Switching From Soil To Hydroponics

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The Weave

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I am a first time hydro grower this year and using dwc, once I got the ph and nutes figured out the plant growth was amazing. I also planted 2 blueberries in soil 2 weeks later and the soil plants are very far behind. In the future I think ill do all hydro, a little more up keep but also more results so far.
 
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heisen

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scubascrog said:
so I would set up 2 equal rooms, since you dont need more room to veg than you do to flower in rdwc. you are going to want to not rip them out. im doing coco side by side with rdwc and i can say rdwc all the fucking way.
. I'd go 2 inch bulkhead fittings on square buckets I am already clogging my 1.5 inch pvc tubes, I have to manhandle my roots out of my tubes once a week to prevent overflowing.... I used the big disk air stones and it creates an obstruction when the roots wrap around it right in front of my pvc pipe ends. , if you are construction minded uni-seals work just fine, just takes more attention when SANDING your holes open and dont shove the pipe in too much. ;)

i'd do 8 buckets in a 4x8 with a 700gph water pump and 2 700gph air pumps.

my DIY system is pretty nice check it out https://www.thcfarmer.com/community...is-head-4xrdwc-6xdtw-6x9-led-perpetual.95538/
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prune the runners and you wont have that problem.I moved to 2 inch pipe also.When you get them long runners just prune them off before you flip to flower.I also put my air stones in front of the pipes to keep the roots away from the inlets.
 
scubascrog

scubascrog

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It's a 2 month veg problem hahaha. I started overflowing on one of my buckets last night when i overfilled above my float valve. It's something i gotta check on every day or so.
 
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Superlite27

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Vonkins said:
I've been growing using earth juice for some time now. I'm getting tired of getting dirt everywhere, hand watering, and not being able to use trellis cause of the hand watering and moving plants around. Im interested in the faster growth and the possibility to increase yield. Dont know if ebb and flow or rdwc would be for me. So heres were my questions come in. I could eliminate my trellis issue fairly easy by just setting plants in place and install the trellis. Instead of having to move buckets I can purchase a long watering wand, flow meter. I currently have a water pump, so just use hose and fittings and now i can water without moving plants. But I'm interested in the fast growth and yield. Is it true that both will noticeably increase once the rdwc is dialed in.
Ok I grow in one large room 13 by 13 that has an enclosed 4 by 8 room. The 4 by 8 is for flower and the rest of room is used for veg and hanging plants to dry. How do I veg/prep plants for the flower buckets? Obviously I cant veg in dirt anymore. Do I have to build an rdwc just for vegging? If so I will just stick with my dirt and water wand idea. I really dont want to build 2 rdwc setups. Any ideas guys. Will the difference in veg times and final yield be worth all this change? And of course I wont be hand watering and I'll be using trellis netting.
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Superlite27

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I have found that hydro in its varying forms such as aeroponics, NFT, DWC etc.works better than soil in terms of overall yield, speed of growth, harvests possible in a given time and root development just to name a few.
It's certainly cleaner than soil. It's a personal preference thing. I like the naturalness of soil grown herb, but hydro herb can be great if you're careful about using quality nutrients.
If you're interested in overall yield and 60% faster growth rates, then dwc or aeroponics is great and not difficult to learn.
 
Vonkins

Vonkins

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Another reason I'm kinda scared to switch is I think my water carrie's some type of cyanobacteria. Every cloner I've built or bought stops working after the second run and no matter how much cleaning u do it will never root clones again. I've ran calcium hypochlorite through my diy aerocloner that was so strong it dissolved my filter in my pump. I cleaned all the filter material out and continue to let run for a couple days. I've done this 2 or 3 times with the pool shock and hydrogen peroxide 35%. Then I run plain water, changing it every day for 3 or 4 days to flush out any chemicals. Put cuttings in. They dont get mushy or get slime but they just never root. Same goes for my bubble cloner. Pretty much all u clean with it is the little container that hold about 1gal of water. Everything else to it is new, the airstones, air lines, and permaclone collars. I just assumed my water wouldnt allow me to do any type of hydro. Maybe I could do a couple of dwc buckets. Just keep it super simple. Was thinking of not even top feed, just get a bucket and a put water and a airstone and see what happens.
 
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Vonkins

Vonkins

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I've got this silly idea and too many girls in veg. With that being said what would happen if I took one of my soil girls out of her container and thoroughly cleaned off the roots (very ez when soil is dry), then drop her in a bucket of nutes, hygrozyme and a airstone. Would she die from the shock from going from soil to hydro. I was thinking the shock wouldnt be so bad if I didnt put the roots all the way in the water at first. Just let then hang just above the water so the bubbles bursting would moisten the roots, at first. I was thinking the roots would search out the water and grow to the water possibly avoiding the shock of going straight from soil into deep water. Is this a possibility,cause if so I can get this going tonight. If the plant dies then I know it doesnt work, but if it lives, then I might switch a few over. They are already nice size, so introducing the dwc would be make them explode if all goes well
 
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H

heisen

2,626
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Vonkins said:
Another reason I'm kinda scared to switch is I think my water carrie's some type of cyanobacteria. Every cloner I've built or bought stops working after the second run and no matter how much cleaning u do it will never root clones again. I've ran calcium hypochlorite through my diy aerocloner that was so strong it dissolved my filter in my pump. I cleaned all the filter material out and continue to let run for a couple days. I've done this 2 or 3 times with the pool shock and hydrogen peroxide 35%. Then I run plain water, changing it every day for 3 or 4 days to flush out any chemicals. Put cuttings in. They dont get mushy or get slime but they just never root. Same goes for my bubble cloner. Pretty much all u clean with it is the little container that hold about 1gal of water. Everything else to it is new, the airstones, air lines, and permaclone collars. I just assumed my water wouldnt allow me to do any type of hydro. Maybe I could do a couple of dwc buckets. Just keep it super simple. Was thinking of not even top feed, just get a bucket and a put water and a airstone and see what happens.
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1 gram of pool shock in 1 gallon of water,than mix 2 - 3 ml per gallon of that mix to to your cloning water.thank me later.Youll get roots again
 
Vonkins

Vonkins

215
43
heisenbubble said:
1 gram of pool shock in 1 gallon of water,than mix 2 - 3 ml per gallon of that mix to to your cloning water.thank me later.Youll get roots again
Click to expand...
I've done the pool shock thing for the last 5 yrs in my cloners. Still nothing works. Was thinking of just getting a new bucket, drill me some 1 7/8th holes, got a brand new water pump, get some new PVC, got 360 misters, and make me a 5 gallon bucket aeroponic cloner, and only use store bought water. Couldnt do that with my 36 site diy aerocloner cause it was in one of those yellow top tough totes and it held alot of water, so I had to use city water. With the 5gal bucket I can just purchase water. Or just spend 80 bucks and get a damn clone king and be done. Only use store bought water though. I'm sure a clone king 36 doesnt hold more than 2 gallons of water.
 
Vonkins

Vonkins

215
43
Screw the cloner, I've got tons of 1.5 rockwool and time so I'm good on the cloning. What about that silly ass idea I came up with about transplanting from soil to dwc. Could it work?
 
S

Superlite27

4
3
Vonkins said:
I've got this silly idea and too many girls in veg. With that being said what would happen if I took one of my soil girls out of her container and thoroughly cleaned off the roots (very ez when soil is dry), then drop her in a bucket of nutes, hygrozyme and a airstone. Would she die from the shock from going from soil to hydro. I was thinking the shock wouldnt be so bad if I didnt put the roots all the way in the water at first. Just let then hang just above the water so the bubbles bursting would moisten the roots, at first. I was thinking the roots would search out the water and grow to the water possibly avoiding the shock of going straight from soil into deep water. Is this a possibility,cause if so I can get this going tonight. If the plant dies then I know it doesnt work, but if it lives, then I might switch a few over. They are already nice size, so introducing the dwc would be make them explode if all goes well
Click to expand...
Vonkins said:
Screw the cloner, I've got tons of 1.5 rockwool and time so I'm good on the cloning. What about that silly ass idea I came up with about transplanting from soil to dwc. Could it work?
Click to expand...
 
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