DWC...Rubbermaid Bins VS. 5 gallon Buckets

[Roullette]

Last DWC i did was a 18 Gal Rubbermaid Bin that held 4 plants

1 turned out to be a male that i spotted about a month into the grow.
and another a Herm which i let grow cutting off his/her balls.

I ended up cutting the male down, all the roots in the Bin had grown together and by killin the male left roots in the rez for the remaining grow. if i were to remove them i would cause alot of damage to atleast 2 plants.
the roots strated to get rot in the dead male and i dont want to run into this again.

Has anyone tried both of these types of DWC and been happy with either ones results?

just wanna know if goin 5 gal buckets is a good thing. it requires a few more Air pumps and air stones. just wanna see if its worth the loot or just stick witht the rubbermaid bins..

Thanks

 

[JohnnyPotSeed1969]

i have tried both methods. quite frankly, i prefer using multiple 5 gallon buckets. the reason being is that it easier to mess with the reservoir once the plants are in flowering stage and are quite large.

in addition, i found the rubbermaid container to be somewhat unwieldy when it came time to change the nutrient solution.

the nice thing about individual buckets is that your plants can have separate reservoir conditions. some strains have nutrient strength and ph level preferences. even different phenos of the same plant can have individual preferences.

while i have to adjust my ph more often, i only change my nutrients once a week. in reality, i could probably go longer, but i do this to avoid nutrient salt buildup.

 

[Earl]

Buckets work great.

I put a drain in my tubs.

 

[nashvillekyle]

I am halfway through my first grow, and I am using a 30 gallon rubbermade bin. I originally had six plants in there but now I am down to three. I will defiantly be going to 5 gallon buckets for my next grow. With this big bin it is really hard to change the water and I am going through a lot of nutes. The other down side to having the large bin is that the roots grow together and when you remove a male you just have to leave the roots.

 

[smokertoker]

I use a 2'x4' tub that is about 8" deep, it holds 5 gallons. I put it on some blocks to raise it up and put a hose and valve on the bottom to make res changes easy.

 

[Earl]

Yep, I like to have a drain,
so I don't have to lift heavy tubs.

 

[P@ssw0rd]

I have seen a 5gal bucket dwc grow in action, and i have done a rubbermade dwc grow myself. Unless you intend to grow really small plants go with the buckets, the ability to move them around is a huge +.

Btw Earl, nice tub. I love the drain

 

[Earl]

Buckets are good.

arcinNsparkin's Cindy Aloha

 

[Roullette]

yea i was thinking of the buckets. and i was going to drill in a 1/2 pvc male adaptor and then glue in a 1/2 female x 1/2 plug. then screw in a regular 1/2 boiler drain to the female plug at the base of the buckets. kinda like the pic earl threw up of the bin with the kitchen sink strainer in it. but mine is going to be each bucket like that.

then im going to take another 1/2 male adaptor and drill it up top then put a 1/2 90 degree elbow on it an raise the 1/2 pvc about 12 inches above the bucket lid. this is goin to be for filling the rez without having to pull up the plant every time. and with that i can test my PH and PPM there since there will be about 4-6 inches of water there.

how does that sound?
to much work for a simple bucket system? i mean once its done its done for ever right?

and for moving them around i can just put them up on 4 roller wheels so the buckets can roll across the floor. or just lift them lol...i mean 1 gallon of water weights 8.33 lbs and with nutes maybe 8.5 lbs so total of 42.5 lbs so i couldnt see the bucket ever getting over 48 lbs with a full grown plant...

 

[Roullette]

And what do you think of this i was thinking of putting them in a cabinet and making a little grow room( not really little). take garden hoses an attach them to the 1/2" boiler drains and run them into a condensate pump and run the 1/2" clear vinyl hose to a sink,tub, or even right out the window.

condensate pumps an handle up to 4 hoses being placed in the pump at a time an its only a 120 volt pump so a regular wall socket will work.



any thoughts on that?

 

[BeverlyRollins69]

I use 12.5 gal rubbermaid tubs with about 8-9 gal of nutes in them for three plants. The plants are in 5" net pots. I have had nothing but success so far and plan to keep using them.

 

[bubblerking]

Buckets work great but are more high maint. Use tubs with drain attached to a pump. Its easy turn pump on when you want to drain you dont even have to go in your grow room if you dont want. Keep it simple buckets only hold a small amount of water wich makes the ph go up or down like crazy with large amounts of water you will have a more stable ph wich in return gives you higher yeilds this is were i love tubs also small amounts of water heat up quicker wich is bad tubs are best in my opion

 

[Roullette]

Buckets work great but are more high maint. Use tubs with drain attached to a pump. Its easy turn pump on when you want to drain you dont even have to go in your grow room if you dont want. Keep it simple buckets only hold a small amount of water wich makes the ph go up or down like crazy with large amounts of water you will have a more stable ph wich in return gives you higher yeilds this is were i love tubs also small amounts of water heat up quicker wich is bad tubs are best in my opion

what size of bins are you using?

cause like you said about the Ph fluctuation, i wasnt getting that in my bin which was a 18 gallon rubbermaid. i only filled it 1/2 way up or 3/4 at the absolute most.

i had 3 plants in it. im hoping that the 5 gallon buckets wont have a fluctuating PH. i figured they wouldnt cause it would be about 4.25 gallons of water per plant. which is more water per plant then i was giving during my 1st DWC.

but yea i am interested in the bin size you used... kinda hope its smaller then my 18. i dont wanna have to deal with PH problems.. never had that on my 1st DWC.

 

[hydrogrower420]

what size of bins are you using?

cause like you said about the Ph fluctuation, i wasnt getting that in my bin which was a 18 gallon rubbermaid. i only filled it 1/2 way up or 3/4 at the absolute most.

i had 3 plants in it. im hoping that the 5 gallon buckets wont have a fluctuating PH. i figured they wouldnt cause it would be about 4.25 gallons of water per plant. which is more water per plant then i was giving during my 1st DWC.

but yea i am interested in the bin size you used... kinda hope its smaller then my 18. i dont wanna have to deal with PH problems.. never had that on my 1st DWC.

im also going to be using 18 gallon bins and i was wondering how much nutrients you used for 1 grow?and when you first started veg did you have to have the bin all the way full?

 

[fitzyno1]

When you say 18 gallon bins, how many? And how many plants?
Yes, try and have the soup as high to the bottom of the net pot as possible, and plenty of bubbles.

 

[hydrogrower420]

well im getting 10 afghan seeds and i could fit 3 of the bins in my growing area but since this will be my first grow im going to use 1 bin for probably 2-3 plants i dont want it to get to crowded..also would you reccomend a site that sells good nutes?

 

[fitzyno1]

By the sounds of you, you will probably grow again. Dont splash out on expensive nutes for the first time.
Get litre bottles from Ebay, if your growing from home get a trusted friend to order what you need through his account.

 

[hydrogrower420]

alright thanks for your help man.so i should get micro,grow and bloom is there anything else that would help out i should also get ph up and down right?

 

[gohydro]

I like the Rubbermaid tubs myself for the reason stated above. More solution...less PH fluctuation. I use the 20gal tubs with (6) 3" net pots in each. The biggest problem I've found with the tubs is that every drain I ever put in the SIDE of the tub eventually leaked regardless of how I attached it. I suppose I could have put the drain in the bottom of the tub but that would mean I'd need to elevate it and I rely on a cold basement floor to help keep the nute solution cool. I've used bulkhead fittings, fittings with silicone, blah....blah...blah. The tub distorts in size when filled half way and these eventually leak. SO....all I have penetrating the tub below the water line is my waterlevel tube with a 90 degree barbed fitting and grommet. I also have a spray header in each tub so I'm partly aeroponic. I have a 350gpd pump in each tub with 6 spray nozzles. The 3/4" pvc manifold penetrates the tub on each end. One end is capped and the other has a hose thread connection with a cap. There is a twofold benefit to this. By penetrating the tub with the PVC it makes the spray header much more stable but the best thing is that when it comes time to change nutes I turn off the spray pumps, unscrew the cap on the hose thread fitting and connect a washing machine hose. I turn the spray pumps back on and empty the tubs. This gets 98% of the old nutes out and I don't worry about the last 2% until flush time. Then I use the water level fitting to get the last little bit out. Because I use 2 tubs I have (2) dual outlet air pumps with 12" airstones. 1 outlet from each pump feeds 1 tub. That way if I have an air pump failure I still have 1 air stone working in each tub.

Lastly, every night when I check PPM/PH I lower the water level hose and collect a sample for measurement. I got tired of sticking my meter IN THE TUB and hitting a rootball which gave me false readings.

 

[Roullette]

I like the Rubbermaid tubs myself for the reason stated above. More solution...less PH fluctuation. I use the 20gal tubs with (6) 3" net pots in each. The biggest problem I've found with the tubs is that every drain I ever put in the SIDE of the tub eventually leaked regardless of how I attached it. I suppose I could have put the drain in the bottom of the tub but that would mean I'd need to elevate it and I rely on a cold basement floor to help keep the nute solution cool. I've used bulkhead fittings, fittings with silicone, blah....blah...blah. The tub distorts in size when filled half way and these eventually leak. SO....all I have penetrating the tub below the water line is my waterlevel tube with a 90 degree barbed fitting and grommet. I also have a spray header in each tub so I'm partly aeroponic. I have a 350gpd pump in each tub with 6 spray nozzles. The 3/4" pvc manifold penetrates the tub on each end. One end is capped and the other has a hose thread connection with a cap. There is a twofold benefit to this. By penetrating the tub with the PVC it makes the spray header much more stable but the best thing is that when it comes time to change nutes I turn off the spray pumps, unscrew the cap on the hose thread fitting and connect a washing machine hose. I turn the spray pumps back on and empty the tubs. This gets 98% of the old nutes out and I don't worry about the last 2% until flush time. Then I use the water level fitting to get the last little bit out. Because I use 2 tubs I have (2) dual outlet air pumps with 12" airstones. 1 outlet from each pump feeds 1 tub. That way if I have an air pump failure I still have 1 air stone working in each tub.

Lastly, every night when I check PPM/PH I lower the water level hose and collect a sample for measurement. I got tired of sticking my meter IN THE TUB and hitting a rootball which gave me false readings.

thats a pretty smooth bin set up man...