DWC or RDWC questions......bring em here!?!?!!!

Bassackwards, well whada ya know! Thanks CC.

 

I do what CC described. I dump my solution Friday night and refill with plain ph adjusted water. I let that run overnight then add my nutrients Sat morning, then let that sit till Sunday afternoon and ph at that time. When I start this, the ph of my plain water in the top-off ressy (50 gallons) is 9+. I drop that down to about 6.0 with approx 45-55 ml of ph Down. I add a little h2O2 to the water, let it mix up really well (I have a small pump in the res for this) and then fill up my buckets. I let that sit overnight. When I have checked the ph during this time, it is usually between 5.0 - 7.0, and it might drift some, but the next morning after about 12 hours with plain water, I add the nutes (useless formula full strength). I don't have a ppm checker, but I know I run a little cool since I mix for 20 gallons, but run about 25 gallons in the system. If I check for ph on saturday after adding nutes, I get readings all over the map. I just let it go a full 24 hours with nutes in the solution, let the buffers do their thing then adjust ph on sunday.


Most times when I do this and then check the solution throughout the week, it's dead on at 5.8 for the whole week. Then I change it out again each weekend. I have noticed that if I do not have the top-off float valve open, my PH drops throughout the week, presumably because the nutrient solution gets more concentrated as the solution level drops.


In general, I do not stress out about ph too much. I have not yet had it get so out of whack on me that the plants showed any sign of it. Once it dropped to 4.0 or so (when I had no auto-fill keepin' her at level) and I freaked out and added to much ph up, then had to ph back down. Now I don't even check it daily anymore, but when I do check during the week it's been right on.


The tiller is very sensitive. My advice is don't oversteer. Minor adjustments should be given a little time to take affect. :thumbs-up:

 

Isn't that the truth. I am in the process now of doing it the way he described too. I have a 20 gallon res that I ph'ed to 5.8 (plain water) this morning. It really pays to rtfm!

 

So I set my water at 5.8 this morning, no nutes, and turned on the air stones. I just checked the ph and it is already at 7.0. Don't think that was supposed to happen. I'm going to check the ph again in the morning and then add the nutes without adjusting the ph and see what happens after it bubbles away for several more hours.

 

I checked my ph again this morning in the res, it has dropped overnight to 6.8. I filled two five gallon buckets with that water and added the week one useless formula to each bucket. I checked the ph of the bucket after adding the nutes and it is at 6.4. That is strange. I am going to let the nutes sit today and then check the ph again tonight, also, there are no air stones in the five gallon buckets.

 

"Take your bucket of clean fresh water......take your netpot bucket lid and place on top of bucket.......you want your water level JUUUUUST BELOW the BOTTOM of the NETPOT......say a half inch or so"


Is this where you want the water level throughout the grow or do you lower the water level as the roots grow out?

 

Midnight, I usually run my water level 1/2 inch above the bottom of the net pot, flush with the bottom of the rock wool cube so it stays moist. When growing from seed that is... Then after a week or so once the roots start showing I bring it down gradually so the roots are always touching the water and eventually work down to about 1-1/2 - 2 inches below the bottom so you have a 2 inch air pocket..... Make no mistake when they get big they will suck up a lot more water and you' ll be toppin them off with fresh water every 2-3 days... So for periods of time it could become a 3-4 inch air pocket sometime I have a 5 or so gap ... But when I top off I bring it up to that 2 inch gap mark .....


Hope that answers your question!


-S420

 

Here's what I typically do.. I will fill with plain water (R/O) unless your tap water is good water ... In my case it is and works quite well..... I will fill my ressy and add my nutes according to the useless formula... Remember micro first.... Then let sit for 18 hours. Then I balance my ph if needed ... Then check again in 6 hrs to make sure it hasnt drifted...Usually if the mix is correct to useless formula it will end up around 5.9 - 6.0 .... Which I leave because by day 3-4 into the week the ph tends to drift down a little because the plant is sucking water up faster than the nutes and causes the ph to flux... That's why you only top off the ressy when there low with plain water and when you do and bring it up to the original level the ph will most likely be back in the ball park your looking for...


I hardly have to use ph up or ph down which is part of the beauty in useless formula ....


Sometimes the last day or 2 of the week I might need to adjust the ph back up occasionally... Depending on strain some are more finicky than others. My blue berry shows my signs instantly if my ph is off ... She hates unbalanced ph lol...asssit:

 

So if I understand what you are saying... You always leave a couple of inches of gap between the bottom of the netpot and the top of the water. And, the water level stays like this for the entire grow. Thanks!

 

I have tried eight different ways to sunday now to get my ph to do what I want. It will not cooperate. I have to ph the plain water first to 5.8. It rises to 6.5. I ph to 5.8 again, add nutes and let it sit for a day, ph goes back to 6.5, good for soil but not hydro. Bottom line, I have to continually ph my water/nutes. One thing i did notice about the dwc, after putting ph down in the bucket every morning, on about the 3rd or 4th day the ph will finally stabilize and quit swinging.

 

Whats the temps with lights ON? Sounds like theyre drowning cuz theyre not eating...


How did they live till u put them in their new homes?


Size pump? Size system? how many airstones?

 

U want to try and keep it at about that same level

 

Dont trip out bout your PH soooooo bad.......i think your just going to need to wait a few hours or even a day longer to get your ideal spot....


Where does your water come from?? U might need to use the hardwater micro instead of the normal micro, its designed for naturally higher PH "city/public" water

 

I do use the hard water micro. My water comes out of the tap at about 205/225 ppm. I am tripping on my ph because of all the problems I have seen with respect to hydro, the majority of them seem to be ph related. I just want to make sure mine is correct.


I've tried putting the ph down in first, putting it in last, air stones, no air stones, water sitting for days on end and still no joy (water sat for three days with nutes in it and got slimy, the roses ate well that day). I have settled on the fact that the shit is going to continuously swing and I just have to stay on top of it.

 

No bullshit man, ph is very important but its not going to destroy your grow in hydro......its a relative number with a sweet spot(5.2-6.3) in which the plant eats at its best......swings in the PH also means your plants are uptaking alot or alittle...


It still sounds like your doing 1 single thing a bit wrong but i cant figure it out....hmm

 

Hmmm, you have to introduce new plants with a good root base very carefully, turn off 1 light....raise the other to the ceiling and run a light solution of week 1 till they come back.......your basically flooded them with water instead of slowly getting them into the lake feet first then up to balls deep (know what i mean Gene?)

 

Well I did notice something odd this morning. I use this tub to hold my water..





This water gets ph'd to 5.8 and has two air stones in it, no nutes go in his tub, water is taken out and put into 5 gallon buckets to mix the nutes. Without fail, the water in this tub will be back at 6.5 within 24 hours.


Yesterday I emptied out the dwc and put this 6.5 water in the dwc, about 4 gallons in each bucket. I ph'd the dwc water (no nutes, plain water) to 5.8. This morning I checked the ph of the dwc water and it only went to 6.0. This is the smallest swing I have seen.


I added the week one useless veg at 525ppm to the plain water in the dwc. When I checked the ph it was now, as in right now, at 6.5. I ph'd it back down to 5.8. The other odd thing that I noticed is that the dwc buckets, when they have the week one in them, I ph them to 5.8, each morning I check and they are at 6.5, I ph them back to 5.8, but, after three days the ph stops drifting and stays at 5.8.


And the other thing, I too experienced what ofo was saying about droopy plants, but only this morning after they sat in plain water over night. How the hell does a hydro plant NOT drown, nutes or not, since it lives in water all its life?

 

Damn, I think i figured out a solution...


First I said "I've tried putting the ph down in first, putting it in last, air stones, no air stones, water sitting for days on end and still no joy (water sat for three days with nutes in it and got slimy, the roses ate well that day).


Then I said..."The other odd thing that I noticed is that the dwc buckets, when they have the week one in them, I ph them to 5.8, each morning I check and they are at 6.5, I ph them back to 5.8, but, after three days the ph stops drifting and stays at 5.8."


The only difference here is that the slime water had no airstones in it, the dwc bucket does. So maybe if I put my nutes in the 5 gallon with the ph set at 5.8 and bubble it for 3 days. I am going to set this up when the lights come back on and see what happens.

 

You should always have an airstone of some sort going in your buckets. The more DO, the better.


The plants won't drown because of the air from your stones and all the DO.


I know I don't excatly do it right, but I never have a problem with my plants taking up nutes. I fill my buckets, then ph and put the plants in the buckets. The following day I add my nutes. I never check my ph after this. I also don't add into the bucket during the week unless absolutely necassary. I've had 2 inches of water left sometimes. (shit, I've almost run out before without it causeing a problem). Sometimes, I think, over thinking and over testing screws with you and you start to complicate things. All I know is, my way works for me. My plants stay healthy and have great growth rates. I do the same for my veg plants too and they always remain healthy.

 

I do have air stones going in the dwc buckest, I just never put them in the nute bucket. I agree about keeping it simple. I am trying to dial this all in though because I have something planned and if I fuck up it will be rather costly, hence, my little dwc and hempy "test run". The first thing that comes to mind is all of the messing around with nutes, ph and water, I see why someone that runs dwc would want to do rdwc. It seems much simpler in the grand scheme of things. But having not tried it I have a felling that it has it's issues too. It would just be so simple though to just set the damn nutes and forget about it.