Hard Water Solutions

Howdy ya'll,

I haven't used a hydroponics system before. I'm considering aero or bubbleponics. I'm well aware that I need to work on my water source which has way too much lime and I believe calcium as well. I understand I can buy a water softener at Home Depot or Lowes or similar places. I was just wondering if anybody had any specific recommendations for a faucet unit or alternative softening unit. Buying water on a regular schedule is basically out of the question.

Thanks

(Working on making the jump...)

set up a rain bucket.

You should move...

I dont know what to do to combat hard water itself... filtering it doesn't really change it

Get hardwater nutrients.

i have very hard water myself and switched to dwc from soil and i have been having no probs what so ever. i have done a ton of reading and was worried as well but seems to me i worried for no reason i am using gh nova series nutes on this grow and on the previous one i used bumper crop ab nutes.my water reads out on my ppm meter at 390 and my ph is 8 but i keep that down with bumper down. the system is resurculating dwc and i cannot beleive my eyes as to how much faster the growth is with hydro compared to dirt...i am just amazed..but as far as the hard water i am doing well off 4 plants in a 4'x2' area every month i get roughly 9oz's and the little woman likes that..she's a cronick..lmao
this is my 3rd session and i think i am doing ok as long as the temps and ph is kept good i use the half is more theory and it works for me.gh offers hard water nutes as well. just my 2 cents hope it helps

You can try without doing anything special - it is a weed afterall

But like nongreenthumb says - they do make hardwater-specific nutes. General Hydroponics uses a 3-stage nute solution 1) Flora Micro, 2) Flora Grow and 3) Flora Bloom. Like any other 3-stage nutes, you use all three through the whole grow in different proportions (according to what stage you're in). Anyway, Flora Micro is also available as Flora Hardwater Micro - recommended for water with greater than 200 PPM (total) or greater than 70 PPM calcium.

rothelb said:

i have very hard water myself and switched to dwc from soil and i have been having no probs what so ever. i have done a ton of reading and was worried as well but seems to me i worried for no reason i am using gh nova series nutes on this grow and on the previous one i used bumper crop ab nutes.my water reads out on my ppm meter at 390 and my ph is 8 but i keep that down with bumper down. the system is resurculating dwc and i cannot beleive my eyes as to how much faster the growth is with hydro compared to dirt...i am just amazed..but as far as the hard water i am doing well off 4 plants in a 4'x2' area every month i get roughly 9oz's and the little woman likes that..she's a cronick..lmao
this is my 3rd session and i think i am doing ok as long as the temps and ph is kept good i use the half is more theory and it works for me.gh offers hard water nutes as well. just my 2 cents hope it helps

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Half is more theory? You are getting a half pound a month, that's more than enough for me ;p
Your 2 cents is some what helpful. I 'm curious if your dwc will start clogging down the road. Thanks for sharing.

I am using hard water. I fill a 20 litre pail with it. Add my nutes (DNF bloom A&B now and a bloom fortifier), test ph. Lower ph, test again. And so on. Get the ph down and you are good to go. I cover the pail and just use a 2 litre jug to fill my grow tub. I check the level everyday and fill if need be. Once pail gets low, do it all over again.

never had that prob but i went with 1 inch drains and all the plumbing is pvc. was always worried about leaks and over flowing who needs that right. maybe i went overboard but no leaks no clogging no probs i even have auto top off rigged up on it . everything works a okay this is the third time around with this and i was a dirt lover before for years and i am having alot of fun with the dwc. did alot of reading before deciding to go with this setup and i like it..any questions i will try to answer as best i can

the half is more theory worked for me and never had a burnt plant yet. then i just move ppm up from there was a base line because i have never done hydro before and wanted no problems thats how i started with soil and worked my way up till i new my limits. i think in the whole time of growing ganga i have nute burnt two plants during one grow 6 years ago. i think i have been very lucky. started with white widow changed to sour deisel and then went to love position #2 and after that i went to blueberry kong mix not sure where that came from but it was a hermi strain i am sure every feno type went that way and in the mist of it all i polenated a awsome white widow with a sour deisel male and i think i found what the wife likes..kinda funny how it took this long i love growing it it is a stress releiver for me but i do not smoke it on acount of my job.....i am really liking the hydro and think i will be staying with this format it works very well..and a big thaks goes out to all of the diff forums for all the great reading material because this is were i learned it all

Yo rothelb, I purchased a DWC system, how did you make yours recirculating?

Also, do you still wait for your chlorine to evaporate out of the water?

I am very interested in dwc as well, and want my babys to be alright when the system arrives!

well i use 16ltr pails i used 1" pvc bulkhead fittings for the drains then put a union at each bucket a few tee's and elbows and out of the closet and into the res. then i plumbed the the water in with half inch pvc. everything is glued and no leaks thats a +.the water intake lines have unions at the buckets and the res so it can be taken apart to clean and be safe as well no one wants water on the floor lol. i did and it sucked. i think my res is 24x16x16.5 inches rubbermaid roughneck. the auto top off is crude but works well 5gal water jug for camping took the little air vent plug out and used the black quarter inch plastic air line shoved it in the water pail to the bottom hooked it to a simple float valve in the side of the res and thats it siphon top up easy to fill and it works no more nut creap the pump is a mag drive 3 works perfect..there is proly alot of cheaper and easier ways with the black soft hose this is what i did at first but i liked the pvc idea for the stregth of it and the reliability factor it will be around for a long time with no failure. i went with the big 1" drain for the overkill factor of no clogging. i have used this setup for 4 rounds and with not one prob no clogging no overflow no nute burn no ph troubles just works great for the newbie to hydro and now that i used it i think it is great for the advanced as well it has its place and that is in my closet. i had bubblers in each bucket and swapped out to a powerhead in the res.i did 2 grows with air stones and 2 with powerhead and found no differences at all that i could find except the nutes are not sitting on the flor of the res anymore. oh i also have an over flow tube at each bucket in case the roots ever decided to clog the huge one inch drains. so as you can see i am kind of anal but it works great.

silk you also could use a ro-di system for your water i do for my saltwater fish tank and it takes the minerals out ppm at 390 and with ro ppm 008 so that is anothe option as well

rothelb said:

the half is more theory worked for me and never had a burnt plant yet. then i just move ppm up from there was a base line because i have never done hydro before and wanted no problems thats how i started with soil and worked my way up till i new my limits. i think in the whole time of growing ganga i have nute burnt two plants during one grow 6 years ago. i think i have been very lucky. started with white widow changed to sour deisel and then went to love position #2 and after that i went to blueberry kong mix not sure where that came from but it was a hermi strain i am sure every feno type went that way and in the mist of it all i polenated a awsome white widow with a sour deisel male and i think i found what the wife likes..kinda funny how it took this long i love growing it it is a stress releiver for me but i do not smoke it on acount of my job.....i am really liking the hydro and think i will be staying with this format it works very well..and a big thaks goes out to all of the diff forums for all the great reading material because this is were i learned it all

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Ooooh, half strength nutrients. I prefer my soil like media but hydro will be a lot easier in terms of disposing media. That's why I will be using it for my next grow. I will at some point want to use a few DWC buckets to grow some monster plants just to experiment, but for the next grow I'll use a much smaller bubble or aeroponics unit.

mine is a small setup as i have no room i have moved the nute levels alot higher then half now that i am used to hydro now just did not want any mess ups right away i pretty much go by the nutes directions and just subtract 2 gallons and never had any probs gives me a little leeway either way.i use the aeroponics for the clone veg cab love it

A water softener will help, and usually brings the PPM down somewhat too. I soften my water, and then run it through an ro+di filter. By softening it first, the filters last longer because it is filtering salt and potassium, rather then a lot of hard minerals. If it is really hard water like mine, you can add a rust filter before the softener as well.

pincher said:

A water softener will help, and usually brings the PPM down somewhat too. I soften my water, and then run it through an ro+di filter. By softening it first, the filters last longer because it is filtering salt and potassium, rather then a lot of hard minerals. If it is really hard water like mine, you can add a rust filter before the softener as well.

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Now we are getting somewhere! What system(s) do you use? Howuch do hey cost and what have been your results?

I also should have asked - what is your PPM out of the faucet?

I actually got a softener way before I ever decided growing because of the hard water (I'm on a well). I bought a good softener from culligan, and actually rent the rust filter from them (always rent the rust filter, never buy one). I went with culligan because I needed them to pipe it in, and didn't have the desire to do it at the time - I bet you can get them much cheaper then the 1500 or so i paid for mine. I haven't done enough research on them to tell you what makes one better then another.

After the rust filter and softener, I had about 200-250 ppm - but the problem is that it's all salt and potassium (bad for plants). This is where you add the ro+di filter. Hands down, the best deal you will find is from an ebay company called aquasafesystems. Get the "aquarium II" model - only about 70 bucks, 5 stages, and will bring your ppm down to about 10,which is perfect because you want some trace minerals. It's actually better then using distilled which is 0-1 ppm. I got the garden hose attachment, so i can hook it right to my washer faucet, and fill 5 gallon pails with it for changing my reservoir. If you have a res that can easily accommodate a float valve, then the filter can keep it topped off (but you will still need to fill buckets anyway because it fills to slow by itself during res changes.

hope that helps

pincher said:

I also should have asked - what is your PPM out of the faucet?

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I don't know! haven't bought a PPM meter yet. Thank you for the aquasafesystems tip. Very helpful!

i will take some pics for ya of my hard water i use just ph'd down to 6 and res temp of 64 . my ppm of the water out of the tap andit is well water with uv filtration is 386 +-15
4 weeks into flowering they are 4.5'