Soiler Reforming to Bubble/AeroPonics - VERTICAL - Check it !!

Hello Aeroponic enthusiasts !!
I am 4 weeks into 12/12 of what may be my third and final soil grow!!! The girls look great and I know I have my climate finally dialed in and holding steady 70-72 deg lights on /62-68 deg lights off no matter what the time of year. (I am dropping my purple kush mama lower as the flowering continues - already she has the fattest tops! - size of my big thumb!)
Once flowering has completed on all plants I plan to pull all soil, disinfect, sterilize, and refit my rooms for Aeroponics / Bubbleponics. I want to move from a full plant grow out to a perpetual harvest.
I have been researching for the last 3 months planning for this change over. Got some great advise from this and other sites and also some AMAZING info from the book Jeff Mowta’s - Marijuana New School - Indoor Cultivation, The plans for my aerotower are based on a design from this book - I just converted them to a much smaller setup.
Looking for some comments and advise for my new growroom set ups and then advise and comment as the build and grow happen.

Current Set Up:
2x2x5 Motherplant Tent
I have a 2x2x5 motherplant tent which now houses 4 - 5 gallon soil buckets with mamas who are now flowering out this cycle (YUMM !!!).

3x3x7 Flowering Room
My other ‘flowering’ room is 3x3x7 which at the moment is flowering out 8 clones which vegged for 30 days. <BTW - Growing some GH Ice for the first (and last) time and that bitch is lanky! almost like a vine! Might be good for a SCROG grow showed the fastest buds - just not right for my setup.>

New Set Up:
2x2x5 Motherplant Tent

I already have a air cooled 250 watt fixture in this tent and will stick with that for veging the moms on a 18/6.
The plan is to convert my mother tent to a Stealth Hydro bubbleponics tub which will house my 6 moms, I know this will be tight but as I will be cutting these ladies allot I figure I will be keeping them trim... or should I just get a custom 4 top with 6 inch pots and only house 4 moms not 6? I like variety in my medicine... I am treating several ailments which require the effects of both indica and sativa and their hybrids, but I do want to do what is best... ADVISE ME PLEASE !!
I have read ALOT of Roseman’s posts as well as Roseman and Purpdaddys guide for my Bubbleponics setup from Stealth Hydroponics (thanks so much guys!) and I am going to opt to buy this set up from stealthhydro - I love DIY but I will have plenty of that with my custom built aerotower !!

3x3x7 Flowering Room
(See Illustration below)
I have also read allot of Heath Robinson’s posts and have considered a modified ebb & flow like his, but my set up is really for one wall not a circle of grow tubes in my modified aerotower.
As I said above the plans for my aerotower are based on a design from Jeff Mowta’s - Marijuana New School - Indoor Cultivation, I just converted them to a much smaller setup.
I am using a 16 gallon Rubbermaid for the base/reservoir and will have two aerotowers with 5 - 4 inch net pots on each tower running into the base/reservoir tub. A 350 GPH pump will push nutrient water from the tub up thru 1/2 inch pvc ‘feed tube’. The ‘feed tube’ will have three ‘t’s along its length, which house manifolds to distribute individual spray lines with a mister on the end for each net pot.



I will be using a air cooled 600 watt HPS mounted vertically on one wall facing the opposite wall which will have the Aerotower. Each 4 inch T will house a basket - 10 baskets in all - each will have one clone from the moms placed into it after rooting in my cloner.
I am guessing I may have to add a chiller to the tub from what I have read.
I was also considering adding an additional pump and feedline with an airstone in it - either additional individual lines to each pot (like bubbleponics) or flowing from the TOP of the tube down. Seems like this might be of benefit as the roots are in there last growth cycle... or maybe I am overthinking it... ADVISE ANYONE?

Oh and here are some shots of my current girls so you don’t think I am full of shite.

I considered this at one time. Seems whenever I tried deep bucket of clay rocks ,it would grow great through only media untill it hit the bottom.Then it might have slowed down.
Anyway how about just dripping the nutes/h20 into the tube from the top.Only two fluid lines instead of ~10. This might create more oxygen?.
I dont agree that bubbling the h20 is that much more beneficial. _ it doesnt justify the extra noise and electricity.Your roots are going to be suspended in oxygen anyway.

Interesting. An alternate design of this tower does simply water from above. I just figured with all I have read about Aero and bubbleponics is that you wanted to introduce the nute water spraying close to the roots.

Seems interesting I will be watching this for sure. I have a couple quick questions. You said you are just doing one is this because of space? Also you said you have read through heaths grows and designs couldnt you just stick one tube at the top and have that water splashing over all the roots constantly like a water fall ? If you do a successful grow I will seriously be considering doing a similar design because you could do multiple ones and have a res. for each and make 3,4,5,6 or 8 around a single light and you could pull them apart if they get to close or you need to get to the middle. Plus because it would be easy to just add another unit it would make upgrading easy. Anyways I wish you the best of luck!

Healing Herb said:

Interesting. An alternate design of this tower does simply water from above. I just figured with all I have read about Aero and bubbleponics is that you wanted to introduce the nute water spraying close to the roots.

Click to expand...

I think with all the splashing going on from the water hitting the roots that you wouldn't need multiple sprayers. You should post this design in heaths vertical thread and get some feedback from others who are considering doing verts and maybe from heath himself, he has been around lately.
https://www.rollitup.org/hydroponics-aeroponics/149998-heaths-flooded-tube-vertical.html

Hey healing Herb! I'm swtiching from soil to aero just like u and I need alot more info. Can u please tell me where I can get that book by Jeff Mowta? I'm excited about aero, I've heard only good things about it, anywayz thanx Herb!

I think the book is available all over the net ... but I picked it up at my local farmacy. Thank the ganja gods I live in safe and sane CALI !!

The book is awesome and has a HUGE section of hydro set ups - in fact the guy is pretty anti soil... this is the book that changed my mind (well that and all the hydro posts here!!)

Hey Nickbbad,

Thanks for the suggestion. BTW the book I got the plans I modified from actually has the aerotowers set up with each tower ending in a 5 gallon bucket mini-res. Set up the towers around the light source (like heaths set up) and connect them all to a larger resevour.

I will be buying that book off amazon in the next week or so and I hope people here will take interest and help you along the way.

On the diagram ,would the spray nozzle get clogged with roots? Can you get to it if it does?
Personally, I would fill the entire tower with grow rocks,then drip from the very top( top side, same side as the plants). Also . leave a space at top so you get a splashing cascade effect for oxygen .
Hope it goes well!

The Idea of filling the tubes is an interesting one. Wouldn't that cause a lot of major trouble once the time came to clean and refill for the next cycle?

Nozzle cleaning is a great point - definately would need to set the feed lines to be be pulled and inspected easily. Again perhaps this begs a feedline that is more like a bubbleponics feedline - with no sprayer at the end. The major disadvantage to this set up is that there is no possibility of DWC benifit like you get from the water slide design like Heaths... and if the pump shuts down you are SOL...

Hummmm.

I might be rethinking this...

if you look into the coliseum http://www.4hydro.com/hydroponics/coliseum.asp they use perlite in theirs but I wouldn't suggest filling it with anything as it would be a pain to clean and really not needed. and I think with the humidity in the tubes if your pump did shut off you would have a day to be able to fix it before any real problems set in.

Ok so I am rethinking the Aero Tower. Biggest concern with AERO is the clogging of the misters. Also cleaning and sterilizing between grows. The more I read and SEE the pics! on Heath Robinson's tube set ups I have come up with a new SIMPLE design based on HEATHs. I call mine the 2 X 7 Grow Luge ! (my space is 2' x 2' x 7' vertical)

The Dams will be the biggest challenge I think for me. For cost reasons this will be all 4 inch PVC (available at the local HDDP) not the soil tube that Heath uses. My guess is that if I pre assemble each tube with dams I should be able to find and set the correct hight and angle of the dam for optimum water level... then as long as I keep a level on the pipe while setting it up outside the booth - and when I mount it inside there should be no need for adjusting the dam... am I right? - or missing something.

I thought I would also use a 350 GPH pump with a BYPASS to adjust flow... overkill? Would a 230 GPH work better and add less heat to my RES ? (16 gallon rubbermaid - 12- 14 gallons of water)

Any reason to add bubbles to the RES or is this just overkill considering the water flow oxenization... guessing the later considering Heaths grows... or does my smaller scale effect this ya think?



Gonna post this in Heaths thread to see if he has any valuable input...

I think the 230 would be fine and there should be no need to bubble the res. Also you should do a higher contrasting color in you pic for your tubes I could barely see how the tubes were set in a S formation with the white tubes so maybe make them grey in your pic. And it would be good if you could find something to seal the pieces together that is waterproof without it being permanently sealed ( silicone ? ) so you can take it down if you like or if you decide to change up the design. And your probably going to need some support backing or something so there is not a lot of weight on any one section . and yes once the dams are set there should be no need for them to be moved except maybe when your draining it out cause they will hold water.

Damn great idea about silicone sealer so they can be taken apart!!!

I will make a new jpg. Strange how dif they look per monitor ... just looked at it on each of mine and its do diff!!

Pretty sure this is the way to go. Gotta crawl before I walk in this new hydro world. In fact I am setting up a mini seeding/cloning booth right now to get my feet wet. Just a small 15" x 33" flood table. Thinking I will start my clones or seed in the same 3.5 net pots that will eventually go into the Grow Luge, that way less root stress no?

Thanks again for your help.