Vertical PVC Tubes *Never Tested*

[Greenmopho]

Got an email from a buddy that was helping us out in Cali with our horizontal RDWC PVC systems, and he had a vision of his own using 6" PVC. Let's just call him Capt. Jack. This has never been tested. Just wondering if anyone has done anything like this. I know you are limiting the horizontal, or wide, root growth, but you are giving serious vertical space for roots. This could be used as either a flood&drain, drip irrigation, aeroponic, or Recirculating DWC. I will pass any input on to him that you guys have!

 

[Greenmopho]

My first notes to him were:

Looks pretty good actually! I think this would work real good. I would use the drip halos on the baskets, maybe hydroton or lava rock instead of rockwool, or combine rockwool and coco, 60/40 mix or whatever. Also, for 64 plants I would say you need at least a 20 gallon res, you'll burn thru 5 gallons of water and nutes in no time and have a pain in the ass keeping your salts and ph in check. Other than that, good design. Dis you draw up all that? I love the smiley faces on the tomato plants! LOLOL

 

[shaqattack]

Looks awesome!!!!

 

[delta9nxs]

somewhere i've got a link to i think a .edu site where the reseachers are growing in vertical pvc tubes. i'll try to find it.

 

[ourcee]

yeah definitely scrap the rockwool idea. some people love it but not me. Hydroton would work well.

if you've got the res that height in relation to your 6" tubes, it'll have an even level of water across the board, if you want that good, if not then you're gonna have to elevate the tubes.

what are you doing to aerate the water around the roots? is this just a recirculating drip system with roots free hanging in the air in the tubes? or is it gonna be DWC with them bathing in the nutrient solution? if youre gonna have them sitting in water i'd put in an airstone in each tube, you'd get great oxygenation of the water given the fact it needs to travel a foot before it even breaks the surface. aerating all of those roots along the way.

looks like it could work very well, quite a bit of DIY pvc construction but hey I love that stuff, its fun for me.

if you are doing a DWC, dont forget about reservoir temp, given you have tubes, that allows a lot of air around them, could be very good or very bad, if you have high room temps, or a small sealed room with lots of 1k's, you'll probably want a chiller, this is if its DWC, if free hanging roots in the air, you can get away with higher temps, however you need to be careful there so theres no rot.

 

[delta9nxs]

here it is

http://www.usu.edu/cpl/PDF/JChardASA2006Poster.pdf

 

[dubwise]

i think that's a great idea! I don't know if I'd do it dwc or rdwc...seems like the temperature variance could be too much to maintain, it would be a lot easier (IMO) to keep the resevoir temperature correct and pump to the drip stakes, etc...
delta-thanks for posting this. very cool!

 

[TND]

very interesting stuff would love to see how that works out.

 

[Greenmopho]

Utah State, of all places, lolol!

 

[CareFreeLivin]

Pretty slick idea. Someone build one so I can copy the design, haha.

 

[ItsGrowTime]

Seems overly complicated for growing a weed but I like the ingenuity of the design. I'd go with a 10gal res as I don't think 5gal is enough and definitely go hydroton instead of rockwool. Leave the top feed pumping 24/7.

My only concern with the design itself is that the roots will probably "bunch up" more under the netpot instead of growing downward. Roots tend to grow where the water is most plentiful and it will be the top of that system, not the bottom. Bunching roots stunts growth. My .02.

 

[foaf]

I think that deep narrow dwc chambers are a great idea. I think the roots will grow straight down to the bottom even if the recirculation is from the bottom to the top. You want an airstone in each grow chamber for sure. Mine has a small seedling in it now. This is a 10" and its almost 4' tall. rdwc, yet unproven technique . Im going to lst downward and try to use all of the volume of this space, I think that with light below the base of the plant, and a narrow grow chamber, you could maximize any smaller space, even a grow tent or smaller closet. another obvious benefit, if you you use seeds, you can get males out without the roots being tangled with a neighbor's. good luck.

 

[Scrogerman]

I was thinking of a similar set up but with 8-10" pvc horizontal, With holes cut out at certain intervals, setting the inlet/outlet ports high on each stop'end and using airstones or Bubble tubing set in the PVC, this would make the system a hybrid of NFT & DWC or Bubbleflow as i like to call it! Nice idea guys!
Peace & Respect.........Scroger'

 

[foaf]

jsut a note, 8 and 10 inch pvc is very expensive, especially the fittings and especially for 10". Just an endcap for the 10" pvc was almost $100, thats why I potted mine in a bucket instead, they didnt have solvent weld, only gasket, but you can order cheaper solvent weld fittings for 8". 8" and above is only available from pipe companies, you cant get it at home depot ect. . If there was any way to do this with multiple 4" you would save a ton of money and time since you can get it all cheap at big stores.

 

[Scrogerman]

$100 that would be around £60 here(i think), no-way! £15 max!£5 for the clips! not in my country dude-lol i have no issues using PVC pipes and rubber end stops, only you may have to buy 6m lengths at a time but they aint that dear1! if i spent £150 on my irrigation set-up, its no-bother!
g'Luck to ya fella!

 

[one Q]

no offense but, with the cost of PVC... you should have him build the Bozo slash Anima Super Simple Ebb Flow buckets and just use 5 gallon buckets. This will cut cost by A LOT

 

[danishpassion]

looks interesting
please keep us posted on the progress

 

[TheMonarch]

here it is

http://www.usu.edu/cpl/PDF/JChardASA2006Poster.pdf

That one uses 2" pipes which are only 1ft tall


"A greenhouse experiment was conducted with the cultivars being grown in PVC tubes that were four inches in diameter and six feet tall to characterize turfgrass root systems. The tubes were divided into six one-foot sections to study the roots at each depth. The first bottom section was capped with pipe cap which was drilled for proper drainage and half of this section was filled with pea gravel. The rest of the bottom section and all other sections were filled with fired clay (Turface) and vibrated for uniform packing. Six one foot sections were assembled together, one at a time taping each section together.
Turface provides a uniform root zone for moisture and nutrients and facilitate clean separation of the root system for evaluation. All 144 tubes were placed in a pipe rack constructed to hold the six foot pipes vertically. Tubes were arranged in a completely randomized design with 4 replications. Each tube were irrigated on a daily basis to saturate it three times per day using a drip irrigation system before and after seeding. Immediately after seeding a mist system was used together with the drip system to avoid surface drying until uniform establishment."
www.turf.uiuc.edu/research/summaries/1991/91_2.4.pdf

and near the bottom of this page they have pictures of 6" pipes that are 5ft long
http://roots.psu.edu/en/book/export/html/12

 

[smug druggler]

no offense but, with the cost of PVC... you should have him build the Bozo slash Anima Super Simple Ebb Flow buckets and just use 5 gallon buckets. This will cut cost by A LOT

I`m with you on the buckets! However I`ve taken it to a new level.( I think) I use 3 gallon buckets , with a 2" hole in a regular lid. I also run aeroponics instead of DWC. Each bucket has a sprayer in it , projecting at the root zone( about 4" from the top drilled through the side of the bucket. Each bucket has its own drain that conects by hose back to the rez. I failed to mention that the sprayers connect in series and dead-ends at the last bucket.So 1 feed hose from pump and 1 drain return to rez. The rez is a 5 gallon bucket with a float valve hooked up to another 5 gal. bucket that keeps my main rez full. The replenishing bucket is just reg PH balanced water. When that bucket is empty I change my nutes and start over . I run 4 buckets and get 5-6 zips per bucket under a 1000 with a 2 week veg. Im happy. Im sure I left a bunch out so fire away......