Blumat auto watering

[Canniwhatsis]

+1.


I just set up my first slave set, 3 droppers in a 5gal smart pot.


Had a minor runaway, that took 2 day's to recognize. Half an arrow too far out, and the droppers were flowing too much and overflowing the tray!.....

 

[GuFF]

Thanks for the welcome sunny. I just hooked up 8 of them on my mother plants to give them a try, so far so good.

Do you know anyone using the slave drippers with nutes in a pressurized system sunny? That's the route I would much rather go as itd be much cheaper as you said. Just don't to deal with clogs either.

 

[skyview]

I've used the slave drippers with Age Old Organics Grow and Bloom for many months and didn't have any problems even though my water tank was only 2.5' above the plant surface level. I also used some Bountea Superfood without any trouble. I think the more pressure in your system, the thicker the nutrients you can use without clogging problems - though Blumat recommends not going over about 15 psi.

 

[skyview]

I would put the upper reservoir up as high as possible. My elevated reservoirs are 5 gallon buckets, and the lids are like 3 inches from the ceiling. Most people, myself included, use a 2 reservoir system, so you don't need to have a huge 30+ gallon reservoir up that high. If I had 12 foot ceilings they would be 12 feet in the air. I think somebody in here calculated the height that would be required to match the pressure given by the pressure reducer faucet fitting; it was like 30 feet or something, so I wouldn't worry about having too much pressure just by hanging it.

After every run I clean mine. That involves running hot water through them while I stretch out and massage the drip lines. This usually dislodges some salts and stuff from the inside. While doing this I also uncap the end and smack the black feed line with a yard stick. The black feed line is really too firm to squeeze or massage with any effect. I just try to smack it hard enough to shake something loose inside. It seems to work.

AK-51, I just found this storage tank called a WaterBrick. It's smaller and more expensive than 5 gallon buckets but it's really strong, high quality and only 6" high - it can go higher and give Blumats more pressure. I have some on order but haven't had a chance to test them yet. Here's a link: http://www.waterbrick.org/lp-water-containers.php

 

[GuFF]

Thanks skyview, good to know the drippers are working for you before I give em a whirl. As to the water brick only being 6" high, the height of the water level is what determines the pressure. So weather it's a shallow container or a 5 gal bucket I think the actual head (topmost height) of water is the factor.

 

[skyview]

GuFF, yes that's true about the pressure being from the top of the water. I was thinking though with the WaterBricks, I could put them on a higher shelf which would leave more growing room for my plants. And because they are more horizontal, the water pressure wouldn't drop much like it does when the water in a 5 gallon bucket gets lower.

 

[ak-51]

The distance the water drops for each unit of water drained is dependent on the surface area of the water in the container. I think that a 5 gallon bucket is going to have as much if not more surface area than one of those bricks.

The point of the 2 reservoir system however is to keep the top reservoir at a consistent level, regardless of what size it is. If your pumps are working correctly it shouldn't matter much what size the upper res is. I wouldn't want to go lower than 5 gallons though. It gives me a little buffer in case a pump fails or a GFCI trips.

That said, you might be able to keep the heaviest sediments out of your lines by placing the bulkhead on the side of the container instead of the bottom. This would not be as easy with round buckets.

 

[GuFF]

So for this 4' x 8' geoplanter I will have 32 plants, one square foot per plant. I'm going to use one blumat per plant, with 3 drippers connected to each. The circumference of the drip circle will be 6", that way each circle remains 6" from the next one. The perimeter of the circle will be 48 cm (18.9"), which means about 16 cm (6.3") of drip line between each dripper.

Was also considering just using 18 blumats with 4 drippers on each and having a dripper every 8 inches which should give good coverage across the entire 4 x 8 bed but it seems people are having better success going for a little more coverage than what blumat recommends, plus I like the idea of one sensor per plant. Not quite sure at this point, any advice would be appreciated.

 

[sunnydog]

Thanks for the welcome sunny. I just hooked up 8 of them on my mother plants to give them a try, so far so good.

Do you know anyone using the slave drippers with nutes in a pressurized system sunny? That's the route I would much rather go as itd be much cheaper as you said. Just don't to deal with clogs either.

Yes, me

 

[skyview]

Some specs on the distribution drippers from the mfg. in Austria: You can go as far as 100 cm (39") from the sensor with these and they water about 20 cm wide (8"). Minimum pressure to use them like this is 4.5 psi. You can go down as low as 2 psi but the last dripper or two might not put out much water. And of course, the higher the pressure, the less likely to get clogged.

 

[Canniwhatsis]

Pink slime vs Biofiltration?

Pink slime vs Biofiltration?

My res and lines are starting to suffer pink slime.


I look at this constant level res setup, and can't help but compare it to my 125 gallon freshwater fish tank with sump filtration.......

No pink slime in my fish tank, So,....


what if I re-upped my res with water from the impending water change on my fish tank, and perhaps added an external filter to the main res that would filter a part of the water thru a biological filter much the same as my fish tank does?


Any thoughts on nitrifying bacteria living in the res?

 

[skyview]

I know that one of the factors in slime/algae build-up is light - the darker your res, the less problem there should be.

 

[ak-51]

My reservoirs are mostly dark most of the time. They never receive direct light from the 1000 watts, and only receive indirect light from at least 12 feet away from T5s for 18 hours out of the day. Any significant indirect light is probably eliminated at the outside of the container, since they are all opaque. During the 6 hours of veg lights off it is pitch black. I do fill up my reservoirs with water directly from the tap, so the chlorine probably suppresses any growth in there somewhat.

With these measures I have never had any kind of slimy growth in my reservoirs or lines.

 

[moodster]

with the pink slime you need a 2 in 1 fish filter and pump my res has never been so clean and I don't use drip clean now

 

[Canniwhatsis]

Res is black plastic, upper is opaque white, the only light is for the laundry room and is a CFL that's only on when we are doing laundry. Never exposed to the HID's.


It's not bad, just noticed it when I topped off last time, the pump dislodged and the line was slick when I stuck it back to the bottom of the res.

 

[ak-51]

Hm. Maybe adding bleach or chlorine? I made some mock clear-rez solution from hgh shock & swim. That could probably be used in a regular reservoir just as easily as a cloner, maybe just at lower rates.

I am interested in this aquarium filter idea. What is the filter made out of, is it just like that plastic sponge like membrane that is in a lot of pumps? Maybe just a bit thicker? I think one made out of carbon would be bad because it would probably just catch a lot of nutrients up in it then.

 

[Canniwhatsis]

I am interested in this aquarium filter idea. What is the filter made out of, is it just like that plastic sponge like membrane that is in a lot of pumps? Maybe just a bit thicker? I think one made out of carbon would be bad because it would probably just catch a lot of nutrients up in it then.

Some filters use a sponge like that for bio media, others use ceramic pellets, or nylon mesh. The ones that hang off the back of the tank use a "Bio wheel" which is just a corrugated paper paddel wheel that spins in the return stream of water to grow beneficial bacteria on it.. Just depends on the filter. Look up "Power Filter"


I"ve got a tiny one in my 5 gallon quarantine tank, the carbon in it is shot, but it keeps the water chemistry perfect with the fish that are in there (currently a fry tank for bristlenose pleco)

 

[Canniwhatsis]

I was just curious if any other growers had tried to actually "Culture" their water to prevent harmful bacteria build up?

 

[rrog]

I don't use a res any longer, but backin the day I added a culture. I forget the name, and I would also add a tiny amount of molasses. After that the res never had an issue. That's what turned me to soil- embracing the microbes. I figure if there's no escaping them, you had better have some allies amongst them.

 

[silver hawaiian]

Crap. Y'all got me thinkin, now..

I run a two-res setup - about 18g on the floot, and 4 on the shelf.

I keep a mix of (per gal) 5 ml ful power, 5 ml pro-tekt, and 2 ml sm90 in my rez.

Constant waterfall from the top into the bottom. Pump never stops.

Over time, I came to notice that, despite the constant cycling of water between the two vessels, and the relative (damn near 100%) absence of light, I was still accumulating a good amount of funk at the bottom of the rez.

Growth never seemed to suffer as a result, but it's been an observation I've been chewing on lately. I ended up draining the rez(s) at one point (18 months later ) and wiping all that shit out -- the primary concern being not letting that shit gum up the pump, and nothing to do with "OMG IT'S BAD."

This conversation's got me thinking, though. .. I like the idea of the bio-wheel deal as a filter in one of the rezs, but to avoid another moving part, what about throwing a handful of bio balls in one of the rezs?