After two years of getting close to pulling the trigger and having it fall through, I am finally going to build my grow cab. It’s down to three options for the build. One’s free (Facebook Marketplace), and the other two are IKEA cabs. The Pax wardrobe would be the easiest to convert and has a possibility of two grow chambers with about 4’ height each and 12.5 sq ft total canopy, its also the most expensive and largest option.
The third option I think would be perfect for our needs, but I’m not sure on if I’m planning the airflow correctly. It’s an IKEA Brimnes 3 Door Wardrobe. My thinking is that I can put the fan and scrubber in the main chamber with passive intakes in the bottom of the main chamber and the bottom side chamber. From there the bottom side chamber would vent into the top side chamber then over to the main chamber with everything being exhausted through the fan and scrubber. Ill be using an AC Infinity S4 or maybe a T4. Please excuse my poor drawing on a screenshot of the wardrobe lol.
I think your idea looks fine. Suck out air at the top, pull in from the bottom.
I used to build mine from lauan and hard back foam, 1" x 2"'s and 2" x 2"'s using the old New Ganja Boy design.
The issue you may run into doing a remod of that cabinett, is light leaks and venting issues.
When building it, I did away with vents and light leaks by off setting round soffit vents. I would also use tubing fit tight to where the door closed, or any edge that leaked light.
Please excuse my wood butchering skills, as I’m no carpenter at all!
Same lay out well on opposite sides. I made the lights from maintenance kits, a 150 hps, and a 70 mh.
Vents I used are soffit vents, and just hole sawed a hole, but off set from each other, so air can flow through the walls, and no light leaks.
I’d mount 1 up at the top of the wall into my small veg/clone area, on the left side.
Then straight down, on the inside flower wall, made a sliding vent trap, this allowed more sir to be drawn in.
The final box on the base, so I could drop the medium container through the floor for more bud room.
Squirrel cage fan, (all the rage way back then) was mounted on the back of the utility/clone/veg area. Filter was on the back, sorry no pic. The hps/mh ballasts mounted in cheapo bake pan.
This was back 2006, and I gave that box away, when I upgraded.
Free is good but try to maximize space whenever possible. I’d get the largest cabinet you can manage.
Tiny space is a real bottleneck and in a little cabinet once you get plants growing you’re going to wish up and down you had just a few more square feet of wiggle room.
Thanks for the replies everyone! The third option is out now though… IKEA is having trouble keeping stock atm.
@webeblzr, I appreciate all the info! I loved the old New Ganja Boy box back in the day. I had already considered the light traps and had plans to rig light traps up between the side and main cabs and on the intakes, and weather stripping and black silicone for joints, etc.
@vernal and @Who, I definitely want to maximize my space, but this is also going to share the bedroom with my wife and I for the foreseeable future. Ideal for me is the Pax wardrobe, but that’s 92" tall, 22.5" deep, and 40" wide, and doesn’t match any of our furniture well enough (who knew IKEA Black-Brown wasn’t the same throughout their lines?). So now we’re compromising by looking at solid wood wardrobes on the Facebook Marketplace. I get a larger footprint than in the Brimnes, and much more modifiable to suit my needs.
I wouldn’t recommend a grow cabinet in your bedroom. It will make some noise. Always ways around that I suppose, but then you need an even bigger cabinet to allow for duct silencer, insulated ducting, foam on the inside to absorb noise…etc. It’s doable with a AC infinity fan haha I was just posting about how quiet those really are. Air and water pumps can make noise too. Something to think about.
Yea, I’m praying that I can keep it fairly quiet with the ac infinity. Living in a 3 bedroom with 3 adults and 3 kids in a prohibition state leaves few options, but if i can supply at least the majority of the herb my wife and i consume we will save about $75-100 per week. Im going to run LEDs so I shouldn’t have to keep the fan too high, and that should be the only source of noise. Gonna be starting out in this solid wood cabinet. Roughly 3.2 sq ft foot print and 75 in of vertical space inside. I’m gonna split it into two levels, just not exactly sure the height of the shelf. Thinking 30" or 24" on the bottom. Fan should take up roughly 8" of the ceiling. Plan is to run autos the first run in both chambers, and maybe start some photos towards the end for the 2nd run. In the future I’ll either use the bottom for mom’s and veg or have 2 flower chambers and a separate mom/veg cab.
Nice cabinet!
To my mind, prohibition state = carbon filter is mandatory.
I’d look at exhaust fan + filter + LED driver in that top area.
A small seedling/clone area next then then flower/veg area. I would want to maximize height for the flower/veg as much as practical.
Yea, I was gonna put a couple 1x2s across the top to put an ac infinity with the carbon scrubber and lights to. As for which way im gonna set it up, I have 74-75" on the inside. Fan/filter will take about 8", then 2-3" for light assemblies, then an inch or two for the shelf. Leaves around 62" for pots n plants. If I was going straight into photos I’d skip hanging the lights in the veg, attach em straight to the shelf and only make it 18", but im planning on running autos in the full cab for the first run to try and get the stash built up, so I’m thinking more like 24" veg, 36" flower. Ill have to do a bit of LST on the autos in the shorter cab, but I planned on that anyway to try and maximize my space (~3.2’ sq ft per level).
