ebb and flow

I want to set up my first hydro system, but befor i do I want to have everything on paper, ( blueprint) before I start the set-up.

The system below is what i'm planning. it's a 11 plant system using 2 liter bottles. I have a few ?'s.
1- What is the best medium for this system?
2-I'm thinking about using clay pebbles, are the clay pebbles fine or should I mix in perlite?
3- If I only use the clay pebbles, how many times a day should I flood the system and for how long?
4- If I would to use only perlite would the flooding times be different?
5- Are the 2 liter bottles large enough?

I know I'll have a lot more questions as things get going , but first I need to get the system set up correctly.

I did have a lot more ?'s but found a lot of my answers here. great place , My hat off to the admin and mods here. :thumbsup:

This is easy with a system like that one grow rocks are fine.

Make sure your overfill tube is working because you will need it. Ebb & flow in something like this should work for plants up to 24-30" tall plants at finish. That's not much of a yield but if you do enough then it adds up quick. You will find if the plants root system gets too large they will clog the 1" hole you are using as a drain.

That is why I said to make sure your overfill tube is working.

Happy growing

In this Saturdays pod-cast I cover Hydroponics nutrients so you may want to check it out.

thanks Zandor,

I got the system put together , a lot of pvc cutting and gluing.

got my cloning chamber set up. But first I'll be starting out with seeds.

Still got a lot of work to do to get all the rooms set up.
but hope to end up with a 3 room system, 1-for mothers, 2-for cloning, and 3- for flowering.
and yes I hope to do small but fast yeilds.

how soon can i put the clones into flowering and how often should i flood the plants? from what i've been reading , 3 to 5 times a day.

Hopefully you have female seeds then? I ended up with 1 female out of 4 and thats the first and last time I will take a chance with seeds for hydro. Clones or female seeds - perferably clones.

Dirt is different - I don't mind havin a regular orgy in dirt because it's easy to move small pots around, cull them in or out etc. but never again for hydro.

if you have close spacing as in a sea of green then about 14" tall is good maybe 12" if you have tight node spacing and like 6 nodes or more in 12" you will be fine for that type of growing.

You will need lots of air movement with close spacing.

Watch your Ph and please change your water & nutrients every 7-10 day's. If you want post some pictures and description of your grow equipment and your grow area and maybe my self or some others can give you ideas to improve your success.

This is not the eaisest to set up . I hope it ends up producing.

found a pic on this site that shows the system I'm trying to set up.
I'll post some pics of my system in the next week or two.(after I get it set up) There's still a lot of work to do.


the 2 liter bottle caps just don't fit in the pvc as discribed in this system.
Blue glue , does not stick to the bottle caps . all my caps leaked where they are glued into the the pvc. ( the caps only fit in about 1/4 inch.)

I've reglued the caps with a multi perpose glue and that seemed to work.

Zandor,

Quote:

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You will find if the plants root system gets too large they will clog the 1" hole you are using as a drain

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The directions for this system called for a 1/2 " hole drilled into the bottle caps. I went back and drilled a 3/4 " hole in the caps.
I'm also going to add a extra overflo line to this system.

Its a lot of work to set up a good system but give me some time and I hope to post great pics. :D

I have played with those. NOT all bottle caps are the same size I found out my self years ago. I did find that the 1" thin wall PVC works and seals tight. What I did was take a sample of the PVC to the store and try it on all of them. The cap size is the same for the small bottles as the larger one so you can mix and match the caps. Red coke caps I think fit the 1"thin wall PVC, but nothing fit the thick wall stuff that I found.

Good luck and the top return should keep them from running over when they get clogged.

started seeds a week days ago , in paper towels. Old habit. (I grew a little 15 + years ago. stop growing to raise the kids. Kids are grown so time for me to grow.)
System came together ok . but now I need to work on the room. Temps running around 80 to 90 and humidity was hanging around 80 , now 70 after I added a fan to the room.

came up with a nice pump system , used a boat dc pump ,( burge, livewell pump), found at walmart . and a ac/dc converter, make sure it's a 12 volt converter. and a timer from home depo.

right now the seedlings are under 2 100w cfl's, but got to get at least a 400 hps. money is short and got to get a a/c to cool the room so i'd like to build my own light system. I know i can make a nice reflector, but where can I get the lite ballast parts and socket?
anyway , i'll post some pics over the weekend.