Indoor garden exhaust fan setup guide

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Your Garden Exhaust Fan Setup

Now for your exhaust fan setup. By now, you should already have an idea of the light you want to use from the light selector tool, and an idea of the fan you will need from the exhaust fan calculator, so let's get started!

Just like a good garden design, a good exhaust fan setup can be broken down into a few easy steps. The basic idea is to...

make the run as short as possible

make as few turns as possible

pull in fresh, cool air from the bottom

exhaust hot, used air from the top

The Exhaust Run

Easy enough...determine where you will exhaust your hot air and than design your garden so the garden grow light is nearby. If the distance is greater than 20 feet, make sure the fan in your exhaust fan setup can handle the extra strain. Try to make the run straight from your lights to the exhaust point.

Airflow in the Garden

Since hot air rises, you will be removing much more heat from the garden by starting your exhaust near the ceiling of your garden area. This creates a vacuum that naturally pulls cooler, fresh air into the garden area.

Use an oscillating fan on the floor to keep the cooler, fresh air moving through the plants and toward the exhaust.

Just One More Thing

Fans are much more efficient at PULLING air than at PUSHING air. With this in mind, the exhaust fan is usually placed right at the point of exhaust. From there it will pull air through your exhaust fan setup (through the light reflector) and out of the garden area.

Some Examples

If your garden is in a tight space, like this example, you may need to mount your exhaust fan outside the garden area. Keeping your ballast outside the garden area will help keep the temperature down inside the garden area.

exhaust for grow room

This is an ideal exhaust run. The intake on the exhaust system (the carbon filter) is up high to catch the hottest air. The exhaust run is straight (no turns) and short. If you do not have a carbon filter, simply leave it out of the picture.

another grow room exhaust

If you cannot attach your carbon filter to the ceiling, try to get it as high up in the garden area as possible. Milk crates might come in handy for this. The exhaust setup in this example should be fine.

One side note...the examples here are all shown with centrifugal fans. With no carbon filter, these examples would work fine with squirrel cage fans These fans are covered in more detail on my garden exhaust fans page.

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