Your tap water is kinda hard. I rarely even look at my EC. I paid $350 for trimeter,and a $50 ph&items meter would have been good enough. You should look into a RO filter,that's always a good investment.
They look fine to me. I wouldn't worry about the roots knotting up. By the time you harvest you will wind up with a root mass the shape and size of your buckets. 900 ppm seems a little high for that stage of growth.
I just used 8oz foam cups filled with seedstarter mix. After about a week vegd in there, I would wash the dirt off the roots and transplant into my hydroton. Gives you a little room for grower error. I never lost a seedling yet.
I clearly said pulling extracts heat better, atleast in my situation. Sometimes in the winter I run no fan at all. If your fan dying kills your plants your lights are probably too close.
How big are your containers? I find 8 plants are my limit, and I'm using 2 600w hps's I usually just run 6 plants. If you keep em small and don't top them you should be ok. I pull about 3-5 oz a plant in 5gal ebb&flow buckets.
You ph should be between 5.5 and 5.9. I use 40 gal in my Rez too, for veg I use 200ml micro,grow and bloom, also calmag,silica and hydroguard. In flower I use 200ml micro,400ml bloom,200ml liquid kool bloom,40ml Floralicious plus.
I would change every 7 days, a lot less problems that way. Topping off with just water in between. That's how I was taught. If you're not chilling everything an your Rez temps get above 75 you're just asking for trouble.
CG puts out some good products. After seeing those pics, I'm leaning towards popping a pack of rainbow jones,I got stashed away. Looking good very good indeed!