This post shows how to convert a crawlpace into a microgrow. I don’t know what it is about constructing grows in unsuspecting places, but I love it. For this build I converted a rather large and deep crawlspace into a mini grow room. I will be using this room to veg plants and help prepare them for the flower room.
There would be a lot of challenges with flowering in a vertically limited space like this but with shallow totes and a low enough trellis net it could be done.
Materials:
- Panda Film
- Alex+ Silicone
- 1×4″ wood boards
- 1/4″ staples
- Tuck tape
- 2 1/4″ Tapcon screws
- Pest proof door sweep
- Concrete Paint
- 4″ Exhaust Fan (AC infinity is best and comes with temp controller)
- 4″ ducting
- Power Bar w/ surge protection
- Light Timers
- Barrina LED shop lights
- Light Meter (optional but nice to have)
- Wooden Dolly
- Rolling Shop Stool
Tools:
- Caulking gun
- Staple Gun
- Drill
- Sharp Scissors (fiskars are the GOAT)
The start of the project. I decided to seal the room with panda film. This absolved me of the task of painting the walls and also helped seal out any bugs from coming in through the cracks between the foundation and the framing.
Next step was adding a door. I made it a bit smaller than needed and will be sealing it off from the inside.
I used tapcon screws to affix the 1x4s to the wall. I chose a height of about 6″ off the floor. My reasoning being that if I ever have water spill I don’t want it to soak into the wood.
Apply a layer of Alex+ Caulking between the wood and the concrete for an airtight bug proof seal.
As with all my grows I use an air intake filter. Sometimes I build a contraption that sandwiches them in place for easy replacement.
With the tight space in this grow I opted to just tape the filter on with duct tape.
I also added a 4″ exhaust fan and ran the intake into the room. The fan is an simple booster style fan. It pulls air out of the room helping ensure negative pressure.
If there are any objects that you will need to work around frame them up with wood. This will make it much easier to staple the plastic later, while keeping it tight against the wall.
My advice for working with Panda Film is: do not cut too big of a piece. You can get a perfect seal connecting smaller pieces using tuck tape, there’s no need to try and do a full room with two pieces of film like I did.
The guy at the hydroponics store recommended this 3M spray for adhering panda film to the walls. DO NOT USE IT. It does not work. Also smells nauseating. I had an organic solvent mask on and one 5 second spray still had me evacuating for a few hours.
Line the 1×4 on the wall with caulking. Then use 2″ screws to drive in a piece overtop. This will create an air-tight, bug-proof seal. The sequence should be like this:
Concrete > Wood > Caulking > Panda Film > Wood
Use a staple gun to attach the plastic to the ceiling joists and any other exposed wood. Double up the plastic using a piece of tuck tape or duct tape at the points where you will be adding a staple.
Tuck tape works really well for connecting pieces together. Do not cheap out and try using duct tape. The two are worlds apart in terms of adhesion.
I was testing out some Home Depot LED panels here but after checking the LUX found them to be woefully underpowered. Never trust the manufacturers rating when it comes to lumens or “watt equivalency”. There is so much deceptive marketing in the LED light segment.
It would not be cannabis cultivation if there was no cleaning involved. Mop everything up in preparation for a quick coat of paint over the cement.
Painting exposed cement is optional but I wanted to keep dust and dirt down. Exposed cement gives off quite a bit of dust so I do recommend sealing it up if you can. It will help you keep you grow room clean, especially if using dollies to cart stuff around.
Lighting
I went through a few different iterations of lights before I found the best option. Barrina LED bars are by far the best way to go. They are so incredibly cheap on amazon compared to other options. They use white full spec LED’s that come in a cool blue. They’re sold as garage lights so you’re not paying a premium for “grow lights”
Mounting them on the ceiling (about 3-4′ to the canopy) got me approx 3,000 lux. I like to be at 7,000-15,000 lux for vegetative growth. So I built a frame for the light bars allowing me to raise and lower them depending on plant height.
Doing this got the lux up to 12,000 at the canopy. Exactly where I want to be to promote aggressive vegetative growth. Don’t mind the soil, these came from a breeder I trust and will be making their way over to DWC via aeroponics cloning soon.
To maintain proper humidity in the grow I setup a DIY auto fill humidifier.
I hope you guys enjoyed this post on how to convert a crawlspace into a growspace. If you end up executing on this build please DM me some pictures on instagram or reddit – I’d love to see it.
