5-Gallon Homemade Cloner

I'm sure this has been done before, but I see these things for sale on various sites and the price is way high as compared to a do-it-yourself job. In any event, my ladies have been in there 2 weeks now, at several of the nine sites there is vigorous root growth and at a few there are just signs of roots in their nascency. Here goes:

Materials: 1 opaque five-gallon bucket, from Home Depot perhaps, with a sealing opaque lid. 1 air pump. 1 airstone. Tubing. 1 small Rio pump. A few feet of 1 inch or 3/4 inch (stoned-forgot ) pvc piping. 6 pvc elbows(one of the five must be a 3-opening elbow, i.e., an elbow with an opening). 2 pvc T-fittings. Pvc cement. 1-2 nozzle emitters (depends on what you can get. I use one spinner type nozzle that does not atomize but throws small droplets in all directions and it works). Enough split neoprene cutting holders for the number of holes you put in your lid. Lastly, I think, is the necessary fittings to connect your pump to the pvc. I just went to the hardware store and put together something that necks the pvc down to the size of the pieces that come with your pump.

Tools: Something to cut holes in the lid, e.g., a Dremel tool, hole cutter (size has to be close to perfect). Something to do any slight resizing of pvc fittings when constructing the connection from the pvc to the pump, e.g., again, a Dremel tool. A drill bit to drill a small hole in the lid for the airtubing to go inside the bucket. You can drill this hole in the lid or the side very close to the top. Another drill bit to drill a hole in the pvc at the top to screw or epoxy your sprayer-emitter in. Might as well have a drill, I guess. Optional: Tap and die set to tap the hole in the top of the pvc if you have a sprayer-emitter that screws in. (I prefer this because it allows for cleaning/replacement of the sprayer-emitter). Forgot: Hacksaw to cut the pvc to size.

Step One: Place your split neoprene cutting holders on the lid in the arrangement you want when the cloner is finished. The number you can use, IMHO, depends on the sprayer(s)-emitter(s) you use and their coverage. I cut 9 in mine, wish I'd done more, but hey, just buy another lid right? But I digress.... Use a marker, Sharpie works well, to outline the neoprene plugs. Now take your cutting tool and cut about 1/8" inside the marked circles. After the first, test the size out by inserting one of your plugs to ensure it seals all the way around. Cut the remaining holes the same way.

Step Two: Get an idea of how the base of your pvc pipe system will look. It should be self-centering in the bottom of the bucket in order to maintain the sprayer-emitter in correct position. Build the base using 3 elbows, one in each of three corners and the other corner will have a 3-opening elbow fitting. This is where you will install the fittings that lead to your pump. When you choose the lengths of your sides and ends, keep in mind it has to be self centering there must be enough room between end-corners to allow a pvc T-fitting into which the vertical risers will be glued. So when your base is done it will have three openings, all going up- one in the middle of each end, and one in the corner. Run pvc pipe up from the two fittings in the end, but make sure they are at a height that will allow your sprayer-emitter to get water in the stems sticking down inside the bucket. Mock it up before you glue just to make sure you have the right height. Before you glue these vertical pipes in, glue elbows on the top ends and then glue the upper cross pipe in. Now glue the vertical pieces in down below.

Step Three: Drill the proper size hole in the top cross pipe in the positions you want to place your sprayer(s)-emitter(s). For these holes, make sure they are at the very top of the pipe's outer circumference othersie your spray may be too high on one side and too low on the other. For glue-in sprayers, drill to proper size and glue them in-easy enough.

For the thread-in sprayers, find the proper tap, i.e., proper diameter and thread count, then get the proper size drill bit. Every tap has a specific size bit. Some tap and die sets have little gauges with them that have holes next to the tap diameter; find a bit that fits perfectly through the hole and that is the proper bit size. Next, drill your hole. Again, drill at the very top of the pipe's circumference. Now thread the hole with your tap and then screw in your sprayer-emitter.

Step Four: Put all your misc. fittings together to hook up your pump to the pvc. It is a good idea to have some threaded instead of all of them glued to facilitate replacement.

Step Five: Once you have your pump hooked up to the pvc, place the entire pvc system and pump in the bucket. Put your airstone under the pump, i.e., arrange your pump so it keeps the airstone from flipping over or floating. Run the air tubing up and out the hole you previously drilled. Fill up to a point just below the sprayer-emitter with 300ppm of your fav veg nutes. Put the lid on, running the pump power cord out one of the holes you created for the neoprene plugs. Now take your cuttings, insert them into your plugs (you can dip in rooting hormones first but not necessary), and insert the plugs into the lid. Make sure your cuttings have enough length below the plug. Put the bucket under some 24-hr lights and let it rip. First roots for me began to show at about 8-9 day mark, so be patient.

If there is enough interest in this thread, I will post pics which will make it all self-explanatory. Probably should have done this to begin with and saved time writing all this.

 

With the cloner I built you do not need rooting hormone, there is no chance of mold attacking the plants, and you do not need a humidity dome, though one might help. I simply took the cuttings, inserted them in the neoprene donuts. It is basically similar to this http://www.hydroponicequipment.com/detail.asp?itemnumber=2055 but not as many sites and not super expensive. I guess I have about $50 into mine. I have tried rooting clones in rockwool cubes with a humidome and it was not very successful, and it was just a pain in the ass. With my bucket cloner I basically take the cuttings and stick them in the holes in the lid using the neoprene donuts and leave them go. No misting them or checking the humidity or anything, just leave them go, wait about ten days and voila-roots! Not saying this is better or worse than anything else, but I have found using rockwool cubes or anything that encloses the cut stem to be kinda crappy. It is just like this one on ebay: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=7768230731&indexURL=2#ebayphotohosting but mine has an air pump and airstone to provide more oxygen to the roots, which adds about ten bucks to the cost.

 

That's all well and good if you are soil growing, but if you want the best growth rate and yield you gotta go hydro. You can't go ripping your clones out of the soil and then stick them in net pots with hydroton and expect them to be okay.