Justin Freidman
Well-Known Member
Hey Everyone,
I built a drain to waste system stupidly thinking it would work well if I used the biggest big mama grodan cubes and just top fed nutes on to it now and again. It worked well for the first month but now is a total mess. I'm thinking of nuking the whole thing and rebuild a newer system based on something that will give me proper feedback and control.
This is my (badly drawn) idea.
I really want to stick to drain to waste as I'm in the tropics and the room temp will be hot as I'm using C02. I did have chillers before to keep nutes to 20 degrees, but they cost a lot to run (especially when room temp was 27) I do have dual aircon in there and de-humidifiers, but would rather run the room hot for veg with correct VPD. I will use aircon during flower to reduce both temp and humidity.
The idea is to top feed the grodan 6" cubes using floraflex top feed system. There will be a flow sensor measuring the amount of liquid going in and a flow sensor measuring the liquid coming out for each cycle. I can then work out run-off percentages to dial them in.
The solution coming out will go in to a catch tray which will have a bluelab guardian. There will also be one in the main tank. It means I can then see the difference between nutes/pH going in and nutes/pH going out per feed. So can dial this is more.
I will use an electronic valve to empty the catch tank to waste just before the next watering, so there is always water on the probes (so they don't dry out) and I get a fresh reading each time.
I am building an arduino based system to monitor the moisture in each of the cubes so I get the dry-back perfect, then will program the system to water at certain moisture percentages.
Any feedback on this would be great, I think it will work, or maybe I've missed something? I am still new to all this.
Thanks for any feedback,
J.
I built a drain to waste system stupidly thinking it would work well if I used the biggest big mama grodan cubes and just top fed nutes on to it now and again. It worked well for the first month but now is a total mess. I'm thinking of nuking the whole thing and rebuild a newer system based on something that will give me proper feedback and control.
This is my (badly drawn) idea.
I really want to stick to drain to waste as I'm in the tropics and the room temp will be hot as I'm using C02. I did have chillers before to keep nutes to 20 degrees, but they cost a lot to run (especially when room temp was 27) I do have dual aircon in there and de-humidifiers, but would rather run the room hot for veg with correct VPD. I will use aircon during flower to reduce both temp and humidity.
The idea is to top feed the grodan 6" cubes using floraflex top feed system. There will be a flow sensor measuring the amount of liquid going in and a flow sensor measuring the liquid coming out for each cycle. I can then work out run-off percentages to dial them in.
The solution coming out will go in to a catch tray which will have a bluelab guardian. There will also be one in the main tank. It means I can then see the difference between nutes/pH going in and nutes/pH going out per feed. So can dial this is more.
I will use an electronic valve to empty the catch tank to waste just before the next watering, so there is always water on the probes (so they don't dry out) and I get a fresh reading each time.
I am building an arduino based system to monitor the moisture in each of the cubes so I get the dry-back perfect, then will program the system to water at certain moisture percentages.
Any feedback on this would be great, I think it will work, or maybe I've missed something? I am still new to all this.
Thanks for any feedback,
J.
