You can easily grow chile plants indoor in a grow box. All they need is light and warm conditions (with some air-conditioning). I call my Grow-box "Time-Machine" because it looks like a time-machine with 2 fans on its back. :-) Plus, the plants growing inside the box look 2-3 times older than my other plants!

I created step-by-step report how I built a grow-box for my plants. This is an easy and a very low-budget solution and hope it will be useful for you guys!

Step 1: Ingredients

1x big cardboard box (3$)

1x mylar foil, 3x1m (6$)

1x heat-and-water-resistant ducktape (5$)

2x energy saving light bulbs and E27 socket (10$)

1x Red-Blue grow-light and E27 socket (8$)

1x switcher for the light (2$)

2x used 12V PC-cooler fans (4$)

1x 12V power supply (2$)

...a few more little but helpful accessories.

This is summa 40 bucks! And you have a grow-box for many years. Of course, you can use different materials and other combination of lights for example. This was my version and I hope it will help you to start building your own indoor-garden :-)

Step 2: Setting Up the Foil

For setting up the foil I used only ducktape and cable ties without any glue. And I can tell after 3 months it is still perfect!

For the bottom part I've set up the foil like a dish, so it can hold little amount of water. It is useful when you're watering the plants inside the box. For safety's sake I put some piece of sponge below the foil so it can absorb the water but this is absolutely optional.

Why not simple aluminium foil? Because mylar foils can reflect 90-98% of the light and they're strong, you can use them for months or even years! I used two types of mylar foil for the bottom part and for the sides, but you can use just one, I just wanted to test both types. The foil with a diamond-shaped surface is the best.

Step 3: Setting Up the Lights

For perfect results I used a Red/Blue growlight in addition to the 6500K energy saving bulbs. There is a switcher at the top of the box (outside) to switch between the type of lights or use simultaneously both.

The roller at the top of the box helps you to customize the height of the lights so you can easily follow the growth of the plants! :-)

You can use more lights and other combinations but this combo worked me fine for this box-size. Don't forget that plants need special lighting, the classic 2700K lights are not enought for this project. But with 6500K lights you will see the results soon. The first flowers appeared on my plants after a month!

Step 4: Setting Up the Fans

This was the hardest but the most exciting part of the project :-) To avoid must/mildew and other diseases you have to change the air inside the box continuously. Therefore I used 2 old PC coolers for keeping the air fresh in the grower.

Cut the wires of the coolers and attach both to the power supply with soldering-iron.
Cut two holes in different heights on the back of the box and on the foil, already installed.
Set up the coolers and fix it with cable ties and ducktape.

You can decide which method do you choose: direct air-pushing to the plants, or air-sucking method through the front-door of the grower box. Both are OK!