advice on my first dwc - air?

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straightup636

Member
Thats plenty.

Always keep in mind that it's the actual surface agitation that increases the rate of gas exchange between air and water, not the bubbles themselves. I basically have the same setup as you except with the ez stor squared buckets - I find that the squared buckets make for better connections with bulkheads and/or uniseals (ie fewer leaks).

Also, if you have enough water pressure, try throwing a few pipe screens in the ends of your waterfall lines - it will aerate the water even more. You could also throw a 3 way elbow on the ends of the waterfall pipes - that will give you two streams of water and because they are elbows, it will shoot down rather than t connectors that would just shoot off to the sides.

I'm a big believer in ditching all the reverence for airstones and airpumps. They heat up your solution, introduce airborne pathogens, screw with the ph, and are a general pain in the ass. Everything I've researched and read states that as long as you have even very minor, or limited, surface agitation, the DO levels will be just as good, if not better, than using traditional airstones.
 
H

hivealive

Member
i wish i had the square buckets.. i managed to stop the leaks i was getting by A) drilling holes smaller than what was recommended for the uniseal size, and B) using electrical tape with two turns around the uniseal.

i ended up machining some delrin parts to reduce the pipe diameter before the entry of air into the elbow joint.
i made a few variations to find the achieve the right amount of reduction for maximum bubbles / water agitation.

i will try the screens and other methods you mentioned tomorrow, i also noticed that the inner diameter of the airline into the elbow had an impact on the size of the bubbles it created. With the wire screens however, i guess i won't have to worry about bubble size created from airline internal diameter.

had no idea about the pathogens and ph complications an air pump provides.. i only went with the venturi system to reduce cost of electricity - its a great system once you get it setup with the right step down pipe diameter...


also, how do i know if i have enough water pressure? the pump is maxed out.. i went for your suggestion on the DCP-2500


Regards
 
Keesje

Keesje

Well-Known Member
straightup636 said:
I'm a big believer in ditching all the reverence for airstones and airpumps. They heat up your solution, introduce airborne pathogens, screw with the ph, and are a general pain in the ass. Everything I've researched and read states that as long as you have even very minor, or limited, surface agitation, the DO levels will be just as good, if not better, than using traditional airstones.
Click to expand...
Although you are right that the bubbles themselves do not bring O2 in your water (or your bucket should be 30 feet high) it is not agitation as well.
Let me correct myself: it is and it is not.
What brings O2 in the water is the air pressure of the column of air above your bucket. Even if the water would be totally flat and not moving, there would still get some O2 in your water. But just in the upper layer. The layers of water beneath the upper layer would not get O2 or in a very slow pace.

Agitation of the surface is a way to exchange the O2 rich upper layer with a new layer of water without O2. Then this new layer can get O2 because of the said air pressure and this will happen over and over again.
As long as you have a system that like a conveyer belt replaces the O2 rich layer with O2 poor layers of water, you are fine.
Bubbles do this, waterfalls, flooming, etc.

It is more a semantical discussion :)
 
thenasty1

thenasty1

Well-Known Member
hivealive said:
ok after a little advice i have put my first dwc together, its not quiet finished yet..

wondering if someone can tell me, from their understanding, do i have enough air from the water pump / venturi system? i'm not sure i can expect much more..

http://imgur.com/a/4gV80FI

Regards
Click to expand...
aeration looks good, might want to choke your pump a bit to even out the water level
 
S

straightup636

Member
Keesje said:
Although you are right that the bubbles themselves do not bring O2 in your water (or your bucket should be 30 feet high) it is not agitation as well.
Let me correct myself: it is and it is not.
What brings O2 in the water is the air pressure of the column of air above your bucket. Even if the water would be totally flat and not moving, there would still get some O2 in your water. But just in the upper layer. The layers of water beneath the upper layer would not get O2 or in a very slow pace.

Agitation of the surface is a way to exchange the O2 rich upper layer with a new layer of water without O2. Then this new layer can get O2 because of the said air pressure and this will happen over and over again.
As long as you have a system that like a conveyer belt replaces the O2 rich layer with O2 poor layers of water, you are fine.
Bubbles do this, waterfalls, flooming, etc.

It is more a semantical discussion :)
Click to expand...
Right, so as long as there is circulation, like in a RDWC setup, that O2 deprived layer would be constantly replaced by the saturated layer above it. I ditched my airstones/pumps almost 2 years ago when I built my RDWC system - it's basically a UC setup, except for in the UC systems the pump draws from the grow buckets and flows into the reservoir. I reversed it, and use negative pressure to draw from the 3" drains into the reservoir, which means my water pump is drawing from the reservoir, and feeding the waterfall lines. Going with an inline pump was also a much more efficient choice, IMHO. To this day I don't know why people bother with submersible pumps, as it's like having a little space heater in your reservoir - maybe the cost is a variable I guess.

Thanks for info though. Great stuff. Do you personally run sans-airpumps? What I'd really like to do is get a DO probe but I'm hesitant to fork over that much cash for something that might not be necessary.
 
H

hivealive

Member
thenasty1 said:
aeration looks good, might want to choke your pump a bit to even out the water level
Click to expand...
Im not sure exactly what you mean but it sounds interesting,

also i have just transplanted some of my favourite plants but the leaves have curled since being in for the past hour. any suggestions?
maybe i need to reduce the water level a touch?


Regards all and thanks for your input!!
 
Keesje

Keesje

Well-Known Member
I think I might have a DO-meter, but if I do it is somewhere collecting dust.
A guy I know once told me "if you look angry at water it already has maximum DO"
Just any movement and there is maximum DO.
The bigger problem is to get O2 rich water to your roots in such a way that the water gets in between the rootball.
 
thenasty1

thenasty1

Well-Known Member
hivealive said:
Im not sure exactly what you mean but it sounds interesting,
Click to expand...
i mean restrict the intake on your pump a bit so you have close to an equal amount of water in each site. some pumps have a built in way to do this, others require you to install a ball valve on your return line
 
H

hivealive

Member
thenasty1 said:
i mean restrict the intake on your pump a bit so you have close to an equal amount of water in each site. some pumps have a built in way to do this, others require you to install a ball valve on your return line
Click to expand...
Could i just lower the power / watts using the flow controller?

Not sure if that would reduce the amount of bubbles I am producing though.

Any ideas on why my plants are wilting after transplantation?
 
H

hivealive

Member
There were in soil, took them out and removed most of the soil and perlite.
They have a small but good looking root system.

Put them each into its own net cup with roots at the bottom some slightly coming out.

In the buckets the water line is just above the bottom of the net cups.

Temperature is temperate / cool at the moment.

Nuts is Cana Coco a, b. pH 5.8.

Not sure what you mean by live Res or sterile.

Regards.
 
E

Enanthate

Member
I would expect them to wilt, having gone through those changes. As mentioned earlier, the air could be spread out a little more. It looks like the bubbler is not centered. Most of those roots used to breathe and drink, now they just drink, = Wilting. They will adapt to their new environment though, from my experience anyway.

Post pics of plants/roots for more precise feedback✌
 
thenasty1

thenasty1

Well-Known Member
hivealive said:
There were in soil, took them out and removed most of the soil and perlite.
They have a small but good looking root system.

Put them each into its own net cup with roots at the bottom some slightly coming out.

In the buckets the water line is just above the bottom of the net cups.

Temperature is temperate / cool at the moment.

Nuts is Cana Coco a, b. pH 5.8.

Not sure what you mean by live Res or sterile.

Regards.
Click to expand...
moving them from soil to hydro is probably the cause of the symptoms youre seeing. give them time, theyll be fine. i would refrain from any bending, topping, etc until they look happy again
live res=living reservoir=using beneficial bacteria and/or fungi to control undesirable bacteria and/or fungi. living organisms are purposely introduced to the reservoir
sterile res=using chlorine, hydrogen peroxide, or any other sterilizing agent to control undesirable bacteria and/or fungi. ideally has no living organisms in the reservoir
 
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