Titan RDWC | 60 Gallon | 6 Sites| MegaCrop

kingtitan

Well-Known Member
Made some adjustments to the water.

PH: 5.81
Nutrient:Added Mega Crop +60g
Total Solution: 570ppm
Water Temps: 64f - 68f by end of 18 hour light cycle.
Room Temp: lights on 23c, 25c under hottest hot spot.
RH: 35% lights on and 50% lights
Wind: Trying out higher wind gusts on the floor tower fan.
Lights: about 20 inches

Plants ppms were going down faster now and plants were looking good, maybe a little light green so I boosted the ppm with MC with 2 x 30g doses 48hrs apart.

So I am finding roots traveling with the flow into other buckets. I am afraid this will lead to a blockage and then a flood? Should I be trimming these every few days?

Some things I have been brainstorming:
  • I have thought about screens and such but they would all eventually clog or the roots will grow into them and break off when I lift lids, or maybe just moving them around daily would prevent this? I have used those crochet screens in the crafts department to make mesh "pipes" for aquariums but probably would not work for roots?
  • I have heard of people using orange construction mesh rolled up into a ball and put over the pipe, thoughts? maybe window type mesh rolled up perhaps?
  • What about using paint strainers for 5 gallon buckets? I could tip tie it to the net pot. They seem to be in the 600 micron size, would this have any problems with oxygen/nutrients? Air stone in the bag with the roots or outside churning the water?
The idea is to create lots of surface area for water to pass through even if blockages start to happen.

Another idea is maybe to turn down the flow of the re-circulation pump? right now I I think the system recirculates 10-13 times per hour.
 

kingtitan

Well-Known Member
What about doing some kinda root training? Like I gather all the long ones and wrap them up or loose knot?

I wont be able to do this with a net which i had planned. Maybe I should look at cutting open doors on the lids before they get too big to handle?
 

Cold$moke

Well-Known Member
Paint strainers sound good as long as they dont
Slow your flow. I used them a lot for going arnound my pumps as a filter.
Good if you use an in res pump anyway.

Root training is an option or pruning .

I have my airstones positioned almost under my return pipes it bubbles most of the roots out of the way

But since this is my first run with this particular set up i wouldnt know till the end :)

Dont know if turning your flow down would help or not as i built my setups different i get a full circulation in about 2 mins by my calculations.
So i turn over 30 times plus an hour

I used slightly taller chambers ... perhaps this is what is helping? I havent noticed any root clogging issues yet 1 week into flower with about a 8 week veg or so but i think these plants are slow cause they where monster cropped.
 

Cold$moke

Well-Known Member
Observation lids are excellent but hard to make nicley lol but ive made many for exactly the same reasons as you :)

Actually my first rdwc set up had perfet size in my opinion containers meant to stack on eachother yet they all had lids

They have them at target i think like a stackable dog food tote with a hinged lid at a 45 degree angle 16gal cubes.Theu where perfect in theory but in practice they deflected to much cause they where to weak to handle the water pressure.

But the size shape and lid screamed hydro system to me lol
 

kingtitan

Well-Known Member
Here they are tonight

Group Shot
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Day 39 Veg

Pineapple Express #1
20180227_015002.jpg

Bubba's Gift #2
20180227_015009.jpg

Bubba's Gift #1 - This ones always been really big broad leafed and droopy, but it seems extra droopy today. Thoughts?
20180227_014946.jpg 20180227_014950.jpg

Day 26 Veg

Pineapple Express #4
20180227_015015.jpg

Blue Cheese #1
20180227_015022.jpg

Day 19 Veg

Pineapple Express #5
20180227_015018.jpg
 

kingtitan

Well-Known Member
Observation lids are excellent but hard to make nicley lol but ive made many for exactly the same reasons as you :)

Actually my first rdwc set up had perfet size in my opinion containers meant to stack on eachother yet they all had lids

They have them at target i think like a stackable dog food tote with a hinged lid at a 45 degree angle 16gal cubes.Theu where perfect in theory but in practice they deflected to much cause they where to weak to handle the water pressure.

But the size shape and lid screamed hydro system to me lol
I know exactly the containers you mean. I had all my treats in that for my pup (RIP). Now I am picturing it and it really does scream hydro lol. I currently have potatoes in it...not growing or anything like that, just storage lmao!
 

kingtitan

Well-Known Member
Paint strainers sound good as long as they dont
Slow your flow. I used them a lot for going arnound my pumps as a filter.
Good if you use an in res pump anyway.

Root training is an option or pruning .

I have my airstones positioned almost under my return pipes it bubbles most of the roots out of the way

But since this is my first run with this particular set up i wouldnt know till the end :)

Dont know if turning your flow down would help or not as i built my setups different i get a full circulation in about 2 mins by my calculations.
So i turn over 30 times plus an hour

I used slightly taller chambers ... perhaps this is what is helping? I havent noticed any root clogging issues yet 1 week into flower with about a 8 week veg or so but i think these plants are slow cause they where monster cropped.
30 times/hr! would you even need air stones in each bucket at that rate?

with 60 gallons I think I can get max 19/hr turnover if i have it full on.

I did some research on pump sizing and with the Current Culture retail setups that sell for thousands (yikes) the mag 9.5 was on the 12+ site systems. the smaller 4-9 setups use the small mags. All of them show an averages 6-7 /hr. But more cant hurt right? :cool:
 

Cold$moke

Well-Known Member
If everything else is happy except that one id look at the roots first.

if they are happy and the water level isnt magically way low in that one tote ;)

Id just make sure that one isnt getting the roots too pummled

If not ive no clue but im tierd and cant think right now lol
 

Cold$moke

Well-Known Member
30 times/hr! would you even need air stones in each bucket at that rate?

with 60 gallons I think I can get max 19/hr turnover if i have it full on.

I did some research on pump sizing and with the Current Culture retail setups that sell for thousands (yikes) the mag 9.5 was on the 12+ site systems. the smaller 4-9 setups use the small mags. All of them show an averages 6-7 /hr. But more cant hurt right? :cool:
Ha ha i built mine speacial cause sometimes i ride the short bus lol

Easy to get fast circ times if you lower yoyr res size :mrgreen: just figure out how much they use up in a week and top off and refill every week 2 max

Cause they seem to deplete the small res quickly :) but it works for me.

I designed the setup for small water capacity

No i dont think i need stones at all :)
But i use them simply to churn water and give an air exchange as i built them pretty air tight for the most part
 

Cold$moke

Well-Known Member
lol. actually I was letting the water level drop a bit and haven't topped off as much with plain, maybe that could be it? ill try raising a bit higher tomorrow.

Yea dwc likes steady higher water levels if you let it sit out of water too long they become cord roots which some believe are a waste of energy

So yea i just top mine up with plain water and after a week to 2 weeks ill dump it depending on what the ppm meter is doing.


I posted som updates in my journal

Later man sleepy time lol
 

Cold$moke

Well-Known Member
Last thing just make sure you dont make an observation lid that will jeopardize the integrity of the lid itself :)

The great paradox how to put a hole in a lid without weakening it :) cause your plants will get heavy soon :fire:
 

kingtitan

Well-Known Member
February 28th Water Change (Water 13 days old).

I was seeing some slower growth so I decided to do a water change. I pulled all but ~12 gallons of water. I wanted to leave some biology in there and I also did not scrub any bio-film from the sides. I wanted to go another week but I also wanted to do a water change just after the 12/12 stretch so doing it now worked better for the schedule.

I had about 20 gallons of RO water that I needed to dump but instead I mixed this in to help dilute my hard water that is at 210+. I premade the solution in my 33 gal trash can, ph 5.5 and ppm ~1000.

Some mistakes I made:
Forgot to cap my res before dumping. I had planned to mix my pre made and filtered tap water, adjust then release. So plants got a shock of that and varying PH 6.9 and PPM water.

PH: 5.78
Nutrient: Added Mega Crop 130g
Total Solution: 605ppm
Water Temps: 64f - 68f by end of 18 hour light cycle.
Room Temp: lights on 22c, 24c under hottest hot spot.
RH: 48% lights on and 59% lights off
Wind: back to night mode on both fans, nice steady flow going.
Lights: about 20 inches
 
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kingtitan

Well-Known Member
After 6 hours lights off I noticed the roots were brown. They are not slimy, they are not smelling (smells like root vegetables when I sniff up close) they are also not breaking or anything. Roots lower down in the water were whiter.

Some possible causes:
  • Shock from my bad water change technique
  • Staining from high PPM MegaCrop
  • Too big water change volume upset biology
  • Roots were only 2 weeks from the slime outbreak and bio film had not fully settled on the root masses
  • Something in my RO?
Thoughts?
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kingtitan

Well-Known Member
24 hours the plants are looking very happy pointing up and "taco" leaves, doesn't look like the bad kind of taco"ing"though. Roots still look tanish cant really tell if its lighter or not but it doesn't seem to be affecting them. The Bubba bottom right is still a bit droopy but up a bit more. I think this is just how this pheno is lol.

20180301_201635.jpg

The big ones are getting a bit big...17 inches so I am really needing to do some training or netting in the next day or two.

I topped all the remaining small ones before the water change. I think I may throw this into 12/12 on the MH for the stretch in a few days.

For netting I am thinking instead of doing one big net and having no flexibility I would perhaps add some kinda post to the corner of each lid, be it dowel or pvc then cut up the trellis to stretch each individual tote?
 

kingtitan

Well-Known Member
24 hour water parameters:

PH: 5.83
Total Solution: 593ppm
Water Temps: 65F

I was finding roots traveling to other totes so I used a sterile plastic stick to gently pull them back and wrap them around and into the main mass. hopefully that worked. I had to turn my pump off to pull the roots going into the line that water pulls from the totes in the back as the suction was too much and difficult to pull with the stick.
 
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