Water Temps=important Summer=warm

What about using something like this as well or instead? These are half the price of the cold plate posted and won't need a freezer to use it. Stainless Steel Immersion Wort Chiller :: Midwest Supplies Homebrewing and Winemaking Supplies It says it can bring water from boiling down to under 80degrees in 15min.

bongrippinbob said:

What about using something like this as well or instead? These are half the price of the cold plate posted and won't need a freezer to use it. Stainless Steel Immersion Wort Chiller :: Midwest Supplies Homebrewing and Winemaking Supplies It says it can bring water from boiling down to under 80degrees in 15min.

Click to expand...

that could work well too. I'd like to check at the scrap yard for some stainless steel tubing. how can I tell what kind of metal it is? just bring a magnet with me? would that be enough to tell if it's ok to use?

Yeah, if the magnet sticks to it, and its not rusty, its stainless LOL.

I homebrew...and I have a copper immersion chiller for my wert. I would not recoommend trying to fab this up...you can take the cold plate I showed off earlier and simply put it into an igloo cooler full of ice water....tits on a Ritz, now THAT'S a good cracker!!!

So 100 bucks for the cold plate.

20 bucks for a decent cooler.

12 bucks for a fountain pump.

5 bucks for some tubing.

Wallah...$137.00 later, you have a home brew chiller. You just have to keep ice or ice water (transfers the heat better, more contact on the plate) on the cold plate.

I should'a been a rocket scientist!!! Check out my new flood table. This works KILLER!!! I was gonna do a DWC to veg em out, but this will work a thousand times better!!! AND...I don't kill my plants if the power goes out for a couple hours!

Peace!

Yak, did you get anywhere with your DIY cooler, or did you end up buying them 2 you were talking about?

I was wondering if using hydrogen peroxide in your resevoir would make up for the lack of dissolved oxygen at higher temperatures. I was also wondering how to use hygrozyme properly. Do you add it to your nutrient soup or is it something that you use on its own with plain water? Thanks!

Biz you can't use hydrogen peroxide (H202) if you use hygrozyme. Hygrozyme is organic and the H202 will eat it.

H2O2 should only be used if absolutley necessary.

The H2O2 will kill all the good the stuff in the water along with killing the bad. You should only use it if you are having problems.

fitzyno1 said:

Yak, did you get anywhere with your DIY cooler, or did you end up buying them 2 you were talking about?

Click to expand...

I got two "drop in" chillers.. one worked, and one looked like it had been left outside for 20 years, it wouldnt even turn on. I took it apart, cleaned it, painted it, and it turned on, now I just need to charge it (again) and find out where the leak is in the system thats keeping it from holding refridgerant.

It was 150 bucks for both of them, a huge bargain if I can get the other one running on the cheap.


As for my mini-fridge system.. that is on hold for a little while until I buy one of those cold plates that CHK suggested. I'm in no hurry so I'm not going to rush to spend the casheesh right now. When I try it though, I will show the process with pictures too.


first pic, nasty ass dirty chiller. second: the one that works well, keeps the temp at 69 +/- 1 degree. third: my 7 foot trees, all the way to the ceiling and bent over.

YaK said:

I got two "drop in" chillers.. one worked, and one looked like it had been left outside for 20 years, it wouldnt even turn on. I took it apart, cleaned it, painted it, and it turned on, now I just need to charge it (again) and find out where the leak is in the system thats keeping it from holding refridgerant.

Click to expand...

some water in a spray bottle with dawn dish soap in it. spray that on the pipes and you will see it bubble where it's leaking

will adding h2o2 (hydrogen peroxide) in my res allow me to run higher res temps because of more DO?

past 75 degrees water holds little to no oxygen. If you do rely on h2o2 make sure to add it on a strict schedule. every 3 days add whatever ml/gal u see to be the magical number. (varies by the plants age and whoever you ask)

what is a temperature that is TOO cold? I'm having issues with my temp controller on my drop in chiller, and I want to just put the thing on a timer to let the temps fluctuate, but hopefully keeping the temps within a certain range not to exceed 71. I want to play with the timer settings, but need to know how cold is too cold.

oh, and thanks for the tip for finding the refrigerant leak, I will definately try that. they are charged with 134A which I can easily get at any auto parts store.

c'monnnnnnnnn WINTER!

apparently running your res. as low as 50 F is acceptable. Earl says Canadians do it all of the time in their hooses.

gvega187 said:

apparently running your res. as low as 50 F is acceptable. Earl says Canadians do it all of the time in their hooses.

Click to expand...

lol... okay eh.

Thanks!

Does anyone have any go tips to lowering the temp of a couple bucket bubble systems? they are stand alone systems and dont share a res so i would have to run them too both and or add a large res which i dont want to do. I have heard of the ice probes but know little about them. If anyone has any ideas and on ways to lower a DWC bubbler please please let me know. I am running about 80F and am a seedling so i have about a week at most to figure somthing out. Thanks for you help and sorry for hijacking

i'm in the tropics and i use 28 or 40 quart coolers with 6"net cup holes in the top. my nute temp stays at the lower end of whatever i set the wall unit 2. u can get some of the really big coolers for your rez if running a different system. i just bubble the heck out of the coolers. that's interesting what was said about the nute strength. i inadvertantly figured this out 6months ago, but i never attributed it to the lower DO level. we always had issues on the initial put into the coolers into flower with brand new nutes and all that. I've found that it's better to put them into flower with the nutes they were in(meaning veg stuff) for the first 3-5 days of flower. and then switch to flower stuff( weaker to start) and then bump it up. sidenote i used to have a 1/3HP drop in chiller. they work well, cost a lot and they also need 2 be exhausted. I've had better luck with a $200 wall unit and the cooler set up. peace

hey hydrochron. if u r using the 5gallon net cups they fit perfect into the home depot water coolers.

Water has very unique density qualities.

Most liquids become denser as they become cooler.

Water, however, gets denser as it cools
until it reaches a temperature of approximately 39ºF.
The denser the water becomes the more oxygen it can hold.

50º is a common earth subsurface temperature necessary to stimulate germnation.

As Water cools below 39º,
it becomes lighter until it freezes (32ºF).

As ice develops,
water increases in volume by 11 percent.

The increase in volume allows ice to float rather than sink,
a characteristic that prevents ponds from freezing solid.

Dissolved gases are those which are in a water solution.

An example of gas dissolved in solution is soda water
which has large quantities of dissolved carbon dioxide.

The most common gases are oxygen,
carbon dioxide, nitrogen, and ammonia.

Concentrations are measured in parts per million (ppm)
or milligrams per liter (mg/1), both units of measure are the same.

At sea level and zero salinity,
(that means no nutes),

68ºF water can hold 9.2 ppm DO,

while at 86.0F,
saturation is at 7.6 ppm DO,
and unable to support "any useful life".