I got my 2x2 Botanicare econojet flood table all assembled, clean and have ran it over night with some h2o2 in it to help clean the system. My question is...I got 8 babies I wanna put in it to start watering. What's a good timer cycle and should I run any thing but ph balanced water (ie. GH Rapid Rooter Liquid Nute) They're 8 babies in rapid rooters plugged into the small rock wool cubes with the whole cutout. I've heard you doing have to flood it 3-4 times like hydroton as I. Think I might stick with the small cut up rock wool pieces for grow medium when put in bigger pots. Also what is a good temp to keep res at and should I use air stone in bottom of res? Thanks in advance for any input.
I'm about 4 weeks in to my first ebb and flow grow. You can check out my journal I'm about 4 weeks in and our set-ups are very similar.
Come on gents. I know there's someone out there that has used rockwool in an ebb n flow type setup. I know for sure I'm not the first so a little help/ support would be nice. Nobody knows how often to flood and how long to flood for using rockwool. I'm new to the new hydro scene so a little feedback would be appreciated. Thanks...
Pretty sad when i get ONE reply on A website USEd for helping people...exactly why i went back to RIU in the first place.... Coincidentaly it is same reason.... Oh did i say it was a coin idence.... My bad...
Cut up rockwool as a medium? Sounds like a mess. Rockwool tends to break up over time if it is just lying there sucking up water, stuffed in a pot. Put them into bigger rockwool cubes, put the big rockwool cubes on slightly larger coco mats to raise them up a bit. A 2x2 tray fills up really quickly so you should experiment. Start with a two minute cycle and see if that fills up the tray however high you want it, like maybe 1/3 full. If not, increase or decrease the watering cycle. When they are small you can start with once a day, but again check. If you are watering once a day and the cubes seem too light too soon, then increase it to twice a day. What is GH Rapid Rooter? Is it a complete fertilizer? I don't think so. Get a complete veg fertilizer, follow the manufacturer's chart.
this is a general question, that can be answered, but only if u know all your variables. first u want to know how long it takes to flood the tray,, and how fast your cubes dry out, the length of time the cubes dry will very due to temp, humidity, size of plants, and health of plants/ water. first u want to time the time it takes your pump to fill the tray. 5-20min dry out rockwool make sure moist enough to keep plant alive, but dry enough to aerate the roots, if the plants start to wilt the cubes are to dry. this could take a couple hours. keep notes on the time it takes, and during your trial and error time watch the plants, making sure u dont kill them. once you have these bases, repeat flood, drain, dry. untill harvest
The 2x2 trays I have are being used for small seedlings, cuttings until they get rooted and are big enough to transfer. I'm still stuck on medium not sure while route I'm going to go, I have them in a rapid rooter and in a 2x2" rockwool cube. It is just a rooting hormone I use in beginning stages. It takes the 2x2' tray about a minute and half to fill up to its overflow fitting. Right now I'm plugging in pump by hand to fill tray until I get a feel for it as I've never done hydro yet. I plug it in let it fill takes about 1:30 seconds, let it sit for about ten min, and another 1:30 seconds to drain. Do this once a night but they feel awfully light and are damn near dried out. If I lay my finger on cube my finger is moist, not wet. Doesn't seem that they are completely dried out. After they out grow these rockwool cubes I was either gonna do ripped up pieces of rockwool or takes the rockwool cubes and put them in net pots with expanded clay. I plan on getting either Titan flo n gro or CAPs ebb n gro or there new ebb n flo? Either way I'm not sure and still very confused. Taken it day by day! Thanks for your responses!!!! Take care
[quote name='"usedtocare"']Cut up rockwool as a medium? Sounds like a mess. Rockwool tends to break up over time if it is just lying there sucking up water, stuffed in a pot. Put them into bigger rockwool cubes, put the big rockwool cubes on slightly larger coco mats to raise them up a bit. A 2x2 tray fills up really quickly so you should experiment. Start with a two minute cycle and see if that fills up the tray however high you want it, like maybe 1/3 full. If not, increase or decrease the watering cycle. When they are small you can start with once a day, but again check. If you are watering once a day and the cubes seem too light too soon, then increase it to twice a day. What is GH Rapid Rooter? Is it a complete fertilizer? I don't think so. Get a complete veg fertilizer, follow the manufacturer's chart.[/quote] Can I use same nutes as I used for soil? If not what would you recommend. Also should I wait to start feeding Nutes or can I start now with a 1/4 of the strength. Sounds like your not a big fan of rockwool. What medium do you use. I'm open to anything and everything as this is my first soilless grow.