im not qualified to give out advice (I'm a beginner) but from the information I've gathered id say flood and drain is the way to go if you plan on leaving weeks at a time
Instead of running one big light, consider using multiple smaller ones, then instead of dimming you can simply turn some off/on.Now, If I could combine that with my other idea of an auto-dimming ballast using a thermostat probe hung from the hood to detect the temperature at the canopy.
I'm an engineer, so automation's in my blood
Hydro is probably not the best system to leave unattended but I do it lol. I run a non flooded root zone and once the roots are established the plants can survive for quite some time if a pump fails do to the high humidity and moisture but that's not a great thing lol. I leave my system for a week with out any additional need for nutes, water, etc. But I still have my partner check things like pumps, lights, etc. She has no clue how to do anything though so hopefully it's all good lol.
Yeah, I had a friend like that once too. I was trying to help her out by setting up a grow room for her and teaching her how to grow, and from watching "Weeds" every week on Showtime she assumed it would be really easy. Her role at the start was to monitor the seedlings, and water as needed.
Actually I kill house plants lol, she nurtures and loves them lol, my house looks like the Amazon lol. My setup up is pretty automated with the exact same shit ever week but if something goes wrong I figure it's about 3-4 days before I hit the point of no return
. She doesn't know how to set the timer on the coffee machine lol.
Do you not have to keep the water chilled? Never tried DWC, well once and it was a assume failure lol. I just installed a chiller of sorts for my ebb and flo's and sprayers and am getting way better results. Also your right about the PH thing and if you keep a journal you can pretty much just add at beginning and not adjust anything until the next Res change I've found. I add exactly 30ml of my down and it's perfect every time and it stays pretty close, raising no more than 2 points in 7 days. It may be different for lots because I don't switch nutrients. The issue with a flooded root zone for me is the quick death that can happen if air fucks up. With a drained root zone system, and if their established (big white mat lol) then they will last a few days and still be alive. I've had plants that were mutants (little) that were left in a powered down setup last a few weeks just from the Matt left from the harvested plants, I would like to say it was for research but I was lazy lol.just run a DWC inside oxypots(works with single or multiple ones all linked together). just fill up the reservoir before you leave and for one week you are good to go. make sure that the bubbler runs all the time (together with the ventilation systems) and you have the lights on a reliable timer. dunno what type of hydroponic people refer to that needs to be monitored every day, but as soon as you set up your timers properly you dont really need to check anything
unless:
- your plant(s) are very small. in that case you need to be more careful with the nutrients and check them a bit more often
- you are doing some mainlining/LST/scrog etc, which ofc needs frequent checks in order to tie/cut/care all the leaves and branches properly.
for me i found the best time to leave plants unattended in the late flowering (assuming your timers are good). plants take up very low nutrients (in DWC) and they dont need pretty much any checking except once per week anyhow.
not really. well it depends where you live i guess. in northern europe the room temperature is around 17-22 degrees Celsius, so is never too high for indoor DWC. the most important thing is to prevent light going inside the pot or the reservoir. i also usually add a powder of mycorrhyza/beneficial bacteria to the res each nutrient change (ie every 7 days). although in submerged roots the mycorrhyza never take hold like in soil the bacteria can still help take up nutrients, or at least in the worst case scenario to prime the plant immune system without causing actual infection (like a vaccine in human for instance).
