a couple questions before i shop.

First off all I have done in the past is indoor soil grows, but I'm now looking at a 3x3 ebb and flow system. Now can I just place the grow cubes directly in the flood tray or are they better in net pots? Are stg blocks better than rockwol? Are all the plants roots going to be tangled preventing moving of plants, preventing a perpetual grow without multiple tables? Any help is greatly appriecated.

Yes you can place cubes directly into the flood tray. You can start with small cubes and work your way up to bigger ones. Make sure you peal the plastic off before inserting a smaller cube into a bigger one. In this case I think a passive drip system would be better than flooding the tray. You would use the same system except instead of pumping water into the tray you would pump it into a manifold and put a drip line to each cube. Then you would use a passive drain in your tray so all excess would flow back into your reservoir. They also sell THESE that could hold more roots. If you want to use a system like this all the way through I wouldn't veg for very long due to running out of space for roots. Another option would be to veg like this and then Fill 2 gallon pots with some coco, throw those on your tray and put your large cubes with drippers into the pots. You could have some pretty nice plants like this.

I've heard good and bad about sure to grow. It dries out well so your roots get a lot of oxygen and it is ph nuetral. On the downside it costs a lot and cant be reused plus I've heard of algae problems with it. Personally I prefer hydroton which is the best medium IMO because it would really get a lot of oxygen to your roots in between floods or with a dripper system. You need a lot of space for roots with hydroton because they blow up which is good. You could build an awesome 9 bucket ebb and flow system on a 3 x 3 table. Just connect all the buckets together and put a 27 gallon tote under the table with a pump in it. Fill the buckets with hydroton this way your roots would get a chance to get totally oxygenated between fills.

I use DWC tho it kicks ass you can get same or better results if you use a good air pump.

IF

Thanks for the reply. I biggest concern was being able to move the plants. But I think I will do 2 tables one for veg and one for flower
This way I can scrog. Without moving plants, by just swapping lights. I'm only gonna run 6 on a 3x3 table under 600 Watts. But since I will be using a Aero cloner, should I use 1" rockwol, neoprene, or clay pellets for cloning if they will be moving eventually to pots of clay pellets.

Also running a drip system like you mentioned would the pump run 24/7?

use 1" rockwool cubes to get it started, just bury the cube in the Hydroton when its ready.

420forme said:

Also running a drip system like you mentioned would the pump run 24/7?

Click to expand...

If you use rockwool the pump rarely needs to come on because it holds moisture so long. I've heard of people doing 2-3 waterings a day with large rockwool cubes or coco. I use hydroton (clay pellets) and keep my pump on 24/7 pumping aerated nutrient rich water to the roots at all times in my constant recirculating system. You can some do 15 on/15off but that shortens the life of the pump and isnt necessary. If you're going to flood do it 3 or 4 times a day with the hydroton

If you use neoprene inserts in your cloner you avoid having to use rockwool at all which is what I do. When you get a nice lil root system just pull the stem out of the insert and gently bury it in some well rinsed hydroton No chance of stem rot and the plants get all the fresh air they need.

I might build this system to run alongside my 4 bucket RDWC system:


...and only the 4 three gallon buckets would be full of hydroton the middle one would be empty so it can be the controller with the pump sitting in it.

Peace,
IF

Thanks for the info, I like the drip line idea. With the drip system do you feed from top with a stake or run a line right into the side of the net pot?