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Blumat auto watering

sanjuan

Member
Any one attached the blumat drip line to pvc sched. 40? I'll be building a blumat system over the next couple days. Do the kent 3/32 barbs leak when punched through the drill bit holes drilled in the pvc? Are you using a 3/32 of 5/64 drill bit to pilot the hole? I'll have between 1 and 4 feet of head at the resin the 3/4 supply line.
Any help is appreciated.
I'm thinking you want hose, not pipe to punch into. Like Lazyman's post #426/427.
 

designated

New member
I'm thinking you want hose, not pipe to punch into. Like Lazyman's post #426/427.

I think you are right. I was confused with a pic I saw of a drip system. Oh well, I've picked all that is needed to run 250 blumats (2 per 7 gal smart pot) with the PVC. I'll have to do a pressure test tomorrow. If I was not remote on an island I'd be back to the store. Maybe on the weekend.
Thanks for the info
 

Lapides

Rosin Junky and Certified Worm Wrangler
Veteran
I think you are right. I was confused with a pic I saw of a drip system. Oh well, I've picked all that is needed to run 250 blumats (2 per 7 gal smart pot) with the PVC. I'll have to do a pressure test tomorrow. If I was not remote on an island I'd be back to the store. Maybe on the weekend.
Thanks for the info

Good luck with that. Make sure to report back.
 
I plan to use the blumat maxis with an elevated res and I was wondering if I should put in an air stone in the res or not? is it useful at all with these:dance013:
 

sunnydog

Drip King
Veteran
I plan to use the blumat maxis with an elevated res and I was wondering if I should put in an air stone in the res or not? is it useful at all with these:dance013:

If you are running straight water, I would NOT use an airstone, as the "fizzy" water would be more likely to cause inline bubbles.
 
Thats what I was worried could happen but I'm using nutes for coco and all my other grows have used air stones... still no air stones?
 

Lazyman

Overkill is under-rated.
Veteran
I would NOT advise anyone to try running these off PVC pipes, it would be a pain to seal the tees to the pipe, and once sealed impossible to service (they WILL clog at some point!)

Stick to hoses, much cheaper and easier to work.

Also, never had any problems with buibbles or air in any of my lines, I have 200 Blumats on 4 barrels, all heavily aerated and no problems. my lines run across the ground and then up to the pots, so I guess that makes all the air bleed out of the drippers right away?

Oh and just to reiterate:

Use NO molasses
No organic ferts
Use Drip Clean or the like once a week
Try to run a dead res, I use DM Zone to keep the nasties at bay.
 

Lazyman

Overkill is under-rated.
Veteran
By the way, anyone who wants Blumats call

Elite Hydro
Cotati CA
707-665-9855

Jonathan knows about them and will order you the right units and 3mm hoses.

Order the barbs and main hoses yourself and save a ton of money. Blumats are around $5 each and the 3mm hose is around $40 for 30 meters.

Good luck all!
 

Lapides

Rosin Junky and Certified Worm Wrangler
Veteran
Molasses and organic ferts work ok. However I wouldn't plan a week's trip while using them and expect to have everything go smoothly.

With daily checks, molasses and organic ferts do work.

Just wanted to clear that up.
 
D

DHF

LM.....How far above your plants are your Rez barrels ?.......The reason I ask is from your last post about your manifold being on the floor and feed lines rising straight up to and back down into the containers to the sensors......

I mean.....This is a Gravity fed system based on constant pressure and dialage of the sensors releasing needed juice as moisture/nutes recede/used by the plants right ?...

Haven`t started mine yet , but don`t wanna fuck up when I do.....

Thanks Bro.....DHF.....:ying:......
 

Lazyman

Overkill is under-rated.
Veteran
Lets see, the tops of my pots are about 1' off the floor, the bottom of the barrel probably 33" off the floor. Yep all gravity fed.Remember the valves wont drip all the time unless it's on one monster plant, but the knob allows you to dial in an overall water content of the pot. i go around and kick my pots every few days, when they are light they move and need a little tweak of the knob (usually I find just pulling the dripper hose through the valve a bit releases a small clog and it flows again.)

I put my valve at one edge of the pot, and run the drip tube to the opposite side, so it has to water through the whole pot before it turns off again. Works great!
 

InlineMax

Member
I would like to second the no organic nutes. I threw some hygrozyme in my 6/9 rez just cause i like zymes and had a bottle laying around. Bad Idea. Withing 3 days there was a film on the top of my rez. After 4 days my 8mm feed line was clogged. Luckily I checked the room during their night and was able to clear the block with little to no damage to my girl. (suck and spit method, THANKS LAZY) Nasty stuff though. Stick to cannazyme or others really meant for hydro if your rez is meant to least more then a few days.

Ive got a drip clean question, can I start to use this halfway through flowering? I have a bottle but have not started for fear of messing something up. Lazy, you said once a week, do you do a flush with a wand with it or just add it into your rezes once a week?

Also, Lazy, while I've got you here, you put the kent systems Ts into the 3/4 tube, so you are running 2 blumats off each connection correct?

DHF, you are a wealth of info in the hydro section, thanks for that! I was just wondering if you were planning on doing your blumats in an amended soil mix or coco? If the amended soil, what recipe?

And FWIF I used some sammys and hung 6' threaded rod pieces. Then I used some unistrut to hang my rezes from the threaded rod. Now my rez heights are fulled adjustable. I would guess they are at least 2 feet above my drippers.
 

Lazyman

Overkill is under-rated.
Veteran
Ive got a drip clean question, can I start to use this halfway through flowering? I have a bottle but have not started for fear of messing something up. Lazy, you said once a week, do you do a flush with a wand with it or just add it into your rezes once a week?

Also, Lazy, while I've got you here, you put the kent systems Ts into the 3/4 tube, so you are running 2 blumats off each connection correct?

I try to use Drip Clean on any barrel attached to Blumats, the timing of it doesn't matter. If there's a Blumat on the line, the barrel has drip clean in it (I use .5ml per gallon.)

When I flush, I dump the barrel(s), refill with RO, Final phase, and Floranectar. Then just let the Blumats do their job.

Yep I bought the tees so I could run two valves per tee, saves money on the tees. I would recommend (if you're running more than one blumat per pot) that you DONT put them both on one tee, if the bottom of that particular tee clogged, that plant would be hurting. I cross them up so it gets one BLumat off one tee, and another Blumat off the neighboring tee. If one clogs, the other will probably still function. Better to have slightly underwatered plants than dead ones right? ;)
 

InlineMax

Member
Thats a good call on crossing the lines. Although the Ghostbusters might disagree.

Sorry for the confusion on the flush part of my question you already answerd me as far as the final flush. I was referencing when you said you use drip clean once a week. Thanks for the clarification. Do you think I would have a problem starting to use drip clean 3 weeks into bloom?
 

Lazyman

Overkill is under-rated.
Veteran
Oh, yeah I top up my barrels about once a week with fresh nutes and additives, including drip clean and DM Zone. I think it would be fine to use Drip Clean anytime, couldn't hurt a thing.
 

InlineMax

Member
THANKS LAZY!!! You gunna run the blumats on your stadium you talked about? Thats my dream. Vert stadium with blumats in coco!!! I know you use FFOF though.
 

Lazyman

Overkill is under-rated.
Veteran
I'm still trying to decide, given my space and power constraints I would really prefer to use aircooled hoods, which means flood and drain tables of (probably) coco/perlite in 2g smartpots. I'm gonna shoot for using 10 600w HPS over 10 3X3 trays (or 4 3X6 and 2 3X3) so I have a walkway between them inside the tent. Harvesting half the tent per month means I only need to keep about 50 plants per month running through, and should yield at least 4-5# every 30 days. Damn near a 6KW sog, but I have 30 days to veg too so i can get them as big or as small as I want.
 

Thaniel

Member
I finally got a a few of these blumats hooked up. I think I mostly copied Lazymans system. I have 2 of these per 5 gallon fabric pot. Only 10 setup at the moment, but will add 40 more in the next few days.

LM, can you tell me how much adjusting you usually have to do after the initial 2 notches closed from the point that a drop simply hangs?

Also, can you post a close up of the top of one of your pots? If I understand correctly, you have the ceramic sensor on one end of the pot, and then about 10 inches of the 3mm tube out from it going to the other side of the pot, that correct? I guess that would sounds about right if you have 1 per container.

You expressed interest in 600 watters. I'm running these 30 off of 15 1k ballasts. So far so good.
 

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