I have run buckets, but they were not waterfarm. My buckets had airstones in them, and then I had the water circulating. Then I was in a grow shop one day and saw the waterfarm, and a salesperson showed me the principles on how they work. Well, mine were 5 gal home depot buckets, so I tried to get just the tube that waterfarm uses and it was just not built for round buckets. Their sizing was also such that you could not adapt them with anything from Home Depot, so I decided to make my own. I think you might find a pic of what I built in my gallery. It worked better FOR ME and my buckets than the ones I bought from Waterfarm.
About a year ago I went to drippers. Basically a 4'x4' tray maybe 8" high. Using one on the floor as a reservoir, then I have a couple of 2x4s across them and an identical tray on top that holds the plants. I have 15 pots in there, each about 10" high, a pond pump in the reservoir brings the nutes up onto a 1/2" pvc pipe that runs the around the edge of the top 4'x4' tray. From there I have the small 1/4" tubing going to each pot. NO Drippers, I just turn on the pump and let her rip. Nutes run thru the pots drain out the bottom and then the tray drains back into the res... Works great, keeps the water temps nice, I can move the position of the plants anytime... I really like it.
I used to be in the HVAC biz, and if you want to have a room with A/C, you should have an independent system, and you need 5000BTU for each 1000W light. Depending where you live (climate), it may make sense. But, if you are running 5 1000W lights, that means you need a 2 Ton A/C. An A/c that size will consume about 20 amps. For 20 amps I can run 2 1/2 lights (1000W each), so I'm trying to avoid that. Not that it wouldn't be nice to have, but I don't want my electric bill being 3x what my neighbors use.

SpaceNeedle
SpaceNeedle Reviewed by SpaceNeedle on . Waterfarm 8 Hi..., and thanks in advance for your help. I have read a lot on these forums and now have questions of my own ;-) ... I have an indoor growing room with a waterfarm 8 using hydroton and GH nutes. I am on my first crop which was started from plants that were almost 2months old as a friend was growing them for me as I put my room together. I lost a couple during the transition do to the roots not catching in the hydroton (the rockwool the plants came in too big..., learning lesson ;-) I Rating: 5