Drip Drip Goes The Uniseal (Leaking!)

Cold$moke

Cold$moke

Well-Known Member
Ok i watched the vids and i did tell him to "spillover" his feed lines. That said

how are you thinking of incorporating this into a system? Out of curiosity on my part

Overflow rdwc setups have been around for a bit as well
 
rkymtnman

rkymtnman

Well-Known Member
nc208 said:
May I ask why every design I see has the plumbing coming out of the sides? Why don't people design systems with the plumbing running underneath, all you would need to do is put your buckets on a 6" riser. You could utilize overflows in each bucket helping create more oxygen naturally as well. Bottoms of buckets are typically flat so it would be much easier to install a bulkhead on versus a rounded side.
Click to expand...
that's how i did my rdwc. used shower drains instead of bulkheads so the metal grate keeps out stray hydroton too. and with them elevated, they would drain completely empty instead of leaving leftover nute solution. then just one pump in the control bucket thru 5/8 heater hose to each grow tote for a waterfall, no airstones.
 
Sour Wreck

Sour Wreck

Well-Known Member
rkymtnman said:
that's how i did my rdwc. used shower drains instead of bulkheads so the metal grate keeps out stray hydroton too. and with them elevated, they would drain completely empty instead of leaving leftover nute solution. then just one pump in the control bucket thru 5/8 heater hose to each grow tote for a waterfall, no airstones.
Click to expand...
that's what i wanna do...

i will elevate my 12 gallon HDX totes (4 of them) on cinder blocks. these will be in a 4x4 area with the rez sitting just outside of that 16 sq ft. then put a bulk head in the bottom of each, all draining back into a center pipe going back to the rez. the pump, probably submersible (will have to see what i have, got 2 or 3 different ones) will feed 1/2" PVC line to the center of the totes and branch off for water fall feeds. no airstones. total return line length 10-12 ft. about the same for the water fall feed lines.

couple of questions.

1. what is the smallest return lines i can get away with
2. what is the minimum GPH pump for this application
 
rkymtnman

rkymtnman

Well-Known Member
Sour Wreck said:
that's what i wanna do...

i will elevate my 12 gallon HDX totes (4 of them) on cinder blocks. these will be in a 4x4 area with the rez sitting just outside of that 16 sq ft. then put a bulk head in the bottom of each, all draining back into a center pipe going back to the rez. the pump, probably submersible (will have to see what i have, got 2 or 3 different ones) will feed 1/2" PVC line to the center of the totes and branch off for water fall feeds. no airstones. total return line length 10-12 ft. about the same for the water fall feed lines.

couple of questions.

1. what is the smallest return lines i can get away with
2. what is the minimum GPH pump for this application
Click to expand...
i used the 27 gal hdx totes, 2 plants per tote for 4 total plants. these are on cinder blocks. one 27 gal outside the room as a control tote. i plumbed in a drain with shut off valve off the 1.5 pvc that runs to the drain next to water heater so i could dump the whole system easily.

since i used the shower drain version of a bulkhead, they use 1.5 inch pvc slip fittings. that was my drain line size.
my submersible pump was i think 600 gpm range. just split that into two equal lenghts of 5/8 heater hose to each tote. anchor the heater hose to the top fo the tote so it doesn't move and it created a waterfall in the center of lid of the 2 totes.
 
Sour Wreck

Sour Wreck

Well-Known Member
rkymtnman said:
i used the 27 gal hdx totes, 2 plants per tote for 4 total plants. these are on cinder blocks. one 27 gal outside the room as a control tote. i plumbed in a drain with shut off valve off the 1.5 pvc that runs to the drain next to water heater so i could dump the whole system easily.

since i used the shower drain version of a bulkhead, they use 1.5 inch pvc slip fittings. that was my drain line size.
my submersible pump was i think 600 gpm range. just split that into two equal lenghts of 5/8 heater hose to each tote. anchor the heater hose to the top fo the tote so it doesn't move and it created a waterfall in the center of lid of the 2 totes.
Click to expand...
awesome, thanks...
 
Joint Monster

Joint Monster

Well-Known Member
@Cold$moke I was not really thinking velocity when restricting the flow in front of the pump, merely trying to slow down the water so the last bucket would not empty before it could refill. It did work, but it's definitely not ideal, and definitely a short-term solution.

So you are suggesting to close the last bulkhead. Then run the pump as a top feed, one long pipe branching into the top of each tote?
Sorry, what do you mean by Spill-over design?

I was also just thinking, what if I kept everything the same, and just add a (second pump) 400gph submersible in my res to top feed to each of the four buckets. Then run the 300gph pump without the washer restricting it? Or do you think that would cause the 27gal hdx totes to over-fill?

@Sour Wreck It's still a work in progress, but as of yet, roots seem to have no interest in the bulkheads... they're all chilling in the middle over the air stone.
I believe you want 6-to-10 circulations per hour. So 100gal system you'd want 600-1000gph pump.

@nc208 I'm trying to make the most of the height, even an extra 6" can make a big difference at the end of flower. That over-flow thing in that fish tank looks pretty cool! I recon a vertical "dump" pipe without that surrounding white curved wall would serve the same purpose? (just not as much DO from the waterfall action?)

Since I'm running Bennies, I'm not emptying all of the old water. So drain on the bottom or side it does not really make that much of a difference for me. It would be more about the leak-proofability.
 
Cold$moke

Cold$moke

Well-Known Member
Basically a spill over means your feed lines wuold have to fill a small section of pipe before "spilling" over into your totes.

If you dont get it i can draw one.

The reason i top feed is i believe its one of the only ways to keep a system nice and even

Because your water will spill out evenly hence
Filling your totes evenly , hence water displacment will kepp them even :)

I have a system running right now with a 320 gph i think pump 4 buckets 1 brain bucket
 
Sour Wreck

Sour Wreck

Well-Known Member
Joint Monster said:
@Cold$moke I was not really thinking velocity when restricting the flow in front of the pump, merely trying to slow down the water so the last bucket would not empty before it could refill. It did work, but it's definitely not ideal, and definitely a short-term solution.

So you are suggesting to close the last bulkhead. Then run the pump as a top feed, one long pipe branching into the top of each tote?
Sorry, what do you mean by Spill-over design?

I was also just thinking, what if I kept everything the same, and just add a (second pump) 400gph submersible in my res to top feed to each of the four buckets. Then run the 300gph pump without the washer restricting it? Or do you think that would cause the 27gal hdx totes to over-fill?

@Sour Wreck It's still a work in progress, but as of yet, roots seem to have no interest in the bulkheads... they're all chilling in the middle over the air stone.
I believe you want 6-to-10 circulations per hour. So 100gal system you'd want 600-1000gph pump.

@nc208 I'm trying to make the most of the height, even an extra 6" can make a big difference at the end of flower. That over-flow thing in that fish tank looks pretty cool! I recon a vertical "dump" pipe without that surrounding white curved wall would serve the same purpose? (just not as much DO from the waterfall action?)

Since I'm running Bennies, I'm not emptying all of the old water. So drain on the bottom or side it does not really make that much of a difference for me. It would be more about the leak-proofability.
Click to expand...

thanks
 
Joint Monster

Joint Monster

Well-Known Member
^No prob! Post your build up once you make it, I'd love to see what you build to!

Is this what you mean, a section of piping for each one to fill before it goes into the hdx tote?
spill-over?.png

My only worry with this is, what if the pump empties my Res too fast and over fills my containers? Or should this not be an issue as it *should* be equally filling each container?
 
Cold$moke

Cold$moke

Well-Known Member
Water self levels bud

So as long as your brain bucket is tall enough you wont have any overflows

Your piping is almost right you just need to rotate it up to where the main pipe fills before
"Spilling" over into the totes
Ill try to make a drawing :)
 
rkymtnman

rkymtnman

Well-Known Member
Joint Monster said:
^No prob! Post your build up once you make it, I'd love to see what you build to!

Is this what you mean, a section of piping for each one to fill before it goes into the hdx tote?
View attachment 4116214

My only worry with this is, what if the pump empties my Res too fast and over fills my containers? Or should this not be an issue as it *should* be equally filling each container?
Click to expand...
change your drawing so the returns are the huge purple ones and the fill ones are the skinny black ones.

and like @Cold$moke says, water will find equilibrium. if you make your control res higher than your grow res, it can (should) never overflow.
 
Sour Wreck

Sour Wreck

Well-Known Member
rkymtnman said:
change your drawing so the returns are the huge purple ones and the fill ones are the skinny black ones.

and like @Cold$moke says, water will find equilibrium. if you make your control res higher than your grow res, it can (should) never overflow.
Click to expand...
what if your control res is lower than your grow res, i kinda wanted to build it that way so i could drain the entire system from a valve at the bottom of the control rez.

that won't present problems, will it? only talking about 3-5 inches difference..
 
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Joint Monster

Joint Monster

Well-Known Member
Cold$moke said:
This way youll get pretty equal flow without ball valves
Click to expand...
Thanks a lot mate! I will work on this and report back one changes have been made.

And would you recommend I try the top feed with the 1056GPH pump or the 300GPH pump?

rkymtnman said:
change your drawing so the returns are the huge purple ones and the fill ones are the skinny black ones.

and like @Cold$moke says, water will find equilibrium. if you make your control res higher than your grow res, it can (should) never overflow.
Click to expand...
Haha.. if only it was that easy! I can change the drawing, but budget can not fit new/larger bulkheads.

The purple/blue was just me trying to draw the lines clearly to make sure I understand what Cold was explaining. I was going to use the same 3/4line for the feed. (It is 3/4" return right now also.) Only because I can't really buy bulkheads again right now. Would that cause a problem?

My Res is the same height as my grow containers.. on the same levelled floor. However the Res. is a little more than twice as tall as the grow containers.
 
Cold$moke

Cold$moke

Well-Known Member
Do you have the big ass pump?

If so you would beed to mame your intake manifold out of at least 1 inch pipe.

300 could work on 1/2 but a 3/4 main would be better imo or build it with 1inch then upgrade your pump if you want later. :)

I top feed my setup with a 900 gph pump i get a complet circulation in under 2 min
It works sweet cause you can get acurate ph reads pretty fast aftwr you top up takes 2 mins or so and evens out :)
 
Cold$moke

Cold$moke

Well-Known Member
Sour Wreck said:
what if your control res is lower than your grow res, i kinda wanted to build it that way so i could drain the entire system from a valve at the bottom of the control rez.

that won't present problems, will it? only talking about 3-5 inches difference..
Click to expand...

The only ONLY way i would be comfortable running my res lower then my totes it would have to be able to contain ALL the water that gravity could provide ;)

Now a better option for a dropped ress would be to run a taller container and plumb the line in from the side .

At least it would guarantee no overflows

But if you post a drawing of your ideas id give it a looksi
 
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