Question for the early stink buddies...
Are you still using this system?
Are you happy with the results?
Do you recommend any changes?
Thanks in advance...
I think there is a better way.
I think in the begining, the stinkbud system is overkill, and i think in bloom the system is weak... i will explain.
In the begining, you dont need to stack 2 tubs on top of eachother.
All you need is the big giant 4 ft rubbermaid totes, or roughneck totes.
I am running about 100 plant sites in this tote.
This tote is my ez clone tote, and my vege tote.
THere is water in the bottom of the tote, about 5 inches or so... the roots explode and go crazy when they hit this water as long as there is an air stone or 2 in the tote.
Im also running longer off cycles, and a 1 min on cycle in the tote.
Now, those are minor changes, but make the whole system so much simpler.
so let that sink in for a sec, and ill move on...
now, in the current bloom setup, we take our plants, with these nice long roots, and we put them in these little tight fence posts....
which makes no sense if you stop and think about it.
So here is a better way, and it is just as cost effective...
keep using the big rubbermaid totes for bloom...
only, have a seperate bloom station set up with the totes and these totes are daisy chained together.
below i show a couple setups.
Now ive got to more of a 50psi pump and more fine sprayers, but you could easily still use the stinkbud sprayers.
The cool thing is, you dont have to put a pump in every tote, you can just run one pump, and figure out a way to put a pvc pipe that runs the length of all the tubs, and have pvc or poly lines go through the upper parts of tubs,a nd spray within the tub. Then, all the nute water that rains down, is constantly being moved around, keeping the oxygen levels really high... in the bottom 3 inches of the tub. The rest of the tubs are all still air.
What i do is have a sump pump and a seperate elevated res, but thats only because i like to have a seperate res so that i dont have to lift the lid off of one of the tubs to check nutes. Further, you dont even need a sump pump if you put the extra res down on the ground with the other tubs. HOWVER, if you plan on filling this extra res really high with fluids, THEN YOU NEED TO USE THE SUMP PUMP, because otherwise, if was just daisy chained in like the other tubs, then ALL water levels in all tubs would rise, and thats not the point of this system... you want as much air, and as little dwc water in the bottoms as possible, but you need the dwc water to catch the rain of the sprayers, and keep it all mixing and oxygenated
To use a seperate res which holds high volume of water so that i dont have to check the system every day, i have a sump pump with a level sensor installed in the tubs.
I have the sprayer pump in the main res.
Once it rains enough in the tubs, the sump pump comes on due to the level sensor, and refils up the main res.
If the main res gets too low, its because the plants drank a lot, and it needs to be refilled.
Thats the tubs idea... i showed it in different configurations, but id use 2 rows of these setups side by side, and jsut hang lights down in plants down the length of it
Best part is, if the power goes out... plants dont die. Roots are still in water.
Only thing you need on battery backup to keep plants alive for DAYS is the air pump... i put an air stone in each tub.
I run 2x 1" lines from tub to tub. THese lines are about 2 inches up from the floor.
THe high volume pump, pumps water out via a pvc pipe, or you could use flexible hose. It splits, and goes in both directions to the 2 end tubs.
All water comes back to the middle tub via gravity.
I put a little screen over the hose port holes inside the tubs.
These tubs could be used for clone or veg as well, all you have to do is PLUG the hose ports.
It makes it nice because everything is interchangible, and roots have all the room in the world.
Its also less expensive to setup, and less risky when power goes out.
If you run large plants, you could put only 4 or 6 holes per tub.
If you run lollypopped plants, sog, you could put 20 or more holes per tub.
The nice thing is... all you need is a different lid... the tubs stay the same.
So going from one strain to antoher simply requires an extra lid, and lowes usually has an extra lid in count to the tubs, so if you tll them you bought a tub, and forgot to grab the lid, they will usually let you have the extra.
These big tubs are 20 bucks.
I put waterproof tape over the couple holes where the handles are, on the inside of the tub, and i put about an inch wide, waterproof tape LIP around the whole top of the tub, and it keeps it from leaking out the lid.
If you go to 50psi sprayers tho, and dont point them towards the lid seam, it doesnt leak anyway.
and for anyone who wants to talk bad against the dwc portion of this setup, understand, over in thcfarmer.com, double D's setup is making over 4 lb per plant, and the platns are 6 ft tall... so dwc is fine.
His system uses high volume flow rates to keep lots of air in the water... just as my system does.
THe reason i DONT put the high volume pump at the end of the tubs row is because if BOTH 1 inch lines in a tub did CLOG... you are screwed, and you might even have a flood, and you pump will run dry.
in my sysetm, by keeping the pump in the middle, and having the feed line split both ways, if one tub did clog, understand, the water would eventually only flow the other way when it hit the T because of backpressure being hgiher in the clogged tub, due to raised water levels in the clogged tub, so the water would go the other way, to the non clogged side, and always make its way back to the pump.
Meanwhile... ONLY 1 TUB COULD EVER GO DRY DUE TO A CLOG...
because if the tubs are 1, 2, 3, 4, 5
And the pump is in tub 3
If tub 2 or 4 clog, it doesnt matter, all tubs still have water.
If tubs 1 clogs, then 2 would kind of go dry, but not really because water would backflow from tub 3, AND the sprayers still come on every 7 min or so.
So technically... a tub going dry is pretty much impossible.... but thats why i put the high volume pump in the middle tub.
THis makes mixxing nutes a piece of cake too, becuase, you can shut off the sprayer pump for a couple min, and mix everythign right there in your main res, and then once its all spot on, turn your pump back on. Honestly, i dont even shut it off anymore because im so used to mixing correctly the first time anyway.
But like i said, sump pump, and main res are optional. You can simply put the 2 pumps in the middle tub, or have 2 smaller sprayer pumps, and put them in each end tub...
or 5 small sprayer pumps and put them in every tub... but to me thats just a hassle.
1 sprayer pump works fine. If it fails, plants live.
if high volume circulation pump fails... plants live.
if air pump fails after those other 2 fail... plants still live for quite a while as their roots are in water... but the DO will run out eventually.
Like i said, air pump, battery backup... and you are good to go...
all plants roots touch the water by week 3 of existance if you are a good grower...
so that means roots hit the bottom before they ever get to bloom tubs anyway.
**all pumps can be bought on ebay for pretty cheap, if you hunt youll find a 1600gph pump for about 80 bucks shipped, and you could use this same style pump for stinkbud sprayers, or you could get a higher pressure pump on ebay as well, for about 80 bucks. Sump pump, i found a new one on ebay for 30 bucks.
Air pump, prob about 50 bucks. 5 air stones, 20 bucks. 5 buckets for bloom, and 1 or 2 buckets for veg and clone, 140 bucks tops. You really only need one bucket tho, because you can put 100 2 inch netpot holes in a lid, and then transfer the plants when they start to crowd eachother.
1 8x bulb, t5, 4 ft fixture fits perfect over the clone and veg tub. Will grow 100 plants past a foot if you let it. (i know because i cloned early, and had to wait for the bloom area to finish)
Pvc pipe and hoses stuff, maybe 40 bucks tops
**plant roots never have to re-adapt to a new enviroement... they exist in the same style enviroment from start to finish... least amount of stress possible, plants say, "what transplant?"
ps, now we cant just say SB system anymore, bc both of our initials are SB
altho, he was here first, so he can have sb... just call mine the sherriberry system
Hope this helps