Deep Water Culture

[Jay Ryan]

It's been suggested a few times that my posts in Indoor Grows should be posted in the Hydro forum, so here goes.

I started growing hydro over a year ago, starting with a drip system with grodan, but I live in the mountains, and we get some nasty storms and can lose power for hours at a time. I also travel at times, and have been concerned about my plants making it through the night, no less through a week, so I switched to Deep Water Culture (DWC). I started with plastic planters, 30w 6h, 6d with 2.5" net pots:

I use two of them with the bottoms stuck on top to hold up the net pots, and I have .5" black rubber tubes as drains and .25" black tubes supplying from the res on the floor once a day to top off.

Once the roots hit the water they take off!

If you notice, they aren't very deep for DWC, and I just started some mothers (Super Lemon Haze and Himalayan Gold) and wanted a deeper container, and a new grow area.

I bought an old wardrobe on craigslist ( a free service web site in the states where people sell their stuff ):

This is after I did a lot of work on it, reglued some of the wood, and sured it up.

My next step was to line the inside with a foil bubble wrap I found to be very effective:

I then picked up some 19 liter black plastic boxes from Office Depot:

I then plumbed the boxes with highlevel drains and top off lines as well as air lines. I put a 2' 4 bulb HO T5 light on light yoyos:

Once a day the same res that I use for my babies now also tops off these boxes:

And now my ladies are all fat and happy:

I keep the PH between 5.8 and 6.0, they are fed Dutch Masters nutes, and change the water completely every 2 weeks. Though in bloom I usually change every week as they drink so damn much!

[Jay Ryan]

I'm a software developer, but like to play with hardware.

[Jay Ryan]

Some update pics, one week later:

And a look inside the Super Skunk's box on the left:

The roots are growing nicely, and the plant is thriving. She's already created 10 clones. 5 had roots in 10 days, the next 5 look good too, and none of them ever seemed to lose a step during the process.

She's an amazing girl. The other plants sharing space with her are also looking fantastic, just a few weeks behind her.

[Zeff]

Hello, my name is Zeff.... residing in Ma. ...just wanted to give you a congrads with your G - Room

I' ll post photos of mine soon !

[Guest superbluehaze]

3 cheers, and excellent project and a great garden. That wardrobe is beautiful, looks like it is from the 30's or 40's. Your roots are fine but could be healthier, there is a slight discoloration, if you can give them more oxygen(or air) that would go. (either add hydrogen peroxide to the water, or better still, use benificial bacteria, and add some silica. and fulvic acid. Otherwise, I take my cap off to your skills. Great stuff, my friend.

happy growing,

john

[Romeu9]

Very nice set up!

Keep posting us with pics from that!

[anguscr]

Love the work u did inside that wardrobe...Congratz!!!

[discovery2]

your set ups great i would put some air stones at the bottom of each tank plenty oxygen for ur roots goo luck