120-60-300-120-60-177.2 Nutrient Tutorial, or, My Thread Can Beat Up Your Thread.

dankworth · Feb 13, 2012

It took me a while to figure out the fertilizer salts. One of the reasons is that I could not find a good tutorial.
I would strongly recommend reading the other nutrient threads if you are not up to speed yet. It is best to take notes in your notebook.

I will be making a 120-60-300-120-60 food. It is modeled after Jalisco Kid's flowering food, but with slightly higher K. JK recommended at least 2.5:1 K:N ratio for dtw. Something about this promoting a "bigger, tighter bud with a better trich profile" or words to that effect. This formula is intended as bloom food for a drain-to-waste coco/hydroton mix(chow mix).

I spent several hours on the computer and phone to find the ag place that sold these salts. I spent 181.06, and bought 5 50 lb bags of salts, and a 3 lb bag of micros.
I bought
Calcium Nitrate (calnit) 15.5-0-0-19
Potassium Nitrate(Knit) 13-0-44
Potassium Sulfate(Ksulf) 0-0-50-0-0-17
Monopotassium Phosphate(MKP) 0-52-34
Magnesium Sulfate(epsom) 0-0-0-0-9.8-13
And the micros(4.5% iron)

You will notice that the only fertilizer with phosphorus is the MKP. We will start there.
Phosphorus comes in the form of P2O5, which is 43.6% P.
So if we want 60 ppm of P, we will need 137.61 ppms of P2O5. P is always listed on nute jugs as P2O5. So my 3-1-2 veg food is actually not 3-1-2. It is 3-.436-1.66. I will explain about the K later.
So we need 137.61 ppms of P2O5. Our MKP is 52% P2O5. We divide 137.61 by 52. We get 2.65. Which gets us the 137.61 ppms of P2O5, which gets us the 60 ppms of P that we were after.
So 2.65 units of Monopotassium Phosphate.
Next we will get our calcium. As with the phosphorus, we get the calcium from one source, the Calcium Nitrate. The Calcium Nitrate is composed of 15.5% nitrogen and 19% calcium. We want 120 ppms of calcium. So we divide 120 by 19 and get 6.32.
So 6.32 units of Calcium Nitrate.
Next we will get nitrogen. The 6.32 units of Calcium Nitrate, multiplied by calcium nitrate's nitrogen content of 15.5%, gets us 98 ppms of nitrogen. We want 120 ppms nitrogen, so we will need 22 more ppms of nitrogen. We will get that from Potassium Nitrate. Potassium Nitrate is composed of 13% nitrogen. So we divide 22 by 13, and get 1.69.
So 1.69 units of Potassium Nitrate.
Next we will get our potassium. Potassium comes in the form of K2O5, which is composed of 83% potassium. So to get our 300 ppms of K we will need 361.4 ppms of K2O. Potassium Nitrate is 44% K2O, so our 1.69 units of potassium nitrate above contribute 74.4 of our 361.4 ppms. We will need 287 more ppms of K2O. We will get that from Potassium Sulfate, which is 50% K2O. So 287 divided by 50 is 5.74.
So 5.74 units of Potassium Sulfate.
Next we will get our magnesium, from magnesium sulfate(epsom salts). Magnesium sulfate is composed of 9.8% magnesium. We want 60 ppms of magnesium. So we divide 60 by 9.8 to get 6.12.
So 6.12 units of Magnesium Sulfate.
As we have all of our N(120 ppms) P(60) K(300) Ca(120) and Mg(60), we need to find out how much sulfur our Potassium Sulfate(17% sulfur) and Magnesium Sulfate(13% sulfur) gave us. Our 5.74 units of potassium sulfate multiplied by 17 gives us 97.6 ppms of sulfur. Our 6.12 units of magnesium sulfate multiplied by 13 gives us 79.6 ppms of sulfur, for a total of 177.2 ppms of sulfur. That is a lot of sulfur. Sulfur is a huge key to flavor, aroma, and dankness. Mulder charts show potential for potassium and calcium interactions. I do not know what the limit is with sulfur before it interferes with potassium or calcium availability. I have found that when my res smells like hot springs, my medicine is more flavorful, odorous, and effective.
Lastly we have micros. My micros are 4.5% iron, and that is what I am going to base my dosage on, is the iron. I figure 4.5 ppms is fine, so we will need 1 unit of micros.
So 1 unit of micros.
Don't forget to dilute each salt independently, I have read that it is best to add Calcium Nitrate last. I dilute my salts into 1-5 gallons of water before adding to the reservoir. I have a pump laying on its side in a 5 gallon bucket for mixing. Do not rush anything. I add 20 ppms potassium silicate before any of the other nutrients(1 ml/gal Pro-tekt). I will be replacing that as well.

Remember that one gram of salts per liter is 1000 ppms.

-dankworth

HG23 · Feb 13, 2012

Nice post Dankworth. I also have been studying up on the concepts of using raw salts and molecular weights to come up with fertilizer profiles, its very interesting stuff. I've had to read and re-read many threads and print articles/take notes to get a firm grip on things. I'm a little confused by your method and use of the term units, what exactly does that mean? Seems to me the decimals are off by one place to be considered the usual unit of g/L. I have a little different way of looking at it, check it out maybe you can help me. I always figure out formulas for one liter of solution and then multiply that by how large the res. is because PPM in water is the same as mg/L.

So for the Calcium, you want to raise solution(1 liter volume) level by 120PPM or 120mg/L. That means you need to come up with 120 mg of Cal, but your salt is only 19% calcium by weight.

So you take 120mg/L Ca / .19 (mass ratio of ca in calnit)= 631.58 mg/L Calnit needed to raise one liter of water by 120ppm Ca. Take it a step further and divide by 1000 to get .632 g/L Calnit.

For the P, you need the 137.61 PPM of P2O5 from a salt(MKP) that is 52% P2O5 so you take 137.61 PPM divided by .52 (mass ratio of P2O5 in MKP)= 264.63 ppm MKP or 264.63 mg/L MKP. And once again take it one more step and divide by 1000 for .265 g/L MKP to have the net effect of raising solution by 60PPM P.

I was also wondering if you're going to be running the 50/50 chow mix I've heard JK and mr.dizzle talk about, I'm interested to see a grow log using this profile either way.

homebrew420 · Feb 13, 2012

Dank, that looks solid to me. We run a large RDWC warehouse in Boulder and that is pretty damn close to the profile we use. I think there may be more to the mixing of salts than people think. For example, if you look on most of the salt formulations we see that monopotasium phosphate is not used heavily, infact its used rather sparingly. I think this has to do with over availability and possible pH fluctuations as a result of salts be used. Not saying it is wrong by any means, for I know not. Just putting that out there. Keep up the good work my friend.

Peace

Just reread, pH issue is not going to be an issue here, missed the drain to waste. Duh, wish I could blame that on the herb. Haha

MarijuanaBaybee · Feb 13, 2012

goood post brutha!

dankworth · Feb 13, 2012

HG23 said:
Nice post Dankworth. I also have been studying up on the concepts of using raw salts and molecular weights to come up with fertilizer profiles, its very interesting stuff. I've had to read and re-read many threads and print articles/take notes to get a firm grip on things. I'm a little confused by your method and use of the term units, what exactly does that mean? Seems to me the decimals are off by one place to be considered the usual unit of g/L. I have a little different way of looking at it, check it out maybe you can help me. I always figure out formulas for one liter of solution and then multiply that by how large the res. is because PPM in water is the same as mg/L.

So for the Calcium, you want to raise solution(1 liter volume) level by 120PPM or 120mg/L. That means you need to come up with 120 mg of Cal, but your salt is only 19% calcium by weight.

So you take 120mg/L Ca / .19 (mass ratio of ca in calnit)= 631.58 mg/L Calnit needed to raise one liter of water by 120ppm Ca. Take it a step further and divide by 1000 to get .632 g/L Calnit.

For the P, you need the 137.61 PPM of P2O5 from a salt(MKP) that is 52% P2O5 so you take 137.61 PPM divided by .52 (mass ratio of P2O5 in MKP)= 264.63 ppm MKP or 264.63 mg/L MKP. And once again take it one more step and divide by 1000 for .265 g/L MKP to have the net effect of raising solution by 60PPM P.

I was also wondering if you're going to be running the 50/50 chow mix I've heard JK and mr.dizzle talk about, I'm interested to see a grow log using this profile either way.

Thanks, I was hoping that someone who knew more than me would provide input on this.

I chose "units" so peeps would use them as relative values to one another, as ratios.

Anyone who really knows about fert salts knows far more than I do, my knowledge is really basic.

dankworth · Feb 13, 2012

homebrew420 said:
Dank, that looks solid to me. We run a large RDWC warehouse in Boulder and that is pretty damn close to the profile we use. I think there may be more to the mixing of salts than people think. For example, if you look on most of the salt formulations we see that monopotasium phosphate is not used heavily, infact its used rather sparingly. I think this has to do with over availability and possible pH fluctuations as a result of salts be used. Not saying it is wrong by any means, for I know not. Just putting that out there. Keep up the good work my friend.

Peace

Just reread, pH issue is not going to be an issue here, missed the drain to waste. Duh, wish I could blame that on the herb. Haha

I have an aquarium ph controller, and peristaltic pumps for diluted ph up and down. I was going to use those to keep my ph in check for recirc, but ended up a big fan of dtw. Perfect feeding every time. Not returning pathogens to res.
$250 and anyone can keep any recirculating system's ph in check.
At least that is what I was thinking.
Thanks for your input, it is cool to get the free learning.

dankworth · Feb 14, 2012

HG23 said:
Nice post Dankworth. I also have been studying up on the concepts of using raw salts and molecular weights to come up with fertilizer profiles, its very interesting stuff. I've had to read and re-read many threads and print articles/take notes to get a firm grip on things. I'm a little confused by your method and use of the term units, what exactly does that mean? Seems to me the decimals are off by one place to be considered the usual unit of g/L. I have a little different way of looking at it, check it out maybe you can help me. I always figure out formulas for one liter of solution and then multiply that by how large the res. is because PPM in water is the same as mg/L.

So for the Calcium, you want to raise solution(1 liter volume) level by 120PPM or 120mg/L. That means you need to come up with 120 mg of Cal, but your salt is only 19% calcium by weight.

So you take 120mg/L Ca / .19 (mass ratio of ca in calnit)= 631.58 mg/L Calnit needed to raise one liter of water by 120ppm Ca. Take it a step further and divide by 1000 to get .632 g/L Calnit.

For the P, you need the 137.61 PPM of P2O5 from a salt(MKP) that is 52% P2O5 so you take 137.61 PPM divided by .52 (mass ratio of P2O5 in MKP)= 264.63 ppm MKP or 264.63 mg/L MKP. And once again take it one more step and divide by 1000 for .265 g/L MKP to have the net effect of raising solution by 60PPM P.

I was also wondering if you're going to be running the 50/50 chow mix I've heard JK and mr.dizzle talk about, I'm interested to see a grow log using this profile either way.

I have seriously been so high the last couple of days that I completely missed many of your questions. Didn't mean to ignore.

I really like your explanation of mg/l equating to ppms quite like that. I had not yet done the math on that.

I am going to be running about 40% hydroton, because of how many bags the store had. I am guessing that 50 or 60% hydroton would speed growth up. I will be dripping periodically out of 1/4" tees that are plugged into the bottoms of 1/2" food grade vinyl tubing. I will be using EZ roots aeration frames in totes as skeletonized netpots, to discourage root circling. The aeration frame will be around 2" above a shallow layer of water at the bottom of the tote(1-1 1/2"). The totes will have 1/2" fittings for drainage. So the roots will dangle into that layer of nutrient solution. There will be lots of bennies. Should be pretty relaxing. It is fun to look at dangling hydro roots, I have missed that. No idea about the irrigation schedule yet. I want lots of frequent small irrigations, several times an hour obviously.

Homebrew420, I have read that more Ca and P is good for recirculating hydroponic solutions, that they balance ph against one another basically, to keep the solution more stable.
What are your thoughts on this? And what changes have you made for example to achieve greater stability for your solution ph for rdwc? And if you don't mind my asking, what do you do to keep your roots healthy?

El Cerebro · Feb 14, 2012

Hmm, so finally it's on! Not to sidetrack from nutrients, but is the swc used here as an insurance policy? Or is that the primary feeding zone once roots descend from the media? What size root mass will you be maintaining in the bottom, and how are the drain fittings configured?

pork · Feb 14, 2012

nice work laying it all down...

thanks HG23 for showing the final calculation formula too...

here's in layman's terms:

g/L g/gal
MKP .265 1.002
CalNit .632 2.389
KNit .169 0.6388
KSulf .574 2.170
Epsom .612 2.313
Iron .100 0.378

This will make:
22,650 gals MKP
9,500 gals CalNit
35,530 gals KNit
10,460 gals KSulf
9,800 gals Epsom
3,600 gals Iron

all for $180...not bad....not bad a'tall

dankworth · Feb 14, 2012

Damn, nice work Pork. Way to make use of that free time and those math skills. I bet you are in your 20s. ;)

El Cerebro, I am(edit-should have said will, not doing it just yet) absolutely using SWC dtw as an additional method of feeding roots.
JK has hanging roots all aero'ed, and sometimes a SWC layer of nutes at bottom of his infamous bucket system. He described at one point how his roots outside the bucket by the end of the run are haggled.
Lots of big kids here in the last few years have shown how one can get 2-3 lb from 5 gal buckets worth of medium, topdripped. So even if the SWC roots die off, I will still have ample feeding occurring via the roots in the buckets.
Drain fittings will be the same as w/my 27 gal coco/perlite hempies. I took a 27 gal tote from home depot, and drilled a 1 1/4" hole with a spade bit(hole saw is better if you can help it) as low as I could go to the floor of the tub. And then I screwed in the ebb-and-flow or drain fittings or thru-hull fittings or whatever we call them. So not the 2" that hempy passive reservoirs are known for, shallower than that.
I will be delivering nutes with 3/4" coming from the pump to a loop in front of the totes. Then I will have loops of 1/2" coming off of the 3/4" loop. The 1/2" loop is then laid across the lids of a line of tubs. I poke holes in bottom of 1/2" tubing with a tool, and then insert 1/4" tees. That shit will hurt your fingertips.
That way I do not have to pay 37$ apiece for those 1/4" top hat grommets. I need to order a cargo trailer full of those and retire from the profits.
I will not be pumping air into the bottom tubs. I would have to run the airlines through a body of chilled water to rob the heat before it got to the tubs, and it would present a lot of additional risk and complication w/heat and introducing pathogens potentially.
Nah, I will just tile my tote in reflectix like everything else in life to insulate and keep root zone at right temp.

Had the store I usually shop at not fucked up my orders for cns-17 nutes 4, yes 4 times in a row, I might not have got on the salts as fast as I did. Thanks, stoned customer service representatives!

pork · Feb 15, 2012

hehe...yes...26 and with a physics degree...thanks for the killer thread...

my question that has been looming in my head has to do with the rest of your micro..are you only feeding Iron as a micro? what about the other 10 "essential" (really 80, the rest of the periodic table) elements?

dankworth · Feb 15, 2012

I would have to look at the values presented in my micro mix. I did not write them down. There are the usual others, boron, molybdenum, the usual.

Treasure these years, pork.
Have you had the urge to settle down yet?
It happened to me at your age.
So I trapped my girlfriend with a kid(joke)

Pork, go big in your twenties. You will thank yourself in your thirties. Grow your ass off.

Giddeon · Feb 15, 2012

Thanks DW for the info!!

TylerDurden119 · Feb 15, 2012

siiik good to see other farmers rockin the six pack!

my veg profile is

300-79-340-285-103-166

and bloom

158-98-428-194-119-288

we should get a thread rockin with everyones nutrient profiles!! like a database.

EDIT: i just got back up n runnin after a cpl months of downtime. my girls were at my bro's n he uses some commercial brand. well as soon as i got em back and hit em with the six pack it was like a switch was flipped.

the six pack is the holy grail!!!!

dankworth · Feb 15, 2012

TylerDurden119 said:
siiik good to see other farmers rockin the six pack!

my veg profile is

300-79-340-285-103-166

and bloom

158-98-428-194-119-288

we should get a thread rockin with everyones nutrient profiles!! like a database.

EDIT: i just got back up n runnin after a cpl months of downtime. my girls were at my bro's n he uses some commercial brand. well as soon as i got em back and hit em with the six pack it was like a switch was flipped.

the six pack is the holy grail!!!!

Check you out with your sulfur ppms.
I just copied JK, but did the 2.5:1 K:N ratio.
I think he uses 60 ppm because beneficial bacteria is supposed to start dying off at 60 ppm(I have read 50 ppms elsewhere)

If I ran a touch higher K I could add K sulfate to bump up my S.
And a little more epsom to bump it up as well.

Sulfur leads to the return of the awesome creamy taste of my chemo x og. Which leads to it being stronger. Which leads to me having a stomach that works 24/7, an immune system that fucks off, and the ability to store a ton of oxygen in my bloodstream. I can jog 8-9 miles now, and I am healing faster than I have been able to in years.
Sulfur. (and chemo x og kush. look into it.)

Mr. Durden, what did you base your ratios on? And what medium do you use again?

Jar Man · Feb 15, 2012

What could be a yield results comparison between mixing your own recipe in lieu of what could be achieved with, say, Dyna-Gro? Seems like there's so many potential variables to play with that one would have to do extensive test studies and keep incredibly detailed records for different scenarios relative to temps, humidity, strain or even pheno type, etc.

TylerDurden119 · Feb 15, 2012

@ dankworth- i got this as a base recipe years ago from the hydro shop. funny thing is, is that my dad used to used the same stuff and his recipe was almost bang on the hydro shops one. always had amazing results, n even tinkered with the ratios which i felt were improvements but never documented anything. was young n wasn't reaaaally into it.

thanks for the headsup on the bennies not makin it out alive past that ppm mark. gona hit the canna calc n see what i can come up with to get me down there. although with the results im getting it'll b hard to change.

im runnin some coco and some promix HP gona prolly switch right over to coco but wanted to see the diff first.

dankworth · Feb 15, 2012

TylerDurden119 said:
@ dankworth- i got this as a base recipe years ago from the hydro shop. funny thing is, is that my dad used to used the same stuff and his recipe was almost bang on the hydro shops one. always had amazing results, n even tinkered with the ratios which i felt were improvements but never documented anything. was young n wasn't reaaaally into it.

thanks for the headsup on the bennies not makin it out alive past that ppm mark. gona hit the canna calc n see what i can come up with to get me down there. although with the results im getting it'll b hard to change.

im runnin some coco and some promix HP gona prolly switch right over to coco but wanted to see the diff first.

I feel the same way I do about coco as I feel about breasts. Straight up.

dankworth · Feb 15, 2012

Jar Man said:
What could be a yield results comparison between mixing your own recipe in lieu of what could be achieved with, say, Dyna-Gro? Seems like there's so many potential variables to play with that one would have to do extensive test studies and keep incredibly detailed records for different scenarios relative to temps, humidity, strain or even pheno type, etc.

Nah, you just have to keep stepping up your game until you have a climate-controlled sealed room. Then you dial your environment to your favorite strain. If you don't have one, buy a pack of chemo x og kush and find the keeper(s)
Then you dial the nutes by seeing what happens when you bump up the K(bigger buds, better trichs) relative to the N. That kind of thing.
You will see how too much N in flowering makes your buds too leafy. Higher S, especially late into flowering, makes your meds stronger and more stank.
You can't help but notice these things over time.

pork · Feb 15, 2012

damn this thread will beat up a lot of threads for sure....great info..

looks like beans of chemo x og kush aren't the easiest to find...

so you'll use this mix the whole way through flower,no boosters?

120-60-300-120-60-177.2 Nutrient Tutorial, or, My Thread Can Beat Up Your Thread.

120-60-300-120-60-177.2 Nutrient Tutorial, or, My Thread Can Beat Up Your Thread.

dankworth

HG23

homebrew420

MarijuanaBaybee

dankworth

dankworth

dankworth

El Cerebro

pork

dankworth

pork

dankworth

Giddeon

TylerDurden119

dankworth

Jar Man

TylerDurden119

dankworth

dankworth

pork

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