What do we want to water and room temperature to be. Usually my soil tem for the room would be about 80- 85 degrees. Any benift to higher or lower temp for room air and water? Also as I see it each plant grow is basicilly a Black 5 gal container with a flower pot partially suspened in it so the roots are in the rockwool nute solution. And Bubbles adding O2 hitting the roots via the nule solution. Kind of keep the roots out of the solution other then using the rockwool as a wick to bring the solution up to the roots. Keep raising the rock wool or lowering the water level to the point that the wool always gets wet. And check PH every day or several times a day? Are we still expecting 1-2 weeks of veg and 2-3 weeks of flowering? Over the next couple of days I will be be building out my grow area and will upload pictures. I expect two areas..one soal and one hydro till I feel comfortable I am on track. I'm up to 1000 watts of HPS lighting 400 from above and the rest offset on 45 degree angles from corners above. I have been running my swimming pool 12 hours a day to maintain a steady electric vill so as not to draw atttention when the usage goes up.
We don't want to move water all we want to do it add bubbles to our plants. Does this mean the plant roots are sermersed in the grow fluid completely. If so why don't they rot or drown...or do the air bubbles take care of that? So.... Now instead of setting up a flush unit like I saw at Epcot. I want to make sure there's lots of bubbles constaintly flowing through my plant media. So - Don't fill the buckets with anything but water/nute mixture and just make sure the roots have something to attach too..? Correct? Side note: I know I always get offtrack.....Iv'e read that adding H2O2 adds O2 to system....Does it? And if so would I want to have the fluid in the my mixture or just the extra O2 that would be expelled as you allow H2O2 to sit idle.? I'd liek to help along as best I could... I have a timeline of a total of 3 months to get done with this grow. I know It is cutting it close.. I may be able to add another month. BUt it would mean cancelling cruise reservations and delaying a vaction. Regards to all. MoW2
Ok have a handle on the net pot.. I can envision the roots coing out the bottom of the net pot into the nute bucket, Chnage he nuke bucket mixture every 3-10 days. I have seen pictures of people having to tie their plants up above to handle the weight. I think Im ready to kill my first batch...Laugh... I'll find my nutirents tomorrow and I'll be on my way... Thank you BPP [ QUOTE]Originally posted by THUG i like the 3 seed idea, novel way round doing clones for a small grow. i find hydroton is well worth the money for the results compared to gravel and it can b reused after propper cleaning cutting the cost. also if growing from clone, if the clone is done in a aero cloner (simple to make) or water then when the roots r long enough it can b "planted" straght into the hydroton saving the need and cost of rockwoll. i find a spare bucket the same as the 1 used in the BB is handy to mix up the nutes in, then i just swap the lid with the netpot and airline straght over. much safer and simpler than tryin to mix nutes in a bucket with a plant balanced on the top. my airline is run through the top of the bucket not the side. dont use clear airline tho. u say to keep the water level under the pot when rooting. i find that if the bottom of the pot sits in the water but not so deep as the rockwool is sodden that works best in rooting then as soon as "a few" roots come out the bottom of the pot by a few inches i drop the level just under the pot and dont let it drop more than 2 or 3 inch. just the way i do it and it works well. [/QUOTE]
One thing I'd like to clear up... We should or shouldn't allow the roots to enter the nutrient Bucket? I saw reference to keeping them just above abd another allowing them to enter just below the water surface level. How deep if at al do you aloow the roots to enterthe nutrient bucket. I envision a ( smaller bucket as you suggest hung within the hole of the nute bucket. The water level has me puzzled. The nute fluid hits the stone/rockwool mixture or does the smaller pot sit at a level where it is slightly under it. I did see where you recommended if the samller pot gets too dry to add a cup of nute mixture to it. So I am going to assume I keep the NET pot just above the nute fluid. I allmost bought that coconut fiber stuff they have for hanging plants in place of the rockwool.. Once I find rockwool I will certainly use it. I am hopeing tomorrow when I get my nutrients they will be selling rockwool. Also - I imagine that the general moisture within the sealed system will take care of the watering of the plants. If I can;t get rock wool will vermiculite mixed with river rock stones work decently??
HIGH All, The net pot is just above the Solution and the roots go into the Solution. Once the Level of the Solution goes down you change...I do my every week. You'll Also need expanded clay pellets...the river rock would work just as long as it's pea sized and sterilized. It's really an easy system..just read up on it more.
I'm wondering how hard it's going to be to take the top off the bucket once the plant's pretty big? I just made two buckets yesterday, abd I have a hard time snapping the bucket lid on and off already. When a full plant is in there, I'm afraid I'm going to send my plant flying or something if I try to hard to pry it off! EDIT: Oh yeah, one of my beautiful buckets ready to go:
nice theaed ive printed it all out so im gonna give it a read coz im thinking of doing a sea of green using a bubbler or two insted of my wimar watering system thanx for the infor
If you are gonna do a sea of green, u can link all the buckets up to each other. Just link all of your buckets with hose at the bottom and link them to a main bucket with no plant in it - but a water level bubble (like in the top of your toilet). This will allow you to set the levels for all of the buckets. I have got this main tank linked up to a "reservoir" tank which i mix my nutes in and allow to drain into my main tank regulated by the bubble thing. Hope that makes sence..... here is a pic of what my small system looks like!
I too have been thinking of using a float valve setup to maintain the proper water level. Could you please be more specific about how you set up yours? Have any more pics? Looks great!
i bought mine already set up..... ill try and explain tho.... the big tank is the reservoir and from this, we have a small plastic filter which runs down into the head tank (the tank with the blue pump on it). So a pipe runs from the reservoir to the head tank through a hole drilled in the top of it to which the float mechanism is attached.... Once the height of the float has been set, this regulates the level of the water througout all of the four plant holding pots as they are all connected by hose at the bottom using T connectors and rubber seals.... hope that helps
This made my life a million times better! I can't thank everyone enough. You will see a BB by me soon!
PS. Has anyone thought of an easier way to keep light out of the bucket other than using like two rolls of duct tape? Also, I couldn't find buckets with covers... Any advice there??
use black buckets and for sovers just get some wood/strong cardboard/plastic thats strong enough to hold ur net pots and just put em on top of te bucket with a hole cut in
There is an easier way than manageing your water leval. Instead of using a lid, cut a large piece of styrofoam to float and then cut a hole in the middle to hang your net pot in. Here is a diagram: http://greenmanspage.com/guides/hydrosystems.html Its the second one down : "WATER CULTURE SYSTEM"