes mounted the LED frame. You can detach those, mount those outside the tent, and run wires inside to the LED.
Oh wow ok I never thought of that for the led drivers! I will look into that. And yes the left corner device is my Honeywell evaporative humidifier
At this point in your grow, I wouldn’t think you would need the carbon filter attached. I would detach that carbon filter until flowering when it’s needed to get rid of smell. Taking it off will also improve air flow, even though that T8 is a monster for a 4x4. Also, it will just make your carbon filter last longer.
Yeah o didn’t realize how monster the T8 was going to be. Reason I bought it was cause I thought I would need it for temp control but I really don’t know what I need or needed… wish I came across this community before all my purchases. Do you think if I purchase an additional fan to put into my vent at the bottom of my tent, that that would make a difference. You see what I have to rely on for bringing air back in… open tent flaps and just those small fans for circulation…