Real world Hi-Pressure Aeroponics

PetFlora said:

Let's agree to disagree. I have referred you to Pod Racers long thread where you can see the pics. I have seen what I say in my own grows.

As to you being confused about roots on the screen. Think surface area. A few random roots leaves ample room for the nutes to drain through the screen, but a massive root mass will completely cover the screen (and even turn and begin growing up the side walls) not only prevents the runoff from draining through, this mass of roots will absorb all those nutes. Not bad in veg, but about 3rd week of flower when the pH and ppms skyrocket, well, you'll see. All you need to do to prove/disprove what I am saying is to grow 5ft trees in a 2ft pod, monitor your runoff during that time. Believe me I wish these guys you trust were right. It would solve a lot of problems.

hth

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TF has already done that for us, and has demonstrated that it can be done very well.

No offense intended, but I've never seen you produce HP roots (your roots are LP, insofar as I can tell), so I have my doubts about your understanding of how they grow - they are light and fluffy enough (as demonstrated by TF) that they won't block mist from getting through them and draining - since neither of us have tried it, I'm gonna go off of the word/results of someone who has and has produced awesome results.

Admittedly, I haven't yet produced HP roots, either (I kind of have, but have had to water too long because of different plant sizes to keep them), but I do take the word of people who have shown pictures of properly produced HP roots, whereas you listen to Pod Racer who was (effectively) running LP Aero for your information.

FYI, I have roots on a screen in my rig, and they're doing fine and allow mist to go through while keeping the roots suspended (needed to do that to protect my second mister in each column).

Honestly, this is a pretty silly debate by two people who are still trying to work out HP aero - I'm gonna listen to the people like G-Love and TF who have figured it out, and you can choose to listen to LP aero guys like Pod Racer.

You use outdated and faulty information from that thread and present it as fact, and that's just wrong and irresponsible (IMO).

I agree. We are all here to learn and improve upon the reletively un-charted waters of aeroponics (pun intended). I think it's important to the evoloution of the process that we don't make false claims & reguard them as facts.

I love all the different designs & ideas that HPA has given birth to. I find it more exciting than actually growing itself. It seems that the amount of time spent bickering could be put to better use. That being said. Petflora, I think you get up the asses of atomizer & bob because some of the facts you present aren't factual. This isn't helping progress. There is alot to be learned, and these guys can only help if you choose to let them.

Bobby is a champ, he strives to provide the best info and I always see him trying to learn and help folks,
now if he is saying your outdated i would check yourself cause he ain't a bullshitter. No offense flora, plus I have seen some of pods stuff hes no TF.
hows your misting times working out?

Oh dear I spent a good bit of time responding, but it did not upload.

MM, First I will answer your question about how my plants are responding to increased mist times (now 15-30 seconds to 30-40 minutes) GREAT.

Not that evolving F&D was considered beforehand, but I think it was A who stated this, and it got me thinking. Decades ago, I grew huge trees with F & D, so I understood what he was suggesting. Where what I am doing now differs in that is, instead of feeding ~ every 4 hours with some nutes and DO remaining in the medium, my shorter feed cycles and high pressure nute delivery compensates for not having any medium to hold some of the nutes and oxygen between feed cycles. And as we know, atomized nutes are more readily absorbed. I will be posting pics of my new plants and my lonely lady (above and below) on my threads and journals here and elsewhere.

As to having BobS' back. I like him. He has the passion, desire and interest to push the envelop and apparently has the money to toss his mistakes. If you see his last HPA effort, the coliseum, you will know he is "learning". Now it can still be used for cloning or growing short root veggies. If you look through his thread you will see I told him why that wouldn’t work for mj roots. He now realizes what I, and probably others, were saying about this.

When it comes to TAG and HPA, basically we all are gleaning information from others and adapting it to our abilities and resources. We start with the information available at that time, which over time may turn out to be bad information, or the result of not fully understanding the method and even the hardware that was available at the time, like Pod Racers TAG. The pods they were building near the end are very serviceable today, though round pods makes it easier for the pressurized nutes to swirl throughout the pod. The primary purpose of the pod is to provide ample depth and area around the roots to allow for nutes to swirl and drain.

Let's get to the point I have been trying to get BobS, specifically, but anyone building a Pod to understand: using a silk screen to keep roots longer than the pod depth from reaching the bottom of a short pod. If it’s just a few inches no problem, but think about how big a ~ 3-4ft mass of HPA roots is. (5 ft tree= 5 ft roots; 2 X 2 X 2 ft pod with screen in place leaves ~ 20” above the screen to retain the mass. Why do I consider using a screen in this scenario problematic?

No one here will dispute that roots grow like crazy in HPA, when delivering nutes via an accumulator, probably more so. My last journal (on another site) I was using bag seed that turned out to be Sat dominant. Just as the plants quickly outgrew the space between the ceiling and the light, the roots quickly outgrew the 17” of pod depth. I had to add a second stacked tote (cut the bottom of one and the top of the other) to handle the 4 ft long roots that developed from 4 ft plants.

I was in mid flower and was recirculating nutes. One of my mentors made me aware that from mid flower on, the plant hormones change radically in support of massive bud development. He suggested I consider D2W, and to test my runoff. At first, I didn’t believe it would be ‘that’ big a deal, so it took me a few days before my curiosity got the better of me. WOW. My feed ppm was 900-1000, but my runoff was over 2000, with similar pH increases. Most likely BobS’s mentor's are using D2W, but that won’t solve the problem a shallow pod presents. Let's look at it logically...

If you are growing a 5ft tree in a 2 ft deep pod, you will quickly wind up with ~ 3ft of roots accumulating on the screen, that by mid flower double or triple in mass. Now that mass has to go somewhere. If it is allowed to stack on a screen it will spread, quickly covering the entire screen and even turning and growing up the sidewalls, but most of that mass will stay on the screen. This root mass will be roughly 6-8" thick, and though the root mass is fluffy, the runoff (both from the roots above the mass itself) is slowed down by the mass it has to drain through. Some portion of this runoff will be reabsorbed. This is OK until about the 3rd week of flower where the plant hormones radically change the runoff as it focuses on bud development. I know I wouldn't risk it.


I hope this clarifies my position. If you don't see the logic in it, go for it.

PetFlora said:

View attachment 1488352BobS do not want you to think my EGO is responding. The fact is anything I say is from my experience. Here is a pic of roots from my last grow, probably in late veg, or early flower (there is a later one where the mass is more than doubled, but I cannot locate it. It clearly shows the roots morph into pom poms) , and for your information, no I am not using low pressure. The fact that the first second or two is not a full 50psi plus, does not discount the fact that the remaining feed time is high pressure. I know you are going through a huge learning curve, but don't be guilty of overstating your knowledge. Try to sit back and learn by what you experience, before making bold statements.

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Yeah bro, those look like my EZ Clone 120 roots when I take out my cuttings - that's LP Aero, FYI.

BTW, because you did something (like messing around with your feedtimes, which you're obviously still working on) which may or may not have produced "pom pom" roots does not mean that the "pom pom" roots were caused by it being week 3 of flowering - that's just faulty logic, and the proper HP grows I've seen have had "pom pom" roots from the get go, because their feeding tmes were correct from the gate.

I'm not overstating any knowledge, because I don't make claims - I simply repeat claims that I find to be valid from knowledgeable people (and give credit to the source, so others may check it and decide for themselves).

BTW, I find it funny that you're telling me to "sit back and learn" when you're onto your third grow and have still not come close to figuring out what you're doing (IMO) - didn't you just lose a plant during this grow?

Bro, I said from the gate (before it was setup) that I wasn't going after pretty roots with this - I did this conversion in the interest of energy savings (getting rid of a 600 watt pump, chiller, and a couple of other pumps) - no more, no less. If I got pretty roots that'd be great (and I did and do have some), but I knew that 4" tubing wasn't enough for the mist to disperse - the fact that you think this could be a clone rig is pretty laughable, in all honesty.

I realize that your main goal is to be able to "say" that you run HP Aero (regardless of whether you do or you don't), but I have no such desires - I try to grow healthy plants in the most efficient way possible, so I decided to switch; that being said, now that I understand more about HP Aero (and want to get my plant count down) I will be designing a pod or two for use on large plants, and believe it or not I'm going to go with someone's advice (and pod designs) who has proven that he knows and understands HP Aero better than either of us over your misguided opinions and musings.

Here's a question - given the evidence available to us, who seems to be the more credible source? The guy who documented his tree grow in 22 gallon pods and then got 1.4g/w on his next grow, all with pure white fuzzy roots, or the guy who runs VPA (Variable Pressure Aeroponics), is on his third run and hasn't figured out misting times yet, has roots that (on a good day) look like LP aero roots, and just lost one of his two plants?

I have no problem with you spouting out your (IMO) misguided and silly beliefs, but as Mike Young said, this thread is to help people to move past the BS Pod Racer disinformation that you seem to be trying to keep alive - when I see posts like yours where you tell the guy he needs a 5' deep pod to grow a plant he wants, which would obviously dissuade him from even trying, I get kinda pissed off. You wanna give people bad info? Do it in your thread, I promise I won't stop by anymore - that can be your soapbox to spout all your beliefs and none of us will go in there and correct you, deal?


You've decided you want to run VPA, you have no interest in trying to upgrade your setup and run a proper HP Aero setup - that's fine, and I'm sure your setup will produce for you.


That being said, don't fuck over (by giving incorrect advice) other people (like me, or the poster asking about pod sizes above) by spouting your faulty opinions as facts - I know enough to take what you say with a grain of salt, but someone else may think that you know what you're talking about.


Sorry for being harsh and brutally honest - I tried the nice route in about five different posts but you continue on with your disinformation - honestly, I'm saying what everyone else here thinks (as far as I can tell).

He is not getting upset nor is he calling your silly, just saying your not doing HP. You post pictures up that are clearly not hp and try and convice bobby they are.... thats just not going to fly

Looking at your roots I don't think you should be call them HP roots... nice roots for sure!!
but hp, nah man not even.

low pressure aero can grow some nice plants though ...

My goodness, those are some roots! I know some turfgrass managers that would die for those.

MediMary, Your PM is full. Winter Woman

MediMary said:

He is not getting upset nor is he calling your silly, just saying your not doing HP. You post pictures up that are clearly not hp and try and convice bobby they are.... thats just not going to fly

Looking at your roots I don't think you should be call them HP roots... nice roots for sure!!
but hp, nah man not even.

low pressure aero can grow some nice plants though ...

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Too bad I can't show you the follow up. I went through all my albums, sigh, it's not there, but I have a new batch going, though these are feeding at 15-30 second intervals with 30-40 minute pauses. The roots on that particular plant were feeding under 3 seconds every 3 minutes. This was too short, and I adjusted it higher later. Those subsequent roots looked a lot more like THPA roots.

If they are not True HPA roots, they are close enough for me as they provide most of THPA benefits. As a personal use grower, I'm more than happy with the results of my 'Variable' HPA. The word Zealots comes to mind, but it's a free country, well mostly. I probably won't contribute here anymore, but will leave them with this- correct me if I am wrong, but the purpose of using THPA is to provide just enough nutes to fall on the roots without soaking them. Too long feed times and the droplets collect forming larger droplets which takes away from the super feeding efficiency of small droplets. Now if you believe that is a corner stone to THPA, (I do) then ask yourself, "What is happening in essence to the equivalent of a bowl of roots sitting on a screen near the bottom of the pod?" IMO, it's going to act more like a sponge, as these roots are not free in space to drain away the excess, and the excess of every feed is landing directly on them, working it's way to the bottom.

IMHO, if you are going for the benefits of True HPA, you cannot let your roots collect on a screen. To me, my VHPA is much closer to THPA than allowing a large portion of your roots act as a sponge.

hth

PetFlora said:

Too bad I can't show you the follow up. I went through all my albums, sigh, it's not there, but I have a new batch going, though these are feeding at 15-30 second intervals with 30-40 minute pauses. The roots on that particular plant were feeding under 3 seconds every 3 minutes. This was too short, and I adjusted it higher later. Those subsequent roots looked a lot more like THPA roots.

If they are not True HPA roots, they are close enough for me as they provide most of THPA benefits. As a personal use grower, I'm more than happy with the results of my 'Variable' HPA. The word Zealots comes to mind, but it's a free country, well mostly. I probably won't contribute here anymore, but will leave them with this- correct me if I am wrong, but the purpose of using THPA is to provide just enough nutes to fall on the roots without soaking them. Too long feed times and the droplets collect forming larger droplets which takes away from the super feeding efficiency of small droplets. Now if you believe that is a corner stone to THPA, (I do) then ask yourself, "What is happening in essence to the equivalent of a bowl of roots sitting on a screen near the bottom of the pod?" IMO, it's going to act more like a sponge, as these roots are not free in space to drain away the excess, and the excess of every feed is landing directly on them, working it's way to the bottom.

IMHO, if you are going for the benefits of True HPA, you cannot let your roots collect on a screen. To me, my VHPA is much closer to THPA than allowing a large portion of your roots act as a sponge.

hth

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You don't run "Variable HPA" - you run VPA, which is Variable Pressure Aeroponics.

Your pressure starts at 0 and then eventually ramps up to high pressure (unknown PSI, so I'm assuming it gets to "high" pressure), before ramping back down to 0.

Therefore, your style encompasses low, medium, and high pressure aero............VPA seemed to be a good name for it (feel free to use that name for it, if you'd like - I personally think it's kind of catchy).

As I understand it, the purpose of HPA is to provide the exact amount of nutes/water the roots need at exactly the time they need it in a very small droplet size for optimum uptake (~50 microns); no more, no less.

That's an interesting opinion/theory you have of roots collecting on a screen; I'd tell you mine (I actually have a screen in every column in my rig) but I don't find it (my opinion of my screen after a few weeks of running) as relevant as Tree Farmer's grow (and pics of beautiful white roots), which (IMHO) proves your opinion to be entirely incorrect.

His followup grow where he achieved the same white roots (brilliant white roots, not like the LP roots that you and I have) and achieved a 1.4g/w harvest further proved (again, to me) that your theory is totally wrong - I really don't understand how you can argue this fact when there's evidence that you're 100% wrong right in front of you.

My theory/opinion is that you've never seen/felt/touched how light and fluffy HP Aero roots are, so you're having trouble wrapping your mind around how they can grow upwards and outwards, as your roots and my roots can not do that (yours because you lack the timer/accumulator to get your times correct for doing that, and me because I lack the growing system to let HP roots flourish in, but that will be corrected sooner rather than later) - I'd really recommend you take a look at TF's thread again, and then take a look at the Atomix threads by G-Love.

Anyhow, thank you for clarifying that what you've said about screens inhibiting HPA is your opinion/hypothesis and that others (and the only available evidence we have) disagree with it; that's really all I ask when you make claims.

I for one see no reason for you to leave, but if you choose to than happy growing to you and I wish you many bountiful harvests in the future.

Sorry to everyone for wasting space and time with this; I just think it's really important that people differentiate between facts and opinion when there's so much myth and mystery surrounding HP aero.

I am not leaving. I am keen to stay abreast of what HPA are a doing for all of you.

My biggest issue is the screen thing, so there is really nothing else for me to inject, though I will certainly ask questions about sourcing hardware from time to time. Enjoy the day!

Petflora another possible option is to make the bottom of your container like a hempy bucket. I emailed fatman and he said it should work out great.

Basically I am considering using the bottom couple of inches and put chunky perlite in it and put the drain on the side. I will back flush it a couple of times a week. My thought was that it would allow a small resevoir inside the container just in case the plants needed a little more water (heat, humidity etc...). This obviously will be late in flower since I'm using 30 gallon drums and the roots won't hit the bottom until probably 3 weeks into flower.

I have not done this yet. But I have read many people who used hempy buckets and they say the plants take off when the roots hit the resevoir. Of course with HPA most of the roots will have tons more air then in a hempy bucket.

Chen: I would have PMd you, but I guess you haven't responded to enough posts yet.

These guys swear it's not a problem, I remain unconvinced, but I have no interest in growing trees, so I will never have their issue.

In your situation consider covering the bottom with a couple inches of some lava rocks. The roots should spread sideways more than down. Hopefully the roots won't develop into too thick a mass on top of whatever medium you choose. And as you said, you are already well into flower.

hth

hth

where do you get your pods, sorry If I missed the info already.. got a link?