passive plant killer

[SCROG McDuck]

D9... it has been 2 weeks since I cut Hawiian Snow....
120 days bloom and crap! it might have been another 2 months
before it was ready.........

anyway, broke down 2 boxes, repositioned alot of fragile stuff that is also
in the room, set up fans, light, Temp/RH contorller, humidifier
(new Commercial Grade is in the mail, thanks JJ), still using timers for humidity, ATM, because I cant keep the humidity higher than
52% with lights on, Commercial Grade is in the mail, and should
take care of that.

This all comes at a time when my retail business peaks...

with at all that, find myself with the 'babies' in the PPK cloners alot.
I'm starting to fell the PPK, 'adults', want me to, 'leave them alone'.
The Jacks at 1.2 is making the 3 of them happy, and the PH
is, as you said, dead on with no adjusters. I dont get it but I dont need to.
How do I go from 1.2EC to 1.5? Drain and refil?

I'm still working with controlling temps and humidity better and
have some to go.. it's been fun. and very entertaining and educational. Thanks.

Also, computer died a mont ago and neew one doesnt have familiar photo app,
so it will be a few days til I learn how to upload proper photos but
they're coming soon.

 

[jjfoo]

How do I go from 1.2EC to 1.5? Drain and refil?

so glad you asked

think of it as steering the EC

To increase raise your input water EC a bit, then the EC should slowly come up

plants don't like quick changes in EC, so flushing to get it there in one shot is optimal

it can take time to get the EC to climb, but don't over compensate, you should climb slowly, not climb too high then lower then back...

 

[jjfoo]

no pH down

no pH down

I'm becoming more PPK compliant. I have stopped using silicon and pH down. I'm just using RO and jacks/calcnit.

 

[DevilWeed]

Question for you guys using Jacks Pro/Calcinit. I setup a calculator for different rez volumes and EC's but somethings not right.

Here's what I'm doing:

Took values for 2.1EC Standard Formula
130oz's/1000gals Jacks
86oz's /1000gals Calcinit

Grams:
130x28 = 3640grams/1000g Jacks
86x28 = 2408grams/1000g Calcinit

So:
3.64g's/gallon Jacks + 2.408g's/gallon Calcinit in RO water should give me an EC of 2.1 correct? Next I take the desired EC and divide by 2.1. Take that and multiply it by the respective grams per gallon (3.64 or 2.408) and then multiply by the number of gallons. Make sense?

Now, my last rez fillup was 52 gallons. This is on a measured 55gallon poly drum so it should be pretty dam close. The calculation looks like this for a desired EC of 1.5:

Jacks: (1.5/2.1)*3.64*52 = 135.2
Calci: (1.5/2.1)*2.408*52 = 89.44

Using a high accuracy PPM meter(.7) I found that it took 1.34 times the calculated amount to reach the desired EC. I have 2 meters and just calibrated both so I know the readings are right. Any idea what I'm doing wrong here?

 

[SCROG McDuck]

Question for you guys using Jacks Pro/Calcinit. I setup a calculator for different rez volumes and EC's but somethings not right.

Here's what I'm doing:

Took values for 2.1EC Standard Formula
130oz's/1000gals Jacks
86oz's /1000gals Calcinit

Grams:
130x28 = 3640grams/1000g Jacks
86x28 = 2408grams/1000g Calcinit

So:
3.64g's/gallon Jacks + 2.408g's/gallon Calcinit in RO water should give me an EC of 2.1 correct? Next I take the desired EC and divide by 2.1. Take that and multiply it by the respective grams per gallon (3.64 or 2.408) and then multiply by the number of gallons. Make sense?

Now, my last rez fillup was 52 gallons. This is on a measured 55gallon poly drum so it should be pretty dam close. The calculation looks like this for a desired EC of 1.5:

Jacks: (1.5/2.1)*3.64*52 = 135.2
Calci: (1.5/2.1)*2.408*52 = 89.44

Using a high accuracy PPM meter(.7) I found that it took 1.34 times the calculated amount to reach the desired EC. I have 2 meters and just calibrated both so I know the readings are right. Any idea what I'm doing wrong here?

Hello DevilWeed.. taking some of D9s early figures and sorted out
these ideas.. They seem to be working.

Was never able to sort out those 1000 gallon X whatever and divide by XYZ=.19X 67%, or whatever it was.. calculation that
come with the Jacks.... so being a good Marine, I improvised.

My standard (.5 conversion):
Concluded that; 1/4 tsp of jacks in 1 gallon of water gets 120PPMs.

With this in mind, 4x1/4 tsp=1tsp in 1 gallon of RO will = 480ppms

In your case, 52 gallons, 52 tsps of Jacks, will get you 480 PPMs.
.67% of 480=321 <Calcinit. 480+321=1.5EC.

Take a rough calculation for Calcinit (52tsp X .67=34.xtsp)
to bring one close to the 320 and sneak up on the 320PPMs
by meter..

I have found that, as D9 suggests, wait some 10 to 30 minutes after the addition
of the Jacks for complete disolution of the Jacks powder completely for more accurate
PPM/EC and PH readings before adding the calcinit..


I've also built a calulator:

In excel:

Cell1 (Controll Cell): target ppms >Cell2: =(Tgtppms: Cell1 X .6)=Jacks PPMs >Cell3: =(Cell2 X .67 of Jacks)=Calcinit PPMs>Cell4 =(Cell2+Cell3) = total PPMs.
*** CELL1 is the controll Cell, change this figure to obtain the others

and another that goes like this:

Cell 2 (Controll Cell) Jacks PPMs wanted,
Cell 1 (Target PPMs) =Cell 1 + Cell 3
Cell 3 (Calcinit PPMs) =Cell 2 X .67%

*** CELL2 is the controll Cell, change this figure to obtain the others.

I know it is a clear as mud!
Please, anyone...correct me if I'm wrong...

 

[delta9nxs]

holy shit! i leave for a few days and all kinds of stuff happens!

i'll start trying to answer some questions but first i want to put up a few pics of the new top bucket build.

 

[delta9nxs]

this is a 3.5 gal container just like the bottom. i have changed tooling somewhat to make it simpler and faster to build.

you only need a 2.5" hole saw, a 1.5" hole saw, and a 7/16th bit. i also used a 1/8th bit for a pilot hole.

the 2.5" is for the lower reservoir bucket lid hole (not shown), the 1.5" is for the tailpiece in the top bucket and the the 7/16" does the sidewall holes, the hole for the tire valve, and the access hole. (7/16" hole shown in last photo)

the sidewall holes are at 12 equidistant points. i then drew 3.25" straight lines up from those points and centered the top hole on the point where the 3.5" line stops.

one hole at the bottom, and then center the rest.

only drilling 60 larger holes is much faster than the approx 400 5/16" holes yet will still give comparable air flow relative to the bucket size.

in the photo you see the access hole plugged with an upside down tire valve. nice stopper.

for each setup you need 2 3.5 gal buckets. one lid, and i strongly recommend the "re-usable" lid they offer as it goes on and off easily.

you will need a 3" piece of 3/16" black latex tubing, a john guest fitting for the pulse system, and 2 tire valves for each.

that's it.

make a control bucket with a float valve, a pump bucket for the pulse system, and an elevated volume tank.

figure out how you want to control it and add some drip line and you are ready to go.

 

[delta9nxs]

Hmm, so no pre flower dfol? I've done both and for the way I WAS growing veg defol was a life saver. I could keep a plant less than a foot tall for 40 or 50 days and by then is was a branch monster. My cheese strain loved that treatment...

Are you still testing various levels and timing of defoliation? Can't remember if you already posted about it...too much meds me thinks...

hey, i'm done with the variations, i'm just waiting for results now.

 

[delta9nxs]

.

 

[SCROG McDuck]

so glad you asked

think of it as steering the EC

To increase raise your input water EC a bit, then the EC should slowly come up

plants don't like quick changes in EC, so flushing to get it there in one shot is optimal

it can take time to get the EC to climb, but don't over compensate, you should climb slowly, not climb too high then lower then back...

OH yes, thank you for this JJ

 

[delta9nxs]

Hi, huntingbb! Thanks for coming by!

The coco extends all the way to the bottom of the tail piece. This moves the perched water table down into the tail piece and both feeds and drains the medium at alternate times.

The tail piece is 6” long and bridges the air gap (3”) between the upper grow container and the bottom reservoir container water level. As the water level should be constant once set this is enough and will also get you a few days away if the volume tank runs dry. You can run a longer one all the way down to the bottom if you like.

During operation I get no water coming out of the holes. If you are getting water you are putting too much in at once and need to back off.

The “air gap” is in the bottom bucket. The amount of gap is established by the float valve in the control bucket.

My plants have gotten near 6' but I bend them over into the lights.

There is an inherent problem with using blumats in conjunction with the sub-irrigation. They are both gravity fed and, if fed from the same tank, will quickly flood your system.

The liquid for the blumats needs to come from the control bucket so it does not add volume to the floor part of the system. The only way to do this is to pump water from the control bucket into a day tank separate from the rest of the system. This will feed the blumats but will need to be topped. Either by hand or a pump on a timer. If you use a pump on a timer you might as well pulse.

As I run perpetual and have plants in every stage of life simultaneously I don't know how much solution each plant is using but i'm using about 20 gals a day total.

This system is extremely forgiving with temperatures. I don't even think about solution temps anymore. My lights on air temps are around 78-82f and lights off around 70f. Medium temperature stays about 75f.

It is closed tightly at every opportunity with no light access and very little evaporation. Everything stays remarkably clean.

I hope I have helped, d9

 

[delta9nxs]

Delta, that branch is insane!

I was just thinking about something...maybe it was already discussed. If someone doing drain-to-waste coco put a 6" tailpiece on each pot and elevated them, would the PWT after a flood be lower in the pots? I need to reed back through all those posts... If that was the case one could flood a lot more often without worrying about drowning. Got thinking about this because of all the plants I have to finish before I can really switch to PPK's...

Here's a couple shots of my biggest girl to date. It's about 40" from soil to tip, about 36" across and about 20" deep. It's between two bare 1k's about 30" on center.

Some young ladies just starting out in life:

first, absolutely beautiful plants! you will really enjoy growing those in a ppk system.

with drain to waste using any medium i would stick a cloth wick in each pot at least 1.5" up into the medium and then have it hang down below the pot at least 8-9". this turns the wick into a one way drain only.

someone has done this using a wire rack and one of those cement tubs.

since it drains the pwt entirely it would require more frequent but smaller irrigation events.

if you water only until the first sign of run off each time the slight run off would probably evaporate.

nice plants!

 

[delta9nxs]

Oh, that big girl is GH Cheese. Was a lucky freebie and is my current favorite. DSDv2 may change that. That one is growing in organic soil mix (LC1) fed [email protected] for the last month or so via Blumats. Wish it was in coco...

She produces some nice buds:

yes, it does! what is that?

 

[delta9nxs]

devil weed,
yes , I use wick on all my drain to waste veg plants

Since adding wicks my plants stopped drooping as the day passes. I would say they where showing moisture stress from the perched water table keeping the bottoms soggy.

exactly, the pwt gets used up by the plant and evaporation. as it falls air type roots invade the space. you water again and drown them. it's really reverse water stress in the sense that it is too much water that causes the condition rather than too little.

 

[delta9nxs]

D9... it has been 2 weeks since I cut Hawiian Snow....
120 days bloom and crap! it might have been another 2 months
before it was ready.........

anyway, broke down 2 boxes, repositioned alot of fragile stuff that is also
in the room, set up fans, light, Temp/RH contorller, humidifier
(new Commercial Grade is in the mail, thanks JJ), still using timers for humidity, ATM, because I cant keep the humidity higher than
52% with lights on, Commercial Grade is in the mail, and should
take care of that.

This all comes at a time when my retail business peaks...

with at all that, find myself with the 'babies' in the PPK cloners alot.
I'm starting to fell the PPK, 'adults', want me to, 'leave them alone'.
The Jacks at 1.2 is making the 3 of them happy, and the PH
is, as you said, dead on with no adjusters. I dont get it but I dont need to.
How do I go from 1.2EC to 1.5? Drain and refil?

I'm still working with controlling temps and humidity better and
have some to go.. it's been fun. and very entertaining and educational. Thanks.

Also, computer died a mont ago and neew one doesnt have familiar photo app,
so it will be a few days til I learn how to upload proper photos but
they're coming soon.

hey, mcduck! jj has it right on the next post. i never change out, i just start feeding the new strength.

 

[huntingbb]

Hi, huntingbb! Thanks for coming by!

The coco extends all the way to the bottom of the tail piece. This moves the perched water table down into the tail piece and both feeds and drains the medium at alternate times.

The tail piece is 6” long and bridges the air gap (3”) between the upper grow container and the bottom reservoir container water level. As the water level should be constant once set this is enough and will also get you a few days away if the volume tank runs dry. You can run a longer one all the way down to the bottom if you like.

During operation I get no water coming out of the holes. If you are getting water you are putting too much in at once and need to back off.

The “air gap” is in the bottom bucket. The amount of gap is established by the float valve in the control bucket.

My plants have gotten near 6' but I bend them over into the lights.

There is an inherent problem with using blumats in conjunction with the sub-irrigation. They are both gravity fed and, if fed from the same tank, will quickly flood your system.

The liquid for the blumats needs to come from the control bucket so it does not add volume to the floor part of the system. The only way to do this is to pump water from the control bucket into a day tank separate from the rest of the system. This will feed the blumats but will need to be topped. Either by hand or a pump on a timer. If you use a pump on a timer you might as well pulse.

As I run perpetual and have plants in every stage of life simultaneously I don't know how much solution each plant is using but i'm using about 20 gals a day total.

This system is extremely forgiving with temperatures. I don't even think about solution temps anymore. My lights on air temps are around 78-82f and lights off around 70f. Medium temperature stays about 75f.

It is closed tightly at every opportunity with no light access and very little evaporation. Everything stays remarkably clean.

I hope I have helped, d9

TONS of help, thank you sir!

I'd like to stay with 1 1k if possible, your earlier comment about the 8x8 really hit home for that goal, would i be correct in assuming you meant vertically bare bulb or in a cooltube? unfortunately for this round there's no time to prep plants for the ppk, but ive got lil ones that can and will. gonna do 16 in 5 or so gal buckets of coco - simple shit.

i see what you mean about the pulse and pump, was wondering if that was pulled separately, but that control bucket acts like a water level, and i think that dropped coco is a reverse almost equivalent of the blumats.

but, you mean you don't add anything to prevent algae, root rot, and the like? What RH do you keep things at?

 

[delta9nxs]

so glad you asked

think of it as steering the EC

To increase raise your input water EC a bit, then the EC should slowly come up

plants don't like quick changes in EC, so flushing to get it there in one shot is optimal

it can take time to get the EC to climb, but don't over compensate, you should climb slowly, not climb too high then lower then back...

thank you!

 

[huntingbb]

first, absolutely beautiful plants! you will really enjoy growing those in a ppk system.

with drain to waste using any medium i would stick a cloth wick in each pot at least 1.5" up into the medium and then have it hang down below the pot at least 8-9". this turns the wick into a one way drain only.

someone has done this using a wire rack and one of those cement tubs.

since it drains the pwt entirely it would require more frequent but smaller irrigation events.

if you water only until the first sign of run off each time the slight run off would probably evaporate.

nice plants!

oh yeah - exactly what would one shop for to find such a wick?

 

[delta9nxs]

I'm becoming more PPK compliant. I have stopped using silicon and pH down. I'm just using RO and jacks/calcnit.

cool, ain't it?

 

[delta9nxs]

Question for you guys using Jacks Pro/Calcinit. I setup a calculator for different rez volumes and EC's but somethings not right.

Here's what I'm doing:

Took values for 2.1EC Standard Formula
130oz's/1000gals Jacks
86oz's /1000gals Calcinit

Grams:
130x28 = 3640grams/1000g Jacks
86x28 = 2408grams/1000g Calcinit

So:
3.64g's/gallon Jacks + 2.408g's/gallon Calcinit in RO water should give me an EC of 2.1 correct? Next I take the desired EC and divide by 2.1. Take that and multiply it by the respective grams per gallon (3.64 or 2.408) and then multiply by the number of gallons. Make sense?

Now, my last rez fillup was 52 gallons. This is on a measured 55gallon poly drum so it should be pretty dam close. The calculation looks like this for a desired EC of 1.5:

Jacks: (1.5/2.1)*3.64*52 = 135.2
Calci: (1.5/2.1)*2.408*52 = 89.44

Using a high accuracy PPM meter(.7) I found that it took 1.34 times the calculated amount to reach the desired EC. I have 2 meters and just calibrated both so I know the readings are right. Any idea what I'm doing wrong here?

looking at this i wonder why you mix like this. you have a nice meter. why not use it to mix. it is far easier.

i like ec 1.5 right now. i'm getting very good growth in all stages with it.

if you mix in a separate container, using any amount of water, at the .5 conversion, you would start with 630 ppm jack's. stir until dissolved. if you overshoot correct it before proceeding. then mix in the calcinit until 1050 ppm is hit. this is 420 ppm calcinit. stir until dissolved. that's it.

420 divided by 630 is .67. this brings the working ratio to 1/.67 jack's/calcinit. which is their recommendation.

i then pump this up into my volume tanks which are already correct all the time. you are just topping off clean solution.