DWC questions

Strange. If I remember correctly you have hard water with a high starting PPM. Apparently its the plants using up what nutes are in the water causing it to go up.


Ive got GREAT water here with a starting PPM of >25 so I dont deal with the same issue. Interesting.

Thats exactly whats supposed to happen after the buffers in the GH nutes work. :thumbs-up:


You guys will get a system figured out perfectly after a while. Its trial and error. Ive been growing for a spell and have recently been dealing with pH issues myself due to a faulty/uncalibrated pH meter. New one will be here in two days, cant wait! Make sure and check your meter against a calibration solution every so often! My original hanna is probably fine but out of calibration....and I didnt have any solution so I ordered a new hanna that came with it to solve all my nightmares. pH is everything. Until you get it figured out you will do alot of head pounding :BangHead:.

 

My head still hurts.

 

WHat I have one of my control buckets is a valve that I can turn to drain the whole system. 20min later I take the shop vac and clean the rest. If slime is present than I clean with a rag and straight water than vac that shit up. :thumbs-up:


On temps; I would get a chiller....larger than needed so it is not on all day. I tried the ice thing and it sucks BUT does the thing if you had no job and did the change out all day. Fuck that!


My PH fluctuates also.....I just wait a half a day than play with it. You'll get dialed in and that my brother is the key.....dialed in.

 

I use 1/2 hp one for the 18 bucket system cause the system is elevated and gets hotter. I run a 900gph on her.


Got to keep temps down consistent.

 

i think im on the road to chillerville myself.....why not if it helps right

 

I have mine set for 69F so the actual water temp in the buckets are around 72. It pops on every 7 mins for about 2 mins. That is a 1/2hp. If I would of bought a smaller one it would of taken a lot longer to cool 75 gals so it would of been on 3-4 times longer which means more energy and more of a light bill.


I do not run a chiller on the other 2, the concrete does the job pretty well.


I think with a 25 gal system you'd be able to get away with a 1/4 hp but that is IMO.

 

Id go with a 1/2 hp cuz we ALL know, its only gets BIGGER when you find the speed and success that hydro gives and at the cost of the chillers, ya dont want to have a weak one takin up space

 

Take a sample in a solo cup and test it that way. Same for testing pH. The air bubbles/movement of water will affect the reading.

 

my ph seems to rise for the first 2 days in my dwc and my new rdwc it did also, I am going to go with useless's sudgestion of going to 5.5 with the water when I add it to the res. because my ph is apx. 8.2 if I dont

 

I will post it on my LOG in a bit but I did the res. change 2 days ago. I wasnt sure exactly what to expect so I added 50 ML of PH down and my water was at 6.4 so I decided to see what happened with that number. I Added the nutes yesterday when the ph was still 6.4 and it raised it back to 7.4 so if you go the rout of adgusting water first then do what useless said and go all the way to 5.5, that is what I will do on my next change next weekend.

 

Hhmm doesn't seem right if you ph down to 5.5 then add 1000+ppm solution. Are you sure this was exactly what he said? What is your exact water amount in your system ? Don't add 3 5 gal buckets and a 20 gal res and tell me 35 gal either. I don't use a ppm meter too much it's kinda pointless if you are following a recipe. Regardless don't stress I have hit 2200ppm before lol just a smidge of tip burn. I like to run a hot solution compared to a conservative one make the plant want for nothing. The point is to make up the difference in Ph with the down. If you can hit 6.4 with no down in say a 30 gal res. you should only need to add 10ml down at most to get down to 5.8 . For best results wait 24hrs before checking after any change in state. Checking in an hour or two is not accurate at ALL. The nutes in the far reaches of the system have not circulated with, nor chemically reacted with the down yet.


Example:


Drain and Fill it on Sunday at 8pm


Add nutes Monday at 8pm


Check ph and add down accordingly on Tuesday at 8 pm


Check Ph Wednesday at 8pm


Don't add more down unless you are way high like 6.3 or higher. Note your results and tune in your ph down amount and if you are adding more than 10ml . Raise the gallon variable to get the solution hot enough not to fluctuate on you all week. If you are adding ass loads of down to control your ph you aren't addressing the problem. You are putting a bandaid on it.


If you are lower than 5.2 add an 1/8 of the amount of your system of fresh un ph'd water.


Example IF we are at week 4 it's 3-8-16 and we have exactly 26gal circulating. Calculated by filling up your system one time with 1 5gal bucket full at a time till you hit the bottom of the netpots.


If it were me I would round up to 28 gal to start so 84ml of Grow, 224ml of Micro and 448ml of Bloom. This would be our week 4 amounts.


Hope this helps...Steelcity

 

exactly how much water do you have circulating?


I have never had my ph drift upwards before. I have experience it drift down lower into the 5 range towards chop due to less uptake and some salt buildup. But after flushing for a week it's usually very controlled.


I would look also at your water content. Are you on city water or well water? What is the ph and the ppm of the water out of the tap? Pending on those results you may need to get some filtering and use gh micro hard water.