Cheap D.I.Y Hempy Bucket/Soil Automatic Watering System

rimfire · #1 04-19-2008, 07:15 AM

I use Hempy Buckets in a SCROG for my girls. According to Hempy you need to hand water your plants 1 time a day until they are established and then every other day after that. While I love tending to my small garden, I'm away from it for more than 2 days at a time and needed to come up with an automatic watering system to keep them happy and healthy. So here is what I came up with.........

A small submersible pump. You don't need one that has a large Gallons Per Hour (GPH) rating. The one I use pumps 145 GPH and is used for a pump in small fountains. It also has a flow adjustment on it and suction feet to hold it in place. I found it on E-bay for $8.00. Works like a champ

rimfire · #2 04-19-2008, 07:17 AM

A bucket of your choice. If you are automatic watering lots of large plants for an extended period of time you will need a large bucket or tub. In my case I have 2 plants in 2 gallon Hempy Buckets and I get by with an old 4 gallon paint bucket for my nute rez. I can water every other day and go over a week without having to hand water. If I needed to be away longer I will just increase the size of my rez and add more nutes.

rimfire · #3 04-19-2008, 07:18 AM

1/4" tubing, connectors and bubbler heads. For these items I went to the auto sprinkler section at Home Depot. I have approximately $5.00 in parts. I have about 4 feet of hose connected to the pump on one end, a tee connector, 2 short pieces of hose and 2 heads with built-in stakes to hold them in place. Very simple.

rimfire · #4 04-19-2008, 07:19 AM

The timer. This is the most important and expensive part of the system. It will be necessary for each different garden to establish how long the pump needs to run to water the plants. I my case with my 2 gallon Hempy Buckets I have to let the pump run for 4 minutes every other day in order to keep them happy. The only way to be able to do this is with a DIGITAL timer. You can program it to water everyday multiple times, every other day or only on weekends. You can also program it to run for only a minute. This is nice for small pots. The timers that have the red and green trippers for shutting on and off will not work. The smallest increment of time for adjustment is 1 hour. Home Depot has the one I have for $20, has a battery backup and it's easy to program.

rimfire · #5 04-19-2008, 07:20 AM

Hope this covers it and you find this useful. When you consider one of your plants has the potential to be worth hundreds of dollars, why not protect your babies with an under $50 watering system that is easy to make and works like a champ. Here are Dr.'s Biggie Small and White Ice 23 days into bloom in my Hempy Bucket SCROG. Happy farming.

MonkeeMan · #6 04-19-2008, 11:46 AM

how long do you think you could leave those for max?

Hags · #7 Today, 04:09 PM

fucking finally. been looking all over for this! youd think more people would have to do this...