Don't kill your plants but if you're starting off with hydro you will at least once. It's not quite as easy as it seems until you do it a few times and then it's simple.

If this is your first time doing hydro I'd put me a couple plants in some soil as well just for back up, I have buddies who have literally cried because they were new to dro and fucked up their whole crop because they forgot something simple or tried doing too much, and a couple of them have spent over $3000 for their grow equipment and now don't even use it!
Hydro has a different set of rules than soil, soil is a little more forgiving of mistakes. Good luck with your grow.

Definetly use coco. Its the best way to go. Nutrients also are key. Good luck

ok for first time grower you want to keep it SIMPLE i would advise using COCO and get some good nutrients something like canna or dutchmaster will be fine you should also get some sort of root conditioner like rhizotonic and a potash to start using when u start flowering. dont use too many lights depending on the size of your room but say one 600 watt to every 1.5x1.5 metres ventilation is VERY IMPORTANT one exhaust running 24 hours one inlet running 24 hours and one oscillating fan set in a fixed postion keep it low bout pot height and angle it towards a wall so the air hits that wall and agles off to the next wall and so on keep your lights between 18 and 36 inche above plants i prefer to keep them between 30 to 36 inches, room temp should round 25-28 degrees celsius when lights are on and 18-23 when the lights are off and humidity should be between 50-70% for veg and 40-60% for flower this is important cause if it gets higher during flower you could end up with bud mould so try to keep it at the lower end and it doesnt really matter if it gets below 40% when its flowering. Watering- at the start water every 4 hours for one min then as they get bigger alternate between 2 min and one min so first feed 2 min second feed one min and so on, PH must be looked at daily and adjusted if need be keeping it between 5.5 and 6.5 you might also want to buy a nutrient metre reader as they tell you exactly what range your nutes are at and remember it doesnt hurt if its a little low, also its a good idea to flush the medium at least fortnightly, i do it weekly, cause nutes are salts and they build up making it harder to feed the plants properly, you can get a flushing solution at the shop. So there the basics for you i would also advise for keeping your eyes open for bugs the 2 most common are fungus gnats which look like little mozzies flying round the base of your plants and spider mites which you really need a magnfying glass to see them they live on the undersides of the leaves and you can tell if you have them cause you will see little dots appear on the leaves, thats the mites sucking the nutes out of the leaves for both bugs go to your shop and they will have something to clear them up. Finally i would advise to go and get a HYDROPONCS FOR BEGINNERS BOOK and read it you will find it very helpful

potgutz,, super informative post there,,, i think u covered all bases for AMPED.... fyi,,, i started with hydro first,,,, and it is a lil diferent,BUT you can successfully gro some bud your first time around,,,i did...



the biggest thing i learned was/is moderation.... in everything...i think most peeps start off overfeeding their plants...i use canna products,,super easy to use
I use them at half strength and get great results....

biggest things are pH....if pH is off it can cause a nutrient lock out and if u dont realize that is the problem, then you may try some other solution to fix issue,,, and if you dont know what is wrong, well, then, you will complicate and worsen it if you say treat plants for nute lock out , but its a nute defiency instead,,,then you have original problem, PLUS fixing the solution to this original problem....

so, i hope that wasnt too confusing there...


mistakes i made... i measured tablespoons instead of teaspoons... i thought plants liked HOT water,,, they DON'T,,,, res should be around 65F,,,,
ventilation is very important.... you can use ONE fan to both exhuast and get fresh air into your groroom tho,,, you create nagative pressure by exhuasting your room,,, and this neg press while suck air in from your fresh air inlet ( you need about double the area of your exhuast opening) ,, i have a6 inch fan to exhuast and i cut 3 holes for inlet that were 6 inch diamter....

light leaks can make your plants hermie on you,,, once your room is set up,,, go inside and shut the door, and with lights out check carefully for any light leaks,,, LED little power on lights wont mess with it IMHO,,,

make sure to change your resivior every 10-14 days

make sure to add nutes first,,,, dilute them into a gal jug with a lil water instead of directly adding to res,,, make a habit of doing it that way cuz if you mix all your A & B nutes together first, they can react with each other and cause problems,,, pH your resivior last to 5.8....

oscilating fan is also needed to help strenghten plt stems from wind blowing on them,, also helps prevent mold and also creates a lil bit of hostile enviroment so spider mites n fungus gnats will want to find a nicer home ( hopefully you'll never meet mr spider mite & miss fungus gnat cuz they are a couple real pain in the assses!!
that means keep your room CLEAN....your room is not a show n tell,,, anyone that goes in there can steal or snitch , plus they can caryy in bugs on them,, no PETS either,, they bring bugs too...

dont try to get too fancy,,, keep it simple.... you dont need ten diferent kinds of flower boosters n crap like that IMO


and the only way you will learn this is by hands on practice,,,and it is like other said here,,, it takes a few gros to get comfortable with it...you are the sole creator of your room, you are light, temps, food, and all else too...after you are useed to mantaining the room, you will be able to stay ahead of the little problems, seeing and making lil adjustments as needed.. and a little goes along way with hydro... that is both good n bad cause a little mistake can set you back alot

for example with me in the past...
i just flipped to 12/12 to flower plants and i added a flower boooster , BUT i added tablesppons instead of teaspoons,,, so i used 3 times the dosage and burnt my plants,,, and here is the tricky part,,, if you dont know where yo made the mistake to could easily make another mistake on top of that , in my case, i added more flower booster and fried them even more,,,, so you can see the chain link effect here... go easy , give them love,,, you will enjoy seeing fat greasy buds develop inside your room, they r beautiful plants for sure,, and just wait till you smoke it!


hth

If the grow isn't going to be height limited then the DWC bucket system is the easiest to set-up, will last the longest and will give the most satisfaction. I designed mine from scratch myself after having never built anything really.

Take your time. The grow room is at least as important as the equipment. Seal every joint in every wall, the ceiling, the floors, around the drains, around any protuberance that comes out of the wall, and any window. I boxed in the room inside the room and then painted it with three (3) coats of KILZ and a final coat of white elastometric roof paint. This was expensive, but no funk can grow on the walls, ceiling or floor. No bug can enter my garden without me knowing it. Controlling your environment is as important as the grow equipment itself.

You can do a DWC system fairly cheaply. I did a 4-station system with a kool tube and a 400 watt CMH lamp that grows out about a pound at a crack and leaves ya' with an elbo. I have an active reservoir system and never have trouble with temperature control, mold or any shit in the water. I have my own RO filter and a complete air extraction system for the benefit of the lamp and for the stink in the air. It is all completely silent and sustainable.

All of this is to say that planning, planning and more planning, will lead you away from failure after failure after failure.

Grow some bag seed the first time so that you don't kill expensive genetics. Buy the lowest cost shit you can or get some extra cheap clones at the store.