New ebb n flow

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Parcero

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Good days.

Going to make new ebb&flow set and cold use some thoughts from other growers who perhaps have done this kind of thing before.

Only four totes, big 100l each (approx 26gallon).

Normal Ebb&Flow parts from hydro shop should do?

I ve decidet to use plastic hose, theres plenty around.

My pump is 7500l/h, that should do if I can fit in the rez.

Any good tips for preventing this kind of system from clogging?

What would be most convenient medium for this? My thought were on Leca at the bottom and hydroton or rocks on top. Leca floats so something heavy to stop this on top.

Thanks for joining.

Parcero
 
I could be wrong on this but I think Hydroton is LECA. Hydroton is a brand name. As far as medium goes, a lot of hydro users like the LECA as it is convenient and easy to use. I personally like to use coco coir over hydroton. I usually use 1gal nursery pot that have many holes drilled in the bottom and sides to approximate the net basket design. Having the hydroton about 1-2" deep holds the coco coir in place in the pots so that it doesn't wash out the holes. The coco is great for catching and holding the nutrients for the plants roots to take in and is very managable to work with, and it gives good protection to the roots against disease. However for ebb n flow yu may find the large rockwool cubes work better. Some people who use that will actually use the cubes over RW slabs to allow the roots to grow down n spread to give better stability as the plants get bigger. Hope this helps..Green mojo
 
Thanks Hushpuppy

LECA might make hydroton aswell, I dont know but this one what I got floats and is not suitable by it self for hydro like that.
That coco is good idea and I've been thinking that aswell. Something like that yeah, more light than just rocks.
I have no idea if rockwool only would do in those big totes? It would hold a massive amount of water when wet and if only 100l / 26galoons of rockwool would it not?
 
Also thinking that maybe I could put few bricks at the bottom, say 3, around the feed line?
For some reason Iḿ worried a bit about burying the feed line under 100liters of heavy growmedium. Bricks around and coco coir inside to take the weight off abit,huh?

I appreciate all kind of input and ideas.

Thanks MP
 
Whew, a lot of stuff there!
Clay pellets would be my preferred option but they can and do float in a flood & drain. Rinsing them thoroughly before use to get rid of the dust does help to stop them floating.
You pump is HUGE. You may have a problem with the res running dry before it drains back. Since I am not sure how large the flood table is and the bore of your tubing I would suggest doing your calculations correctly and setting your timers accordingly to acomodate that pump.
Flood & drain is something I tried a while back but could not get the ballance quite right and I didnt like the lack of flexibility. What I did find was I got fed up testing, then tweaking, then testing, then tweaking until I got it right, once I did, the results were hardly worth the effort so I switched to rdwc.
When you ask about preventing clogging, do you mean with the clay pellets? I used tubing with holes drilled in it.
I am not sure how you intend to set up your system but more details are needed. You specify 4x 100l totes, do you intend these to be your flood tables or res's? Is your return gravity fed or powered? How many plants do you have in mind? What is the surface area of the totes?
W
 
Thanks WoodyPheonix, good info and feed back.

I chose a big pump for this so I can get them 100l totes full quickly and calculated that this kind of pump should do it just fine. I can attach hose valves to it, or to every single one of them if needed but I think it will be quite ok.
Big overflow return line should keep the reservoir more or less full but very true, thats been one of my big conserns aswell. I do not know how big that res is excatly, I need to measure it but my guess is 700l.

For that clogging thing, I've made few small ebb and flow before without proper fittings for the buckets and had some problems them getting somehow clogged with the medium. But I suppose that getting proper ones from the hydro system should prevent me from this this time.

Them 4 x 100l totes are the totes for the plants. One plant each. My grow area is as big as I need it to be, I can move a wall when/if needed, sorry dont know how big it is now. I'm height restricted thou to about 2 meters. Return is gravity fed.
 
Make sure you do a good few test rund before comissioning the set up. If you get a digital timer, you can have it flooding for say 8 mins instead of the usual 15 mins which should help with the res running dry.

For the clogging, make sure you have a couple of returns, one at the high solution mark which is usual. Your second, which is normally the inlet point for the pump. If you make this slightly higher than the lowest point, it will stop sedement and gunk clogging the drain. It will leave a little solution in there which isnt a good thing but it will stop crap going back into the pump.

Hope that sounds right, difficult to describe without pics.
W
 
The way yu are describing this sounds more like a UC (an undercurrent RDWC). If yu want to see a really good setup on that which may give yu some ideas for yer setup, goto Docfishwrinkle's "maiden voyage UC" in the grow journal threads. He has a really solid setup.
 
hey Parcero.

wuzzup friend? I followed your NL grow and was very pumped to see the results. Hope all grows well w/ u on this grow.

Peace,

7greeneyes :)
 
Thanks WoodyPheonix, I will test run it for sure, learning from my earlier mistakes I guess. Feed lines in will be at the bottom of them buckets so they should drain nicely, well at least I hope so. I used to run 1h on and 2h off 24/7 before in a smaller system and that worked super so I might stick to that.

Cheers Hushpuppy. No this it not an UC. Normal ebb&flow but with big growing containers.

Hello 7greeneyes, thanks for visiting aswell. All good over here. Really excited about this forthcoming grow. Once again Im going to try something what I havent done before, let us see if Im hiting my head to the wall again or perhaps this will be a smooth run.
Results on that NL grow were good in my opinion for a first timer and actually I might be able to put out some harvesting pics now, couple of years later. That smoke was very good, heavy and I managed to smoke some of it couple of months ago which had beed in jars, curing for 17months. Nice.
 
So changes...

Smaller buckets, only 70liters but they should do.

Lot of work to do in the room still.

Have a nice day.
 
Not looking too good actually.
Plenty to do still and I'm loosing my motivation a bit for there seems always to something more to deal with...

The actual ebb system is more or less ready and looking good. Now I'm strugling with water.

Be well
 
If you are struggling with motivation, nothing helps motivate a grower than seeing some green.
I know your room is not quite set up yet but if you are to be working from seed, maybe if you got some seeds popped it would help. If using rockwool, this would give you 2 weeks at least before they needed to go into the flood & drain so it gives you a deadline to work to and seedlings dont need a lot of lighting.
Just some thoughts to keep you going. I am sure we have all been there at some point and a short term target may be what you need.
Peace dude. W
 
WoodyPheonix said:
If you are struggling with motivation, nothing helps motivate a grower than seeing some green.
I know your room is not quite set up yet but if you are to be working from seed, maybe if you got some seeds popped it would help. If using rockwool, this would give you 2 weeks at least before they needed to go into the flood & drain so it gives you a deadline to work to and seedlings dont need a lot of lighting.
Just some thoughts to keep you going. I am sure we have all been there at some point and a short term target may be what you need.
Peace dude. W

Thanks WoodyPhoenix, nicely motivated. I do feel better and I have reconsidered my options.

I dont why Im taking this so hard, I guess I just wanted to try this ebb properly and see them grow fast.

There might be one more chance for me to get some suitable water for this hydro so I will check it out and then move on if its not good quality.

I might just run 2 of them 70l buckets, maybe I can collect that much rainwater for them.

And then why not soil, I did ok on it so why not do that again and I will.
I got 3 California Orange Buds, germinated about a week ago, non sexed in soil.
1 Fem Northern Lights from Nirvana in soil. This was supposed to be the mother for them ebb totes and stuff and I took some cuttings from it already but will flower it straight away when its a bit bigger and recovered. And them clones aswell.
And one Ed Rosenthal Superbud clone which I will also flower as soon as its bigger.

I have one quite big plant now, 3 weeks on flower and its looking very good.
My friend ordered some autoseeds and did terrible job with them. I came to have a look, too late to save the others but there was this one plant which did not flower at all. Dont know if it just misses the auto gene or is it altogether a totally different seed that got mixed in. But anyways I took over, repotted it and gave some food, proper lights and air, vegged it for awhile more and placed it 12/12 and its blooming full power. The strains were blueberry and green-o-matic from greenhouse.
 

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