Tuesday, November 6, 2007

Effects of the fan, insulation, & more

Unfortunately I forgot to turn on the rollover feature of my thermacron so the data never got recorded. In the mean time I was able to pickup some 2 inch foam insulation from HomeDepot, which was cheaper than Lowes. Last night I was able to install the insulation in the back wall. The plan is to fill in the cracks with the spray foam to seal it up really good but I want to get all of the pieces in first so that I don't waste the can of foam. I'm planning on insulating the end wall Wednesday night and hopefully sealing it up on Sunday. I'm also hoping to be able to make an insulated door on Sunday which should really help seal things up.
Until then I've stuck a small utility heater in there that is rated at 1300w. It is set on the lowest setting and is on a timer that turns on and off every half hour during the night so that I'm sure it will not run to much. The heater blows onto the fan which blows onto the plants. Hopefully this will help keep them warm and happy, but not scorched. It seemed to work well yesterday. I'm hoping to post the temperature data from that on Wednesday night.
I've also purchased two dark green 30 gallon trash cans that I plan on putting water in to help collect heat during the day.