Calculations for Common Nutrient Formulas

I have decided to make a thread Listing the actual fertilizer amounts in common plant food formulas.

Often the bottles list X/Gal will yield Y ppm. This is very inaccurate, because of the different scales associated with ppm. I have seen plenty of people get burned (and burn there plants) using the bottle listed ppm.

So how do I know which scale the manufacturer is using?

I don't, so lets forget that part of the bottle.


Let us also forget about Vegging at xxxxppm and flowering at xxxx ppm. Some products do not register on a ppm meter and some register higher than the listed NPK (for example, Liquid Karma raises the ppm a lot, compared to the actual amount of fertilizer/Food in contains. Most of the reading is from the 'Non-Plant Food Ingredients' Humic Acid, Aloe Vera, etc). So saying i want to flower at 1500ppm is sort of rediculous, because Cal-Mag+ and Liquid Karma, will add a lot more to your ppm without adding much to your 'feeding' program.


So instead of that, I will look else where and shoot for Lucas/pH's Formula
N100 P100 K200 Mg60

I will focus on the liquid weight of the product (ml/g), the Guaranteed Analysis, and the listed application rate, to derive the true NPK of the fertilizer. All three are normally listed on the bottle, and there is a handy little calculator for just this task.
http://www.angelfire.com/cantina/fourtwenty/articles/profiles.htm
Now I can easily see what the real profiles of my nutrients.



Once again, just to reiterate, an N 50 P 25 K 25, is a TRUE ppm of 100, but a 100 ppm reading will not equal N 50 P 25 K 25 (or some other combo equaling 100). Not all elements will register on a meter. SO IT IS A MUST TO UNDERSTAND YOUR NUTRIENT BOTTLES.



Here I will list the Product Name, its' listed NPK (some formulas change {The AN Overdrive, i just purchased, is the old Formula}), its ml/g weight, and either a 10ml or 5ml per Gal application rate(for easy math).

Pure Blend Pro Grow
3-1.5-4
1.0625 grams/ml
@10ml/Gal
N 84
P 18
K 93
Mg 14
Ca 28
Fe 0

Pure Blend Pro Bloom Hydro
2.5-2-5
1.0625 grams/ml
@10ml/Gal
N 70
P 24
K 116
Mg 14
Ca 28
Fe 0

Pure Blend Pro Bloom Soil
1.5-4-5
1.0625 grams/ml
@10ml/Gal
N 42
P 49
K 116
Mg 14
Ca 28

Botanicare Hydroplex
.5-4-10
1.1966 grams/ml
@5ml/Gal
N 8
P 28
K 131
Mg 8
Ca 0
Fe 0
S 8

Botanicare Liquid Karma
.1-.1-.5
.98958 grams/ml
@10ml/Gal
N 3
P 1
K 11
Mg 0
Ca 0
Fe 0

Botanicare Sweet
0-0-0
1.065 grams/ml
@10ml/Gal
N 0
P 0
K 0
Mg 42
Ca 0
Fe 1.68
S 56

Botanicare Cal Mag Plus
2-0-0
1.0208 grams/ml
@10ml/Gal
N 54
P 0
K 0
Mg 32
Ca 86
Fe 2.7

Millennium Cal Mag Max
0-0-0
1.12632 grams/ml
@5ml/Gal
N 0
P 0
K 0
Mg 15
Ca 60
Fe 0.744
Mo 0.045
Cu 0.045

Millennium HyPhos
1.8-7.5-1.8
1.0642grams/ml
@5ml/Gal
N 25
P 46
K 21
Mg 0
Ca 0
Fe 1.40
Mn 0.28

AN Overdrive Older Version, and i had to weigh the liquid myself, since the weight is not listed
1-3-4
1.162 grams/ml
@10ml/Gal
N 31
P 40
K 102
The ingredients list Magnesium Phosphate and Magniesium Sulfate, so there is defiently some Mg and S in this mix, but its not listed, and as another side note, no Ca listed anywhere.



Don't throw out your ppm meter, you can still track the ppm(or preferable the EC, now that you know the differece) up or down, just worry more about the day to day, up or down change, and less about a specific number.

Great information here.

I too follow the Lucas formula using the Botanicare line of nutes.

I use the soil bloom formula throughout the entire life cycle of the plants[veg+flower] up until flush. I don't have N deficiency because I supplement it with the Cal-mag which is needed to raise calcium and magnesium levels up to the 120/70 guideline.

I've found that 15ml/gal of the PBPB soil with 10 ml/gal of Cal-mag plus you have a very complete fertilizer that meets the Lucas formula requirements. This will register around 1.6 PPM. So I always shoot for 1.6 PPM as my baseline full strength mix.

Now I also use Liquid karma, Sweet, and Silica Blast too. The LK and Sweet make the EC shoot up considerably, but like ShroomDr said, it's not because they contain alot of NPK or other nutes. It's because of the sugars in Sweet and the goodies in LK. This stuff is fine to add on top w/o causing burn. My full strength mix comes out to 2.4 EC because of all those extra goodies, but the plants don't burn. They love the Sweet and LK.

If I didn't use the Nutrient calculator I would be scared to use Sweet and LK cuz of the EC spike, but now I know better.

meduser180056 said:

The LK and Sweet make the EC shoot up considerably, but like ShroomDr said, it's not because they contain alot of NPK or other nutes. It's because of the sugars in Sweet and the goodies in LK. This stuff is fine to add on top w/o causing burn. My full strength mix comes out to 2.4 EC because of all those extra goodies, but the plants don't burn. They love the Sweet and LK.

If I didn't use the Nutrient calculator I would be scared to use Sweet and LK cuz of the EC spike, but now I know better.

Click to expand...

This has confused me for some time. I also heard organics wouldn't really register on a ppm meter because they don't really conduct ec, so if sweet raises the ec because of sugar (organic) and LK because of the other organic stuff in there why does the ec raise on the meter if these supposedly organic molecules can't conduct ec?

I just moved everything to the top thread.

BUMP.

would any old growers like to speak as to why no Flowering Boosters have Ca in the mix?

None in hydroplex, Overdrive, Bud Blood, or Sweet.

It is a pattern that i noticed a few months ago, yet i do not understand why.

do plants late in flowering not need Ca?

Calcium + phosphate = precipitates form. This would clog a fertilizer injector. So alot of ferts leave calcium out. Flowering plants do need calcium. Growers usually have more than 1 injector. Maybe one just for calcium like calcium nitrate.

that makes sence

I did have a long detailed post written but then comp crashed, so now Im pissy. What I was saying is that your gram/ml values are wrong for every product. Here is a quick example:
Pureblend pro soil
2.24 net weight and 960 mls
2.24 convert to grams is 1,016.0469087
1,016.0469087/960 is 1.0583821965625

HOLD ON !@#!@#!@
The values are different depending on the size of the bottle, that should not be but it is. My liter of pbp soil has a gram per ml weight of 1.0583821965625 but my 2 and a half gallon has a gram/ml of 1.289156842. Thats a big fuckin difference. Thats such bullshit, botanicare is slackin and still no return phine call from the techs.

There is some monkey business goin on here

Glad I did as well as I did with all the bull shit of this product
day 44

I follow the directions on the bottle of PBP Bloom Soil and add 1tblsp molasses, 1 tsp Tiger Bloom, 1tblsp Sensizyme per gallon. My babies look fine. No burning. I have even gone as far as 3x that amount of tiger bloom without burning. Or 3x Monster Bloom dry instead of tiger bloom. No burns... Am I just lucky?

I dont have any burning, that is not the point

Contacted AmerAgro again and told the tech of this and he seemed concerned. didnt have an answer , said he would have to talk to the botanists or chemist or some shit.

still waiting on a response...

payn4school said:

I dont have any burning, that is not the point

Contacted AmerAgro again and told the tech of this and he seemed concerned. didnt have an answer , said he would have to talk to the botanists or chemist or some shit.

still waiting on a response...

Click to expand...

Then what is the point?

I want to feed them correctly and I appreciate the thread, but I want to feed them as much as possible, without burning or affecting flavor.

The directions on the bottle haven't caused any drama; so am I under or over ferting if I follow them?

Meduser 180056 says he stays in the 120/70 calcium magnesium guideline. Do you really need 120ppm of calcium? What happened to the Lucas 60? Anyone have results on using a low calcium/mag in their mix vs. a high calcium/mag? What is the ratio? Is it 2 parts calcium for every 1 part Mag?

Dr.Schrooms, great thread. You wouldn't happen to know AN big bud PPM's would you?

I found it. Meduser my bad, I thought the lucas was 100N-100P-200K-60Ca, It's not 60Ca, its 60Mag.

20 ml of Pureblend bloom soil looks like it would do the Lucas formula on it's own???

4-2-1 is the ratio you should have of K-Ca-Mg.

Payn4school- I think you need to just trust the calculator. You seem to be making it too complicated, but I understand your NEED to KNOW so find out for us and report back bud.

minglewoodblues said:

20 ml of Pureblend bloom soil looks like it would do the Lucas formula on it's own???

Click to expand...

Nah that's not gonna have enough N, Mg, and Ca if you only use that. Depends though if your using hard water and what kind of soil you are in....

inflorescence said:

This has confused me for some time. I also heard organics wouldn't really register on a ppm meter because they don't really conduct ec, so if sweet raises the ec because of sugar (organic) and LK because of the other organic stuff in there why does the ec raise on the meter if these supposedly organic molecules can't conduct ec?

Click to expand...

Good question I've always wondered this myself. I've heard people say that PBP line isn't really organic because it registers on the EC. I don't know much about all that though. I never really considered PBP to be organic. I always thought it was some kind of semi-organic fert. Kind of like an inbetween.

Hopefully someone can chime in that knows about this....

Ok guys,heres the deal. After several hours Ben from the tech line at botanicare called back. He said that I was correct and I was the first person to notice the discrepancy. He went on to say that they will now be correcting the packaging to fix the difference in gr/ml ratios in the different size containers! I imagine that will take some time before they are seen on the shelf. He gave me a corrected value for the pbp soil of 1.100906. I was at work so i didnt have time to get anymore values, and they are still trying to come up with ppm values for the products as well. Isnt that strange they they cant give those?
I will get more in depth with this tomorrow...

Wow

So how much of a difference does the corrected value end up making?

I will be waiting. I cant believe one size bottle says one thing, and a larger size bottle says another. Thats just strange.

ShroomDr said:

I cant believe one size bottle says one thing, and a larger size bottle says another. Thats just strange.

Click to expand...

But couldn't botanicare be using this as a sales tactic. Selling two different concentrations of the same product in different sized bottles.

Just think, a difference between 1.06 gram/ml and 1.10 gram/ml may not seem much but multiply that times the tens of thousands of bottles they sell each year and it adds up.

Definately seems fishy.