My first DWC setup- Few general questions

Hi all,

For the last couple weeks i have been doing a lot of research on DWC. Seems like a pretty straight forward method for growing with hydro. But, I have come up with a few questions that i either can't find the answers to or i find multiple answers and not sure which to go with. Any help/advice will be much appreciated. Thanks in advance.
Let me first describe what my set up is going to look like. I will add pics later if needed, but i'm at work at the moment Earning my paycheck. I'm going to have 4 five gallon buckets linked up with 1/2" pvc pipe. will use three of the buckets to grow a plant each and the fourth bucket will be the control reservoir. I didn't plan on having a pump and line to recycle the solution from the last bucket in line back to the control res, but that depends on the answers to my questions.

--When adding the solution initially would i just add water through the control to get it to the level i want and then just add solution to the control bucket, let the solution mix naturally to the other buckets and then come back after some time to test the ppm and ph? If so how long to let if mix?

--When testing every day, since there isn't circultaion, do i have to test every bucket individually or can i just test the control? This is for testing the ppm and ph. And if i do just test the control I assume i just add what i need to the control and not to every bucket?

-- I'm assuming that my answers are going to be to hook up some type of circulation, but I'm trying to keep costs down. Trust me they are already climbing and i haven't even bought nutes yet.

-- A general question. I know it varies based on what nute formula you use and different variables, but on average how much nute solution can i expect to use per grow with this set up? I'm finding out that nutrients can get pretty pricey and i want to figure out if it is going to price me out of doing this set up. I plan on flushing every 10-14 days, but that could change depending on costs/nute usage by the plants/etc.

--If i top off every day through the control w/o circulation would i just add ph'd water? Or full solution mixture? Or some lighter solution mixture?

Like i said any advice would be much apprecaited. This is my first DWC grow so naturally i am a little apprehensive about getting things right and cost. Thanks again.

I always just premix my nutes in my five gallon jug to keep things easy. Then adjust your pH as needed.

If your trying to link the buckets via a pipe or tube sounds like your doing a dutch bucket system basically.

If it's your first DWC I would suggest just individual bucket systems. It can be a bit of a bitch when it comes to a reservoir change however it's beneficial as if the res gets a disease it takes out one plant, and not all.

You can see exactly what I talking about if you google image DWC.

Then all you need is the air-pump, tubing, air-stones and no circulation to worry about.

I would say at least flush every 3 weeks and you'll be fine.

General Hydroponics 3 part isn't too expensive and perfect for what you want to do.

Thanks JJ. The reason I am linking the buckets is because I will be growing SCROG and I would imagine that is it very difficult if not impossible to change to individual reservoirs once the plant is up into the screen. Thanks for the GH advice. I think i'm gonna go with the GH Micro and Bloom for my mix. Somewhere along the lines of the Lucas formula. It seems pretty straight forward and for the first time i want to KISS as much as I can with the nutrients.

Maybe if I give out a little more info on my setup i will get a little more feedback. Maybe I'll turn this into a grow journal. I don't have pics yet cause my setup is only about 90% done and i don't like taking pictures of stuff that won't accurately give you an idea of what I'm talking aboot. The grow room and setup should be done this weekend then I will start adding pictures.

I have an old 5x7x5 tin shed in my backyard. I cut the roof off and built it up about 2 feet with a wood frame then covered it with a clear plastic sheeting so the sunlight gets through. I also cut in a bunch of 6" circle windows where the sunlight hits the walls of the shed and covered them with the plastic sheeting. Basically I will growing with a combination of sunlight and artificial lights. Inside the shed i dug a 15" deep or so trench around the border of the inside. When you walk in you are on the original ground with the trench going from the left side of the door all the way around to the right side of the door. This trench will serve a couple purposes. First the shed was a little short for me. I kept hitting my head. Building down will allow the screen for the scrog to be about knee high. I deal for my Lurch ass. The other purpose of the trench is that it will, hopefully, keep the water temps down for all the reservoirs.

So you walk in and in the trench right in front of you is the controller bucket. Pvc coming out on the left and the right that go to the three 5 gallon buckets on each side of the shed in the trench for a total of 6 plants. I may switch up to seperate controller buckets for each side just incase Something goes wrong it only affects half the plants. And I plan on growing two different strains and they may need differents nutes. But that is still up in the air. Any advice on this?

So all of the buckets are linked and then in the last bucket I decided to go with a water pump that will pump the water back to the controller bucket. This will help keep the water circulating for maximum nute mix. It will also help to keep the water cooler. I'm sure there are other benefits as well. But my main reason for adding this is i just wanted to add/test/fill everything from the controller bucket and this will give me a more accurate reading. Also, in the last bucket in line on each side is a drain valve that i can hook up to a hose for draining the entire reservoir for flushing. Of course each bucket will have airstones in them... except the controller. That seemed a little overkill to me.

Connected to both sides of the shed are frames with a screen on them. These are connected to the shed with hinges so they fold up and latch to the side of the shed to get them out of the way when not in use. The screen are about 15" abouve the buckets but can be adjusted with a latch. There is also an exhaust fan up in the corner that is wire to a thermostat so when it gets too hot the fan kicks in to exhaust the heat.

This is deffinitely an expiriment since i will using both sunlight and artificial light. The shed gets sunlight from about 7 am to around 3pm. This ideal as it gets hot here in the late afternoon and at the time the shed will be in the shade. I have two 450w MH lights that i will be hanging over each side. (During flowering they will be switched to two 450w HPS) I am also going to have CFLs on each side. My plan is to have about 650-700 watts total on each side. So about 200-250 in CFLs. The more light the better right? But i also don't want to be overkill and just burning through electricity for no reason. Thoughts on this?

Finally, for nutrients I plan on using a variation of the Lucas Formula using GH Micro and Bloom. I also plan on using some Hydroguard, SM-90 and possibly some Liquid Karma, but we will see what feedback I get from the pros here. I will be using my tap water, so I don't believe I will need any Cal-Mag but time will tell. I may try some Cannazyme, but isn't that very similar to Hydroguard? I wouldn't need both right? I plan on topping of the control every day with pH'd water only. And flushing every 10-14 days or so with a fresh nutrient solution.

Anyways I thought i would just dish out the details and hopefully get some feedback as my grow gets more intense. I'm sure I will be coming across problems here and there that I will need advice on, so i might as well keep this thing going the whole time instead of just coming back every now and then with questions. Thoughts? Advice? Feedback? As always, any comment is appreciated as you at least took the time to read my thread. Thanks


P.S. a tiny background on me. I have grown the wik method before... which actually turned into a type of bubbler because the roots ended up growing down through the ropes into the solution. I did not ph test. Did not TDS test. Because it was a crap shoot and i ended up with 7 ounces of decent not great bud off two plants. So theres that. I have grown in soil a few times here and there. But, i would still consider myself a newb when it comes to hydro and definitely with respects to DWC. I am a fast learner and very motivated so any advice given will be appreciated and considered thoroughly... most likely even used as i differ to those with more experience. Thanks again. Pics soon fo sho.

I'll offer some input. I grow in soil, however I have experience with hydro/DWC. I also have a good friend who has one of the best DWC systems I've ever seen and he easily yields a lb per plant.

First and foremost, if you want to go with DWC you will need a chiller. You absolutely need one to be successful, and they aren't cheap. This can make or break a DWC setup. He recommends keeping the water temperature set to 61 degrees. I know some will say to keep it around 67, but he has explained to me in the 15 years he's been doing it, this temperature gives the root system the quickest access to oxygen in the water and they will flourish. A little about the set up itself...

It's a 5 gallon bucket system, each bucket is ring fed at the top with nutrient solution into a basket. The bucket has a 3/4" drain hose 11" from the bottom of the bucket. Each bucket in the system drains to a central sump bucket with a pump that returns the water to the chiller and then back to the res. Each bucket also has 2 air pumps pumping a liter of air into it. The reason for two pumps is redundancy in case of a failure. This allows the roots to sit in very oxygen rich water at a cold temperature as the water drains to the sump as it is replenished with fresh, chilled solution. The entire system runs on a couple timers, one for the main pump that feeds nutrient solution to each bucket, and then the pump in the sump bucket. It's actually quite simple.

To sweeten the deal, he also uses some other additives to his nutrient solution, but is running on the Lucas formula. I know he uses Rhizotonic, CannaZym, and Open Sesame. The grow room is also CO2 enriched. However, his setup just on the Lucas formula will yield killer results. I'm curious to learn more about the House and Garden line of nutrients, as I know they have a potent setup for Coco grows. I'm pleased with the Canna nutrients that I use for soil, so I am sure their nutes in a hydro setup could be very promising well.

Thanks tehnick for the good info. you can never have too much info.
Keeping the water temps down is crucial to preventing problem with the rez. At some point i will be getting a water cooler at some point. Im trying to keep costs down initially and then improve as funds come in. Another upgrade would be the addition of co2. Can't afford it at the moment so I will get by without this grow. I will be singing to them daily

Ruh17 said:

Thanks tehnick for the good info. you can never have too much info.
Keeping the water temps down is crucial to preventing problem with the rez. At some point i will be getting a water cooler at some point. Im trying to keep costs down initially and then improve as funds come in. Another upgrade would be the addition of co2. Can't afford it at the moment so I will get by without this grow. I will be singing to them daily

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Definitely keep the water cool. The roots will start to stress around 74-75 degrees and at around 76 degrees it will start to kill the root system. You could lose a grow in a matter of an hour or two once the root zone hits 76 degrees. I honestly think if you can't afford the chiller right of the bat, wait to go DWC before you can. Trust me. I went down that road once before and learned the hard way. It sucks that the chiller is the most expensive part. If you cannot afford to go with a chiller, a simple Ebb n Flow will do the trick for hydro and won't require a chiller. The House and Garden line is great for Coco and E&F setups. I know of a couple people using that form of hydro and that brand of nutes who get some bangin results. Another option too, as you can get a good E&F setup for the price a damned chiller.

I think it varies from strain to strain or grow to grow as far as res temps. 76 is high, but it wont kill master kush, not even in a 48 hour period. Mine stay at 69-71 all day and night with no chiller. If they did get hotter than that i would put a 20 oz bottle of frozen water in and they drop to 62 within minutes. You dont NEED a chiller to grow killer bud in dwc, but you should keep an eye on your temps.If you use chemical fert 72-74 is ok, not good but ok. If you go organic you can run into problems above 72. I run my room at 82f all day but the floor is usually around 68 to 70 and that is where the res sits so they stay cool.I guess if i ran my lights 24/7 my res would get hot sooner or later,but even on my veg plants (18/6 ) they get 6 hours to cool and that is enough. What i like about dwc is how cheap it is to get into, airstone, small pump, 5 gal bucket, and maybe a frozen bottle of water. good luck. this one is in a 6 gallon bucket, 2 airstones from meijer, running off of a bad ass pump that is pumping 3 buckets(could do 10 or 12 )

technik how u doing bud? well i have a few dwc crops under my belt and if you want to do a scrog well i have a few tips ill share with you that ive learned along the way.although these tips will prob be disagreed with by some but my point of veiw is ive proven my method and it works well. basicly for dwc you need a res and lid which is the obvious but what is not so obvious is what you dont need!!!!!

my sys consists of 4 kiddie paddling pools 2.50gbp from asda each measuring a meter square.over each pool has a self made lid (wood frame with two layers of black and white stretched over top) stuck into the lids are 60 wall plugs (well about the top cm of wall plug anyway)
there is a 5th tank for cloning dwc. same as the others just under 24 lighting. the cuttings are taken from mother dipped in clonex then placed through the wall plugs so stems are bout an inch under water.in two weeks will have full young root system established will then be vegged for another 2 weeks then the lid will placed on the first of the four tanks under 12/12.when that lid is moved to flower thena new set of 60 cuttings are taken and placed cloner and do this every two weeks ensuring that you move the first tank to 2nd tank 2nd to 3rd and 3rd to 4th every two weeks.you will then end up with a dwc perpetual harvest.
it may sound a lil complicated but i assure you its not. to empty tanks just get urself a water pump. a multi plant system i found is a lot more stable when it comes to ppm and p.h plus it means less tanks to change than seperate buckets, no need for net pots or clay pebbles or rockwool cubes.
check my grow out it has diagrams to explain in more detail.
if you dont have the room to do meter squares do it smaller as long as you keep to the basic principles of the system youll be laughing every two weeks. and if your worrying bout res temps like was previously mentiond bottle of ice. keep bubbling dude.

viva la bubbloution