Blumats vs Drip DTW

[kronk]

Thanks for the replies guys , I'm going to try out the Blumat 12 pack that they do and see how this goes!

Soon my plants will be receiving some blumat lovin !

 

[rives]

I always find the concerns about the cost of equipment, nutrients, etc to be pretty funny. If you have "a few hundred plants" going, it seems like a pretty economical investment to spend $5-6 per plant to free yourself up from a full-time watering job. The patio kit runs about $75 for a 12-pack with related fittings, and there are larger quantities available cheaper. That's pretty close to the same price that I paid for smart and air pots, I think.

There isn't much to wear out - there is just a pinch valve that applies pressure to the tubing passing through it, and the tubing is easily replaced if needed ( I haven't seen the need yet). I've been running mine continuously now for about 3 years with no indication of wear. Good salt nutes won't "go stale" and any water issues that you have will be present regardless of how the water is administered. They will not work well with "organic" nutrients.

 

[kronk]

So good I said it twice!

 

[rives]

If you run into any problems, there is plenty of help on here. At this point, I doubt that you will find an issue that no one else has dealt with yet. The double-reservoir setup is the hot ticket, I think, unless you just have a couple of plants. Joe Fresh has a thread that has lots of detail on setting up reservoirs - see link.

https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=239518

 

[TribalSeeds]

Even tho they will keep moisture and from my understanding they can be gravity fed
so you need to not bother as much just keep water tank filled But here is my question on these blumats costs are pretty expensive for them seems ok for the few plant grow what about the few hundred plant grows ????
how long will they last do they somehow malfunction meaning calcium build up in internal parts ???
will not having a tank full of nutrients go stagnent and ph issues might happen after a few days bringing some more issues to your grow ???
Blumats probably will be a perfect addition to just water feeding your organic soils , lets hope you don't have high copper / iron and calcium in your water
as for chemical nutrients crystalization on internal parts may occur and blockage starts or by passes and it floods your plants . or does not give any volume of water drying them out
you start chasing and working more rather then just little labor on self watering

Nutes dont touch the inside of the blumats. There are no internal/mechanical parts. Its beautiful!
The gravity fed res stays aerated better than a tank with an airstone. No gunk in there. I havent cleaned mine, I dont even need to scrub it. The tubes can build up some gunk, but you can just use the bleed line to clear them.
I havent done a fucking thing since installing my blumats except tie up the branches so they dont flop off of my plants. Some still manage to break off though.
Anyway... Its the consistancy of the juice that keeps them so happy. Its always the same. They dont depleate the medium of any specific nute. Its all always right there for them.

 

[dansbuds]

It depends alot on space you have to set up the rez too cuz they have to be up off the floor & at least 3 or 4' high . i can't use them here cuz i'm in a slanted ceiling attic with 3 trays & 3 rez's . theres no where to put 3 rez's off the floor like i need ... so i'm using drip lines from 18 gallon totes with a 264 gph pump going to each rez .1/2" feed lines & 1/4" drip lines .

 

[Bud Spleefman]

Can someone intelligent tell me if Blaumats yield as well as plain old watering, drain to waste? Anyone using Blaumats hitting 2 lbs a light, and can you use organics like Guano Tea, with a Blaumat? Someone who can give a scientific answer, not some hippy dippy BS about making love to my plants, would be respected and their input would be valuable. Thanks!

 

[Incognegro]

Wow....

1 of your q's was just answered like 3 posts up

 

[TribalSeeds]

Can someone intelligent tell me if Blaumats yield as well as plain old watering, drain to waste? Anyone using Blaumats hitting 2 lbs a light, and can you use organics like Guano Tea, with a Blaumat? Someone who can give a scientific answer, not some hippy dippy BS about making love to my plants, would be respected and their input would be valuable. Thanks!

All of your questions are answered several times over in the blumat threads. Us hippies would rather save space on the interwebz and conserve the energy spent by the server to duplicate that for you.
Much love

 

[RamCTD1027]

Thanks to everyone for all their insight so far. I've decided to take the plunge and ordered a 50 pack of blumats and a 30m roll of extra 3mm drip line. I'll be using 3/4" poly tube as the feed line with Kent Systems barbs to feed the blumats. I'm going to use a 55gal drum on the ground feeding a 27gal reservoir which will be sitting on a platform 7' high.

What is the general consensus as far as maintaining a constant level in the elevated reservoir? I've seen some people mention using a timed pump with drains back to the large res to keep the level steady and other people seem to use float switches like this:

http://autotopoff.com/products/ST1/

I'm leaning towards running the float switch with a drain back to the large res for built in redundancy. Is this unnecessary? Should I just go with a timed pump?

Thanks again for the help

 

[delta9nxs]

pulse watering stomps blumats ass!

 

[rives]

pulse watering stomps blumats ass!

You've tried both?

 

[delta9nxs]

You've tried both?

no, just getting in a blatant plug! how about you? have you tried both?

but i have read a lot of blumat grows and they are full of runaways, clogs, adjustments and spills and there is none of that with a pulse set up.

i'm nearing the end of a long grow with both 5.5 weeks of veg and 9 plus of flower without a single maintenance issue, 24 plants.

a pulse system consist of a pump, a manifold, an open line that never, and i mean never, clogs, and a repeat cycle timer.

my system right now fires 16 times per day for 30 seconds each time or a total run time of 8 minutes per day.

the repeat cycle timer allows for a wide range of adjustment to environmental conditions and/or period of growth.

you have the duration of event and the interval between events as control tools.

if you set up your drain properly you will not need drip clean. properly means to drain the perched water table.

from a container hydraulics standpoint pulsed irrigation outperforms any type of drip apparatus because a drip maintains a supersaturated area in the medium while the pulsed application, with it's intermittent nature, allows a break from the saturation. producing a higher % of usable air, water, nutrient, root, and substrate interface.

draining the aforementioned pwt contributes to a higher usable % also.

and we haven't even gotten into matric potential yet. the blumats have a range of adjustment designed into them that users may find reasons to go beyond.

with a pulsed device you can give enough solution at one time to cause a breath to occur in the medium. air is compressible but water is not and every time the pulse hits it positively displaces an equal volume of air.

then, if you have a controlled drain that drains the pwt an amount of air equal to the liquid in the pwt is also drawn in.

refreshing the o2 while purging the co2.

because of hysteresis a pulse disperses or diffuses better than drip. water "jumps" to wet and resist going into dry. a drip reforms into a column subsurface while a pulse travels as a wave throughout the medium.

drip apparatus has been demonstrated to allow "channeling" in some hydrophobic media such as coco or peat.

with a pulse you water the medium, with a drip you water the plant. with
blumats you water the plants within a preset range designed for what medium?

icmag member HighLife45 has just built a nice example of cleanly functional pulse watering system in his thread linked in my sig.

the pulse keeping the interface in the root zone in better shape for a longer % of time ='s yield.

 

[rives]

no, just getting in a blatant plug! how about you? have you tried both?

Nope, I haven't.

From your definitions, I'd say that blumats are midway between "drip" and "pulse" - they will drip until the sensor hits the setpoint, and then turn off. One benefit of the blumats that I see right off is that they will hold a desired moisture level as the plant's needs change. Adjustability of timers presupposes that you are present to adjust them.

How do you balance the system out so that the plants nearest the pump get the same volume of water as the plants at the extremes of the feed loop?

 

[Bud Spleefman]

How do you balance the system out so that the plants nearest the pump get the same volume of water as the plants at the extremes of the feed loop?

You need to make all your drip/feed lines the same length, and you need to use a big enough pump to pressurize the entire system.

 

[rives]

You need to make all your drip/feed lines the same length, and you need to use a big enough pump to pressurize the entire system.

So basically you are running a short manifold with long individual runs to each plant rather than a long distribution line with short branches to each plant? Makes sense.

 

[supermanlives]

i have used pulse. still havent setup my 2 boxes of blumats. lol with an open line seup you can also put micro valves on each line if ya exp any issues.

 

[rives]

I've tried balancing air flow with micro valves on my aquariums and haven't been too impressed with the results over time. I would think that it would be a real pain in the ass to do it with the "flywheel" effect from a wet media.

One real benefit that I've found to the blumats is that I leave the moisture setting alone between runs - voila, the next plant has the same moisture level as the last one. There is a learning curve with them, but if you have long absences from your plants, I haven't run across anything else that works as well.

 

[Bud Spleefman]

So basically you are running a short manifold with long individual runs to each plant rather than a long distribution line with short branches to each plant? Makes sense.

Actually I am using a 24 foot long manifold with 5 ft long feed lines, 30 of them, per manifold. No drippers, just a "t" fitting on the end.

 

[rives]

Thanks, Bud. Is that pvc in the background your manifold? I assume that you have to be careful about keeping the elevation at the discharge point pretty consistent so the lowest one doesn't overwater it's plant?