Topping up the nutrient mixture

Al B. Fuct · Apr 30, 2007

Originally Posted by Al B. Fuct
Fair enough; if you can save up and buy the bigger ones sometime later on, it probably would save you a little.

If you add freshly mixed stuff with the right proportions to a depleted tank, you're still going to wind up with unknown and probably excessive concentrations of some nutes. You still can't measure individual nutes in the solution with an EC meter. All you can measure is the TOTAL solution conductivity.

If you don't have bottles of the individual component nutrients and a mass spectrometer handy, you're never going to get the proportions of a 'freshened' tank identical to that of a freshly mixed tank.

On saving money, could you reduce your tank sizes to use less mix per dump?

nongreenthumb said:
that would just bring everything your talking about closer,

Yes, if you have a mass spectrometer and quantities of the individual nutes- you can get very close, if not spot on.

you didnt answer my previous message though about ratios

I've answered your question several times in several different ways. If you can't get it from all the effort I've put in explaining it, you're not capable of understanding.

I'm happy with my way and i dont think i would be any better off doing it your way, not noticeably anyway

You're welcome to misuse the products you buy in any way you like.

nongreenthumb · Apr 30, 2007

Al B. Fuct said:
Yes, if you have a mass spectrometer and quantities of the individual nutes- you can get very close, if not spot on.

I've answered your question several times in several different ways. If you can't get it from all the effort I've put in explaining it, you're not capable of understanding.

You're welcome to misuse the products you buy in any way you like.

its not me who is uncapable of understanding, your not capable of helping me to understand whatever diluded ideas you have, just cus the canna man said so.

I'm off to bed anyway its late and im tired of your bullshit

Al B. Fuct · Apr 30, 2007

Bedtime is as good as an excuse as any to stop defending the indefensible.

its not me who is uncapable of understanding, your not capable of helping me to understand whatever diluded ideas you have

Your spelling and grammar are every bit as good as your other capacities.

Milk & cookies for you? :lol:

nongreenthumb · Apr 30, 2007

Al B. Fuct said:
Bedtime is as good as an excuse as any to stop defending the indefensible.

Your spelling and grammar are every bit as good as your other capacities.

Milk & cookies for you?

You go on thinking what you want, thats upto you. you dump your nutes every week, go on pretending that you know something about life.

I have no problems, I let you carry on as you have and then people can follow your ideas and then see how wrong you are.

Btw. would i be wrong for for how i spell colour?

GreenGro · May 1, 2007

Al B. Fuct said:
If you only add water, the nutrients remain close to the proportions that the maker intends- for the specified tank life. If you're adding more nute mix, there's a good chance that you're going to have much more of one nutrient in proportion to others.

quote]

If the nutrients remain close to the proportions the maker intends and I add more nute mix mixed up as original then the whole mix should be even closer to the proportions the maker intends than if I didn't add more. Of this there can be no doubt surely?

BUT if the plants will only take the nutrients they need which can cause the mix to be out of proportion slightly in the beginning then what is the problem with out of proportion mixes anyhow so long as there is enough of each nutrient, wont the plant just leave what it doesn't need?

entropic · May 1, 2007

High concentrations of some nutrients can lock out other nutrients from the plant

GreenGro · May 1, 2007

Al B. Fuct said:
It does, read it again.

Ooooookay- once more- with feeling!

The maker expects that the component nutrients will be consumed over the specified lifetime of a tank. The solutions are designed so that the nute proportions will remain IN AN ACCEPTABLE RANGE for that lifetime. It's a bell-curve.

Nope. Adding more freshly mixed sauce will push some proportions too high while making others closer to the middle of the bell curve.

Again, without a mass spectrometer, you won't know what to add- and if you're adding more nutrient mix, which contains everything, not just the stuff that's been depleted, you're throwing the proportions out of the range the maker intends.

Again though I don't see that you can make an out of proportion mix any more out of proportion by mixing it with an in proportion mix, that goes against some pretty obvious principles.

Anyhow, I'm new to this grow lark and will be following the manufacturers instructructions for a while till I feel my own way around but I still believe the above has to be correct. :blsmoke:

nongreenthumb · May 1, 2007

GreenGro said:
Again though I don't see that you can make an out of proportion mix any more out of proportion by mixing it with an in proportion mix, that goes against some pretty obvious principles.

Anyhow, I'm new to this grow lark and will be following the manufacturers instructructions for a while till I feel my own way around but I still believe the above has to be correct.

I agree with you completely

nongreenthumb · May 1, 2007

Can you also afford to chuck all those nutes away every 2 weeks, if you still get results your happy with, then its in no way false economy.

GreenGro · May 1, 2007

Well the only way to see which gives the best results is by testing things.

Although I know the nutes are expensive my main thing is time, the less time I have to spend on it all the better.

I bought some of that rhizotonic, is that a waste of money then? also I haven't got any of this h2o2 is that something I should be looking at?

Thanks

nongreenthumb · May 1, 2007

GreenGro said:
Well the only way to see which gives the best results is by testing things.

Although I know the nutes are expensive my main thing is time, the less time I have to spend on it all the better.

I bought some of that rhizotonic, is that a waste of money then? also I haven't got any of this h2o2 is that something I should be looking at?

Thanks

h202 works out to be really expensive, I wouldnt bother with that, your better off adding an air pump and air stones. as this will had oxygen consistantly, h202 only remains in the tank for about 2 days, then you have to add it again and it works out that you need quite a lot.

I dont know about the rhizotonic as i have never used it, the only things you really need nutrient wise,

Grow
bloom
boost/pk booster
ph down/up
although i use liquid silicon for ph up

GreenGro · May 1, 2007

I have all of them, I didn't bother with rhizotonic to start but then the grow shop guy convinced me it would be useful whengetting seeds going and essential for rooting clones. took a 10er off me for 250ml so not the end of the world i spose

nongreenthumb · May 1, 2007

GreenGro said:
I have all of them, I didn't bother with rhizotonic to start but then the grow shop guy convinced me it would be useful whengetting seeds going and essential for rooting clones. took a 10er off me for 250ml so not the end of the world i spose

he would do because he is just like the canna man, a salesman, hes in a job to make money by selling products.

As you are probably aware salesman will say just about anything to insure a sale, they dont often think about future sales, just closing the one they are in at the minute

tokaboy7 · May 1, 2007

i find as you get later into bloom you have to change every week. as the up take of nutes is varied in every plant. some will use more than others. i know some will say its a waste of nutes but it keeps your plants at an optimum. i also only top up with ph'd water. as i have encountered lock out when topping up with half strength nutes. keep your ph low to start with about 5.2 then let it get up to around 6.2 this should allow for the maximum uptake of different nutes in the solution. i have had no problems since. i also flush through with ph'd water every 2 weeks the plants love it.

Al B. Fuct · May 1, 2007

GreenGro said:
If the nutrients remain close to the proportions the maker intends

Which they do for a certain time period.

and I add more nute mix mixed up as original then the whole mix should be even closer to the proportions the maker intends than if I didn't add more. Of this there can be no doubt surely?

Umm, no.

Let's say your depleted nute solution has only 20% of the N, 50% of the P and 30% of the K remaining after a couple of weeks.

You most likely do not have the option to add only N, P or K by themselves. Your pre-mixed nutrient solution has all the elements in a fixed ratio.

If you somehow could gauge how much of each element exists in the solution and you added enough nute mix to bring P to 100%, you would only have 70% of the N and 80% of the K of a freshly mixed batch of sauce. If you added enough nute mix to bring our sample depleted solution's K to 100%, the N would be 90% and p would be 120%... oops, nute burn...

The overall percentages in a nute-topped-up tank of sauce will be higher but not in correct proportion. Proportion of NPK ratios make a big difference in the sort of growth they best suit.

Clear now?

However, far as I know, none of us has a mass spectrometer to divine precisely what is in the nute solution to try to patch up a depleted tank. You're going to get it a lot closer to right by just mixing up a fresh tank per instructions.

Al B. Fuct · May 1, 2007

nongreenthumb said:
h202 works out to be really expensive, I wouldnt bother with that, your better off adding an air pump and air stones. as this will had oxygen consistantly, h202 only remains in the tank for about 2 days, then you have to add it again and it works out that you need quite a lot.

H2O2 is used primarily as an antimicrobial; it can oxygenate, but that's not the main reason for using it.

I pay $AUD3.80/litre for 50% horticultural grade H2O2 and use about 100ml per week- that's 38 cents per week. Junior can still go to uni.

I'd use H2O2 whether I was oxygenating with air stones or not. Fungi in particular love nute mixes and will colonise a tank as though they had gotten an engraved invitation. 50% grade H2O2 applied at 1ml/litre every 3-4 days sorts it out.

GreenGro · May 1, 2007

Al B. Fuct said:
Which they do for a certain time period.

Umm, no.

Let's say your depleted nute solution has only 20% of the N, 50% of the P and 30% of the K remaining after a couple of weeks.

You most likely do not have the option to add only N, P or K by themselves. Your pre-mixed nutrient solution has all the elements in a fixed ratio.

If you somehow could gauge how much of each element exists in the solution and you added enough nute mix to bring P to 100%, you would only have 70% of the N and 80% of the K of a freshly mixed batch of sauce. If you added enough nute mix to bring our sample depleted solution's K to 100%, the N would be 90% and p would be 120%... oops, nute burn...

The overall percentages in a nute-topped-up tank of sauce will be higher but not in correct proportion. Proportion of NPK ratios make a big difference in the sort of growth they best suit.

Clear now?
.

No beacause as you say we don't have a mass spectrometer to see what we need so we would not top up the nutes enough to make the k100% as you suggest but instead we would top up until the ppm is correct, if this is done with a regular mix of nutes you couldn't make anything be 120% you would have to go beyond the target ppm to do this. This goes back to what im saying about not being able to make an out of proportion mix more out of proportion by topping up with a proportionate mix.

Obviously if it were possible to try and do what you suggested to get a certain element back to 100% ignoring the overall ppm then it could happen but as you pointed out nobody has the facilities to do that.

nongreenthumb · May 1, 2007

none of us are as rich and can afford a spectrothingamajig, thats why we do it our way, if we were that right then lets chuck all our nutes every 2 weeks on al's say so.

Al B. Fuct · May 1, 2007

GreenGro said:
No beacause as you say we don't have a mass spectrometer to see what we need so we would not top up the nutes enough to make the k100% as you suggest but instead we would top up until the ppm is correct,

Problem is, EC meters measure 'total dissolved salts,' which is a measure of the electrical conductivity of a solution, caused by one or more ionic impurities. The indicated ppm can be right while the proportions are way off. In example, it'd be possible to have a perfectly normal looking 1500ppm and have no N in solution at all. Moreover, you'll have no idea at all anything's wrong.

An EC meter measures everything; it doesn't even care what sort of 'salt' is in the water. You can make a nute meter indicate anything with plain water and table salt (sodium chloride), but you'd sure not want to put that solution on a plant- unless it were seaweed.

If you progressively top up nutes without ever dumping, it'll continue to get "wronger" until it shows up as nute deficiencies or burns.

Al B. Fuct · May 1, 2007

nongreenthumb said:
none of us are as rich and can afford a spectrothingamajig, thats why we do it our way, if we were that right then lets chuck all our nutes every 2 weeks on al's say so.

You must be a lot richer than everyone else if you can afford to pay $60 to mix up 360L of nutes. Only costs $AUD24 ($USD19.68 ) for me to mix up 500L.

Shop better and you won't have to cut corners.

Topping up the nutrient mixture

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