First time grower. Immediately went with RDWC

Fro5ty · Oct 21, 2021

So, I’m going to start my first grow. I have a 16 pot Growrilla RDWC system of 19L buckets. A 600W LED light, a LED 900W and a 630W LED light.

I just got the clones. Gelato 33. I added the nutritions (GHE/AT Tripart) to my RO water in the tank. I had to put in more then what was recommended on the bottle. While I heard to put in less Then recomend. But if I did that, my EC was only 0,4 or something. I just kept adding (always little by little, and the nutritions in the right order) until my EC is now 1,7. My pH is 6,1. Was adding nutritions the right thing to do? Now my nutrition solution looks alright. Like you see it in YouTube video’s. When I started with 1/3 of the dose that the recommend on the feeding chart, the water was clear. And my EC was very low.

I’m ready to start growing. I just finished my work shift. I’m gonna get some sleep. And then I’m going to fill up the system. I’m afraid that I’m a little over my head. RDWC as a first time grower… But we wille see what the future brings.

I would love to have some imput. I will add photos of the lights later. But the 600W and 900W are with the samsung chips. The 630W I don’t know what kind of chips they have.

Aqua Man · Oct 21, 2021

Wait do not put in that... EC of 0.6-0.8 is plenty. Hell I don't even feed 1.7 to fully mature plants in RDWC.

Ph to 5.5 and let drift to 6.0 before readjusting.

I have a pretty good feeling your PH is going to rise a fair bit over the next 24hrs.

I'll pop back in tomorrow to see how things are going.

Plenty of knowledge DWC grows here I'm sure will help ya get things in order.

Fro5ty · Oct 21, 2021

Aqua Man said:
Wait do not put in that... EC of 0.6-0.8 is plenty. Hell I don't even feed 1.7 to fully mature plants in RDWC.

Ph to 5.5 and let drift to 6.0 before readjusting.

I have a pretty good feeling your PH is going to rise a fair bit over the next 24hrs.

I'll pop back in tomorrow to see how things are going.

Plenty of knowledge DWC grows here I'm sure will help ya get things in order.

I was following this chart

EC - us/cm - PPM guidelines

Google and forum searches are leaving me uncertain on this. I found this chart on royalqueenseeds.com: Since my plants are auto's, I can't pinpoint when they switched to flowering exactly, but I believe it was very early April -so let's say I'm going into week 3 of flowering. I am reading...

www.thcfarmer.com

I’m going to sleep now. When I wake up. I’m going to the store to get some last things and I will pump out 50% of my nutrition solution out. And then add RO water again.

thanks for the fast response. It really gives me hope that I found the right place for help. Even tho the website if kind of difficult to navigate true.

Aqua Man · Oct 21, 2021

Fro5ty said:
I was following this chart

EC - us/cm - PPM guidelines

Google and forum searches are leaving me uncertain on this. I found this chart on royalqueenseeds.com: Since my plants are auto's, I can't pinpoint when they switched to flowering exactly, but I believe it was very early April -so let's say I'm going into week 3 of flowering. I am reading...

www.thcfarmer.com

I’m going to sleep now. When I wake up. I’m going to the store to get some last things and I will pump out 50% of my nutrition solution out. And then add RO water again.

thanks for the fast response. It really gives me hope that I found the right place for help. Even tho the website if kind of difficult to navigate true.

Small learning curve. Tons of great ppl here. I'll catch up with ya tomorrow if they don't have you all sorted out by then but I'm sure they will.

Fro5ty · Oct 21, 2021

Aqua Man said:
Small learning curve. Tons of great ppl here. I'll catch up with ya tomorrow if they don't have you all sorted out by then but I'm sure they will.

I’ve started with pumping the solution out. Should I start from scratch, or should I keep 40% and then just add RO water and Hydroguard for the new water? Just making sure my EC and pH is fine?

Aqua Man · Oct 21, 2021

Fro5ty said:
I’ve started with pumping the solution out. Should I start from scratch, or should I keep 40% and then just add RO water and Hydroguard for the new water? Just making sure my EC and pH is fine?

Yeah 40% then top up should be right.

After PH adjusting add the hydrogaurd.

I still think your going going to find PH drift quite a bit. Because of the low alkalinity.

RO water has no buffering capacity and I don't think your nutes will add enough.

If your just starting out in hydro this is definitely worth a read.

Ph is often misunderstood so best to just clear it up before its an issue. Happen to have PH up if needed?

Marijuana pH Levels for Growing Weed: A Basic Explanation

In this article, we discuss proper pH levels for your weed plants; alkalinity, soil pH, tap water, and the effects of nutrients on pH when growing marijuana

www.thcfarmer.com

Fro5ty · Oct 21, 2021

Aqua Man said:
Yeah 40% then top up should be right.

After PH adjusting add the hydrogaurd.

I still think your going going to find PH drift quite a bit. Because of the low alkalinity.

RO water has no buffering capacity and I don't think your nutes will add enough.

If your just starting out in hydro this is definitely worth a read.

Ph is often misunderstood so best to just clear it up before its an issue. Happen to have PH up if needed?

Marijuana pH Levels for Growing Weed: A Basic Explanation

In this article, we discuss proper pH levels for your weed plants; alkalinity, soil pH, tap water, and the effects of nutrients on pH when growing marijuana

www.thcfarmer.com

I have 1L ph up, and 1L of pH down. I think I will need extra to complete my first grow. But we will see. I had 260L of the solution ready . Now I pumped out and have left 107 liter that I’m now adding RO water too, to again get to 260L.

edit: I started to read your link about pH. It’s very interesting. Should I add a buffer to my RO water, or just add a part tap water? I didn’t measure the pH yet. But my tap has 0,6 EC. I also don’t want to use silica or anything in powder form, I’m afraid it will damage my chiller…
I’m really going to bed now. The store trip will be for tomorrow. I really want to plant them in the system asap. I don’t have the stuff too give them 80% humidity. And I just filled my only 2 sprayer with some nasty pesticides.

stltoed · Oct 21, 2021

Aqua Man said:
Wait do not put in that... EC of 0.6-0.8 is plenty. Hell I don't even feed 1.7 to fully mature plants in RDWC.

Ph to 5.5 and let drift to 6.0 before readjusting.

I have a pretty good feeling your PH is going to rise a fair bit over the next 24hrs.

I'll pop back in tomorrow to see how things are going.

Plenty of knowledge DWC grows here I'm sure will help ya get things in order.

I knew I'd find you here AM! Interesting rig Fro5ty.

Smokey0418 · Oct 21, 2021

Doesn’t matter what the water looks like, it’s a matter of how strong the mix is.

Your plants look established and if it was my house I would start somewhere around 3-400 ppm or .6-.7 ec ph at 5.9 and then measure what the mix does over 12 hours .
if the ppm falls eg. 50 , I would in turn go up 50 plus 50 until I find a spot were it’s stabilizes and only drops 5 each day.

Vegged my girls to 400 prior to transition .
Entered flower and have slowly rasied over 4 days to low 600’s with it lowering ever so slightly each day. 5-10 ppm.

Good luck with the grow.

Fro5ty · Oct 21, 2021

Smokey0418 said:
Doesn’t matter what the water looks like, it’s a matter of how strong the mix is.

Your plants look established and if it was my house I would start somewhere around 3-400 ppm or .6-.7 ec ph at 5.9 and then measure what the mix does over 12 hours .
if the ppm falls eg. 50 , I would in turn go up 50 plus 50 until I find a spot were it’s stabilizes and only drops 5 each day.

Vegged my girls to 400 prior to transition .
Entered flower and have slowly rasied over 4 days to low 600’s with it lowering ever so slightly each day. 5-10 ppm.

Good luck with the grow.

How do tou increase the ppm/ec slowly? The only way that I could raise the EC in my setup is to pump the solution in to my water tank, add nutes and then let it fall back into the RDWC system. Should that really be a daily task?

i’m at work now. I letted the tank fill while I was asleep and it’s now 200L with 0.6EC. pH is a little high but not fixable. I still need to add 60L to lax my tank and then let my system fill up and see if it’s enough solution.

Smokey0418 · Oct 21, 2021

I have found with my nutes that mixing 100% bottle level per gallon raises my nutes 25 ppm( 35 gallons)

so 100 would be 4 times as much.

I would mix this super concentrate into 1 or two gallons of ro water. Ph it proper then add it slowly.
I use one of those battery pumps for gas and such.
Over a few minutes.

then wait 10-15 minutes for it to stabilize.

Aqua Man · Oct 21, 2021

That's good. And you can mix tap with RO at 50/50 that's should give you a good alkalinity for PH buffering and not be any issues with nutrient ratios.

To adjust the ppm you can read here. There are a few ways but this is how I do add backs to a system.

DWC, RDWC and RECIRCULATING SYSYEM TOP UP EXPLAINED.

Ok I'm going to explain a more complex way of maintaining our systems for those looking to use best practices (IMO only) There are many ways this can be done but I feel this gives the most stability for PH, PPM, NUTRIENT RATIOS (super important) especially is systems with a low water volume. So...

www.thcfarmer.com

stltoed · Oct 21, 2021

Aqua Man said:
That's good. And you can mix tap with RO at 50/50 that's should give you a good alkalinity for PH buffering and not be any issues with nutrient ratios.

To adjust the ppm you can read here. There are a few ways but this is how I do add backs to a system.

DWC, RDWC and RECIRCULATING SYSYEM TOP UP EXPLAINED.

Ok I'm going to explain a more complex way of maintaining our systems for those looking to use best practices (IMO only) There are many ways this can be done but I feel this gives the most stability for PH, PPM, NUTRIENT RATIOS (super important) especially is systems with a low water volume. So...

www.thcfarmer.com

There's no way I could mix half tap water RO water with Power Si. My tap water is 275ppm naturally

Aqua Man · Oct 21, 2021

stltoed said:
There's no way I could mix half tap water RO water with Power Si. My tap water is 275ppm naturally

100-200 ppm is a good place to start.

So yours at 50/50 would be about 135-140ppm. Why can't you add silica to that?

Smokey0418 · Oct 21, 2021

Aqua Man said:
That's good. And you can mix tap with RO at 50/50 that's should give you a good alkalinity for PH buffering and not be any issues with nutrient ratios.

To adjust the ppm you can read here. There are a few ways but this is how I do add backs to a system.

DWC, RDWC and RECIRCULATING SYSYEM TOP UP EXPLAINED.

Ok I'm going to explain a more complex way of maintaining our systems for those looking to use best practices (IMO only) There are many ways this can be done but I feel this gives the most stability for PH, PPM, NUTRIENT RATIOS (super important) especially is systems with a low water volume. So...

www.thcfarmer.com

That’s a good idea and if i didn’t like my well water some bottle mineral would do the same considering it’s 220 parts.

Fro5ty · Oct 21, 2021

I wil add the 60L to my tank with tap water. Fill my system with another 60L of tap water (I need something over 300L in my system anyway) and then fill my sytem up. Add nutes and balance the pH with diluted nutes in the system itself. And I will let it rest for a couple of houres

Fro5ty · Oct 21, 2021

Aqua Man said:
That's good. And you can mix tap with RO at 50/50 that's should give you a good alkalinity for PH buffering and not be any issues with nutrient ratios.

To adjust the ppm you can read here. There are a few ways but this is how I do add backs to a system.

DWC, RDWC and RECIRCULATING SYSYEM TOP UP EXPLAINED.

Ok I'm going to explain a more complex way of maintaining our systems for those looking to use best practices (IMO only) There are many ways this can be done but I feel this gives the most stability for PH, PPM, NUTRIENT RATIOS (super important) especially is systems with a low water volume. So...

www.thcfarmer.com

I can fill the rest of my solution with tap water. But I think the water is to hard to add nutes to that “part” of the water. So I will have RO water with nutes at 0,7, and then add tap that’s also 0,7 but don’t have any nutritions in it. Is that right?

Smokey0418 · Oct 21, 2021

Litres make it sound huge, I would be pushing 630.

Smokey0418 · Oct 21, 2021

Personally I feel there were a few differnt conversations.

The one with the ro and the Tap water.

I believe the intent there was to give a small baseline of minerals in the water either from the tap , well, bottled mineral so that Silica could be added and ph’d down since ro has nothing it it to ph down .

if you added with nothing it gets watered down .

Personally I would mixed your nutes just as the bottle says. But only go up to say 400ppm and then plant and see how the mix reacts

Smokey0418 · Oct 21, 2021

So as an example , mix up 4 litres a bit more than a gallon mix nute at strength see what it gives for ppm or ec

eg it’s 1.2

We are looking for .4 , that’s 25 percent of what you have
So take 1:4 or what you have and mix nute for that less the one you already did.

hope that’s not confusing

First time grower. Immediately went with RDWC

First time grower. Immediately went with RDWC

Fro5ty

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