Bilys watery wonderland

bigbadbillybob

Active member

• Jan 10, 2020

• #1

Hello, and welcome to my cherry popping diary here in IC.
A bit of background before we get into the good stuff -Ive been growing for years, and in hydro rdwc since about 2012.. I did the usual before that, soil, coco, dwc, before eventually finding my favourite way of growing, roots in hydro, with both rdwc and top fed recirc systems.
Way back in the midst of time, I used to read pretty much all of Heath and Billy Liars posts on varius forums, so my diy system is nothing new.


So my system, right , its 60 litre pots and there are 9 of them. These have 40mm returns to the res, and a 22mm spray bar to top feed them. The spray bars are fed from the res, with a 4000 litre Hailea pump to do the 4 pot side and a 8000litre for the 5 pot side.
here is a pic of the spray bar, and a pic of it in action

The reserviour has another stand alone pump in it, and a large aquarium heater in there. the pump is to feed the chiller. its a 1000 litre pump and a 300 litre chiller, but it copes fine with my. system keepi

 

bigbadbillybob

Active member

• Jan 10, 2020

• #2

ng the temps sweet.
Heres some pics of the system during build and after. it has been modified over the years and is now from a single res.

 

bigbadbillybob

Active member

• Jan 10, 2020

• #3

You will also notice 2 big airpumps, both are 60 litre ones, and have a 10 split manifold, with 2 stones per pot, just to add some extra Dissolved oxygen to the mix. Its not needed and ive grown without any airstones at all with zero issues, but i like to add the stones to get them off to a flying start.
Heres some pics of some previous grows

 

bigbadbillybob

Active member

• Jan 10, 2020

• #4

 

bigbadbillybob

Active member

• Jan 10, 2020

• #5

the pic above is a 4 week veg, at about 3 and a half weeks.

the strains im doing are from dinafem and sweet seeds.
the dinafem ones are moby dick and critical+2
the sweet seeds ones are sweet afghan delicious, cream caramel and blackjack.
they are literally just into the system yesterday

I have 3 pumps in the res, one is a 4000litre one for the 4 pot side, one is 8000litres for the 5 pot side and the last 1000litre one is for the chiller, which is set to 19 degrees c, and doubles up to empty the res between changes.

my lights are hps 600watts each and I use metal halides for veg.

Also shown in the pisc is my twin variac controller. its a diy job using 2 variacs and a home brew electronic control board. it controls minimum fan speed and max fan speed via the controller, and I can set my own min and max via the dials. it runs along on low speed till the temps are exceeded and then cuts the fan into high speed till temps come back down to 26 degres c. its the best thing ive ever built and works faultlessly. I also incorporated a heater socket into the controller, but don't use it, because the temps never go below 20 degrees lights off.

 

bigbadbillybob

Active member

• Jan 10, 2020

• #6

so without further ado

the feeds are 0.8ec and ph is set to 5.6.

let the good times roll.

 

BuzzBob56

Active member

• Jan 10, 2020

• #7

Hurrah! Love your system, BBBB! I'm a Deep Water Aficionado, as well! Though my current set-up is a Top-Fed, Top-Drain BioBucket system.

Question { Stoner Bob should see this but... }: You top-feed with the sprayers, Right? And bottom-drain? What maintains the nute level in your roots-in pots?

 

bigbadbillybob

Active member

• Jan 10, 2020

• #8

the pots are connected to the res via the drain tubes, which feed back to the res.
I fill the res up to a specific level, which at the minute is about an inch higher than the bottom of the net pots (due to the size of the seedlings). water finds its own level, so all the pots are the same height - water wise..
I let he plants feed off the water in the totes, at the bottom of the net pots and after a week or so, when the roots are out of the bottom of the net pot, the water level will reduce, and I leave the water just at the underside of the netpots, for the rest of the grow.
the sprayers just provide disturbance to the water, which creates the dissolved oxygen the plants need to survive. the airstones also add to this.

I use bluelab ec and ph pens, they are the best imo, and will adjust the ph every few days to keep it in the sweet spot.
I like the ph to wander between 5.5 and 6.5, so the plants can uptake nutrients at varying ph's

I use Ionic nutrients, nothing fancy, just grow, bloom, silicone and ph down when needed. and that's it.
I avoid anything organic as it will cause problems in these systems in no time.

Good to have you on board..

 

BuzzBob56

Active member

• Jan 10, 2020

• #9

bigbadbillybob said:

...I fill the res up to a specific level, which at the minute is about an inch higher than the bottom of the net pots (due to the size of the seedlings). water finds its own level, so all the pots are the same height - water wise.

Click to expand...

I gotcha! I actually like the variability of your water level! Something my current set-up does not allow. Very nice!!

 

C

copperfacedave

Active member

• Jan 10, 2020

• #10

Nice!

 

cyat

Active member

Veteran

• Jan 10, 2020

• #11

Excellent job !

 

Bobby Boucher

Active member

• Jan 10, 2020

• #12

Lots of room to move around in there!

Nice to see everyone poppin' their beans for the new year. Our cycles must be lining up..

 

bigbadbillybob

Active member

• Jan 13, 2020

• #13

Day 4 in the system. .
I tried to up my initial feed levels for this grow, and its bit me on the ass. I usually stick with a starting ec of 0.6, but this time I went 0.8ec, and it has proven to be too hot for them , so tonight I will add water till it goes down slightly.
Heres the room, still not much to see.

the plants are doing ok, they have slight nute burn to the leaf tips due to the higher than normal feed. Sometimes its good to try new things, and sometimes its not.
The plants, first 2 are moby dick, next 2 are critical, then its 2 blackjack, 2 cream caramel and one SADs1.
[url='https://www.icmag.com/ic/picture.php?

 

bigbadbillybob

Active member

• Jan 13, 2020

• #14

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bigbadbillybob

Active member

• Jan 13, 2020

• #15

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the chiller temps are slightly low at 17 degrees, and the room temps are slightly high at 28, but the plants show no signs of complaining, so it will be ok, im sure.

ive got a humidifier in there too but it doesn't really add that much to the RH.

The yellow tinge to some pics is the plants under HPs as opposed to metal halides.

SAme time next week

 

bigbadbillybob

Active member

• Jan 13, 2020

• #16

I had these 2 spare seedlings, so stuck them in coco,
One is a blackjack, the other is a SADs1

 

Bobby Boucher

Active member

• Jan 13, 2020

• #17

Have you considered running perpetually in there? Those are some big containers for those little seeds!

I'd start those seeds in their nets like you are, but in 3.5 gallons all squeezed together, in a 2x4 or a 4x4, and just transplant the lids into those big containers every 8-9 weeks.

Your grow, your show, but the fascist german minimalist within couldn't help but inquire.

 

bigbadbillybob

Active member

• Jan 13, 2020

• #18

The fascist German minimalist has a point.
But unfortunately I don't really have another spare area to veg them in at the minute.

But a good idea for the future...

 

bigbadbillybob

Active member

• Jan 17, 2020

• #19

Thanks for the positive posts, its appreciated.
Now here we have the reason why hydro is the fastest method of growing , here are some pics taken only 3 DAYS after the last ones. I left the bits of paper the same, for scale, but they have pretty much doubled in size, in 3 days.
the moby and critical are first up, then the blackjack, cream caramel and sweet afghan delicious s1. [url='https://www.icmag.com/ic/picture.php?
Have a great weekend - fellow stoners

 

bigbadbillybob

Active member

• Jan 17, 2020

• #20

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Im off for the weekend, so will update again next week.

The feeds are still at 0.8 and the ph is at 6.0, they are slightly hot as my temps are hovering around 28/29 degrees c.
ive got a humidifier in the room which I fill daily, and it helps heep the humidity up a bit during veg


You can see a small bit of this by the leaf edges curling up on a couple, but its not a worry that im going to do anything about, they wil be fine.