First Clone Machine

Hi this is my first thread, so i hope it's in the right location? : )

Thought i would make my first cloning machine to help me get the clones i need in the fastest time possible.

I based it on a Oxyclone 40. The box i have is almost to the dimensions but a little wider and slightly taller.
(MockUp)

The collars i have ended up being 2-3mm too large for my 50mm pots,so will need to find new collars or just make a new lid, but for now they sit there pretty well for the cuttings are fairly large but far from optimal so will get that sorted asap.

So i went and took 8 fresh cuttings from the lowest branches of an incredibly large and healthy 16 week old feminized White Widow mother plant.

I have other cuttings but they are too small for this plus they are already in grow cubes with trays.

I only want to try 8 seeing as it's my first time with this, plus i just want to make sure i have it right before i throw another 30+ stems in there, so all remaining holes have been blanked off.

I love using RDWC as a cloning method for i have grown RDWC before but never for clones. I know they produce explosive growth, once i grew a plant with just a few grow tubes with rdwc and that blew my mind. But cloning is different so I'm looking forward to seeing how this method produces roots.

If i get good root growth within 14 days i'll be wrapped.

They seem happy in there after 6hrs now, no wilting which was good to see for their is no humidity hood.




I thought to myself i wonder if the roots would grow well enough to skip a veg room and flip straight to flower for an SOG?

So fingers crossed they root well and fast, will update this thread on their progress. : )

Awesome DIY clone machine, looks super clean. I've used a 5L bucket with an air stone , aquarium water heater and a Styrofoam pizza base, although super simple/cheap gets the job done. I'm sure with the multi color plugs you can identify the different strains easily
Happy Growing

JAMO_Grow said:

Awesome DIY clone machine, looks super clean. I've used a 5L bucket with an air stone , aquarium water heater and a Styrofoam pizza base, although super simple/cheap gets the job done. I'm sure with the multi color plugs you can identify the different strains easily
Happy Growing

Click to expand...

Many thanks Jamo.

Yep that's what i thought about the multi color collars also, good to color code those strains.

A 5L bucket would work a treat with an air stone, so many bubbles.

Cuttings are still very happy, can't wait to lift the lid in a few more days

So far so good and things look promising.

Lifted the lid after 2.5 days and was surprised to see i have small root growth already,

One stem is well ahead of the others which you can see in the pic, so the others have some catching up to do.




Water temps have been between 75-80deg and water is still nice and clean.

Will take some pics 2-3 days from now, but as for now it's great to see some growth after such a short time.

Sadly after almost a week my stems haven't developed anymore roots.

I arrived home the other day when it was very hot, i left early in the morning and arrived home early afternoon, water temp was around 94deg.

So i didn't have a chance to save it, managed to get the temps back down to 75deg pretty quickly but i suspect the damage was already done.

Because of that heat i noticed a lot of funk on, the air pump so i cleaned that and washed the tote out and started again.

The stems never wilted, and now they look fine and i can see their trying to root again.

But alas this is my first time cloning using DWC.

I'm about to build an aeroponic cloner also, so one day when i have enough stems i want to do a side by side comparison to dwc and aero cloners.

Also the noise from the air pump is starting to annoy me, even more so now that after 6 days i have no roots to show for it.

In regards to the heat being an issue, i will simply have the air pump outside.

I wanted to ask a question about air stones.

Would it be possible to run a DWC cloner without air stones and simply have the air pump pushing water up and over the water surface?

I know for a hydro grow its possible, all the times i grew RDWC i never used a single air stone, but for a cloner it seems like they are needed?

Thanks for any help.

Got the aeroponic cloner going now, love how quiet it is.
Takes awhile to warm up so can run it for an hour before i have to turn it off.

I realized if the pump is too small, or has to work harder then water will warm up faster.
Running a much larger pump now and getting cooler temps.

Manifold works great, all sites get misted so will be good to see how this goes!










EDIT-
Thought i better add, i wanted a see through tote for i want a viewing window.

3 sides and the top will be painted, the front will have a slide panel i can easily remove to take a gander inside.

Good way to see if everything is working ok so i don't have to lift the lid every time.

It's a good tote, BPA free and 100% air and water tight.

All dark inside for the girls now.


Temps temps have between 69-72.
Just tap water, didn't bother adjusting ph.

Noticed the aero cloner doesn't get as hot as the dwc cloner, so very much sold on aeroponics now.
The stem with the roots has grown, that's what made me take a photo for when i looked at i went wow your growing.

After not even 2 days i had roots pop out of one particular stem, the others have white bumps here and there, but the one in the pic was really surprising to see. I know i scraped one stem harder than the others, that must be the one...hmm.



Will take another pic of same stem next week and hopefully the others would have popped some roots by then.

I swapped over my 360deg misters to ones with a smaller spray, had them sitting here and thought i have to try them out just in case their better.


At first i thought i made a mistake by putting them in, but i filmed it, and when i played back the video i could then see the difference.

The spray from the red misters you can still see, but the yellow ones i could hardly see the spray pattern.





The mist pattern almost matches the 180deg misters, looks like a more gentle spray pattern with more mist now.

Not even 24hrs later, this is what the stem which is pictured in previous post looks like now.

flip a die

Not sure if that's from changing the misters, or if that's just normal growth, but a couple of other stems which showed no signs of rooting actually popped some roots out, one of them really stretched its limbs out, crazy to see.

Pretty happy with this cloner, it saved my cuttings and looks like all of them will be transplanted successfully.

These 2 only had small white bumps on them yesterday.
Only 2.5 days since they were started.




flip a die

Nice!

Severed Tongue said:

Nice!

Click to expand...

Thank you.

Root growth 5.5 days in. : )





Didn't think i would be transplanting most of them now, really impressed by the rate of growth.

Their White Widows which i've never cloned before, so great strain to clone i think.

I was hoping for roots at around 7-9 days in, but instead I'm transplanting on day 5..aeroponics FTW.

Nice job

Corso312 said:

Nice job

Click to expand...

Thanks very much amigo.

What paint did you use?

It's gloss black non-toxic paint, not sure exactly what it is, but its really good, never smelled, was never sticky, gave it plenty of time to dry and has been great.

Plants don't mind it, had leaves rubbing on it and their happy.

I have to say they look cooler temps.

I can run this cloner for hours if room temps are good, it ran on 64deg all night last night and they seem to really respond to being a few degrees cooler from 68.

Thanks for reporting your findings

It's one thing to see them establish roots for the first time, but nothing like pulling them out and giving them another new home.






Their ready for the show.

What strains?