A NEW Bio-Bucket grow... 12-site/1KW

[Casual]

Greetings all... After lurking and reading for what seems like an eternity, I figured this setup isn't going to start itself!
I've never grown ANYTHING before at all, so this is one hell of a learning experience. Here's the gist of my project.
Pics will be added over the course of the next week or so as we clear the room back out (We've been accumulating!), clean and start assembling everthing.

I have a 'L' shaped room, of which only the longer part is usable.
Usable area measure 5x12. I have a 'Mom tent' at one end, and
am laying out (12) 5-gallon Bio-buckets in the remaining space.
I have an 18-gallon Rubbermaid tote for a rez that will have 10 gallons in it during the grow. 900GPH Danner Mag-drive pump, 1" supply manifold feeding 3/4" lines to the buckets. I'd originally built the buckets exactly as BigToke had in his thread, then discovered Uniseals. I disassembled the fittings from the buckets I'd built, opened up the holes to fit the uniseals and am MUCH happier with the whole setup. I'm waiting on the 3/4" uniseals to arrive so I can finish and fill the system.
The other change I'm making, is the 12" waterfall. In BigTokes thread, he makes it very clear that DO (Dissolved Oxygen) is VERY important for the system to work properly and that the waterfall back into the rez from the drain creates enough DO. My only issue with setting things up that way is that I lose almost 18" of what could be plant height because I've had to elevate all the buckets to get the 12" drop.
Instead of the waterfall, I'm going to go with either a Powerhead or Skilter setup. I'm still reading up on these, trying the make the best decision as to which to go with.
Going this route will allow me to put my buckets back on the ground and gain back the potential plant height I'd have lost.
For this first go around, I have one 1K light in a sealed/ventilated hood on a 6' light mover. I'll be adding a second 1K lamp setup as soon as I'm able and getting rid of the lightmover.
I'll be using tap water, which is pH 7.05 or so, but about 250-300ppm. There will be a line run from the sink in an adjacent room for auto top off. With the water hardness here, I don't think I'll be needing Calmag, but will keep an eye on things.
There's a 4" 250CFM centrifugal fan in there with a large scrubber. I don't recall exactly the rating on it right now. I may up the fan to a 450cfm 6".
Room is going to be lined with Panda plastic this week. Wife and I will take everything out of the room, scrub/bleach/disinfect everything, then line the walls with the plastic. Then I'll get the whole system setup and filled, scope for leaks, get the lava rock in and let it run for a week or so to get the BB established. My clones should be good to go by then. We'll be doing a mix of White Widow and Arjen's Haze #3.
I'll be posting pics in the next few days.

I guess those are the highlights for now. Any comments, hints, tips, criticisms are welcome!!

Cheers all!

Caz

 

[petemoss]

Hi Caz! What happened to your tap water? I thought you had tap water Ph of 9+ and were considering RO instead ( or maybe I'm mixing your grow up with someone else's) . 250-300 ppm tap water is not ideal but still usable, I believe. Any idea what that 250-300 ppm is mostly? calcium? Are your nutes compatible with hard water? I know that GH has a line of nutes specifically for hard water. Can you post some pix of your buckets? Even if they are not assembled, it would help to see the plumbing and layout.

 

[Casual]

Hi Pete... Ummm...well... When I took those initial pH readings... ummmm... I didn't realize the probes on the trimeter had CAPS on them... DOH!!!
pH is actually very good... just a hair above 7. There is a lot of calcium in the water where I'm at, so I'd imagine that a good percentage of it.
I'm right at this very moment retrofitting the buckets for the 3/4" uniseals.
The grow room has nothing on the floor at the moment. Wife and I bleached the shit out of it yesterday. The scrubber is hung, light rail is up, fan is hung, wall fan is up. My little room looks very distinctive, so I'm refraining from taking any pics until I have the Panda Plastic up, which will be either tonight or tomorrow. Pics are coming VERY soon, I promise!!

Caz

 

[Casual]

Ok... The buckets are done for the most part. I just now realized I'm out of PVC cement. I'll go pick some up in the AM and finish up tomorrow, but this is how the buckets look now. There will be a 90 degree elbow on the end of the drain tub that will snugly fit into the 4" main drain.
I had to trim the top edge of the inlet Uniseals so they wouldn't prop the lid up.

I'll try to get some pics up tomorrow sometime of the room mocked up once I have the Panda up.

Caz

 

[angel4us]

pullin up a bb4BB

pullin up a bb4BB

hopein u dont mind me pullin up abean bag 4 your BB show!!!! cant wait to see em blast off!!!

 

[Casual]

Thanks Angel! The more the merrier!!
Kickin' back now, nice buzz going from some Green Crack... Never
tried this strain before... pretty nice!
I noticed the 1st week or so we had this stuff, it would put me to sleep within 20 minutes. Now, I get a nice, functional high... I'd almost swear it was a different strain!

Caz

 

[kp^]

I'd def on board! Look like its going to be a killer system Casual!

Hows the uniseals treating you? so far it looks great!!

 

[Casual]

Thanks KP... the Uniseals are definitely the way to go for bulkheads. The problem I found with the gluing/siliconing method was that it didn't handle flexing well.
A few times while moving the buckets around, if the hose would catch something, it'd move the fitting slightly and I could hear the bond break. Very few things will adhere to the inside of the buckets, but I found that with some surface prep, Gorilla Glue was about the best thing around, at least that you didn't have to special order.
The Uniseals are super simple. Drill the hole, pop the seal in and slide your PVC through it. You MUST use something to lubricate the PVC, as it's NOT fun pushing it through the seal. It's a VERY tight fit. I used Windex, which I saw recommended in another forum.

If any of you have seen that show "Hoarders" on A&E, it's about people who can't throw ANYTHING away... their houses are FILLED with stuff to the point where you almost can't move. The reason I mention this, it's exactly how I feel at the moment. Everything is out of the grow room and in my bedroom. There's a thin path between things to get around. CRAZINESS! I can't stand it. On the upside, it's forcing me to push forward and get this room done!

Caz

 

[Casual]

Well, still no pics, sorry guys. I'll definitely have them tomorrow. I worked on the room all day today. Got my little shelf up for the Ballast, got the 4" hole cut in the rez for the drain pipe. Opened up the holes in the drain pipe for the new PVC pipes to fit through.
Realized this morning that I had to elevate the buckets DAMN! In order to get the drain up high enough for it to properly drain into the rez, I need 6-8", so I went out and bought some Cinder Blocks... soaked them in Bleach water so I'm not introducing anything nasty to the room that might be hiding out in them. I have some wire shelving that I was going to use when I have the buckets up on top of another row of buckets that I'll lay across the cinder blocks. This elevates them a hair over 6". At that height, I have about 1/2 bubble elevation at the rear of the drain. I may have to raise this a bit more. I got all of the PVC installed in the Uniseals, all the 90's setup and glued on.
I was working on the plastic sheeting tonight when my staple gun died. I've had a LOT of trials and tribulations throughout the day but I kept pushing to get things done so I could get some water flowing. Staple gun was the last straw for the day. It's 10pm here now. I'll go to Ace or Lowes or something in the AM and pick up a new gun and get back to it. I'd guess I'm 2-3 hours from getting water in the system.

Aside from the plastic on the walls/floor, I need to cut some very short 1.25" pieces of PVC to go from the elbows into the drain pipe, replace the cold water valve on our toilet with a 'T' to tap off of for the Rez Auto-topoff. That's pretty much it. Not sure how bad that cold water fitting is going to be though... looks like it's been on there since Henry Ford invented the Model 'T'...

Anyhow, that's the latest up to date info. I will be posting pics as soon as water is flowing and I've taken care of any leaks.

In my honest opinion, with all the effort I've put into this, I think I'd have been better off just buying an Ebb and Gro setup for myself. It would have been cheaper in the long run. I'm REALLY hoping this system is going to produce some really nice grass... It's been HARD earned!

Caz

 

[Casual]

PICS FINALLY!!!

PICS FINALLY!!!

Hey all... LOT happened over the last couple of days.
I got most of the plastic up in the room. I still have some tightening, trimming and stapling to do, but it's just about there.
The reservoir was drilling for both the 4" drain, Pump outlet and autotopoff valve. All the buckets were rinsed out, and hooked up to both drain and inlets. In order to get the drain high enough at the end of the row, I wound up picking up some Cinder Blocks... their on edge, which gives me 8". I used some wire shelving across the cinder blocks to set the buckets on.
My wife helped me rinse the lava rock... I bought double what I needed... who knew!
After we rinsed the rock, we soaked them for a few hours in water/H2O2 solution. Rocks were then pulled out and net pots filled.
Scrubbed is mounted, but venting not run to it yet. The blower fan is mounted on a couple of pieces of kevlar strap. With the fan hanging like that, it's seems considerably quieter. No vibration through the house.
Lightmover is bolted to the ceiling with rubber amplifier feet, which dampens the vibrations. I would NOT get the same light mover again. The direct drive units are much nicer and quieter.
Had I known then what I know now, I'd have gone with either 2-600w's or 2-1K's.
I forgot to take a pic of the ballast mounted up on a piece of wire shelving on the wall.

All I have left to do at this point is finish up the plastic, silicone install the new valve for the water supply and hook it up to the auto topoff float. Then it comes down to waiting for the roots to pop out of the oasis cubes. I expect roots any day and should have water flowing tomorrow. According to BigToke, with a system my size, running tap water, a 1 week run should be enough to get the BB established.

I'll be using the Lucas Formula, hopefully I'll have that all figured out in the next week.

That covers it for now. I may take tomorrow off. I've been working my ass off on this project lately.
BIG thanks to BigToke and Petemoss for their insight!!

It sure feels good to have everything setup though. LONG time coming!

 

[darwinsbulldog]

wow that's an awesome job mate! definitely going to be referring here (as well as to pete moss and bigtoke) when getting my future set up running.

 

[petemoss]

You're doing great, Caz! Nice well thought out construction of your room and your buckets. Once you get the system up and running, you'll be surprised how little maintenance bio buckets require. Maybe an hour a week to mix in nutes. A couple of suggestions: If you're going to use Lucas, you should look into swaping the Micro for Hard Water Micro. Just do a search for "GH hard water nutes" and you'll find many articles about nutes specifically for hard water.
Also, your lava rocks look huge. I'd smash them up with a hammer until they were marble size. You'll have to rinse them out again to get rid of the dust.

Any way to pull out the feed elbows a bit? They must be right against the 8" netpots and a couple of inches away from the inside wall of the bucket. I think you will get better circulation if the feed shoots right down the side of the bucket. This is a diagram Hurtback drew to show how the water flows in a circular path inside the bucket, following the walls of the bucket. He said he used dye to see the path of flow.



Good circulation around and through the rootball and netpot eliminates dead spots and gives you healthy roots like this:

 

[Casual]

Thanks Pete! I'll look into the hard water nutes. I need to take readings of my tap water again, as it's been awhile and I don't remember exactly what they were.
The inlet elbows are pulled out as far as they go. I guess 6" netpots would have been a better fit, but we'll see how this grow goes.
I wondered about the lava rock... argh... What a pain in the ass to make them smaller, but I hear what you mean.

Very much looking forward to a day or two off...

Caz

 

[angel4us]

cmon roots

cmon roots

lets see some root action for this righteous grow !!!!

 

[Casual]

Well, I took the weekend off. I'll be back at it tomorrow hooking up my water supply line, crushing the rocks down smaller and filling the system up to check for leaks.
I'm expecting to see roots from my oasis cubes anytime. I have two in the aerocloner that have roots. I'd like to try the aerocloner again, now that I have the temp problem worked out, I'll toss a few in there in a few weeks and add some kind of cloning solution.

I'll keep y'all posted.

Caz

 

[foliohattu]

Any way to pull out the feed elbows a bit? They must be right against the 8" netpots and a couple of inches away from the inside wall of the bucket. I think you will get better circulation if the feed shoots right down the side of the bucket. This is a diagram Hurtback drew to show how the water flows in a circular path inside the bucket, following the walls of the bucket.

hey there!

good lookin bio buckets you've got there..

about water circulation and feed elbows... i ha d some dead spots in my buckets when i did them exactly as BT instructed. in middle of that huge rootball there was all brown, dead spot about size of an big orange. i tried some dye as well and noticed that water going straight down DID leave a dead spot in the middle of bucket, and in middle of lava rocks. ie water didn't circulate properly having that elbow pointing straight down. i fixed this turnin that elbow in 45 degree angle, so that water flowing into the bucket creates sorta whirlpool effect. i found that to be way more effective than having water going straight down.

just my 2 cents..

fh

 

[dachieftan]

Hello mate, that is one hell of a system you got going on there. I am subscribing fo sho. Uniseals seem to be a lot easer/cheaper to deal with than bulk heads. I am glad you are picking up where BT left off an putting your own spin on it. I really like the simplicity of this system but I have a few questions if you don't mind answering...
1) Do you manually refresh your reservoir or is it automated? If it is automated, how do you do that?
2) How does your reservoir know when to water? Other systems use a controller bucket/timer or is this system running 24/7?
3) I notice that the return lines are placed just a couple inches shy of the bucket lip... I've read a lot about flood and drain and how it moves water to create dissolved oxygen. I understand the 12in drop from the return line to the reservoir creates oxygen by a waterfall effect. My question is, how does the water reach this return line if it is so far above the majority of the planter buckets water level? does the water just sit in the planter buckets until another water cycle clicks in and is replaced with fresh?
4) How do you prevent flooding? Any type of anti-siphon valve?
5) What size pump do you use? Is it the submersable kind or the kind that can operate on dry land as well?
I would greatly appreciate any feedback to these questions.
CHEERS & happy growing.

 

[Raphael]

Nice system bro, I did a 1200w 8 site bio bucket grow as you can see in my sig and it looks like you are setup real nice. Are you going to use a light mover?

Yo dachieftan if casual doesn't get back to you on those questions I have experience and can give you answers.

If you want to see some day 46 bud shots check out my 1000w ebb n flow grow they are frosting up same strain as my bio buckets. I cut the wattage to a single 1000w bulb instead of 2 600w bulbs and increased the plant count 4 times and decreased veg time and am expecting similar yields.

Cheers!

EDIT: I wrote this response before I read your first post...damn this exodus cheese is good tonight lol I see that you do have a 6' light mover.

 

[Casual]

Hi Chieftain!
Thanks for the kudos!!

1) Do you manually refresh your reservoir or is it automated? If it is automated, how do you do that?

The topoff on the reservoir is automated using a simple float valve that you can pick up at any hardware store.

2) How does your reservoir know when to water? Other systems use a controller bucket/timer or is this system running 24/7?

The Water pump runs 24/7... the water is constantly moving in the system, supplying fresh nutes and oxygenated water all the time.

3) I notice that the return lines are placed just a couple inches shy of the bucket lip... I've read a lot about flood and drain and how it moves water to create dissolved oxygen. I understand the 12in drop from the return line to the reservoir creates oxygen by a waterfall effect. My question is, how does the water reach this return line if it is so far above the majority of the planter buckets water level? does the water just sit in the planter buckets until another water cycle clicks in and is replaced with fresh?

The bucket is actually always full of water... oxygenating the water with either the waterfall effect of a powerhead/skilter supplies enough oxygen to the roots that they don't rot.
I actually will only have about 2" of waterfall, but picked up a Powerhead and the local aquarium store which should do the job.


4) How do you prevent flooding? Any type of anti-siphon valve?

This is something I don't really see a problem with with this system. The way the system is, and with the position of the drains, if the pump dies, the only 'extra' volume I need to worry about it what's in the lines and drain pipe, which I'd guess isn't more than a gallon or two.

5) What size pump do you use? Is it the submersable kind or the kind that can operate on dry land as well?

I originally picked up a 930GPH submersible pump, but wound up setting it aside and picked up a 950GPH external pump. The submersible pumps heat up the reservoir, and with the expense of a chiller, am doing everything I can to avoid having to purchase one. I've had responses from some people who have said they're using even more flow in a similarly sized system. With this pump, it works out to an exchange rate of about 14x's an hour, which should be more than enough.

I would greatly appreciate any feedback to these questions.
CHEERS & happy growing.[/quote]

Happy to answer any other questions I can. If anything wasn't clear, let me know and I'll try to elaborate!!

Caz

 

[dachieftan]

Thanks alot for the insight CAZ...I'm still a little unclear on some specific details if you don't mind:

1. Okay so a float valve is the thing in the back of a toilet that decides when water level is low and needs to be refilled. I understand that but what is your source of water? Did you hook it up to a tap of some sort or a bigger reservoir? If you could plz provide pics. I would say I'm more of a visual learner.
2. I noticed BT used tap water instead of distilled from an RO machine.... Have you gotten to the point where you might have some insight on this issue?
3. When you said " I actually will only have about 2" of waterfall" are you talking about the bucket or the reservoir? I think you mean the bucket b/c the more water in each planter bucket, the more space is available for roots to grow... If your talking about the bucket,this would mean you would need to buy powerheads for each planter bucket?
4. What kind of gph powerhead would be sufficient for a 2" waterfall?
5. do powerheads hook-up in-line to the feed/drain system or are they submerged separately? I found a centrifugal one online that seems pretty legit...
http://www.aquariumguys.com/hydor-koralia-pump.html