SOG DIY Ebb and Flow in a Homebox L (39.5"x39.5")

Santos L Halper · #1 05-04-2009, 09:44 PM

Hi all,

I am working on a Small SOG project (Journal), and my flowering chamber is DIY Ebb and Flow. I planned it out so I thought I would post how I built it and hopefully it will be helpful to others, and hopefully I'll be able to get some help from all the experienced people here

My hydro setup is inspired by the two liter bottle hydro setups I've seen around and Al. B. Fucts SOG method. I saw someone do what I did with two 3.5 gallon buckets, so I built one with three 2 gallon buckets instead.

My setup consists of 4 hydro stations on (what should be) a 2 week rotation in a 39.5"x39.5" homebox. This sunday I'll be moving the second batch of clones to flower.

I have been working on this for a few months now. I spent a long while trying to find a way to get a hydro station in what is basically an 18"x18" space and this is the best I could come up with. The buckets can probably also be modified for other application besides ebb and flow.

The four reservoirs are 18 gallon Rubbermaid Roughneck totes. Each station has three 2 gallon buckets connected to a pvc manifold with pvc conduit. The fourth spot is for the overflow. I probably could have put four buckets in but I figured the extra bucket might be too much for the resorvoir so I decided to go with three. In each bucket I put an 8" pot with hydroton and a clone. I put three clones in the first station eight days ago, here is a pic I took this evening before lights on (as you can see a bucket is missing. I jacked it up trying to drill the hole and need to replace it...):

Here is a pic of the buckets:

I am probably going to put something over the top or big disks around the stalks to cut down on growth, going to see how it goes I guess. Here is another pic of an empty station with the hole that the water comes up through, the overflow which helps regulate how high the water goes, and the rack to hold it all up:

Here is how I built everything.

First, I arranged the reservoirs in the Homebox like so:

Then I built a rack to hold the buckets up. I used 1/2" PVC to build a frame with four legs in the corners, and an extra leg on each side that comes down between the reservoirs. I glued my legs in place but I recommend using snap-saddles instead (below):

I then laid 2x6's across the rack (with a 2x4 on the back and a 1.5x1.5 in front, it didn't quite fit with another 2x4 in front :\ They are 39.5" long (except the short one in front), and have screws on each end to help it stay on the pvc. I tie loose zipties around the screw/pvc pipe to keep it in place, and tightenen them more on the other side. There are zips around all four scews on the middle piece of wood:

Here is how it worked out with the 1.5"x1.5" piece of wood I had lying around to get everything to fit:

Here are the parts for the PVC Rack:

~8x 1/2" PVC 5' sections (for the four sides you need ~36 1/2" pieces. I would start a little bigger and work down, but that is the approximate pipe distance between the two corners)

8x 447-005 1/2" Cap - Feet for the bottom of the rack.

10x 436-005 1/2" Male Adapter (4 for corners, 4 for middle legs, 2 for beam)

4x 414-005 1/2" Side Outlet Ell (Threaded) - These are the four corners, attached to 1/2" male adapters:

6x 463-005 1/2" Snap-On Saddle - These are for the extra set of legs and the cross beam. They snap to the frame and can be move around. I originally measured out and glued the extra legs in place with Tees but if I made another frame I DEFINITELY use 1/2" snap-saddles so I could move the legs around!

I cut the PVC with Cutters:

Using the four corners and the 36 1/2" pieces, make a sqaure and make sure it fits in the homebox. The legs in the corner of the frame are about ~15 3/4" long with caps on the bottom. Glue the square but I don't glue the legs so I can put shorter/longer ones on if need be.

I ziptie the legs to the homebox frame for stability. The feet on the PVC rest on the corner connector of the Homebox:

The corners should fit snug inside the homebox frame:

Once you have the frame in, put in two snapsaddles and measure out a piece of pipe for the middle bar (in frame pic above). Also measure out the length of the four middle legs:

Now that have a rack with reservoirs underneath it you need the PVC manifold. I made it as simple as I could. Here are the parts:

For each station (total for four stations, this is for PVC to Pump instead of barbs):

1/2" PVC - ~15 1/2" (I measured this out after everything was on the rack to get it precise. This is the piece from the pump up to the 1" PVC).

Some 1" PVC Pipe (1x 5' piece is enough per section):

Cut the 1" PVC into the following pieces:

4x 3 5/8" (16x total)
2x 3 3/4" (8x total)
a ~3" piece for the overflow.
1x 7 1/4" - Overflow height. You could easily get away with a smaller overflow height. I can flood hydroton pretty high it seems.
1x 10" - Dump the overflow back into the res.

1x 401-130 1/2"x1/2"x1" Reducing Tee - This is the piece that connects the 1/2" pump to the 1" manifold.

2x 401-010 1" Tee (8x total)

6x 406-010 1" 90 Ell (24x total)

1x 436-005 1/2" Male Adapter (4x total)

The following connect the buckets to the manifold:

3x 1" Male PVC Conduit (12x total)
3x #18 Rubber O-Ring (12x total)
3x 1" Female PVC Conduit (12x total)

Here is the pipe layout for a station. The thick red line is overflow. There are 2 Tees, 4 Ells on the ends of 3 5/8" pieces, two more Ells for the top of the overflow, and the rectangular piece in the middle between the two 3 3/4" pieces is the Reducing T, 401-130, pointing down towards the pump:

You Make four of these and arrange them like so:

Here is what it looks like with the fitting hooked to the pump (it isn't glued to the pump, just screwed in with an o-ring):

To hook the buckets to the manifold, I use pvc conduit and a #18 O-Ring:

I use a 1 1/4" drill bit to drill the center out of the 2 gallon bucket. I put the O-ring on the Male end and it screws right through the bucket and into the female adapter as in the pic at the very top. I drillled holes in the sides of the male part, and put a mesh with a ziptie over the top of the three currently active buckets. I plan on redoing it because right now I have to ziptie mesh over the holes I drilled in the conduit because they are so big. By making the drilled holes small enough so that no pellets can get through I can hopefully get away with only having to ziptie mesh to the top. Female conduit glued in:

The male part:

Here is a pic of a station with a bucket taken out so you can see how it all works together:

I also have a 100 gallon air pump sitting on top of the Homebox, and run air lines in through the back hole, so there are air stones in the res.

To drain the res I have 4 small pumps I am going to put in, along with tubing running to a drain. To clean the reservoirs, it helps to have another person help lift the rack in order to pull them out.

I'll keep this thread updated as the chamber fills and things arise.... Input is appreciated. Thanks for reading my wall of text! Here is a pic of the three plants I have in there on day 8 of flowering to end this post:

Santos L Halper · #2 05-07-2009, 08:14 PM

Here is eleven days flowering:

I also have three clones ready for second station that I am going to add in three days

naturalhigh · #3 05-07-2009, 11:58 PM

i like this...goodluck..

GypsyBush · #4 05-08-2009, 01:45 PM

Sweet!!!

Best of Luck!!!

Subscribed...

+ rep!!!!

WOOOT WOOT!!!!!

Santos L Halper · #5 05-09-2009, 11:36 AM

Thanks for the support!

I'll post pics of the three new plants tomorrow.

Santos L Halper · #6 05-11-2009, 02:28 AM

Hi Everyone,

I'll have more detail in my journal tomorrow, but I wanted to post some pics at day 14 and of the new clones.

First, here is how I drilled and meshed over the Male Adapters in the buckets. I drilled three small holes instead of 1 big one per side:

Here is the first batch of clones at 14 days before I put the new ones in:

And up close

Here are the three new clones in the next station. At one week and three weeks (next week), I'll lollipop them. I am letting them grow out a little because I don't want them getting too tall for my homebox...

A little closer:

A comparison with the two week plants:

And that's all for tonight. I took a new batch of cuttings and took pics of everything, I'll put it up in my journal tomorrow. Good night! Thanks for reading.

Santos L Halper · #7 05-11-2009, 02:39 AM

Here is the bit I used to drill the bucket. The tighter you can secure the bucket before you drill the hole the better. As you can see it threads nicely (the o-ring is on the other side):

I use a file to file away all the burrs. That is actually one of my best. They can be rather sloppy and still hold the seal long enough. Any water that does drip out drips right back into the res anyway.

Santos L Halper · #8 05-11-2009, 02:50 AM

And I have been reading the Ask Lucas thread I found on another thread here, WOW! I am going with his recommendation on there for GH nutes, 2 part bloom to 1 part micro (16/

for batch 1, it worked out to ~96 ml for 12 gallons of micro and ~192ml of bloom for 12 gallons. I subbed ~30ml of bloom for grow in the second batch (the new ones), since newly flowered ladies seem to like to do that. EC in the first batch was 1.6 so 1.6-1.8 shouldn't be too bad (Lucas says 1300ppm is a good baseline iirc). I also added 1 ml per gallon of Floralicious Plus in each tank. pH was 5.8 (which I read was good in the Lucas thread) ppm was between 1.6-1.8 E.C. (1120-1260 ppm). Where I live is known for good water, I let it sit for 24 hours with airstones and it measures at ~100 ppm or less and high pH (almost 8.0 sometimes) before I add anything.

Santos L Halper · #9 05-13-2009, 10:06 PM

Here is day 14 and 17 (today):

Close ups:

Here is the new batch of clones in the second station at Day 1 and Day 3 (today):

Here is a comparison between the new clones and the ones at two weeks (taken on first day):

Thanks for reading!

Tagh · #10 05-22-2009, 06:41 AM

Hey I have been thinking about making my own Hydro system. But so far it seems spending 600$ on a 18 pot Ebb & Gro System would be alot simpler and less time consuming.

So I was just wondering, including everything seeds, hydroton, ect... how much was total cost?
Also just to make the Ebb & Flow system?

Thanks

I also don't think I have the patience to create something like that. Very nice set up. Great thinking.

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