Who grows DWC without a chiller?

Rahz

Rahz

Well-Known Member
Bottom line, you can get great yields at 65-75. Take precautions to keep the rot away. Chiller not necessary. It's another thing that needs to be cleaned. You'll need to cycle a sterilizing solution through it between grows. Want to grow root rot... use a chiller and don't sanitize it properly between grows.
 
TheHappyDrunk

TheHappyDrunk

New Member
I'm about to start my first RDWC run without a chiller. Being in the garage (concrete floors), and having fair weather here, I'm hoping I can avoid problems. If I'm using an inline water pump, is it only the ambient temperature of the grow tent/surrounding environment that's affecting the water temp? It's not like the water temperature would ever exceed the temperature of the surrounding area after all--or is there something I'm missing? Also, I've heard people saying the bigger the rez the easier the water temp will be to keep down, but I've also heard the opposite. Knowing what I know about water (high specific heat capacity), I would think the larger the rez, the better.
 
Soiless

Soiless

Active Member
TheHappyDrunk said:
I'm about to start my first RDWC run without a chiller. Being in the garage (concrete floors), and having fair weather here, I'm hoping I can avoid problems. If I'm using an inline water pump, is it only the ambient temperature of the grow tent/surrounding environment that's affecting the water temp? It's not like the water temperature would ever exceed the temperature of the surrounding area after all--or is there something I'm missing? Also, I've heard people saying the bigger the rez the easier the water temp will be to keep down, but I've also heard the opposite. Knowing what I know about water (high specific heat capacity), I would think the larger the rez, the better.
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Usually the root zone is slightly warmer than room temp, even more so with DWC (water gets warmer than soil for example). It is much easier to cool down the room with an AC for Example than to make that AC cool down your REZ if that makes any sense, the effiency suffers a whole lot. and yea the bigger the rez the easier it will be to keep cool for the day because think about it, the more water mass you have, the harder it will be for the serrounding temp to warm it up, thus giving you a better chance keeping temps adequite for a bigger part of the day, until lights off. but that would really make a difference if you drastically enlarge your resevoir, say 20 gallon res you would really feel that effect :).
 
Soiless

Soiless

Active Member
That being said, i used to get res temps of 95 degrees (35c) with DWC at times, and never had pythium or root illness of any kind, my tap water is pretty awesome though.
 
CannGro99

CannGro99

Member
Hello new member here
Just wanted to share what I've done in my tent. I ended up buying a really inexpensive water chiller on eBay for around $85 Buck. I connected both buckets together and I even used a liner around buckets to help. I now don't have to worry about ice bottles or high temps. Temps are are around 66 / 67

If I can get a grow or 2 with this chiller then it's money well spent :)
 

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Soiless

Soiless

Active Member
CannGro99 said:
Hello new member here
Just wanted to share what I've done in my tent. I ended up buying a really inexpensive water chiller on eBay for around $85 Buck. I connected both buckets together and I even used a liner around buckets to help. I now don't have to worry about ice bottles or high temps. Temps are are around 66 / 67

If I can get a grow or 2 with this chiller then it's money well spent :)
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Was looking into those myself, seems like it's worth a try, good luck:)
How loud are they though?
 
Aapoo

Aapoo

Well-Known Member
BecauseIgotHigh said:
I don't use a chiller, 30l tote filled 22l. Water Temps @ 17-23c. Lid covered with black film, should be white because I can feel heat coming from it. At the start I was changing Rez about every 3 weeks, now tote is filled with root mass. Can't lift the lid up any more without snapping some roots. Now I just top her up with water and try to keep ph 5.8, use ppm reader to know when to add nutes. I don't over feed anymore. Just @ midway into 2 weeks flower. My roots are still healthy white.

Morning temperature are about 16c, which cools down my tote to about that temperature. When light are on for 12 hours, my room temp get to about 20-23c.

700-900 ppm. Dwc hydro h&g a/b. Just began adding pk13-14 to the mix.
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You ran 700-900 ppm for your veg stage?
 
Aapoo

Aapoo

Well-Known Member
I have been using a radiator that was salvaged from an old drinking fountain. I set it in a cooler with the copper tubing sticking out of holes in the lid I put ice in the cooler and run my pump water through it but it's not that effective I think the pump warms the water up and just equalizes the cooling effect. I had better luck just throwing frozen bottles into my reservoir.
 
Aapoo

Aapoo

Well-Known Member
I am really hearing these guys that don't use a chiller or worry about it too much. On ILGM the guy says that he's seen it grow best in low 70s so... I don't know my plant has been pretty stagnant lately and it's been high 60s and lower so I'm ready to try something different
 
Aapoo

Aapoo

Well-Known Member
But then again it might be because I was changing my reservoir at one point and making adjustments and I tipped my net pot over and plant went out on the floor now there's no roots going into the water so that might have something to do with the stagnation
 
BecauseIgotHigh

BecauseIgotHigh

Well-Known Member
Aapoo said:
I am really hearing these guys that don't use a chiller or worry about it too much. On ILGM the guy says that he's seen it grow best in low 70s so... I don't know my plant has been pretty stagnant lately and it's been high 60s and lower so I'm ready to try something different
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make sure there is plenty of air stone inside the bucket thats all.
round air stones

plants that are over 1 month old, drink about 5l a day, so res will be pretty clean.
 
Alctrz8849

Alctrz8849

Well-Known Member
CanadianKushSmoker said:
I've been reading conflicting reports everywhere. Some people say that a chiller is 100% necessary as well as reservoir temps of 68°.
Then other people say they grow without issues without a chiller and rez temps into the 80s.

So my question is simple.

Is a chiller 100% necessary?

I need people with experience to answer.

Thanks.
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My DWC runs at 60F without any heating or cooling assistance. I only have air stones running in the water though, that's it. I live in the desert too where we reach 115 outdoors at least once a year! While I grow indoors, my reservoirs always are cooler simply because of the air temp in the room. I think this may be more common with smaller buckets but I use 48 quart coolers modified for weed instead of beer! LOL
 
Bushbaby11

Bushbaby11

Well-Known Member
CanadianKushSmoker said:
I've been reading conflicting reports everywhere. Some people say that a chiller is 100% necessary as well as reservoir temps of 68°.
Then other people say they grow without issues without a chiller and rez temps into the 80s.

So my question is simple.

Is a chiller 100% necessary?

I need people with experience to answer.

Thanks.
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I've never used a chiller of any sort, i use silver bullets as a preventive and have no issues at all
 
Bushbaby11

Bushbaby11

Well-Known Member
CanadianKushSmoker said:
I've been reading conflicting reports everywhere. Some people say that a chiller is 100% necessary as well as reservoir temps of 68°.
Then other people say they grow without issues without a chiller and rez temps into the 80s.

So my question is simple.

Is a chiller 100% necessary?

I need people with experience to answer.

Thanks.
Click to expand...
Also a lot of people who have high water temps tend to be the same people who have their air pump in the grow room lol, so all it's doing is sucking in the hot air and pushing it into your res keep it out the grow room
 
Aapoo

Aapoo

Well-Known Member
IaAlso a lot of people who have high water temps tend to be the same people who have their air pump in the grow room lol, so all it's doing is sucking in the hot air and pushing it into your res keep it out the grow room
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Ahhh....air pump. Air pump. Overlooked that one. Will move it out asap. Was actually considering using that cooler/ radiator device to run the air through. Maybe would be more effective than the water was.
 
icetech

icetech

Well-Known Member
No chillers for me.. i just run dwc buckets with 2 tiny air stones each, the main thing is Southern AG.. i don't even change water anymore, just top up when it is down about half way.. Check PH and keep goin..
 
Aapoo

Aapoo

Well-Known Member
What's up Detroit! How long you been doing that and what are your yields? What's your water temp usually at (range)? Do you even bother checking it at all?
 
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