IndoorAddict
Member
Ya hand watering blows for sure! Even Just a few plants is so labor intensive.
Blumat or Timed Drippers?
- Thread starter doob
- Start date
I've never had to use an inline filter w/ blumats, just .4ml/gal drip clean all the time minus flush. and after each run I would simply clean what little salt debris that was on the end of the drip line with my fingers. I've used molasses, kelp products, and a few others than many would consider would "dirty up" a rez w/ no issues.
I've only had to use 2 blumats per pot when I was running in 7-10gal containers, having secondaries for safe measure is a great idea although I've never had a blumat get clogged even when running 30+ blumats on a single loop from the elevated rez. I would think it would be ideal to run a second loop for "backup" blumats
had to put mine away for a while since I was growing in a plac where I had to eliminate every possibility of flooding...new setup is nearing completion and the blumats will be going in for a soak.
TheDude420
Member
Thats awesome.. they seem like a very good product.
TheDude420
Member
Zone???
Yes the H2O2 i was getting.. 30 then 50% was just never getting me anywhere.. i used to make the ClearRez crap with chlorine and realized i was just causing lockout problems.
I went to the bennies and have seem epic results with the same strains and exact same conditions.. im starting to top out which is pissing me off.. Time to build the vertical Coco garden i have been planning!
doob
Member
Thanks for all your replies. Makes me confident in what I have planned, its all about making the grow as simple as possible I think, and doesn't get much easier than a gravity fed on demand setup.
I can check the plants daily but it will be nice to know I don't have to once it is setup. Move lights and top up the reservoir and job done, cant wait!
I can check the plants daily but it will be nice to know I don't have to once it is setup. Move lights and top up the reservoir and job done, cant wait!
IndoorAddict
Member
Yup zone by Dutch master. and yes I still like it. My rez is nice and sparkling clean!
stevewinthrop
Member
Only problem with bennies and blumats is the bacteria really clogs up those thin drip lines fast. I found with blumats the less shit you add to your res the better the performance. I use my base nutrients and pekacid. Bloom boosters when they're scheduled. Bing bang boom.
Some people don't even use the pekacid (drip clean), but I do get some extreme salt build up if I don't use it.
I tried blumat with beneficial organisms, the inside of my res got the typical slime coat and so did my drip lines in turn. I also tried running a dead res using bleach, but that was a pain, so I ended up just putting water, nutrient and an air stone and called it good. Got some slight slime in the res, but nothing extreme.
Really have to be careful about enzymes and bacteria with blumats, ended up stunting a blueberry plant when the lines clogged up. It never recovered. It yielded 4 Oz, while its buddy who didn't get clogged yielded just under 12. And I discovered the clog within 48 hours.
I will say, I got better results and less worries with a timed DTW system using hydro halos, but I was filling my reservoir every 4 days and I went through twice as many nutes. With blumats I just make sure they're dripping before I go to work and occasionally need to massage a line to get the flow back. Even at the height of flower I only had to fill the res every 10 days and only went through half a bag of maxibloom.
All said and done, just the ease and efficiency of blumats has won my heart and that's what I've settled on for coco.
TheDude420
Member
Thanks Steve.. some good info in that last post. I was doing some reading on the Blumats and they seem really nice but like you said, those little lines probably clog easy when running bennies and heavy nutes.
I am going to buy one of those little kit packages or whatever they call it and run it on the momma's. I think they will work great since they wont waste water and since momma feed is only about 1/3 if not less of what hits the fire room, i doubt i will have any issues with clogging.
Ill have to check out that zone stuff.. I really like hydroguard. great results and you don't have to use much at all. Plus they always give me a gal for free when i purchase the rest of the nutes and odds and ends crap.
I was thinking about buying some hydro halos and setting up an inline adjustable emitter but i cant find any 1/2" ones (all 1/4" available) so i can get about the same amount at each site. Even with a Jet Pump at 40psi, my buddy still couldn't get the ones at the far end of the room to be equal so if i get the inline emmiters i could run a 1" main line, then split off that with 1/2" tubing, run through the adjustable inline emitter (if i can find them) and then to the hydrohalo..
stevewinthrop
Member
I have found the blumats to be fine when running anything except beneficials and enzymes. Heavy nutes don't clog the lines. I think they're great for mothers, but they're great for flower room too.
I never had pressure issues with my halos, but my style is to grow 4 plants at a time and I'd be hard pressed to find any kind of system that doesn't work for 4 plants, hah.
I never had pressure issues with my halos, but my style is to grow 4 plants at a time and I'd be hard pressed to find any kind of system that doesn't work for 4 plants, hah.
Zarezhu
Member
I just threw up a pretty dope irrigation system for my 4000w room. First time, and it's working flawlessly.
2400gph danner pump
1" pvc to center of room
split into 4 1/2" poly hoses, all EQUAL LENGTH
Each poly hose runs to a ring of poly I made inside each tray, all rings EQUAL LENGTH
1/4" tubing coming out of the rings, about 12 per ring/tray (all tubing must be EQUAL LENGTH so pressure coming out of every single end is equal)
I put a 1/4" T at the end of all my 1/4" tubing, so it essentially works as 2 outlets per spaghetti tube
Shouldn't clog as the 1/4" openings are fairly large, much larger than dripper openings
Waters all plants with the same amount of water
Can control output/pressure easily as well. Hook up to a timer and waaalaaa
2400gph danner pump
1" pvc to center of room
split into 4 1/2" poly hoses, all EQUAL LENGTH
Each poly hose runs to a ring of poly I made inside each tray, all rings EQUAL LENGTH
1/4" tubing coming out of the rings, about 12 per ring/tray (all tubing must be EQUAL LENGTH so pressure coming out of every single end is equal)
I put a 1/4" T at the end of all my 1/4" tubing, so it essentially works as 2 outlets per spaghetti tube
Shouldn't clog as the 1/4" openings are fairly large, much larger than dripper openings
Waters all plants with the same amount of water
Can control output/pressure easily as well. Hook up to a timer and waaalaaa
SirStynkalot
Member
Blumats are okay for small scale but not desirable for large scale ops. They're too touchy and the worst case malfunction with blumats is a lot more hassle than the worst case malfunction with drippers. Drippers you go buy another pump, blumats you spend roughly seven years with a shop vac cleaning up the res you dumped all the fuck over from one of the drippers getting stuck open. Plus you have to tweak each blumat individually and aren't supposed to jostle them and yadda yadda yadda.
That being said, I'd rather use blumats on small scale or with a lower plant count. I have a set I've been meaning to install for over a year.
That being said, I'd rather use blumats on small scale or with a lower plant count. I have a set I've been meaning to install for over a year.
Care to explain how the dripclean removes the excess salts from the coco when there is absolutely no runoff. Does it grab excess salt and jump off the edge of the container with it or grab it and fly away
The plant can only use so much and any excess stays right there in the media and builds up, with or without dripclean. Don't believe me, then check the first of your final flush runoffs after using the blumats with no runoff for 8-10 weeks. I did, used 1ml/gal dripclean the entire grow, first flush runoff- 2.9ec
Sounds about right. My trays are plumbed to a drain so I don't care about runaways. I agree drippers would be better for largescale
Care to explain how the dripclean removes the excess salts from the coco when there is absolutely no runoff. Does it grab excess salt and jump off the edge of the container with it or grab it and fly away
just keeps the salts from binding to the medium...
I feed very lightly, and even if the ec was that high in the medium my plants never showed any issues...but I suppose with so many variables your mileage may vary.
All I could find is that it keeps the ph in range and stable so these excess salts don't wreck havoc. I believe it has a missing molecule that the salts bind to, to do this.
stevewinthrop
Member
I realize the salts don't go anywhere, but the pekacid stops the salt crust from forming all over the fabric pots. So whatever it does, disguise the salts or exchange ions or whatever the fuck it does, it seems to do it well. Before I started using it I had a few people tell me I'd be able to tell a difference when smoking a bowl of PeKacid grown vs flushed. I have to agree. Cleaner taste and pure white ash.
Like I said, however it does what it accomplishes is beyond my understanding, and obviously not it's intended use, but if it helps make a better product in the end, I'm all for it. Might as well pick me up a bottle of magic hippy tears too, I hear they add a lot to the flavor of the end product too.
Also at 20 bucks per gallon I have no problem using it. That's enough for about 10 grows for me.
Like I said, however it does what it accomplishes is beyond my understanding, and obviously not it's intended use, but if it helps make a better product in the end, I'm all for it. Might as well pick me up a bottle of magic hippy tears too, I hear they add a lot to the flavor of the end product too.
Also at 20 bucks per gallon I have no problem using it. That's enough for about 10 grows for me.
Care to explain how the dripclean removes the excess salts from the coco when there is absolutely no runoff. Does it grab excess salt and jump off the edge of the container with it or grab it and fly away
look up vapoorise very similar product
AuxinRiver
Member
Go with Blumat; properly set up, it gives the plant the amount of water (and nutrients) it needs and changes that amount as the requirements change as it adapts to the humidity of the medium or lack thereof.
With Timed Drippers you're trying to guess those requirements.
With Timed Drippers you're trying to guess those requirements.
After a few days all I can say is blumats rule, I'm running bennies in my rez and having no problems at all. Not as thick as bio buckets tho.
1 5 gal rez, 1,5 feet from the ground is enough to water 4 pots, only watering 2 right now, but will expand after this run. Prob switching to coco for a while, I will do as said in this thread and add a bottom rez to keep my top rez filled, takes around 5-6 days before I have to refill it
Thanks for the tips, that big blumat thread has a lot of info!
1 5 gal rez, 1,5 feet from the ground is enough to water 4 pots, only watering 2 right now, but will expand after this run. Prob switching to coco for a while, I will do as said in this thread and add a bottom rez to keep my top rez filled, takes around 5-6 days before I have to refill it
Thanks for the tips, that big blumat thread has a lot of info!
