Bree's first Aero grow... with Yeast CO2

Hello Everyone,

I have been wanting to do this thread for a long time now. There has been a lot of interest in the success of the Yeast CO2 and I have had a lot of interest in switching to Aero. (thanks a lot to ItsGrowTime and TBug)

I have been doing the same thing for the past five or six years in the same room and had it dialed in fairly well but am a bit bored so am going to give the Aero a try.

I want to first start out introducing the Yeast CO2 method I have been using, then show a little on how I set up my Aero system/room. Then get into the grow.

I have ten Dutch Passion Blueberries going right now. I have only had one grow with BB and not too satisfied..... hermies, mutations, etc. Despite optimal conditions. I picked the best one and cloned the ten off it. They are in very sorry shape... I didn't plan to continue due to the mutations and hermies and my favorite Serious AK seeds became available but they perked up and grew into lovely ladies and I couldn't murder them. So the clones stayed in the nursery too long while the BBs finished out. The nursery only has a 2.5 ft ceiling so they burnt pretty bad on the floros. I am hoping that by the time I introduce the other aspects of the grow they will be presentable enough to post on here without getting laughed off the site.

I would like lots of feedback and constructive criticism and things I have not thought of yet. So we will start with the next post.

Peace

Gonna tag this one....love the aero shows.....

good luck!

count me in! So you'll be makin' some moonshine at the same time eh?

I imagine you'll get to this in the next post, but are you simply introducing CO2 by having yeast "burn" sugars as opposed to using a CO2 tank or a propane burner?

Bout goddamn time Bree! Ill be checking in daily so keep the updates coming steadily. Ive also been waiting to see your co2 solution.

I'll be following bro.

Thanks for those who have shown up so far... please lots of input.

Thanks for those who have shown up so far... please lots of input.

Rule--thanks for stopping in. Hope to get lots of feedback.

Delta--Yes I only use yeast and sugar for CO2. That is part of the reason for this thread. In a town the size of mine to supply by tank is too much exposure. My room is only 3ft x 5ft x 8ft so heat is a major issue so that makes the propane thing out. Plus I don't like all the timing and squirt, heat up, vent , squirt, change by season...... I just run my CO2 hose in and put it..... well never mind I will get to that. But for me it is easier and much less exposure, plus never heard of a fire from yeast and CO2.

IGT-- I know man. Sorry, had to run a few days dry to check for leaks, then my tester died.... damn thing and only after 6 years of use....LOL.. I think I should ask for my money back don't you? Hanna makes damn good testers, will always be a loyal customer.

VT--Have liked your input on other threads. Thanks for stopping by. I hope to get a super room out of this with all the excellent input I get.

I do have to warn you. My clones are pretty sorry looking. Let them grow too big and burnt them on the floros. I will introduce the systems and how I put them together and by then I hope they look somewhat presentable.



Peace

Well lets get started shall we?

Well lets get started shall we?

First the yeast system:

Not any rocket science here. I have been using yeast and sugar from the very beginning of my inside craft, that makes it about 10 years give or take 2. I use to use 5gal jugs but they are difficult to seal air tight believe it or not and when you have several going it takes quite a while to refill each and then duct tape them so they are air tight. I use to have a large room and used a plastic 55gal drum on a dolly. Lots of work there.

I use 20 lbs of sugar and 3 tablespoons of yeast to each 30 gal. I buy them in bulk at Sam's or Walmart. Each mixture keeps the ppm around 1250-2000 for about a week. I have two heating pad under the container that are on timers. 15min every hour when 24/7 light veg. and lower during the dark periods when flowering which I start to back off on heat about 1.5hrs prior to dark and start heat 1.5 hrs prior to light. I am currently working on a way to store the CO2 produced during the "dark" periods and inject it during light.

Right now I am using a 30 gal container I bought at a farm type hardware store like Big R or a rural ACE hardware. Here is a picture.



It has a handy drain spout at the bottom and a large lid on top that screws air tight. I drilled a hole in the top and put a L shaped hard tube and sealed it with epoxy. This is where I connect the primary tube. Ex:



In the beginning, if you fill the container with too hot of water you do one of two things. Kill the yeast culture, or awaken them too much and the tank will over flow out the primary tube. I have done both. You want the water to be slightly warmer than lukewarm. Anyway, I found a fix for the over flow problem. I run the primary tube into a second container...to the bottom. I do this through a drilled hole in a lid that I then seal. I then drill another hole in the secondary lid and put a secondary tube into the lid about an inch and then seal that so that all is still air tight. The gas leaves the primary container through the primary tube, goes down into a secondary container to the bottom that has about 2 in of water in it, the gas bubbles through the water and then leaves the secondary container through the secondary tube. Here is a picture and a drawing:






Here is the whole thing put together.... the secondary container acts to catch any condensation, overflow from over active yeast, and to give you a visual of how much CO2 is being produced by the bubbling in the 2 in of water.



In my room I have a constant flow of fresh air into the room so I place the CO2 delivery hose next to the passive intake and the CO2 mixes with the air as it enters the room. My grow chambers sit above my humidifier which runs constantly so that the CO2 which is heavier than air is pushed back up from the bottom into the waiting stomata on the undersides of the leaves. My out take air is sucked from the very top of the room where the heat migrates to.
The humidifier acts as an air circulator and cools the root chambers at the same time. I will post a pic of part of the room so you can see the way the intakes, humidifier, root chambers, and perforated diffusion board all work together. On the next post I will go more into the assembly of the system and tweaks I did to each part.




I have to give credit to ItsGrowTime and TBug for their parts of the designs I copied. The picture I posted is not the completed set up but shows the large humidifier in the lower right corner, the reservoir bottom middle, the passive intake ducts far left and nutrient delivery next to silver intake ducts, the 5in x 5in root chambers surrounded by silver bubble insulation, all held up by metal frame.

Hope I explained things well.

Peace

:lurk all the best bro.

looking tidy so far mate


keep em green!

so are you buying 20 lbs of sugar every week or hows this work i've been looking into this method but havent understood it yet. would like to give it a try. i was just gonna use 5 gallon buckets and air hose. i do like the secondary container idea also....

Cool shit i'm in.

OH HELL YEAH! This is gonna be a nice one to watch. Great thread so far Bree...can't wait to see the grow

That's a massive yeast CO2 system you got there!

wow

wow

That beats the hell out of my lil co2 bucket in the closet.

Rock on Bree, my serious friend.

I can't wait to see this! I was going to use my 5-gallon glass carboy with sugar and yeast. Even thought about making a special batch of beer to go with it. A nice lager, flavored with bud, mmm. I could call it Bubble Bunny Blossom Beer! When you can't say it anymore, you're cut off.

I use vodka in my airlocks, figure it cuts out the possibility of contamination either way. Best wishes, I'll be watching.

later, flip

ItsGrowTime said:

Bout goddamn time Bree! Ill be checking in daily so keep the updates coming steadily. Ive also been waiting to see your co2 solution.

Click to expand...

High bree! geesh, everybody is already here...Why am I the last to know about these things?...lol. But yeah, glad to see ya finally got it dialed in and I'll be along for the ride!

High ALL! Great to see some old buds, here! Sorry im late, so I'll sit here in the back. At least I beat Babyhugie, so I do the honors...
***TBug passes around a bowl of green gummies to his friends.***

Ahh... anybody seen the Postman yet?
Peace ALL and GL bree, TBug

I'm workin on some comparative math for yeast vs. burner. I don't want to sound pesimistic, but usually these type of CO2 reactors don't last very long. I used to use one to supplement plants on my fish tank, and it worked fantastic, but the real volume of CO2 produced was relatively small, and the yeast mash had to be re-made every ~2weeks as the alcohol builds up.

I never saw a co2 yeast gen this large, cool stuff. Hospital dumpsters are prime for 30 gallon drums, from floor cleaner, I got several last year, now I have something else to do with them. Keep it coming!
H

Another thought I was having is thus: Since alcohol will quickly kill your yeast, perhaps you should consider using a bacteria which will undergo Lactic Acid fermentation instead of alcohol fermentation. I don't know where you would get this sort of bacteria (other than acidophilus, yogurt spores), but it would produce a weak acid which could be easily buffered out with baking soda or something similar. This would enable you to make a saturated sugar solution, and have it run for quite a bit longer before it needed to be replenished. Only problem is that yeast may have a faster metabolism than bacters such as acidophilus.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lactic_acid_fermentation

Some strains are more alcohol-tolerant than others. Unfortunately, they're also way more than the bulk pounds of yeast at Sam's Club. Somewhere there has to be a chart of volume of CO2 produced over time. C'mon, it's teh Interweb, for pete's sake!

Haps said:

I never saw a co2 yeast gen this large, cool stuff. Hospital dumpsters are prime for 30 gallon drums, from floor cleaner, I got several last year, now I have something else to do with them. Keep it coming!
H

Click to expand...

I think I would pay pretty good money for a plastic drum before climbing into a hospital dumpster. I'm all for dumpster-diving, but there are limits. No funeral homes, either!

later, flip