Using hydroponic fan in darkroom

[Col9]

Just joined so this if first post. I am building a new darkroom and want decent ventilation this time. Has anybody used a hydroponic duct fan to blow filtered air into the dark room? I thought of taking air from the house and dusting the exhaust through a vent to the outside. Any suggestions comment would be appreciated.

 

[waileong]

Normal airconditioning works ok. If you want to use any kind of ventilation, remember that light travels only in straight lines, unless there's reflections.

 

[gone]

Assuming your room is relatively large and you don't spend all day in there, as wailwong said, you should be fine. It's the fixer that is not fun to breathe, so consider an odorless fixer for the printing. However, from the sound of your post, maybe you had a darkroom once before and the fumes were an issue? If that's the case, then better ventilation would be in order. W/o knowing the particulars, I can't recommend much, and have no experience w/ the filtering that you mentioned. Sorry. Maybe someone else here can give better info.

 

[Col9]

Yes did have a darkrrom before and suffered much from the fumes. I need to be careful now so am going to use a fan this time. The room is not that big, roughly 3m square but with low ceiling - 2m. This is an example of hydroponic fan http://www.hydroponicfans.co.uk/acatalog/46-dB-A-Hydroponic-Fan-Filter-Kit.html although a smaller and quieter version should be OK.

 

[GregW]

For such a small room I would think a simple bathroom vent fan would do the trick, should change the air every 3 minutes or so. Cost should be about a third of the hydroponic? (30 bucks here) Though the ducting etc included with the H fan would be extra. Also would take up less space. You could even have two, one blowing in one blowing out. It would still cost less.

 

[ic-racer]

Not sure what a 'hydroponic' fan is , but there are hundreds of posts on darkroom ventilation on this forum.

 

[mike c]

Bath room fans are not that great, I've got one and are not that happy with it. I have read about guys using those inline type of fans with good results , do not know if they were hydroponic .

 

[Wayne]

I use surplus muffin fans much like these (except ac). They are small, light, cheap, quiet and they rock, and its easy to build a light-tight window insert to mount them in. Waaaaay better than bathroom fan IMO. Two of these work great in my large wet darkroom.

I'm not sure why you would need to filter anything. You want the air vented out, not in. Likewise I'm not sure how well an air conditioner would work. Seems like they would just stir things up. Maybe I'm missing something?

http://www.surpluscenter.com/Electrical/Blowers-Fans/DC-Fans/102-CFM-12-VDC-ROTRON-4-75-MUFFIN-FAN-16-1380.axd

 

[MattKing]

I prefer to use fans to exhaust the air from the darkroom.

This allows you to place the air intake (for the exhaust) near the trays, in order to draw the air away from them. Flexible dryer exhaust tubing works well for this. So does plastic drain piping.

You can put filters in the (passive) air intake openings.

 

[M Carter]

I upgraded my bathroom fans with the basic builder-store models and they really move some air and are quiet. I think in some cases the issue may be getting the intake closer to your trays, say by dropping some rigid vent down from the intake.

I had the roof vent installed for my darkroom but haven't gotten the fan in yet (2nd story, Texas attic = hot as hell right now). I do a lot of lith printing with hot trays and you can really get the air pretty thick that way (though I associate the smell with magic and wonder and unicorns-peeing-scotch level happiness, since lith is kind of magical). But ever try heated, strong, selenium toning? I'm not doing that again until I have a fan and maybe a pop-on intake tube to go right above the tray - that's a sinus-burner.

By the way, if anyone has a unicorn that pees scotch, let me know?

 

[bsdunek]

Not exactly the same thing, but I installed an fume hood in my Wife's glass studio using a hydroponic fan. Really works great. The one I got uses six inch stove pipe for duct, so it's easy to fabricate the ducting. It is a little noisy but not bad. It does a great job pulling the fumes from hot glass out. I think the one I put in is a 900 cfm rated model - for a darkroom, you might get buy with less - say 500 cfm.

 

[Wayne]

I prefer to use fans to exhaust the air from the darkroom.

I think this is Darkroom Ventilation Rule #1. I don't consider it optional.

 

[Col9]

Thanks for the comments. I will try a hydro ventilation fan with a motor speed controller to vary the amount of air coming through. The idea is to take filtered, warmed air into the darkroom from the house, blow it across the sink and exhaust the other side. The alleged advantage is that when the door is opened dust is not sucked in. If it does not work I can reverse the fan. Taking air from the house will mean it is warmed during winter, pretty much essential here as the village is cold, expecting near 0C tonight.

I know some will think this is overkill but I well remember days spent printing in a small stuffy darkroom without ventilation; the headache and crap feeling the next day. Also, I plan on using some alternative printing processes which makes good ventilation even more essential. I'll post again when it's all installed.

 

[MattKing]

Thanks for the comments. I will try a hydro ventilation fan with a motor speed controller to vary the amount of air coming through. The idea is to take filtered, warmed air into the darkroom from the house, blow it across the sink and exhaust the other side. The alleged advantage is that when the door is opened dust is not sucked in. If it does not work I can reverse the fan. Taking air from the house will mean it is warmed during winter, pretty much essential here as the village is cold, expecting near 0C tonight.

I know some will think this is overkill but I well remember days spent printing in a small stuffy darkroom without ventilation; the headache and crap feeling the next day. Also, I plan on using some alternative printing processes which makes good ventilation even more essential. I'll post again when it's all installed.

Add a small exhaust fan that takes in air from near the trays and vents it outside and you will be golden!