My DIY Bubble Cloner

[East Coast]

18 litre bin. Six holes cut now, the other six either side will be done at a later date.
Found a use for empty Play-Doh pots.
10mm Neoprene sheet cut into disc's, then slit down one side.

Nice fit
Cut the bottom off. Nice and easy to pull out and inspect. Thought about just using disc in holes, but could see that getting messy.
Living in New Zealand, I found we are very limited to plastic ware on the shelves, very hard to find anything coloured also. I would image our major cities like Auckland and Wellington may have a bigger choice.

So, with a usable 18 litres, I would image only using 13-15 litres capacity, what size air pump and how many air stones would be good?

 

[superstoner1]

The yellow cups will allow light to filter in.

 

[East Coast]

The yellow cups will allow light to filter in.

The play-doh lip sits outside the hole drilled in the lid, the neoprene fits in tight. The hole drilled is the perfect fit for the cup, that alone creates a light free fit, add the lip, and we have no light penetration.

Know anything on the air pumps and air stones?

 

[RetiredMatthebrute]

really any air pump and stone should work fine. the idea with cloners is that the bubbles make tiny little plashes that moisten the stem/roots of the cuttings. try and get a pump that has 2 outlets so you can run a stone to each side of the rez.

also keep an eye on the stems. if they are drying out then you mat want to cut a little more off the play-doh cups, but iw ouldnt go fixing it untill you see if it works or not.

i wouldnt worry too much about light, even if a small amount of light gets in its not going to hurt anything, a little H202 if your not running bennies will help to keep bad's out and the only thing you have to be concerned with is algea, which wont really hurt anything anyways just slimy and rez would need to be changed weekly to prevent it from building up (thats if it even grows, it needs light to grow)

i found i had best results in my cloner when they water was kept a little warmer, 75 ish and i had roots in as little as 5 days. also i would suggest using a rooting hormone in the rez and straying away from dupping the cuttings into gel/powder as i fond the gel inhibits stem rot because it is too thick for the plant to take up water and creates a seal on the stem preventing the plant from uptaking water. i have been using clonex with good results but i have heard just plain water works well too. if you cant find clonex you can extract a rooting hormone from willow tree branches if you have any of them around.

 

[East Coast]

Chur chur - a few good words of wisdom in those paragraphs. Aiming for a two outlet pump with flow control. I use H202 for other things, so some in the res will be fine by me.

Was not sure on the length of the play-doh cups, left them long so I could adjust like you said.

The cloner will be sitting in with mums, which sit between 22-23c - looks like I will need to heat res just a bit more.

also i would suggest using a rooting hormone in the rez and straying away from dupping the cuttings into gel/powder as i fond the gel inhibits stem rot because it is too thick for the plant to take up water and creates a seal on the stem preventing the plant from uptaking water. i have been using clonex with good results but i have heard just plain water works well too. if you cant find clonex you can extract a rooting hormone from willow tree branches if you have any of them around

Little confused over your statement on clonex/powder.......do you use clonex in the reservoir ?

 

[spek9]

Sorry if this question seems 'noobish', but I'm literally new to indoor (only doing it for two years)... are you trying to 'bubble' water onto the stems of the clones hanging in air, or are you submerging the cuttings?

It sounds as though you will have some space, so there is an air gap. Why not go with a nozzle setup instead to spray the water directly on the stems?

I use an 'aerocloner' that does what I stated, and it works great. Exact same setup (neoprene gaskets in baskets). I use tap water... no pH, no nothing (considering the plants at that stage don't require nutes, hence pH is irrelevant). Sometimes I dip in rooting gel prior to putting into the cloner, other times not. I've seen 95+% uptake regardless.

-spek

ps. I like your intuitive approach by using the Play-Doh baskets. I can see how no light can penetrate.

 

[East Coast]

Sorry if this question seems 'noobish', but I'm literally new to indoor (only doing it for two years)... are you trying to 'bubble' water onto the stems of the clones hanging in air, or are you submerging the cuttings? Probably going to try suspend clones above water line.

It sounds as though you will have some space, so there is an air gap. Why not go with a nozzle setup instead to spray the water directly on the stems? Nozzles need maintenance.

I use an 'aerocloner' that does what I stated, and it works great. Exact same setup (neoprene gaskets in baskets). I use tap water... no pH, no nothing (considering the plants at that stage don't require nutes, hence pH is irrelevant). Sometimes I dip in rooting gel prior to putting into the cloner, other times not. I've seen 95+% uptake regardless.

-spek

ps. I like your intuitive approach by using the Play-Doh baskets. I can see how no light can penetrate.

I am an ex sparkie by trade, and now work for a building company as their QS and program management specialist. Over the years I have learnt to 'KISS' - keep it simple stupid. Yip - I could build a aero cloner, but I keep looking at the parts, and think, is that simple - and the answer I give myself is - nope. I often have to travel due to work, and when I do, I will just place the stems down into the water for a safety net. The only thing I can see going wrong with a bubble cloner is the air pump stops working. I could put two air pumps in and duty cycle, but thats been paranoid.

Would a bubble cloner be quieter than a aero cloner aswell - not sure on this??

 

[spek9]

I am an ex sparkie by trade, and now work for a building company as their QS and program management specialist. Over the years I have learnt to 'KISS' - keep it simple stupid. Yip - I could build a aero cloner, but I keep looking at the parts, and think, is that simple - and the answer I give myself is - nope. I often have to travel due to work, and when I do, I will just place the stems down into the water for a safety net. The only thing I can see going wrong with a bubble cloner is the air pump stops working. I could put two air pumps in and duty cycle, but thats been paranoid.

Would a bubble cloner be quieter than a aero cloner aswell - not sure on this??

I can't answer that. All I know is that I travel for 9-14 days at a time frequently, and my aerocloner does not give me grief, nor make ANY noise whatsoever (other than the odd 'drip' of water).

I also had to get used to 24 plants flowering all the time on the same business trips, so I had to start using drip-systems for my perpetual.

I cut clones so often that if one round fails, I'm 9 days from the next round, so I didn't worry about redundancy so much. It was my flowering plants and mothers I primarily did redundancy for.

-spek

 

[dux]

Why do you have so much play doh?

 

[East Coast]

Why do you have so much play doh?

So when they bust me, they will finally work out, that all photos of MJ are models made from play-doh.....

 

[RetiredMatthebrute]

Sorry if this question seems 'noobish', but I'm literally new to indoor (only doing it for two years)... are you trying to 'bubble' water onto the stems of the clones hanging in air, or are you submerging the cuttings?

It sounds as though you will have some space, so there is an air gap. Why not go with a nozzle setup instead to spray the water directly on the stems?

I use an 'aerocloner' that does what I stated, and it works great. Exact same setup (neoprene gaskets in baskets). I use tap water... no pH, no nothing (considering the plants at that stage don't require nutes, hence pH is irrelevant). Sometimes I dip in rooting gel prior to putting into the cloner, other times not. I've seen 95+% uptake regardless.

-spek

ps. I like your intuitive approach by using the Play-Doh baskets. I can see how no light can penetrate.

i also use an aero cloner, 5 gal bucket with a short piece of PVC on a pump and a sprayer nozzle...works awesome..

the way he is doing it will work just the same as its pretty much the same concept, you would be surprised how wet them bubbles will keep the stems, nothing should dry out and its not how much water you can vlast at them but ultimatly just keeping them moist.

that being said i have never really used a bubble cloner, in theory i can see how it would work the same.

like i said earlier once i increased my temps a bit i had much better sucess, my gear is in my basement and it stays cool down there, by tap[ing a seedling heating mat around my 5 gal bucket it seemed to warm the water enough to increase my sucess rate from 10% to around 80%

 

[superstoner1]

Yeah, aero cloners are great. I am currently on a 10 day trip 1300 miles from home and I never worry. I've done thousands of clones in my 3 or 4 aero cloners and lost two.