Thanks for your input man. I will utilize the advice you've given me. Do you recommend I flush the res and set it at a lower ppm now or should I just leave it and let them acclimate?
I'd leave it for now and see what happens. You should be writing all this stuff down in a journal (or typing it in one, whatever). You don't want to guess at cause and effect, you want to know. Every single time you make any change, record it, and post results each day over a week and see the results. Examples:
October 7 - signs of what appears to be nutrient burn. Raised lighting 5 inches, placed white craft paper on top of reservoirs to cut down on heat.
October 8 - no visible change
October 9 - plants 2 and 5 looking better. No visible change in other plants.
October 10 - all plants looking better, greener and more perky.
Like that.
After about 4 or 5 grows doing this, you'll train yourself on cause and effect, what works best for you, the systems you're using and the plants you're growing. By the 5th into the 6th grows and beyond, you'll pretty much know everything by simply looking and how to react. It'll become 2nd nature to you.
What's more, after that, you can run multiple grows and try new things; you keep one grow on the tried and true path and maybe experiment with another small grow off to the side with more extreme tactics to increase yields, flavor, and more. Those you'll keep a running journal on as well to see your success and failures.
It's a science, man. Treat it like one.