Jack's 12-4-16 RO

Wastei

Well-Known Member
You get what you pay for. Is it at all disturbing that Jacks smells like pool chemicals?
Is it at all disturbing to pay for water weight? Nothing wrong with Jacks or any other nutrient line. It's fine to experience problems starting out but you only sound stupid blaming a product that hundreds of people use successfully.

Cyco contains the same minerals, plants don't care about grade as long as it's in readily available form.
 

calvin.m16

Well-Known Member
Is it at all disturbing to pay for water weight? Nothing wrong with Jacks or any other nutrient line. It's fine to experience problems starting out but you only sound stupid blaming a product that hundreds of people use successfully.

Cyco contains the same minerals, plants don't care about grade as long as it's in readily available form.
I've known that bottles are water forever so no. Lots of people use Athena blended line instead of the powders and pay extra knowing its more because it's already blended in stock solution.

I'm not going to try and dilly with it, once I saw my plants drop to 4s in pH it wasn't for me. It's advertised to be stable just like lots of shit and yeah its stable in the reservoir but once it touches the roots its unstable unless you do an almost constant feed on them.
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calvin.m16

Well-Known Member

I've found similar threads with people saying pH is crashing down to 4.xx and have experienced the same issue, previous nutrients I never even had to think about pH issues. Not trying to turn this into a dry fert bashing thread I'm just noting my experiences.

eh at least I tried on a dozen plants, they're going back to their old regiment I'm not dealing with wacky pH having me scratch my head and pH Probe rape my plants.
 

calvin.m16

Well-Known Member
mine crashed with Tap in my well water. they sent me RO for free and it stays stable in my res for a week.
Yes the reservoir stays perfectly stable, I'm just noting when I water my plants, I can go in, check the roots with a pH probe that is newly calibrated and the roots are screaming 4.6 pH when my input feed was 5.8. Support said do 6.0 so I did that, checked the plant today and again this time even worse, 4.2 pH!!

I guess I'm not allowed to use the cheap stuff.. I won't deal with pH issues ever again like that. In the past I had issues with H&G Cocos crashing and it fucking slaughtered my yields in a bad way. No hate on H&G I ran the cocos formula for a year in coco/perlite and it always was killer weed but it did have an issue with pH fluctuating a lot and usually acidic side.

My only thought process is maybe the plants need less fertilizer so I even went back to 0.7 EC to try and see if a couple plants would respond differently, plants are in 2 gal coco perlite and nope, same low pH within 6 hours and not only that, those plants that got less EC showed deficiencies so its not too much feed if anything they need more but I'm getting so much mixed info.

Support says run 1.0 EC for clones with RO formula no epsom or additives, pH to 5.8 in coco and I've mixed by the gram and by just pouring in until I hit desired EC.
 

calvin.m16

Well-Known Member
weird.
i wonder if the 321 would do the same with the 5-12-26 base?

hope you didn't buy a 25# bag
Nope thankfully the furthest I went was epsom salt which I Use anyways and a 2.2 lb bag which I already went through quite a bit of. I'll use it on my trees I'm planting this year outside. $20 investment total. Worth a shot though..

I'd be interested to see with the 321 at this point I think I'm gunna not fix what isn't broken and just pay more for the convenience for the time being.. The major reason I wanted to switch to jacks is cost savings.
 

GBAUTO

Well-Known Member
Nope thankfully the furthest I went was epsom salt which I Use anyways and a 2.2 lb bag which I already went through quite a bit of. I'll use it on my trees I'm planting this year outside. $20 investment total. Worth a shot though..

I'd be interested to see with the 321 at this point I think I'm gunna not fix what isn't broken and just pay more for the convenience for the time being.. The major reason I wanted to switch to jacks is cost savings.
I've been running Jacks 3-2-1 for 3 years now, and it has been flawless for me.
I use it in my RDWC system with ZERO ph drift as well as my outdoor projects.
 

Drop That Sound

Well-Known Member
So basically you have to constantly feed with the jacks RO at lower EC to keep the run off PH higher (it works when you do though, right?), using ? times as much product as normal, filtering even more RO water, pumping in extra nitrogen, and costing way more than it should?

You testing straight runoff that drains from the pot, or doing slurry like test with the coco? Waiting for the last few drips of the runoff, or take the sample right as it comes out? Did you up the volume of water during a runoff test, or just use the entire percentage that normally drains every feeding? And your meter, newly as in making sure all the time, or recently calibrated? Just wondering..
 

Drop That Sound

Well-Known Member
I wanted to save money too, and work my away around even buying 2 bags, looking at the one parts instead, etc.. but 3-2-1 (2 part jacks) hydro for the win. Glad I got a limited lifetime supply while it was somewhat cheaper, like 2-3 years ago.

My good buddy worked at the local hydro shop back before then, his boss and the owner were family friends. Kinda spoiled me. I went shopping like a kid in a candy store, once a month or more in the overstock (smoke-out) room, for years, haha.

I got liter after liter of every nutrient line on the market. Pallet worth of green planet and NFTG sample boxes, etc. Gallons of Aqua flakes (worked fine in coco vs cocos A&b).. nova bloom, Every additive you could think of. A fresh mini sample jug of hydro gaurd every week. Lol, Some outdoor grows back then (soil and soilless, organic vs salts, etc) I used 20+ different products/brands throughout the season. My grow room cupboards are stocked with so much still that I haven't already gave away.

I was able to learn first hand that its all snake oil BS just like most products. All you need is solid minimal nute line, and nothing more really. I find it best to get the idea of anything being special out of your head, and supply only the essentials.

Jacks hydro fits that bill for me perfectly. Same batch can feed everything, even the veggies. I don't even care about adding silicates or anything else anymore either. Sucks the RO isn't working out for you.
 

jondamon

Well-Known Member
Yes the reservoir stays perfectly stable, I'm just noting when I water my plants, I can go in, check the roots with a pH probe that is newly calibrated and the roots are screaming 4.6 pH when my input feed was 5.8. Support said do 6.0 so I did that, checked the plant today and again this time even worse, 4.2 pH!!

I guess I'm not allowed to use the cheap stuff.. I won't deal with pH issues ever again like that. In the past I had issues with H&G Cocos crashing and it fucking slaughtered my yields in a bad way. No hate on H&G I ran the cocos formula for a year in coco/perlite and it always was killer weed but it did have an issue with pH fluctuating a lot and usually acidic side.

My only thought process is maybe the plants need less fertilizer so I even went back to 0.7 EC to try and see if a couple plants would respond differently, plants are in 2 gal coco perlite and nope, same low pH within 6 hours and not only that, those plants that got less EC showed deficiencies so its not too much feed if anything they need more but I'm getting so much mixed info.

Support says run 1.0 EC for clones with RO formula no epsom or additives, pH to 5.8 in coco and I've mixed by the gram and by just pouring in until I hit desired EC.

sounds a lot like you possibly have a salinity issue in your roots if you’re hitting with 5.8 and instantly it’s at 4.x ph.

Usually with high salinity comes low pH.

Seen it plenty of times before.
 

Milky Weed

Well-Known Member
You get what you pay for. Is it at all disturbing that Jacks smells like pool chemicals?
No your just alittle inept

have to change your ratios abit to make it work. Cut your r-o formula with some more p and k mostly k. Then can feed at a higher ec if you dont like lush green leafs.
 
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calvin.m16

Well-Known Member
So basically you have to constantly feed with the jacks RO at lower EC to keep the run off PH higher (it works when you do though, right?), using ? times as much product as normal, filtering even more RO water, pumping in extra nitrogen, and costing way more than it should?

You testing straight runoff that drains from the pot, or doing slurry like test with the coco? Waiting for the last few drips of the runoff, or take the sample right as it comes out? Did you up the volume of water during a runoff test, or just use the entire percentage that normally drains every feeding? And your meter, newly as in making sure all the time, or recently calibrated? Just wondering..
That's the big issue is I've yet to invest into automated irrigation, when I do perhaps I'll revisit it.

I'm not saying Jacks is bad just saying it didn't work for me personally with my setup and low level of experience.
 

calvin.m16

Well-Known Member
There are things I've learned personally such as I do not prefer using any Kelp products where I have buddies that slam their plants with different kelp containing stuff.

I know not all bottles are needed, I'm keeping it as simple as possible this next go around.
 

rkymtnman

Well-Known Member
That's the big issue is I've yet to invest into automated irrigation, when I do perhaps I'll revisit it.

I'm not saying Jacks is bad just saying it didn't work for me personally with my setup and low level of experience.
i'm confused: are you testing the pH in the root zone of the coco or the pH of your runoff?

one thing great about jacks is their customer service. the daughter , a Peters herself, answered my emails and helped me with my pH drop issues. good luck trying to contact GH or many others and get a reply
 

calvin.m16

Well-Known Member
i'm confused: are you testing the pH in the root zone of the coco or the pH of your runoff?

one thing great about jacks is their customer service. the daughter , a Peters herself, answered my emails and helped me with my pH drop issues. good luck trying to contact GH or many others and get a reply
Not going to lie the brand of nutrients I used before Jacks I never even had to think about calling them or emailing them. The fact you gotta do that makes it suck imo. To each their own or whatever the saying is lmao. I'll pay extra for pre-blended stuff that is noticeably less finicky and doesn't smell like water park pool water.

I will vouch that Jacks email support is great I did have to communicate with them a few times. I'm not saying it's bad nutrients I'm just saying the brand I used before then gave me zero issues I just wanted to save a buck and broke a cardinal rule, if it ain't broke don't fix it.
 

Milky Weed

Well-Known Member
Not going to lie the brand of nutrients I used before Jacks I never even had to think about calling them or emailing them. The fact you gotta do that makes it suck imo. To each their own or whatever the saying is lmao. I'll pay extra for pre-blended stuff that is noticeably less finicky and doesn't smell like water park pool water.

I will vouch that Jacks email support is great I did have to communicate with them a few times. I'm not saying it's bad nutrients I'm just saying the brand I used before then gave me zero issues I just wanted to save a buck and broke a cardinal rule, if it ain't broke don't fix it.
I bet it does suck not knowing how to use nutrients. I never had to call em :bigjoint:
 
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