Krusty aka Freeddome Buckets

[SacredBreh]

Mr. Bot.....

Mr. Bot.....

Have to agree with the above..... Start with DWC and bubblers. Get the idea and learn to read your plants. This system is easy to start and works excellent. Learn the way to do pH and balance your nutes before tackling harder systems. You may never go on to a different system. I have tried many setups over the years and always come back to DWC and SWC. Have done "sea of green" to Redwood size "trees" in these. Never found a system that gave me more than 10% quicker growth than DWC and SWC. I wouldn't recommend SWC (shallow water culture) more time intensive and lots of tinkering. I use it a lot but like I said^^^^^^^^^^^^.

Peace

 

[Mr Celsius]

Don't take this the wrong way, please.

I am of the belief that Krusty buckets are so hard because pepole don't know how to explain it in an easy to read/see fashion.

You don't know what you're talking about. You're making assumptions. I've done the research and talked with the pros, this system is probably the most problimatic system to have ever been created (aside from TAG).

I will put it simple: You do things the hard way or the easy way, its up to you. You've been warned, so have fun with the slim chance of not wasting your time and money. Wanna save the time and just send it to me?

 

[BlindDate]

There is nothing special about the Krusty buckets. It's just one 5 gallon bucket inside another. The top bucket is drilled out on the bottom and 6" up the sides with as many 3/8" holes as you can get. The bottom bucket has the drain line positioned so that 1 1/2" of nutrient is always there. Use a circular air ring on the bottom of the bucket under the 1 1/2" deep nutrient. Your top bucket feed lines (2 per bucket) should flow the same as taking a piss after a 6 pack.

Have fun hauling and sterilizing 200 lbs of lava every grow.

 

[Anima]

Heres a link you might find interesting..
super simple ebb and flow buckets

 

[Mr.Botanical]

Ok...I think I have it.

1)5gallon bucket with holes all over the bottom, and 6 inches up the side of the bucket.

2)Spacer piece with holes(use to keep the inner and outer buckets apart).

3)Have a soaker hose(to give high pressure air to the roots) woven through the holes of the spacer piece so that the hose sits approximately 1 inch above the bottom of the outer bucket.

4)The soaker hose is connected directly to an air pump. This hose should create a froth of bubbles when the pressure is high enough.The line from the hose to the pump should be fed from the gap created between top of the two buckets. This is so you don't rip out roots when you pull the inner bucket out.

5)Two feed lines are fed to the inner bucket along the same gap as the hose line. One feed line(drip irrigation) goes to the top of the medium. The other goes in the top hole along the side of the inner bucket(A hole you drilled that was 6 inches up from the bottom of the bucket).

6) Drill hole about 2 inches from the bottom of the outer bucket. This gets a thicker line(without close-off valve). This hole is used to make sure there's no more than 2 inches of water in the bottom of the bucket. This water is recirculated to a reservoir(with a float valve?) and back through the feed lines.


7) Length of the "reservoir" hose should follow approximately the same path as the length of the feed lines so that the pressure from the pump is equilibrated as much as possible.

8)Add the rocke lava medium(I forget the exact name) and nutrients/water mix of your choice.

9) Change nute water once a week, and adding water to the system throughout the week if needed. At the end of every week, run the plants in pure water to flush the roots for a day.

Is this correct for the set-up?
I have problems with the float valve concept and the actual recirculation process. Is the water circulating 24/7? Or intervals per x hours? Anyone know how to make it work?

 

[nuggetshiner]

Hey Mr.B, lol, that sounds awfully complicated, ha ha ha, way too much work for this
simple stoner. Nice research though, I got lost about step 4. When I read that and
think about how incredibly simple my recirc buckets are I gotta shake my head.
I think Sacredbreh, Mr Celcius, Suby and others have some good advice, keep it simple.
Somebody mentioned all the lava rock, doubt it's re-usable like hydroton, I deff would
not want to try to clean roots out so then there's constant purchase and disposal.
I would like to see one of my dwc buckets side by side with a Krusty, even if it did
out produce the dwc I just can't imagine it's enough to compensate for all the extra
hassels of that system.
Oh, float valves, look in the tank of your toilet, that's a float valve. A feed hose is
connected to a switch that has a float on it. When rez water level drops the float
drops the switch is opened to allow more water into the rez until it pushes the float up
which closes the switch before it gets too full. Keeps the water level in the system
constant.
Hope all goes well with your buckets. When u get your krusty's done I hope u make a
thread, I'd like to watch.
L8r, NS

 

[Mr.Botanical]

I won't quit just because it's hard. I'm just not that way.....

But I am curious. Is there a way to use this method without this lava rock medium? Perhaps just cutting a hole in the lid to hold the stems in place? I don't even understand why the lava rock is needed...

Thanks for the float valve info. I have to figure this out to a T before any building goes down. It could be a while yet.

 

[Tucker Johnson]

Mr. B, I know nothing really about this system but I saved these pics a while back. I figure it cant hurt to throw them out here. Hope they help.

 

[hydroflower]

If this is your first hydro grow then I would seriously suggest you steer well clear of this kind of set-up and start off with a much simpler system. Then when you are familliar with plant requirements in hydro you can adapt/change the system based on your own experience. Keep it simple and you won't be disapointed, overcomplicate things and I promise you, you will.
HF

 

[Mr Celsius]

O, forgot to mention, the soaker hose often clogs up with salts early on and can't be replaced while the plant is in there without doing damage to it.

Let me ask you this, o stubborn one, why do you want to run the krusty buckets so bad? What advantage to you think you're going to have? DWC or ebb n' flow will produce almost the same results and be significantly less problimatic.

 

[Wait...What?]

it is, for all intents and purposes, a larger waterfarm (top drip on aggregate) with air in the res (the soaker hose on the kfb) and recirculation. the return line is large enough that krusty considered it nft.

a huge part of krusty's philosophy of growing is/was total stress elimination, which is another way of saying totally optimized conditions.

another huge part is the naked vertical bulb of both types, on all four sides of the plant.


we must learn to crawl before we can learn to walk...we're going to keep telling you to KISS when you're learning. i'd like to meet you sometime. i've never met anyone good enough at anything to successfully use advanced techniques, first time out. that'd be something, for sure. there's only so far research will take you. eventually you'll have to go out and DO it... good luck. post your results.

 

[Mr.Botanical]

the best idea for a hydro noob to attack a project like this would be to run it without any plants whatsoever for a little while to document water levels, room temps day/night, humidity day/night, ph chnages every x hours.

Now that I have read a few articles a few times over, it's not so bad to understand.

 

[BlindDate]

3)Have a soaker hose(to give high pressure air to the roots) woven through the holes of the spacer piece so that the hose sits approximately 1 inch above the bottom of the outer bucket.

I would put the air hoop on the bottom of the bucket and NEVER use Soaker Hose.

The line from the hose to the pump should be fed from the gap created between top of the two buckets. This is so you don't rip out roots when you pull the inner bucket out.

You will never pull the inner bucket out and if you do the roots are going to rip anyway since they tend to embrace the air hoop.

5)Two feed lines are fed to the inner bucket along the same gap as the hose line. One feed line(drip irrigation) goes to the top of the medium. The other goes in the top hole along the side of the inner bucket(A hole you drilled that was 6 inches up from the bottom of the bucket).

I think I saw Krusty write about this once, but I don't think he ever did it. Just put both lines at the top.

7) Length of the "reservoir" hose should follow approximately the same path as the length of the feed lines so that the pressure from the pump is equilibrated as much as possible.

Not sure what you mean. Tee off all feed and drain lines from a loop.

8)Add the rocke lava medium

Use 2" crushed Lava not 3/4" or the bucket can get blocked with roots.

9) Change nute water once a week, and adding water to the system throughout the week if needed. At the end of every week, run the plants in pure water to flush the roots for a day.

Krusty used 3 part GH at the bottle dose 1,2,3. That is about 1600 ppm, way high for growing most MJ. I don't think he ever used a EC meter. Hence, a huge salt buildup. That is why he needed to flush 2 days a week IMO. Not necessary if you're minding your EC.

Water 24/7

 

[gregor_mendel]

Mr. Botanical:

I asked on the first page of this thread to prescribe exactly the help you seek.

Do you want to do an exact Krusty purist system? OR

Do you want to a Krusty system with all the modifications that people have developed over the years, which help to address the issues some have been mentioning here?

Keep in mind, it is not the details of the buckets that make this work.

It is the volume of root space + all the other stuff not bucket related.

Some are convinced (such as myself) that the system would work just as well without the "extreme air."

Just set it up as described without the air, still get big yield with no noisy air compressor.

 

[funk_buddha]

You're really asking for major spoonfeeding here dude. Most of the people who know now learned from doing their reading. I'm sure a huge percentage of the people on this forum knew nothing before they started reading this forum.

I'm not trying to be a dick, but please do not say that the information you're asking for is not here already in multiple stickies. I personally think this forum almost makes books on the subject obsolete.

Choose your technique.
choose your plants.
choose your nutrients.
grow it.

 

[gregor_mendel]

To be fair to Mr. Botanical, KFB info is notoriously difficult to find all in one place.
If Krusty were a professor, he might be the worst in the history of mankind.

It took me two years of research to get it all together. That being said, it is burned in my memory.

Also burned in my memory is the learning experience of chasing a hyped system just to realize the part I spent the most time learning and building is the least important part of the system - the special NFT bucket.

Any hydro style with adequate root space will work, all other things in the room being equal.

 

[funk_buddha]

Rereading my last post it perhaps sounds a little too harsh.

Basically what we're all saying is... since you dont know anything about hydroponics, you dont even know why this system is potentially better than any other system. You dont get the point of the system, so you'll have a much harder time making all the proper considerations during your build.

At least wait one season. Build a DWC and use it once, I promise you will be able to recycle everything you buy for it. Every single thing you learn will be applicable.

Dont just go balls deep.

KISS

 

[HeresTheDank]

My suggestion is go to DWC buckets. I just started my first ever grow about 2 months ago, and i made my own 5 gallon dwc's and the plants just took off. Use a good nutrient like GH flora nova, its a 1 part mix, very basic. if you dont have a ppm reader just do the adviced 2 teaspoons per gallon to run light. I just started some clones in soil and im far more confused with growing in soil than hydro. you learn what plants like and dont like very quicky with hydro. But i seem to have had luck and has been pretty easy so far, only problem is some root rot but i think its cause my air stone isnt guerilla glued down its just thrown in the bottom.

 

[gregor_mendel]

Mr. Botanical

I don't mean to discourage you, nor do I think anything is too advanced for one willing to do the work.

As I said, it is burned in my memory. I can, and am willing to walk you through every step.

 

[Funkyskunk]

i get a laugh out a peeps that say this sytem is hard to use, or problematic.

every system has pro's and con's.
even an a ebb and flow can sring a leak. just more water to spill out when it does happen.
it is up to each individual to choose what will work for them.
somtimes, roomsize plays a factor in deciding what style to run. many factors. the smart person will choose a style that fits their needs, and supply's them with the right amount of meds.

i have used the KBS for years aslo, and only have had problems wheni was a newbie too afraid to ask questions.


fs