I just posted pictures of this in my journal, but I thought I would make a thread just for it. I think it's amazing so I thought I would share it with you guys. After all, the only reason I know about this technique is because someone shared it with me! This system uses a waterfall aeration technique that allows for circulation of the nutrient solution. This is good for many reasons, but the best thing about it is that you don't have to stir the reservoir I think! LOL It cost about $100 to make not counting what it costs for a drill and hole saws if you don't have them (I blew like $100 on a drill and hole saws, cheapest drill I could find too- hole saws are expensive as shit!) Building it is easy- you just have to know what parts to get. I'll do a thread on how to build them later, but for now this thread is just for the design. It holds a ridiculous amount of water so that when you use the Lucas Formula or Flora Nova you won't have to fuck with it but every great once in a while. You'll be moving the lights more than messing with the rez. The tubs also put the plants at the perfect height so you don't have to bend over to trim and train them. This one uses three waterfalls for maximum oxygen distribution and two 396 gallon per hour water pumps to move the water. The roughly 32 gallons in the root zone is being cycled around 25 times per hour.
Holy F'n Shit Bro.... That thing is 256 Lbs of water in and on a Sterilite container.... The idea is great just buy some stronger containers or build a frame to set the upper res. on and around it for support...a container like that is rated for about 60Lbs. Sitting on a flat surface.....The "Waterfall Technique" will not work without "Outside Air" without air stones(or some holes for fresh air) bringing in outside air it is a sealed system underneath...that will not be good
That is not a Sterilite container- it's Rubbermaid. Both are. Got it from Home Depot, not Walmart You are right about it being a lot of weight to support- when filling it up you have to start with the bottom or else the top can fall down into the bottom (this already happened, could have been WAY worse than it was) It's not finished yet, these pictures are from it's first test run. It will not only have air lines in the root zone, it will have a fan placed over it's nutrient/ph adjustment window and holes poked in the opposite side. Did you seriously think I designed something like this and didn't know about providing fresh air for the waterfall to work? LOL come on... It would be like someone trying to tell me I needed a slide if I posted a ROOR that didn't happen to have one in the picture.
Damn. I can't even figure out how that entire thing works, looks cool though. Good job. Maybe you can give an explanation about it when you do the Build guide for it, yet I'm sure you've already thought of that.
Well to my disappointment last night my brother came home to his system and it looked like it was going to cave in at any moment. So we drained all the water out of the top bin into another one and you were right Dr.BudGreengenes- we are now planning on building a wooden frame to sit the top rez on. It's just going to be some fence posts and 2X4's- and after this he definitely won't be dealing with the support issue anymore. It's a shame though... I really hoped the Rubbermaid tubs could handle it on their own. I bet it could work with a tub half that size and not cave in, but my brother insists it's not a big deal to him. He thinks the design is great we just need to perfect it and work the kinks out. I'll let you guys know when this baby is up and running and I'll try to get another picture of it when it's done right.
I really like this goodstuff! sucks about the cave in, but looks like you will pioneer a nice setup. keep us updated and start a journal when its up n running!
I was really frustrated with myself when I first heard about it caving in but my brother was very enthusiastic about the whole thing. Even when we tried it again and saw it just wasn't going to cut it sitting on top of the other tub he remained positive. I however felt like an idiot... I hadn't anticipated it at all and I totally should have... But I think we might come up with something special though- It's an idea I got from this guy BigToke but he wasn't even the one who invented it, it was actually a guy calling himself HurtBack that originally designed the waterfall aeration techique as far as I know. BigToke made some improvements and I think I will take it further too using these tubs. I have an idea for a double waterfall too- check this out!
Last night/yesterday morning my brother and I got the support system finished and the system is up and running. It could probably take 1000 pounds but we overkilled it for safety, he's in an apartment and can't afford to have his system spill 50+ gallons of water in his closet. It's solid as a rock though. It's just what the system needed to be sturdy, I'll get some pictures as soon as I can. The only other thing I'm concerned about right now is rez temp because the rez is inside the garden and will probably be around 80 degrees. I've heard this is fine because of the large amount of oxygen the waterfalls produce, and my brother's system cycles the water almost twice as much as people bragging about how many times their system cycles (16X an hour is the most I've heard, from the guy who showed me the technique, BigToke on ICmag) My brother's system cycles around 25 times an hour so I hope we don't run into root rot over high rez temps, but from what I've read people get away with damn near 90 degree rez temps using this type of aeration technique.
We punched some 1/2 inch holes in the other side of the lid and you can feel the air coming out of them when the fan is in place. This will ensure that there is always plenty of fresh oxygen in the rez for the waterfalls. Still need to finish taping it up and hopefully I get an answer back on if the rez temp being so high is going to be an issue- if not we'll need to install a probe chiller or even two of them. I've heard of people getting away with higher temps than this thing will see using this method so I think he'll be fine for the first run and then he'll install the chillers after the harvest. If he can get the money together before that then we'll install a chiller just because I know it's beneficial. Anyways thanks for looking, I'll update this again when the plants are big and beastie
That looks GREAT you guys Good Job...... I love to see "Overbuild".... It's BIG TIME Important in Apartment grows..... I don't know if I just don't see it or if you guys don't have them... but you should put some air-stones in the upper res. just in case of a pump failure when you are away.....it would keep the "Girlz" happy until ya' get a new "Whatever Broke" Also with Apts. it's good to run the "AirStone's" thru a Computer UPS so if the power in the Apts. is shut off for whatever reason....the airstones stay runnin for hours....
That's a great idea- I was thinking of the same thing as a backup in case a pump failed or something; but never thought of a backup battery... He will have some high rez temps too so I think it's for the best that he has as much air as possible going off in it. He does have the airpumps and lines already, we just didn't install them because we thought the waterfalls would be more than enough. But you bring up a great point, so I think we need to use them and not let them collect dust. The UPS idea is awesome- thank you very much for that!
We have the nutes in there and the roots are dropping down now- the plants are beginning to take off. My brother is really impressed by how fast the roots are growing right now. The rez temps aren't anywhere near what I thought they would be- 74-75 degrees. Totally fine! (could use a chiller still, but it's a start) I'm really excited about this baby getting going, seeing this design come to life has been really cool. We have been talking about adding some more waterpumps for even more water movement and oxygen, but I'm not sure how much is "too much"... Do you think doubling the amount of pumps, to 1600 gallons per hour- is overkill?
the airstones seem like it would def add to the oxyge of with the water fall. you may just get the best of both worlds
Just an observation: I've noticed with my DWC plants that water is used up faster than nutes, PH doesnt usualy swing that much, but water content (IE TDS) changes heavily when the plants are big. with this type of system your entire solution will be effected. I bet you will see a steady increase in the TDS of your set up, especialy when the plants get to decent size. a solution to this would be an outside rezivoir feeding a "controlled" solution into the system.. or just keep an eye on it and do periodic TDS checks... either way i think this is a cool set up, but it wont do quite what your after IMO.
Just a little update for whoever is interested in how this is turning out- At 2 1/2 weeks the root systems are getting large, the mediums that were used to clone with are staying moist from the wet lava rocks. They are very healthy and are growing very fast. The pH was adjusted at around 1 week down from 6.3 because he doesn't have a meter yet and 10 days later the pH was 5.7 and didn't require adjustment. The system is using a lot of water- my brother thinks a lot of evaporation is happening because of the waterfalls and the fan exchanging the air in the rez. The TDS wasn't really effected all that much by it because of the massive amount of water in the system. About 10-15 gallons in 2 1/2 weeks with small plants, can't wait to see how much it uses when the plants are flowering! We added 3 gallons of water and the TDS didn't move LOL so I have to make him 15 gallons of RO water and I hope that's enough to bring the water level back up to where it started at. The stability in the system is incredible though- having to check the system once every 7-10 days at this point with absolutely no problems has been very nice. He needs his own meter so it doesn't have to go unchecked for so long, but for now everything is more than fine. It used up 15+ gallons and the TDS went up by a factor of 2... Pretty damn sweet. I'm really liking how it's performing so far! Some new pictures will be coming as soon as they get a little bigger, thanks for reading!