The following is the last post from this thread:
http://boards.cannabis.com/grow-log/...-darkside.html
This log is a continuation of that learning experience... so here we go!
What has Stinky learned from her crash course?
-Minimize plumbing= excessive on the small scale
The idea of the manifold-style plumbing might be important to equalize pressure in a larger-scale system, but in a little one like this, it was WAY overkill and ended up tangling, there were more spots to leak, and yes, the operator could easily shift it by mistake and end up with a spill.
I have resolved this by building a more streamlined emitter out of flexi.
The easy way to make flexi uncurl when it has been sold in rolled-up bundles is to put a few cups of water in the bottom of a wok set on low heat with a wire rack across it, and steam it until it softens. Take a bulldog clip and hang it by one end from the ceiling. I know you guys all have ceiling hooks, lol!!!
The new emitter is a single piece of 1/2" flexi with a half-dozen small holes cut in it with an X-Acto, and 1/4" T- fittings punched into it, and folded over at one end to seal. The thing took me 10 minutes to make... so much for plumbing being too hard for a n00b...
The individual courses to the plants are 1/4" flexi where one side is longer than the other so I can secure the main line OVER one trough and even if the connections suck and it drips, it's dripping into the plants, not on the floor.
-Pre-treat your hydroton before adding live plants to the system if you care about them remaining live plants. Running the system empty for a week allows time to troubleshoot plumbing, inpsect for clogs, and monitor the res pH until it stabilizes.
-Cornucopia is not as forgiving as a n00b without an EC meter needs and I am now going to stick with Canna Aqua (yay, it's buffered!) since as someone above pointed out I'm completely full of shit and don't know a thing about hydro. I'll return to it at a later date when I have proper meters... lol
-More frequent res changes might be in order, and a more stable temperature is an absolute necessity!
On the PLUS side...
-The aeration from the action of the waterfall was fabulous
-The bud development was actually superior to my soil-grown plants coming out of the same room during that same time period
-It was as compact as hoped for
-It was dirt-ass cheap to build
-That $15 'ECO' pump is a champ; the res ran dry innumerable times and it is still working magnificently
-It fits beautifully under $16 worth of Home DePOT shop lights for those of you who would be vegging in it for a little while
-I saw no evidence that any plants were rootbound to the point of unhappiness at harvest time even though the roots were DEFINITELY a big clump of rootiness
-Despite gross operator negligence, the freakin' thing WORKED
Pics coming in a couple hours...
(especially like the yield comment...
)
