Building an indoor raised bed, S.I.P vs drained?

[WeedFreak78]

I've decided to go no till after running recycled soil for the last 2 years. Here where I started and the mix I'll be using:

https://www.rollitup.org/t/opinions-on-my-soil-recycling-amendments.945464/

None of the pre-made beds fill my area quite right so I'm just gonna build something. It's essentially going to be permanent, framed in wood, about 5x7x24"deep. I'm torn on building a S.I.P vs traditional box with drainage and looking for opinions. If we're trying to emulate natural living soil, top watering makes more sense to me, being like rain and carrying elements deeper into the soil, but the benefits of having a contained reservoir, like consistent soil moisture and not dealing with run off, would be nice also. I'm leaning to the drained bed, only because it's what I know.

Opinions?

 

[GanjaSnake]

I've decided to go no till after running recycled soil for the last 2 years. Here where I started and the mix I'll be using:

https://www.rollitup.org/t/opinions-on-my-soil-recycling-amendments.945464/

None of the pre-made beds fill my area quite right so I'm just gonna build something. It's essentially going to be permanent, framed in wood, about 5x7x24"deep. I'm torn on building a S.I.P vs traditional box with drainage and looking for opinions. If we're trying to emulate natural living soil, top watering makes more sense to me, being like rain and carrying elements deeper into the soil, but the benefits of having a contained reservoir, like consistent soil moisture and not dealing with run off, would be nice also. I'm leaning to the drained bed, only because it's what I know.

Opinions?

I've been running the same soil for years using SIP containers... One of the keys is to never let your soil go completely dry, it's easy to so with SIP containers. And you can always hand water if you like, I like to water in tea from above.

 

[DonTesla]

I've decided to go no till after running recycled soil for the last 2 years. Here where I started and the mix I'll be using:

https://www.rollitup.org/t/opinions-on-my-soil-recycling-amendments.945464/

None of the pre-made beds fill my area quite right so I'm just gonna build something. It's essentially going to be permanent, framed in wood, about 5x7x24"deep. I'm torn on building a S.I.P vs traditional box with drainage and looking for opinions. If we're trying to emulate natural living soil, top watering makes more sense to me, being like rain and carrying elements deeper into the soil, but the benefits of having a contained reservoir, like consistent soil moisture and not dealing with run off, would be nice also. I'm leaning to the drained bed, only because it's what I know.

Opinions?

Soma has a chapter on SIP beds in his book, probably his only good and thorough chapter imo lol.
Plants really rely on wicking more than anything in nature, as rain fall just doesn't cut it always, so what I would do is build a sip with wicks that tap into a shallow reservoir. That way it can drain if need be, but can slurp all it wants..even allow for vaycays.

And you only need it 16" deep.. Even with a two inch thick mulch and two inches of breathable rock etc in the bottom.. 18 inch depth would allow for 14 inches of pure medium..which would have faster gas exchanges and be better imo (harder to go anaerobic etc)

 

[WeedFreak78]

Soma has a chapter on SIP beds in his book, probably his only good and thorough chapter imo lol.
Plants really rely on wicking more than anything in nature, as rain fall just doesn't cut it always, so what I would do is build a sip with wicks that tap into a shallow reservoir. That way it can drain if need be, but can slurp all it wants..even allow for vaycays.

And you only need it 16" deep.. Even with a two inch thick mulch and two inches of breathable rock etc in the bottom.. 18 inch depth would allow for 14 inches of pure medium..which would have faster gas exchanges and be better imo (harder to go anaerobic etc)

I'll look into the Soma SIPs. I've been leaning to this SIP design, pic found online.

I was thinking a 24" deep box, those pipes are 4", about 16" of soil, leaves about 4" to the top. I'll have the corrugated pipe tied to pvc coming out the side and capped off. I'll tee my fill pipe into the pvc stub and in the cap I'll put a overflow hole about an inch down and a spigot on the bottom for complete drainage, if its ever needed.

 

[DonTesla]

Nice.
Chapter 3, page 13 is where he breaks them down..if curious.