av8or's PPK - First Grow

Gry · Oct 24, 2014

This is neat as can be. Looks like you have done your homework well. You are running what I would dearly love to be if I had the room and amps available. Reading this I am so tempted to fire up a single unit for a bubba. I will sure keep an eye on what you have going here as it looks gold star good to me.

av8or · Oct 24, 2014

Thanks, Gry. I'm still trying to work out the initial kinks on my end but I'm confident this system is going to work really well. Enjoy the show!

After leveling all six ppk sites and setting the air gap at 3 1/4", the Cotton Candy came back to life. However, the GSC is drowning now. This is confusing. I watered yesterday every four hours, but this seems to be too much. I increased the air gap another 1/2" to a total 3 3/4" and extended the feed to flood once every six hours. The flood is taking 65 seconds.

Room temp: 85 F
Humidity: 55%
Co2: 800 ppm
Water temp: 82 F
Res: 586 ppm
Res Ph: 5.82

Fishywater · Oct 25, 2014

Wow man, everything looks great!
Nice thread.
Just one dumb question, I have searched & read & googled... what does PPK stand for/mean ?

Thanks

av8or · Oct 25, 2014

Fishywater, PPK stands for Passive Plant Killer.

Feeding interval is every six hours but the GSC seems to still be drowning. Rookie question: How long does it take for a plant to rebound from being over-watered? The other four girls are looking fine, but not exactly showing inches of growth a day. Something isn't working right and I'm not sure what it is...either that or I just shocked the plants so much in their first week that they're all taking a minute to get going. Hard to say.

Snook · Oct 25, 2014

av8or said:
Fishywater, PPK stands for Passive Plant Killer.

Feeding interval is every six hours but the GSC seems to still be drowning. Rookie question: How long does it take for a plant to rebound from being over-watered? The other four girls are looking fine, but not exactly showing inches of growth a day. Something isn't working right and I'm not sure what it is...either that or I just shocked the plants so much in their first week that they're all taking a minute to get going. Hard to say.

no other clones you can pop in there? don't remember what you said in #1.

Miraculous Meds · Oct 25, 2014

av8or said:
Fishywater, PPK stands for Passive Plant Killer.

Feeding interval is every six hours but the GSC seems to still be drowning. Rookie question: How long does it take for a plant to rebound from being over-watered? The other four girls are looking fine, but not exactly showing inches of growth a day. Something isn't working right and I'm not sure what it is...either that or I just shocked the plants so much in their first week that they're all taking a minute to get going. Hard to say.

That depends on how long it takes the roots to recover and start to grow healthy. Probably a week or two before u see positive plant growth.

av8or · Oct 25, 2014

Ah ok. Thanks MM. I'll stop checking on them every 13 minutes, then.

av8or · Oct 25, 2014

Snook - I am trying to start a perpetual cycle, so with a six plant max in my state, I figure I'd get another clone when I flip the first plant, as to keep them an appropriate size for my space. At that point, I'll just be timing the spot in the tube, as it were, for the perpetual. I think that made sense...

twist1uc · Oct 30, 2014

Hello. Nice thread. What size buckets/ bowls are you using?

Thanks!

av8or · Nov 3, 2014

Day 17

Day 17

After a watery start, I think I'm getting the idea. I ended up culling the Cotton Candy and the Girl Scout Cookies. I drown them the first few days I transplanted them and I didn't want to wait for them to recover, so I picked up a few more clones. The Bruce Banner #3 is about 2.5 times her original size after 16 days, but I suspect that's because I was dealing with drowning the other girls, so this one didn't get all the feed she wanted.

The J1 is a lot bigger, but still pretty light in color. I am thinking it's because of the feed schedule. Ever since I fixed the perched water table problem by leveling my buckets, there have been no over-watering problems. I'm feeding for 63 seconds every 4 hours, but I'm going to increase that. The J1 looks properly hydrated but still hungry. Anybody care to chime in on the feed schedule increase? If I remember right, I thought D9 said that he put his clones straight into the 90 minute feed rotation. Is this true? If so, how big were his clones before he put them in the system?

Because I'm trying to start a perpetual grow, I decided to flip the J1 (even though she's still small). In two weeks, I'm going to take the next biggest girl and flip her. Two weeks later, the next biggest, etc.. Initially, the yields will be small, but if I'm attempting to do a perpetual six plant cycle with most strains being 8-9 weekers, I'll have to flower the first plants really small lest I overgrow my veg room with the plants waiting for their turn in the que.

Lessons learned so far: Spending a few month's pay on a grow room won't do anything for you if you overlook one detail (like leveling your ppk sites because the garage has an engineered run in the floor).

Twist - Thanks! I am using 70 quart much tubs for the bottom buckets and 7 gallon feed tubs for the top. Here are links to the exact ones I'm using (except I was able to buy my muck tubs at Coastal Farm Supply).

http://www.greatplainshardware.com/products/kmd102-7g-feed-dish.html

http://www.miller-mfg.com/product/PSB70BERRYBLUE.html

av8or · Nov 3, 2014

HL45 - I got your message. Still waiting on 50 posts to be able to reply. To answer your question, yes, I am.

high life 45 · Nov 6, 2014

Perhaps we have friends.

How are things looking?

av8or · Nov 6, 2014

Perhaps we do! I flipped the J1 to start sequencing the perpetual cycle. She looks the best out of all the girls. I am definitely over watering, though. I think I need to be putting more mature clones in the system. The J1 isn't showing any signs of over watering but three of the other girls are. I've turned off my pump for now and am going to hand water until all of the girls get bigger. The floor dry doesn't dry out nearly as fast as I thought it would. I've checked for flow issues, there are none. The air gap caused me problems initially and now I'm waiting while I suffer the consequence of shocking my plants too early, too often. I really need to get a handle on this feed schedule. I'll throw a few pics up later today.

Temp: 83
RH: 60%
Co2: 800 ppm
Res: 600 ppm
Ph: 5.8
Water temp: 81

av8or · Nov 7, 2014

Experience needed...

Experience needed...

Hey all,

I'm running into some problems while at the same time having some success. I can't figure out what to do. Being a newb is definitely showing through right now. But hey, this is how you learn, right?

View image in gallery

Here is a Blue Dream clone I picked up almost two weeks ago. As opposed to throwing her right into a PPK site, I transplanted her into a solo cup with the 8822. I've been feeding 600 ppm whenever the top looks dry. It takes about 12 hours, so I'm feeding twice a day. I'm not sure what kinds of issues I'm looking at here with the curling and coloration. Any ideas?

View image in gallery

Here is a Sour Urkle that was transplanted 13 days ago. I have definitely over watered her. This was with a full flood (63 seconds) every four hours. Is she too small to be in the system at that feed rate? The media dryness that you can see in the picture took 12 hours to attain. I'm at a loss as to what I should do for watering. The two Sour Urkles that are right next to a Pre-98 Bubba Kush and a Bruce Banner #3 are showing definite signs of over watering but the latter two are not. I don't understand.

av8or · Nov 7, 2014

On the flip side...

On the flip side...

Day 5 of flower for the tiny J1. She is growing discernibly every day. The only issue that is starting to develop is some curling at the leaf tips. And ideas?

View image in gallery

The Bruce Banner #3 seems to be hanging on alright. She hasn't really grown much so far. Doubled in size but it's been three weeks. Shouldn't I be expecting more growth than that?

View image in gallery

So, this is where I sit. I've got 8 plants in veg, half in solo cups, trying to pull my head out of my proverbial hindquarters regarding watering. The J1 seems to be ok for now in flower. Fortunately, I'm not expecting to create massive plants right off the bat. Right now I just want to figure out how to water them in this system and get their leaves looking right.

Temp: 84 (lights on) 77 (lights off)
Co2: 800 ppm
Res temp: 82
Nutes: 600 ppm and 5.8 ph input, 701 ppm and 5.98 ph in main res

delta9nxs · Nov 8, 2014

howdy! how much of an air gap are you running? in that tub combination you should have about a 6" water depth in the whole system. how deep is yours?

i have rooted cuttings in both turface and the 8822 with 600 ppm solution and a 90 minute interval and they grow like mad.

so possibly the 8822 has too much fine particle in it or these plants were cloned in a water cloner.

i've seen plants started in aero cloners take a long time to get established after a transplant.

how are your tailpieces built? is there any way you can pick one up and get a pic of it?

av8or · Nov 8, 2014

D9, thank you very much for stopping in. I definitely need a bit of advice figuring this out! I'm running a 4" air gap right now. There is 5 1/4" of water in the system, reason being is the leveling of the ppk sites to the garage floor grade and location of the main res).

I washed the 8822 for about a half hour per bag in a compost tumbler with a bunch of small holes in it. The return water is surprisingly clear with very little silt or sediment from the 8822. I can always wash it more, if need be, but I'll probably be sacrificing some plants to do so.

All of the clones I started with were given to me in coco and perlite. A few had rockwool cubes, a few didn't. I can get clones any day in just about any which way I need them, but it doesn't do me any good until I figure out how to get them to grow!

Here is the wick I installed. It's two 2" tailpieces that are 6" long.

View image in gallery

The flood takes about 70 seconds and the system returns to its static level in just a few minutes. I do not suspect there's a clog anywhere in the system, especially considering the tiny size of the plants.

Is there a rule of thumb on how large the clones should be before throwing them in the system at a 90 minute interval? I'm confused as to why they wouldn't just take if the system is set up (as close as possible) to a nominal setting.

So that's where I'm at. Overwatering showing in a couple plants, slow growth shown in others. Light colored leaves with a slight tip droop on the J1 that I put into flower last weekend. It's like they want to live but they're not happy about doing it right now. Please, please, please help me figure this system out. I want to prove that this system is so stable that even an idiot like me can do it! Thanks, brother!

av8or · Nov 8, 2014

While I was snapping the last couple pictures, I noticed this green stuff on a portion of the top of the media in only one of the ppk sites.

View image in gallery

Any ideas what in the world this is??

Also, take a look at how purple the veins on the Sour Urkle are. All of my plants are starting to look like this, the only exception being the J1 in flower.

View image in gallery

Two plants acting like they're overwatered, two plants acting like they're not getting enough nutes, one plant just growing away...I don't get it. There's a piece that I'm missing still.

av8or · Nov 8, 2014

D9, how should I be taking cuttings that will best transplant into this system? Can you explain your process for rooting cuttings in this media? I have my room setup for a solid perpetual grow if I could just get these roots right so they're not drowning. Thanks!

Miraculous Meds · Nov 8, 2014

That blue dream being hand watered in the solo cup might need more than twice per day now. By the time I had gotten my solo cups healthy above 12 or 14" I was watering them up to 10 times a day.

The green in the ppk looks like algae. Maybe u got the water level too high and need a bigger air gap. or less frequent waterings. Id go with what ever d9 suggests, but Id back off from 90 minute waterings to every 3 hours and see if they perk up. I bet they just don't have the root structure to keep up with those frequent waterings yet.

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