HELP REQUIRED!!

Hi all,
So I've tried to put this off and solve it myself but I have to ask for help, no idea whats went wrong.

Some stats before we get started:

Growing 4 plants in a 4x4 tent
600w dimmable hps
Adequate airflow
4 15l pot 48l tank autopot system
Bio-bizz all mix soil
Bio nova super soil nutes

Been growing 4 mainlines over the past couple months and all has been fine up until about a week or so ago, the plants started showing signs of what i believed was root rot, i pulled them out there pots and when I checked yes they were absolutely drenched after not being fed for almost a week! luckily i caught them before any visible root rot set in!

Now it turns out my drainage is almost non existant, soil is like a big tight compact sponge! I thought the perlite in the mix would suffice but clearly not!

I removed the plants from there pots and left to dry out on cardboard in direct airflow, it took about 10 days and this dried about 60-70 percent of the soil out and the plants stopped drooping and curling down and started to look slightly better. I also added 2 inches of clay pebbles to the bottom of each pot and then removed as much of the compact soil as I could from the rootball of each plant without damaging the roots, i then replaced the removed compact soil with a mix of pebbles (60%) and soil(40%) to improve drainage and airflow to the roots.

I then cleared out all my tanks and pipes and set it back up with fresh nutes and water. Now after the autopots being on again for 24hrs my plants are starting to go back to how they looked before.. i was ready to flip these baby's over a week ago but all this has happened and I don't know what to do now..

Now I'm no expert, it might be something completely different, I have some burnt leaves, yellow plants, really purple defined vanes on the leaves of some plants, and they have not really grown at all in the past week.

I'm really stuck as to what's wrong here, do i now have a load of deficiency or lockout problems due to my overwatering then drying out?

Should I perform a heavy flush and start again?

I'm considering doing a heavy flush then just top feeding from then on and hope that improves things..

I've grown for years but always in a drip fed Wilma system in coco, never done soil and never done autopots, starting to think I've made a massive mistake going this way..

My ph water in is always around 6.2-6.5
Ec never risen above 1.2
Water comes out tap at 8.4 and after nutes is around 7.2 and I bring down with pH down

Temps in tent are good 27c max

The only reason I'm holding off on a flush is because my soil holds that much water and even with the pebbles I've added im scared I saturate them too much again.

Please if anyone has any experience with anything I've mentioned or has any advice whatsoever please don't hesitate to drop in. I really need the help!

Cheers all and happy gardening!

Some photos with led light and camera flash to see better

Once your roots are unhappy, it is hard to recover. I switched to cloth pots for this reason. Unfortunately they have their own issues - They do dry out very quickly and can be hard to water evenly.

Also the burnt leaves you can see, there was loads more that were aot lot worse but I cut them off before I got a chance to take photos, the ones left are the "good" burnt ones..

yeah I've read a bit about it mohican and it can be really hard to recover from overwatering.. if that's defo the problem.. forgot to mention I've since added rhizotonic and cannazym to try and help with the soil and root system as I had them from previous grow, do you think a good flush to get everything out ec wise and the soil to the perfect pH would help? Then just go for a standard top feed from there?
I really don't want to saturate that soil again. I'm so lost with this!

Also all my new top growth has gone really thin and is all twisted like a claw and has not really grown in about a week at least,

My real question is should I flush and top feed from here on? I need to flip these plants its been wayy too long already

I love hanging on the roof!

I had some blue dream that I transplanted to an experimental soil with powdered lava rock. It turned to cement and almost killed the plants. I transplanted all of the plants to fresh Pro-Mix and they all recovered fine.

The first time I used Xtreme Mycos I fried a plant by adding too much - more is never better

Cheers,
Mo

Aw shit thats not what I want to hear man, rip blue dream!!

I did a mini transplant but I only had the same pots so took as much as I could off the root ball and filled with fresh soil and pebbles, maybe got 30 percent. Just dont know if I should flush man.. ahhhh lol

My first hydro was Malawi Gold and I got root rot. It never recovered. The clones from it that I put outside were spectacular!













Cheers,
Mo

This is what the root ball looked like from that trash can grow:





It had drainage issues too. Hard containers are difficult unless you keep them almost dry.

Now I use cloth pots sitting in a larger hard container, or I plant in the ground.





Cheers,
Mo

I just want to save you the time you would spend trying to save the plants. Take some clones and start them in clean new containers of soil. They will grow much faster with the new roots they develop.

If you need any seeds, let me know.

Not what I wanted to hear but thanks for the brutal honesty brother! I defo don't have any rot tho thats for sure I've had them all out, I can't bare to throw them just yet I'm gonna flush em hard and see what happens, its not like I've anything else to do right now!! Thank you for the offer of seeds but I started germinating 5 orange sherbert yesterday just incase this goes to shit lol your plants are absolute monsters! Wish i could grow outside man.. used fabric pots before really liked them gonna order a few more, can't believe the size of those plants man!!

Still looking at those plants man! Wow

Thank you!

This was the big one:

Your just taking the piss now mo