Input needed from a experienced RDWC/UC grower

southernguy99

Well-Known Member
yes everything runs 24/7, I run the black plastic square 100 gallon rez, set right on the floor that way your water is low, that way you only need the buckets 4,5,6 inches off the floor to maintain the water in the bottom of the bucket , I say i run 1 to 2 inches in the bucket but 3-4 is fine and it might be easier for you starting out this way. I run like a 600gpm pump in the rez with a 3/4 feed line 35psi flex hose, I run it out from the rez to the middle of the buckets put a t on the end and then just loop a piece hose what ever size you need to make circle and close it off, from that loop I run 2 spaghetti lines to each bucket, place them down in the hydroton on the outer sides of the roots off the stem. 1 inch bulkheads in the bottom of each bucket with piece of 1 inch flex hose that t's into the main return line that runs back to the rez. one reason we run flex hose is so we can move our buckets, say you run 12 plants when there small bring all your buckets together and run one light, as they grow spread them out at your extra lights, if you have some really bushy plants spread them out to give them light and room, also if you run hanging lights you can move the buckets in and out to get them as close to the lights as you like. its really a no frills system easy to setup with no maintenance, no floats etc. I want to put my work into maintaining everything else food/water, temp, humidity and lighting etc. but thats for another day
 

JSheeze

Well-Known Member
yes everything runs 24/7, I run the black plastic square 100 gallon rez, set right on the floor that way your water is low, that way you only need the buckets 4,5,6 inches off the floor to maintain the water in the bottom of the bucket , I say i run 1 to 2 inches in the bucket but 3-4 is fine and it might be easier for you starting out this way. I run like a 600gpm pump in the rez with a 3/4 feed line 35psi flex hose, I run it out from the rez to the middle of the buckets put a t on the end and then just loop a piece hose what ever size you need to make circle and close it off, from that loop I run 2 spaghetti lines to each bucket, place them down in the hydroton on the outer sides of the roots off the stem. 1 inch bulkheads in the bottom of each bucket with piece of 1 inch flex hose that t's into the main return line that runs back to the rez. one reason we run flex hose is so we can move our buckets, say you run 12 plants when there small bring all your buckets together and run one light, as they grow spread them out at your extra lights, if you have some really bushy plants spread them out to give them light and room, also if you run hanging lights you can move the buckets in and out to get them as close to the lights as you like. its really a no frills system easy to setup with no maintenance, no floats etc. I want to put my work into maintaining everything else food/water, temp, humidity and lighting etc. but thats for another day
No auto top off? How about airstones in individual buckets? Or do one of your spaghetti lines (per site) drop through the net pot for a waterfall while the other one remains shorter and on top of net pot flowing over roots? Can't figure how raising the buckets 4-6in higher than the res makes the bucket water level off at 1-2in and maintain that level throughout the week? Is your res water level only 8in high and big enough you don't notice weekly drinks from it? Sorry just trying to understand your method. Flex hoses def a good idea, I like flexibility. Lastly, are your spaghetti lines the puncture-in type, or do you use some sort of "T" fitting? I can never get the puncture in type to not leak.
 

southernguy99

Well-Known Member
No auto top off's , air stones in every bucket and one in the rez, the air line goes in through the side of the bucket towards the top and drops down to the bottom. both spaghetti lines stay in hydroton , you don't raise the buckets higher then the rez , you raise the buckets high enough so that when the rez is full it has the amount of water in the bucket you want, with the rez we use its about 4-6 inches, the bulkheads in the buckets can't really fit right to the bottom anyhow, so the bucket will automatically hold an inch of water before it returns any, anyhow . so if you can picture it when your filling your rez, no water will back feed to the buckets until your rez is 3/4 full, by the time its full you have the desired amount of water in the bucket 2-4 inches what ever you want, by no matter how low the rez goes you will always have a inch of water in the bucket as long as the top feed is running because of the bulkheads.
 

5BY5LEC

Well-Known Member
I don't like the idea of any kind of top flow because then if you have a clog you WILL overflow unless you build in some kind of overflow drain.
With a bottom feed it is less piping and if you clog, water just stops flowing to the pump.
Any reason that top feed would be better? Besides the whole aeration thing.
 

southernguy99

Well-Known Member
I don't like the idea of any kind of top flow because then if you have a clog you WILL overflow unless you build in some kind of overflow drain.
With a bottom feed it is less piping and if you clog, water just stops flowing to the pump.
Any reason that top feed would be better? Besides the whole aeration thing.
So I don't run any kind of overflow drain nor can I even remember ever having a leak or overflow issue. I'm from the old school where things shouldn't be automated and this wasn't designed for that, this system has one job to produce.scientifically I really can't tell you why top flow is better, but I know test after test it works better, feeding from the top and flooding from the bottom I have even noticed different root grow, I think it has to do with many things, oxygen, humidity, the fact the roots are not submerged, etc, a root is basically a suction cup and it selectively picks out of the water / nutrient what it wants, I think its more natural coming from the top but I also think its much more easier to get what they want from the slow moving, soft downward flow, and add the fact there is better oxygen and the humidity, then if you add a mister you have the very small particles that they can get was well.. have you ever cloned with an ez cloner vs a ultrasonic fogger
The fogger produces a different root structure, it just stacks the roots on top of each other like crazy, there finer, and grow much better, faster.

So I believe one should be in there room every day checking on things at least 15 minutes day, so if your running say 4 plants with a light in the middle you should be turning you plants at least a 1/4 turn everyday that alone will keep the roots out of the drain , but even though the drain will not clog over night from roots it will do it slowly and the bucket will slowly fill with water, so every night just give the bucket a little tip to see if it has extra water in it, so if there is overflow issues its an operator issue lol. But you should be checking on everything else every day anyhow, temps, humidity etc etc. but by being in your room everyday you will catch things much quicker, and you will learn over time how to read your plants,just by looking , touching felling etc. I never rely on ph or ppm meter, hardly use them the plants will tell me, and NO I never under feed over feed or burn my plants at all and I never have deficiency issues. I don't run any kind of auto top off stuff because i'm in my room everyday, but my nutrient solution can change almost daily once i'm in the 2 week of flower and on. for example week 5 in the first 2 or 3 days they may only get potassium phosphate and epsom's salts, then a few days of full flower solution, then back to the other or a variation of it, just depends on how my plants are doing and what they need.

This system really has no work to it, one water pump , one air pump. start it up let it go, the work is growing your plants thats with all systems, you get out of it what you put in it.
 
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shawnery

Well-Known Member
If roots can "pick out" whatever nutrients they need as you say, why would a weekly res change be necessary to balance the nutrient load?
 

fragileassassin

Well-Known Member
If roots can "pick out" whatever nutrients they need as you say, why would a weekly res change be necessary to balance the nutrient load?
because if your nutrients arent perfectly balanced for exactly what they want, they leave what they dont want in the solution and itll build up in concentration and eventually start causing lockout issues. Thats the bad thing about how we monitor, its just the overall ppm/ec we cant see individual concentrations of minerals.
 

5BY5LEC

Well-Known Member
because if your nutrients arent perfectly balanced for exactly what they want, they leave what they dont want in the solution and itll build up in concentration and eventually start causing lockout issues. Thats the bad thing about how we monitor, its just the overall ppm/ec we cant see individual concentrations of minerals.
Right on. If only we had an ion meter to actually read what the plant was taking in real-time. It exists, but $$$$$.
 

5BY5LEC

Well-Known Member
So I don't run any kind of overflow drain nor can I even remember ever having a leak or overflow issue. I'm from the old school where things shouldn't be automated and this wasn't designed for that, this system has one job to produce.scientifically I really can't tell you why top flow is better, but I know test after test it works better, feeding from the top and flooding from the bottom I have even noticed different root grow, I think it has to do with many things, oxygen, humidity, the fact the roots are not submerged, etc, a root is basically a suction cup and it selectively picks out of the water / nutrient what it wants, I think its more natural coming from the top but I also think its much more easier to get what they want from the slow moving, soft downward flow, and add the fact there is better oxygen and the humidity, then if you add a mister you have the very small particles that they can get was well.. have you ever cloned with an ez cloner vs a ultrasonic fogger
The fogger produces a different root structure, it just stacks the roots on top of each other like crazy, there finer, and grow much better, faster.

So I believe one should be in there room every day checking on things at least 15 minutes day, so if your running say 4 plants with a light in the middle you should be turning you plants at least a 1/4 turn everyday that alone will keep the roots out of the drain , but even though the drain will not clog over night from roots it will do it slowly and the bucket will slowly fill with water, so every night just give the bucket a little tip to see if it has extra water in it, so if there is overflow issues its an operator issue lol. But you should be checking on everything else every day anyhow, temps, humidity etc etc. but by being in your room everyday you will catch things much quicker, and you will learn over time how to read your plants,just by looking , touching felling etc. I never rely on ph or ppm meter, hardly use them the plants will tell me, and NO I never under feed over feed or burn my plants at all and I never have deficiency issues. I don't run any kind of auto top off stuff because i'm in my room everyday, but my nutrient solution can change almost daily once i'm in the 2 week of flower and on. for example week 5 in the first 2 or 3 days they may only get potassium phosphate and epsom's salts, then a few days of full flower solution, then back to the other or a variation of it, just depends on how my plants are doing and what they need.

This system really has no work to it, one water pump , one air pump. start it up let it go, the work is growing your plants thats with all systems, you get out of it what you put in it.
If you are not using a PH or PPM meter you are going to run in to problems. You really need them. Your PH PPM is going to tell you just as much about what your plants are doing as looking at them.
As far as automation.....I am not trying to say "do this because you never have to check it". I am saying see problems and try to avoid them. When you got shit massive and cannot even lift your lids too see inside.....it's a different story then. And that is just a single situation. Just my two cents.
 

shawnery

Well-Known Member
Do you have any scientific data or studies to back up the statement that plants choose which nutrients to absorb? I'm not sayi g it's not true I'm just one who likes a little objective data in my acceptance of information.

I can find countless grows and have spoken to many who used to switch out there water weekly but have since changed their beliefs. Who really knows because there are so many things that can change from grow to grow. They saw not noticeable difference in weight or quality after switching to monthly and even only changing out when switching to flower.

Just a nice conversation not trying to push bbn uttons or start shit.
 

fragileassassin

Well-Known Member
Do you have any scientific data or studies to back up the statement that plants choose which nutrients to absorb? I'm not sayi g it's not true I'm just one who likes a little objective data in my acceptance of information.

I can find countless grows and have spoken to many who used to switch out there water weekly but have since changed their beliefs. Who really knows because there are so many things that can change from grow to grow. They saw not noticeable difference in weight or quality after switching to monthly and even only changing out when switching to flower.

Just a nice conversation not trying to push bbn uttons or start shit.
I tried not changing and just topping off with fresh solution after reading about a lot of those type things. I figured they were drinking major portions of the system volume every week anyway so why not give it a shot. It caused me major issues going into flower and when the stretch finished. They pretty much stopped drinking completely for a week at one point. After I changed my solution to re-balance nutes and they had a few days to recover, they drank 50 gallons in a week. It delayed the whole crop by a couple weeks though.
I wouldnt say that every week is necessary, but I wouldnt go more than like a month at a time and id change it when flipping and after week 4 of flower after stretch is done.
Mine didnt seem to mind it at all during veg, but not so much once flower hit.
This will also really depend on the nutrients you are using. Using Megacrop, I was able to let mine go for a very long period before it caught up with me, but it did and now i wont get to harvest most of my plants before christmas like i wanted to.
 

Big Perm

Well-Known Member
Liebig's Law

Liebig's barrel
Dobenecks[4] used the image of a barrel—often called "Liebig's barrel"—to explain Liebig's law. Just as the capacity of a barrel with staves of unequal length is limited by the shortest stave, so a plant's growth is limited by the nutrient in shortest supply.

If a system satisfies the law of the minimum then adaptation will equalize the load of different factors because the adaptation resource will be allocated for compensation of limitation.[5]Adaptation systems act as the cooper of Liebig's barrel and lengthens the shortest stave to improve barrel capacity. Indeed, in well-adapted systems the limiting factor should be compensated as far as possible. This observation follows the concept of resource competition and fitness maximization.[6]

Due to the law of the minimum paradoxes, if we observe the Law of the Minimum in artificial systems, then under natural conditions adaptation will equalize the load of different factors and we can expect a violation of the law of the minimum. Inversely, if artificial systems demonstrate significant violation of the law of the minimum, then we can expect that under natural conditions adaptation will compensate this violation. In a limited system life will adjust as an evolution of what came before.[5]
 

southernguy99

Well-Known Member
Do you have any scientific data or studies to back up the statement that plants choose which nutrients to absorb? I'm not sayi g it's not true I'm just one who likes a little objective data in my acceptance of information.

I can find countless grows and have spoken to many who used to switch out there water weekly but have since changed their beliefs. Who really knows because there are so many things that can change from grow to grow. They saw not noticeable difference in weight or quality after switching to monthly and even only changing out when switching to flower.

Just a nice conversation not trying to push bbn uttons or start shit.
Hey man, yes just a conversation I know your not trying to start shit nor am I, I'm just relating my 25 years of grows and what we found to be best, like I say it very well may not be for everyone.
to your first question " If roots can "pick out" whatever nutrients they need as you say, why would a weekly res change be necessary to balance the nutrient load

the answer above about balance is right on, balance in solution is key , think of it this way your bobbing for apples and oranges, in the barrel is 50% apples and 50% oranges, you should have a relatively easy time getting either one , but if the ratio was 90% apples and 10% oranges, you'll probably have a hard time getting oranges and 2 will there be enough to fill your needs, well by letting your rez go for weeks on end that basically what happens, now consider there is at least 17 elements and some are easy to get and some are harder to get as is, but remember there is a whole other host of interaction with elements and how their absorbed IE potassium interacts with phosphorus, sodium, calcium and magnesium, but thats a whole other story , the idea of hydro is easy availability of nutrients and oxygen, an unbalanced solution only adds stress. to add to that it prevents unwanted build ups of ph up / down etc, helps to flush out diseases, bacteria, flushes the plant of waste and gives it a fresh drink of water, plus much more but you get the idea , Like I said its my experience from doing some pretty extensive testing in side by side room that rez changing made a big difference.

I'd ask what is the benefit to not changing the rez weekly, that benefits the growth of the plant or the system ?

Ok as far as which nutrients to absorb , I think its called a carrier cell that does it, I think its refereed to by other names as well but honestly I'd have to look it up. my understanding is the more leaf transpiration there is the more suction there is at the roots to draw in the water/nutrients , there is a specific cell to collect each specific element. thats why lighting, temps , humidity, feed etc are all equally important because what happening at the leafs is directly effecting whats going on at the roots and vise versa

the reason i say I never rely on ph or ppm meter, hardly use them is because I have my system down so pat that I know what x amount of rez water and x amount of mixed nutrients will give me, I really only use them if I think I made a mistake mixing something up, or to check now and again or once I have a strain dialed in to see what it is. you say Your PH PPM is going to tell you just as much about what your plants are doing as looking at them. But here is how I see it PH and PPM really doen't tell me anything other then what my solution is, if i'm running a new strain I just set my PH and PPM to a ballpark setting from there my plants tell me if i need to up or down PH or PPM, my plants set PH and PPM of my solution not a meter. once the plants set it I take note for next time.

one more thing about water in buckets, if you have a plant in soil and you over water it and continue to it will die, basically drowning it, it can't get oxygen, in a bucket full of water its really the same thing , the only thing keeping it alive is the air pump, its hard for the plant to get oxygen, I believe it adds stress and the plants tolerate it more so then thrive in it, and from our testing the best balance we found is what I stated above. anyhow those are my 2 cents
 

Billy Liar

Well-Known Member
Plants don't pick out what they need..

Different nutrient elements have different forms and rates of uptake/removal from solution.

NO3, NH4, P, K, Mn: active uptake, fast removal.

Mg, S, Fe, Zn, Cu, Mo, Cl: Intermediate uptake.

Ca, B: Passive uptake, slow removal

Bugbee (2003) Scientific reference!
Do you have any scientific data or studies to back up the statement that plants choose which nutrients to absorb?

Peace
BL
 

southernguy99

Well-Known Member
Plants don't pick out what they need..

Different nutrient elements have different forms and rates of uptake/removal from solution.

NO3, NH4, P, K, Mn: active uptake, fast removal.

Mg, S, Fe, Zn, Cu, Mo, Cl: Intermediate uptake.

Ca, B: Passive uptake, slow removal

Bugbee (2003) Scientific reference!


Peace
BL

Sorry I don't meant call you out I guess but your wrong plants are selective, you missed the boat on what I'm talking about, i'm not talking about the rate of uptake, active / passive , metabolic vs non metabolic positive vs negative ions, the interactions of ions, Mass flow diffusion, yeah I got it but thats not what I'm talking about , I wrote the above in layman's terms so maybe my fault

what I'm saying is plants do pick what they need, a plant selectively allows what elements it needs to enter the roots, so if a plant needs a specific ION say NO3 it tells its carrier or transporter cells to go get that ion and bring it into the root, and it does that for all specific ions, Ions can not flow freely in and out of the root, Its a stop and go process, and the plant determines which ones it wants in and escorts them with a carrier cell.
 

Billy Liar

Well-Known Member
plant selectively allows what elements it needs to enter the roots, so if a plant needs a specific ION say NO3 it tells its carrier or transporter cells to go get that ion and bring it into the root,
What does it do when it no longer needs NO3? If uptake continues once the "need" is satisfied, is that still being selective?

Peace
BL
 

southernguy99

Well-Known Member
What does it do when it no longer needs NO3? If uptake continues once the "need" is satisfied, is that still being selective?

Peace
BL
well I wouldn't really agree with that either, I use to do a lot of walking in the woods looking examining of natural plants, what I didn't see was plants killing themselves with NO3 in fact hard time finding plants that exhibited high amounts of nitrogen, and considering nitrogen is the most readily available element I'd say there being selective. in fact most studied healthy plants store 3-5% nitrogen so they do have a cut off limit

but one needs to understand that nitrogen pretty much makes up every part of the plant, nitrogen increases chlorophyll production, component of ATP, leaf structures, nucleic acids/DNA , major component of amino acids, proteins, etc. so its reasonable to understand why a plant can absorb its easily and would store it.
so what happens when a plants get to much, they get dark green, stretch, are weak, get very leafy, root growth is stunted, plus many other things,, again how often do you even see this in the wild , not much because this is regulated.

the problem with Nitrogen is people think they can put a plant in a bucket of water or pot and feed the shit out of it, if you over feed it sure it will get really green stretch etc all that stuff, but it has a limit and will slow down or stop taking it , but some people don't have a clue and keeps ramming the NO3 to it, the plants is trapped in a container so it can't stop taking from one section of roots and get food from another spot because its completely saturated with nitrogen. so what happens is the plant shows nitrogen burn on the tips of the leaves, in case you don't know this as most people don't nitrogen burn isn't because the plant has to much nitrogen in it or is still feeding on it, and the nitrogen is burning the leaf tips, that process as stop, its not taking nitrogen, the nitrogen has completely saturated the outside of the roots to the point the plant can't uptake water and the burnt leaves etc are from dehydration. the nitrogen is outside the plant suffocating it, not on the inside.
so yeah its still being selective.

but hey I just did a quick search you might find it interesting
https://dyna-gro.com/how-plant-roots-absorb-nutrients/

https://www.agry.purdue.edu/ext/pubs/agry-95-08.pdf on this scroll down to you see "The nutrient uptake process" and read that section.

These might explain it a bit better.
cheers
 
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