newbie hydro minigrow - DWC or Autopots?

[Samjana]

hi yah mate

i use autopots for a couple of normal house plants, works well, i use 40 perlite 60 verm. Also good to be able to shake, stir resi once a while, have black resi. i'll be watching this as i'm thinking to keep my moms indefinatley in them under fluros in that sized space.

[euph0rix]

I just got my autopots today, easy to setup I am well pleased with them. This is my first grow too with a 250W HPS, maybe we can help each other out. I am doing DWC on second grow, I want to get some experience first. Ive gained alot of knowledge from here over the past year so I'm pretty confident everything will go well. Good luck with your grow mate.

[pipeman]

I don't think you will have room to put your res in that space, because your plants will be too cramped and the res will be hard if not impossible to get to for flushes and water changes.

 

so I'd strongly suggest mounting your res outside the grow space.

 

of course there is an even simpler solution, don't have autopots or a res. just have pots of perlite sitting in trays in an inch of water and when the trays dry up water em again. that is basically all the autopot valve does, and if you are checking them every day, may as well do it yourself.

[brian]

very interesting topic, you have a similar setup to what I am looking at as we seem to live in similar conditions. Start a grow diary, because I'd be interested in how this all went! How much is all this looking to set you back?

[Al B. Fuct]

Just did a little research on the Autopot. Very simple, very clever. However, I think you could accomplish the same thing for around $3 (or less) per pot by doing a wick system.

 

http://www.thehydroponicum.com/media/media2/images/pyrmid_colour.jpg

 

http://www.simplyhydro.com/images/wicksys2.gif

 

A pot, some medium, a rope and a bucket. Can't get any cheaper, buckets are 85c and pots are about 50c at any dollar shop.

[RobbieGanjaSeed]

I knew a bloke who used autopots for his mothers, it worked great. But like pipeman siad, the resivours wil use up too much space in a flowering situation I think. Not that it won't work well, just you could utilise the space better perhaps.

 

My very first hydroponic grow was 15 years or so ago. I was afraid of it all, and so wasn't prepared to spend a lot of money on it incase it was all too technical for a dunce like me.

 

So the hydro shop bloke (Lismore Hydroponics) sold me 10 inch pots, and I filled them with a pretty much equal share of clay balls and flock. I used one part nutes, and hand watered every day as if they were just soil filled pot plants on the vernada. The plants weren't well adapted for indoor, a thai variety probably, they were huge and unruly.

 

But that first grow yeilded a pound (took 4 months or more), which all I'd like to make the point of i you can do alot with manual systems, if ya home to care for them. There wasn't a single automated aspect to the grow, no ph meters, nor disolved salts meters.

 

Of course I believe in total automation, and salt and ph meters I thik are all but essential., But the old KISS idea is good for first growers I think.

 

Best of luck, I'm sure you'll do well.

rob

[Al B. Fuct]

the old KISS idea is good for first growers I think.

 

Sure is. That's why I like wicks for noobs. No pumps, no timers and no remembering to water. Even the stonedest stoner can remember to fill a rez bucket once a week- and you simply can't overwater a wick.

 

Autopots will behave similarly, it's just that a DIY wick is a hell of a lot cheaper.

[toasty]

Thanks for your replies everyone. My plan has changed a bit since I first posted.

 

My original plan was to build a box myself, but I found a free (little) chest of draws to gut and use instead. It's awfully small, only 42cm wide x 37 cm deep x 60cm tall. Here's how i've got it setup so far.

 

Now this setup is too small for the autopots/wick, and it's pretty cramped as it is so fitting a pump in for DWC seems pretty ambitious. So I think i'll take everyones advice, KISS and go with hand watering.

 

What's the best medium for hand watering? Perlite or Perlite / Vermiculite? RobbieGanjaSeed you said you hand watered your first grow using Clayballs / flock, Do you think that'd work ok for this situation?

 

Putting this space together has been a bit of a learning experience for me, and I know it's too small for a proper grow. At the moment I just want to see if I can get anything going before I bite the bullet and buy a HPS and set myself up with an NGB style setup.

 

Many thanks for the advice people

[Pam]

I noticed your lights. I had quite a few burn out on me and if that starts to happen (it can get costly) you might look into changing your fixture. Believe it or not I learned this from a guy at the pet shop! The other thing that makes them burn out is surges so be sure to use a protector.

I like the idea of adding red and blue led lights (tubes) in the corners for added light waves without adding heat.

Good luck with that project, it's very nicely done.

Edited July 22, 2007 by Granny