iv decided to bite the bullet and go hydro...my set up is as follows:2 dr120 tents,2 600w hps digital ballastsNlamps,2 6" hvk fans,2 6" carbon filters..iv done my last 3 grows in soil and averaged just over a 1lb of each tent..im pretty new 2 the growing game but i done a lot of surfing b4 taking the green plunge..2 be honest im not looking to get much more yeild out of my tents just looking a more practical way of feeding my plants,its a real pain carrying water up 2 a roofspace, which brings me to the waterfarm system...iv read some really good reports and some not so good..im not really into building my own hydro system, just want to buy the lot in one go...the thing about hydro is i havnt got a clue and i dont have the same amount of time to surf the net because of a new job...im more or less set on buying the waterfarm system but wat nutes nutes do i buy, how do i stop the drippers blocking,wats rootrot and on and on,lol soil seems so easy, any info on the waterfarm r goin hydro and i mean any info will be much appreciated..
com on guys ther must be som1 that can help...should hav wrote; HYDRO VIRGIN LOOKING FOR EXPERIENCED HYDRO LOVER:
well I've just done the same and upgraded from soil to hydro usinvthe waterfarm 8 pack. I'm three weeks into budding with no help other than this sight. As for the Idea of not having to carry water well to give you an idea hydrofarms use aproximately (I'm not metric)22 gallons of water per week with some weeks using as much as 64 gallons (weeks where flushing is required)my biggest helpful observation with problems I've had is the fact that, in soil plant roots have an insulating cover to help the roots maintain a steady temp. Where as in hydro all your roots are exposed to the temp. So keeping the temp. In grow optimum in between room temp and few degrees hotter. Your plants will let you know what temp they like as some strains have different heat tolerances. Make sure all your airlines and water lines stay out from under foot or bucket with some zip ties holding them in groups till they branch off to buckets. Don't forget about every week to two weeks depending on the nutrients you use you will have to completley empty your system invest in a shop vac to suck fluids from bottom of buckets during flush and you will have Lot less issues with ph balancing. Before I started I soaked all my hydroton for a Day removing all the clay dust that occurs from the hydroton being rubbed together. As for nutrients i've purcahsed all fox farms I recommend buying the gallon size containers of big bloom and growbig the medium container of tigerbloom and the large container of chaching with the small containers of open sesame and beastie blooms. What else you need toknow?
Oh yeah drip rings! I almost forgot yeah the saltbuilds up fast on them so every time I do a nutrient flush I pull them off and wipe them down and use a m16 rifle cleaner to pull through them (essentially a long string with weight at one end and swab holder at other) as you see when you buy kit they pop right off and right back on. The quality of your water makes all the importance in cleaning up. I guess the reason why they call hard water hard is because it makes everything harder to clean up! (sorry stupid joke but its the truth)so if your base water has a higher ppm of 180 or more do your self a favor and buy a Brita water filter in the because size you can find and filter out your water. As for a great flushing/desalination agent I recmmend floracleen from gh. Don't forget your drip rings only help your roots to reach the water in the buckets so I've found at the begining running my drip columns 30minutes on 10 off worked great but now that I'm in budding and plant roots are all in bottom bucket water that 15 on 15 off is best for me. Hope this all helped your "hydro virgin"ass out!for me