6-plant hydro: bubbleponics/CFLs/Top44

[farmerfunk]

Hey everyone, this is my first grow journal here, so thanks in advance for your advice and help. This is the first time i've ever grown with hydroponics, so i'm sure it's going to be a two-steps forward and one-step back type thing.
I ordered most of my stuff from stealthhydro. I have the 6-plant bubbleponics kit, and a 315-watt CFL light bank. It has 20k lumens. I have 27k, 50k, and 41k bulbs. I know i could optimize it better for vegging, then for flowering but i didnt have the money so i just had to go multi-spectrum. I'm using F1 generation Top44 seeds i got from a vendor based in Holland (but they ship out of the UK).
I'm doing this journal so I can track progress myself, and when problems arise you folks will have the background on the grow necessary to tell me what could be the potential problem Without further ado here are some pics!

edit: sorry for the crappy pics; i had to take them with my cell phone

[farmerfunk]

need help already, lol. it came with an air pump and a bubbledisk. the bubbledisk sits on the bottom and is supposed to release air bubbles so they can be pumped through the roots. but i noticed this morning that no bubbles are coming from it. i tracked the problem to the disk itself since the tubing releases air without the disk being attatched. do i have a broken disk or is the pressure from my air pump so low that only tiny bubbles get released? should i take out the disk and just let the air come from the tube? the bubbles seems a little big and i'm sure they could be taken up easier if they were smaller produced by the bubbledisk. thanks

for now i just have the tube running without a bubbledisk and am just gonna buy a new one tomorrow so see if it works


EDIT: just bought a 14in bubblestone and a new air pump for it. i think it'll turn out better than the disk would have because the stone stretches across the bottom of all 6 plants

[farmerfunk]

so i'm germinating my seeds in the rookwools on my hydroton with h2o running. anyone know how long i can expect to see some sprouts coming through the rockwool? the seeds are fairly new and f1 generation. i know the usual time for germination/sprouting but i didnt know if this would be faster or slower than papertowel method. on another note how tall should i let the plants get before i take away the rockwools? thanks

[PAMid's]

idk but this should be good

[mordgrow]

this is basicaly just a DWC system with a hose to get the water "pumped" to your baskets..

I do the same thing by filling my rez enough to where the very bottom of the basket is submerged in my solution (with a buble disk)

follow other people's DWC grows and you'll be a success too!

(tip : more air = better~! water PH needs to be 5.5-5.8) goodluck!

[pungent]

you'll probably see sprouts in a week to 10 days. you will never remove the rockwool, the roots will grow down through the rockwool into the resevoir and you'll just let em grow that way till harvest.

Make sure the rockwool cubes with the seeds stay wet until you see sprouts! if the irrigation tubes pump water out right at the bottom of the rockwool cubes like the instructions say, the cubes should stay wet on their own.

as others have suggested to me, you should read up on low stress training methods immediately, because crowding will almost certainly become an issue by the time the plants are 1.5' to 2' tall because the baskets are so close together.

i'm completely jealous of your light fixture though, i didn't spend the money on the good one

when you start with the nutrients, i recommend using very mild nutrient mixtures at first and gradually increasing the potency as you see the plants can handle it. i've burned mine a few times with full strength nutrient solutions...

[farmerfunk]

thanks pungent. ya i've been checking my cubes and they are staying damp but not completely saturated (which i've heard is bad). i've already been thinking about LST but i'm sorta just planning on a quicker harvest to plant a danker strain next. its top44 and they say it flowers in 44 days. so i was thinking if i let them get like 14in and then flower, could i still get a decent yield? but i dont know maybe LSTing is essential. also i have to remember all may not be female (but all seeds should be good) so if thats the case i may not have to as much. let me know what you think

[burn1down]

I happen to be doing the same exact thing you are. I have a DWC system and 4 plants. Well one hasnt sprouted yet and i think its a bad seed bc the other 3 plants are 2in to 3.5in already. The difference i have to your setup is im using LED lights and they seem to be working very well.

[farmerfunk]

i was just reading the sticky on LSTing and it looks like i can only do it once to the outside by tying it down to something. take a look at my setup: anyone see something i could use to LST from the netpods? :\

[pungent]

check out SCRoG, kindof a modified LST...

http://forum.grasscity.com/advanced-...og-method.html

[farmerfunk]

K so i was just smoking a bowl checking out my setup and i noticed something on the rockwool cubes.. as you can (hopefully) see from the pics little brown lines have appeared on the sides of the rockwool:

it looks like it came from when it got when up there from absorbtion but the color concerns me. is it brown because of the the dust from the dry hydroton? (i soaked them first but i'm sure a few dried before the pump got water all the way to the higher ones)

or could it be something that got in my water? (i put literally 1 drop from an eye dropper of each one of the flora series: micro, grow, bloom; a suggestion from a local garden shop).

i might just be OCD and it isnt anything to worry about. let me know what u think. thanks

[mordgrow]

did you rinse out your hydrotron really well?

I use my net baskets and rinse out all the rock i'm going to use, there is tons of "brown dust" that will come off, just rinse till the water runs clear while you shake them around under it..

if you didnt, its not a huge deal, just going to be a bit messy, and the stuff will coat / clog your buble disks a bit.

[farmerfunk]

i thought i rinsed em out pretty well in a strainer and everything... but i figured thats what it was; just wanted to make sure it wasnt anything major. thanks for the quick feeback mord

[farmerfunk]

tonight i moved my grow from a smaller closet (check pics). i think in the smaller closet the light will be more effecient and since i decided not to LST this grow too much i think it will work out. the main reason i moved it though is because i cant let people use my bathroom here because they will be way too close to the closet to not be curious about whats going on in it. well here are the pics of the closet where it was and the little closet its in now.

[farmerfunk]

well i went camping this weekend and when i got back marked the 7-day mark and i saw nothing and got a little suspicious. i opened a rockwool cube and saw the water didnt even get near the seed... i figured it out tonight got the seeds replanted and all and double checked to make sure they would get enough water. its frustrating that i wasted 7 days but i'm glad i found it now