recirculating shallow water culture

[Ca++]

~8% stronger, seems a little unlikely. It's wouldn't be epsom salts. I'm no chemist, but 5 minutes (probably half an hour, I'm not admitting to) seemed to offer no explanation how it might be so.

Perhaps it's going to get heavier after opening it. I would keep an open mind to the idea, you could be 5ppm off, buy the time you are done. You could even get 5g out, and see if it becomes 5.4 (I would)

 

[alpo]

32hrs later and the light is on

 

[alpo]

i'm ditching this grow to set up my tables ... brb

 

[need4weed]

the problem with hydroton is it needs to be flushed between grows.
within 4 weeks of being exposed to nutrient solution hydroton absorbes 12 to 15% Calcium cations and a proportional amount of Potassium cations. It takes about 4 weeks of pure water to wash out the Ca++ and much much longer to flush the potassium.
So flushing between grows requires Anions (negative charged ions) to neutralize it's high Ca++ (positive ions) and reset the medium for the next use. Hydroton's CEC is 20 and attracts positive ions. The sprinkler/ring system you have set up is actually perfect for using hydroton but a lid or some gardeners fabric to cover to prevent moisture loss but many growers go without and it works fine. The sprinkler type system that the ring represents is ideal and helps reduce salt buildup caused by using one or two drip emitters. Keeping the stones humid all the time is essential. so more points go towards that ring/sprinkler set up and the hydroton.

To flush the hydroton between use 90% water, preferably RO and 10% Bleach (negatively charged). The bleach , being negatively charged ions will "pull" and attract the positively charged ions (Ca++ and K) from the hydroton.
I used to do a 72 hour soak in 18 gallon totes rinse and soak again for 24... rinse and it's ready to go again.

Not resetting the Hydroton to neutral is a mistake many growers make when using it and they get a great run in the first time and then everything goes to shit the second run as the Ca++ begins to toxify and lock out potassium and other essential nutrient/macro nutrients.
I grew exclusively in hydroton for a couple years running multiple strains in cash crop rooms. We did very well but there was a bit of a learning curve. Algae wasn't much of a concern unless we rooted in rockwool. For some reason any exposed rockwool above the drip line tended to green up with algae.
good luck, looks like a cool little set up for sure.

many growers make the mistake of thinking they have a PH problem using hydroton when it is actually the hydroton being overloaded with Ca++ and Potassium. It's not a PH problem it is a cation exchange capacity problem.

Solid information bro

 

[plumsmooth]

VEry VEry intertesting make me wonder if this is related to some of my nutrient issues but also makes a good case for running a n enzyme consistently...

 

[Hiddenjems]

I thought rinsing the Hydroton with bleach was a no brainer just from a sterilization standpoint.