my gravity fed air atomizing aeroponic system

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Atomizer

Well-Known Member
Just to get them started but i`m still syringing for now ;)
I bought the drippers to make life easier but also for better control over the rockwool moisture levels. An unlimited number of short drip cycles should be better for that than using a few long ones.
Hydro roots can take a fair while to make the transition to AA mist. The rockwool chunks have plenty of open spaces for the finer mist to penetrate so the young roots are at least semi accustomed to the mist before they clear the netpot. It could be interesting to do a side by side to see which one wins.. 8" cloner roots making the transition to AA or AA roots growing from 0 - 8" :)
 
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oxanaca

Well-Known Member
i see your point,

yeah well have do that side by side.. i dont want to post herb pictures on the pubic forums though, just seems a little sketch
so ill just personal message you when i start on that in a week or so.

do you consider a cavadge style hp cloner to be hydro roots?
maybe well have to try lp cloner, hp cloner, and rockwool
 
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oxanaca

Well-Known Member
i just realized the rockwool chunks you are talking about are the tini little pieces.
i actually have a 4cubic foot bag of this green rockwool, from the 1980s, its tini little chunks as well. i wonder how it will work for plants. it is ment for greenhouse use, but i know they had ph issues with there rockwool back in those days so who knows
 
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Aeropuff

Active Member
Hey Oxanaca, off topic a bit, but I like your DIY cloner...please let me know how it performs. Im in the process of making one my self...when I saw the photo of your manifold I LOLd because mine looks exactly like that (great minds think alike :D ), mine is just made from PP-R piping

Photo 31.3.2013. 18 40 44.jpg
 
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oxanaca

Well-Known Member
you europeans are killing me.
i just had to google pp-r piping and cutilene.
cutilene isnt available in my area but we have grodan.
and ive never seen polypropylene pipe in any of the major hardware stores in my area.
 
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oxanaca

Well-Known Member
Aeropuff said:
Hey Oxanaca, off topic a bit, but I like your DIY cloner...please let me know how it performs. Im in the process of making one my self...when I saw the photo of your manifold I LOLd because mine looks exactly like that (great minds think alike :D ), mine is just made from PP-R piping

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you cant be off topic in this thread
just a suggestion, if you buy the small threaded red nozzles. use a thread tapper after you drill the hole. ends up turning in a lot better and if you want to take them out and reuse them, the threads dont end up getting mangled.

a heads up. your going to want to glue your pump to something square and flat, to increase your footprint. my pump/manifold fell over and the sprayers wernt able to keep 2 rows of plants wet and i lost about 5 sites in the 8 hours i was gone to work.
 
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oxanaca

Well-Known Member
another update on my aero grow., the bad

so i came in today, and i opened my system to find all the fine root hairs that i had grown over the last week were gone. now i bumped my ppm up from 150 to 430 yeasterday, so at first i though maybe that had killed them off. then i unpluged my timer and plugged it back in and the air activated but no liquid was able to be sprayed. what happened was the tubing at the top in the gas can had found its way out of the liquid.

luckily i just completed my 5 gallon bucket gravity resevoir. the problem will never be a problem again. im going to look at this as a good thing as it will allow me to first hand be able to watch how long it takes hydro roots to turn back into aero roots.
 
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oxanaca

Well-Known Member
the good

my buddy just gave me the go ahead to build a 48*48*15inch 64 site chamber

another positive, i just dumped my tomato seeds down the drain. as i have found a much more realistic test plant.
its called the solar coleus. its grows faster than a tomato, is very easy to root. and i have several stock plants to take cutting from.
i pulled on pot off one of these plants and noticed tons of fuzzy roots. im glad i asked my buddy for some advice. im expecting this plant to preform identically to cannabis, as i have grown them before to conceal outdoor plots.
 
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Aeropuff

Active Member
oxanaca said:
you europeans are killing me.
i just had to google pp-r piping and cutilene.
Click to expand...
lol

I have 25 red EZ clone style threaded nozzles that I will be using (still not sure how many of them I will end up using on the manifold). Thx for the advice, I have some thread tappers laying around so that's perfect.

The lid of the tote that I'm using goes over the outside edge of the sides of the tote, I'm worried that water will get through and drip. Even though the lid sits on nice and tight, water is water and it will most likely leak...Do you have issues with water dripping the sides? I noticed you are using some kind of clamps on the edges of the tote to make it tight. Maybe a layer of some rubber lining would also help...
 
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oxanaca

Well-Known Member
i took some closed cell weather stripping to form a gasket between the lid and tank, no dripping.

dont forget to do something to stabilize your pump/manifold or youll be sorry when you lose a bunch of plants, when it falls over
 
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Aeropuff

Active Member
cool, I'll look into some weather stripping and figure out a way to stabilize the pump. I guess that's why the EZ clone machine has those ridges around where the pump sits.

I feel ya, I live in an apartment and I'm always paranoid about water leaking and turning my neighbors ceiling into a up-side down puddle, you can never be to safe about that kind of stuff.
 
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Atomizer

Well-Known Member
oxanaca said:
i took some closed cell weather stripping to form a gasket between the lid and tank, no dripping.

dont forget to do something to stabilize your pump/manifold or youll be sorry when you lose a bunch of plants, when it falls over
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bicycle inner tubes make good gaskets. Make a cut all the way around, slip the cut tube over the edge of the container and lock it in place with the lid.
Might be worth putting a cable tie on the delivery pipe to prevent it moving :)
 
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oxanaca

Well-Known Member
Atomizer said:
bicycle inner tubes make good gaskets. Make a cut all the way around, slip the cut tube over the edge of the container and lock it in place with the lid.
Might be worth putting a cable tie on the delivery pipe to prevent it moving :)
Click to expand...
thats a great idea, im going to replace my weather striping with that. ill tack it into place, more of a permanent solution.
 
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oxanaca

Well-Known Member
checked on my plants again, and the hydro roots are already shooting out new little aero roots. i must be on the right track, there nice and fuzzy.
just a heads up, clear ice maker plastic pipe, doesnt work well with john guest. it caused a problem with on my gravity bucket. i used a short run of it between a reducer and a bulkhead fitting. it leaked at the bulkhead. i just used a bucket in siphon mode so im fine until tomarow when i replace it with pex
 
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oxanaca

Well-Known Member
does anyone know if adding enzymes to my nutrient solution would dissolve the dead root layer that is on the outside of my "hydro roots"?
would this cause the roots to become white again and would this create a boost in performance, such as better nutrient absorbtion?
 
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