Drip system water timing

[MrGrapeGod]

Hey, i have your standard 5 gallon drip system going, running a 18/6 cycle for the light. How often should the drip system be on while the lights are on as well as when the lights are off. Let me know, thanks

[mainegrown]

?? what is a standard 5 gal drip?


~MG a.k.a. le Maine développé

[SpaceNeedle]

The medium you are using depends a lot on what your watering should be. For example you would drown a plant that used rockwool on drip if it ran 24/7, yet if you used clay pellets (hydroton), they would likely love it!

[MrGrapeGod]

I've got clay pellets, so 24/7 should be the trick

[LOC NAR on probation]

24/7 will work and if you don't have an air stone keep it 24/7. The water splashing down puts O2 in the water. If your running air stones you can go 15 on 45 off.

[JohnnyBlazeItUp]

Hey LOCnar, I'm runnin a drip system with lights on 24hrs using hydroton in 1 gal pots with clones in 1" rockwool plugs.. I just put them in last night and i'm running the water 24/7 right now. I am running an airstone in my res (20 gal) but i was wondering if i am over watering. Should I slow it down and let it dry out for few min every so often or just water constantly.. Once I go into budding i was planning on running water all day when the lights were on and shutting the pumps off at night except for maybe once in the middle of the night. Does this sound about right? Thanks for any advice you may be able to offer! Sorry to hijack the thread but i figured i'd post on here instead of starting a new one about the same thing.. happy toking everybody!! :smokin:

[LOC NAR on probation]

What kind of drip ?

Are the one gallon pots draining right back to the rez ? gravity ?

We do drip in a ten gallon tub or 5 gallon buckets. Self contained and not part of a bigger sytem all hooked together. Each unit has a small pump that takes care of six drip lines in each tub or one dip ring in a bucket.

The drip is really only needed to get the roots to go down to the water. If need or power outage the roots are fine in the rez water. So from there it is what ever you want. On some we turned it off all together when the roots hit the rez. The strain did not like water on the main rootball.

Now if you drip back to a rez and the pot does not hold nutes then you must water alot more frequent.

The main thing I see with drip is not to have the drip line right on the plant. Either move the plant to the side of the pot or move the drip line to the side. Make the plant go after the water they thrive for this. And you won't have rot or fungus problems either.

[JohnnyBlazeItUp]

Excellent! so here's the exact setup.. 2 4x4 trays with 16 pots each tray that drain via gravity to my res.. 1 pump in the res that feeds to a T fitting which supplies both trays. I have 1/4" lines running off 1/2 in poly tubing connected to circle shaped drip rings made with a 3 prong connector.. the circle sits about center on the pots at an even distance between the stem and the edge of the pot.. currently i have it running 24/7 under dimmed 1000w bulbs (50%).. I suppose i should leave the pumps running at all times when the lights are on correct? what about darkness once i go into budding? I was planning on shutting off the pumps except for maybe once in the middle of the night. What would you recommend? Thank a ton for the advice and info!

Blaze

[iris]

be carefull leaving your pump on 24/7, i ran into serious temperature problems in my res. i hava similar set up but with no pots, sitting in a bed via corrogated plastic instead. i made sure to put ample air stones in my bed underneath and cut my water scheduale down to three one hour feeds a day. lights on, hour before lights off, and in the middle during lights on. i do not feed in the dark.(currently on the same light scheduale as yourself) hope this helps, or atleast prevents some temp problems in your res.

[JohnnyBlazeItUp]

Hey Iris, you have a great point about the heat due to light exposure! So far the room hasn't gotten above 77 and i did see the res climb up to 75 at one point but it stays around 70-73 on average. The rH is a lil low at 46 during veg but i have some water out in front of a fan to try an bring it up.. I'm hoping once i go to full power with the lights and flip to 12/12 the heat doesn't get to bad.. chillers are expensive! the one issue i am having is with ph though.. seems likes it's goin real high and i have to add a lot of down.. i'm scared of adding too much so i've been letting it go until about 6.7 before i lower it.. i'm hopin it stabilizes soon! anybody ever had a similar problem during the first few days of the clones veg? i know it normally goes up but this seems like some big jumps.. ohh well i'm probably just paranoid from smokin too much haha.. thanks for all the help guys!

[LOC NAR on probation]

Keep bringing your ph down to low 5's it will even out.

You say dimmed 1000 lights. If they are on a dimmer you are still using full power at the ballast.

I know heat is always an issue. We have a small 5000btu A/C unit that keeps lights and rez temps cool. It's a must.

OK back to watering. I would not let a system like that go for more than 2 hours without a least 15 minutes on time. Light or dark period.

If I could keep my temps down I wuld run 24/7 if there were no signs of drowning or fungus. But 15 minutes every hour or two hours is where I would go.

[JohnnyBlazeItUp]

sounds good! I think i'm gonna find a happy medium and run it 15min on / 30 min off.. that should keep em from getting too thirsty and keep the water from getting too warm! Thanks for all you help again LOCnar!