Is there a way to recycle DTW water?

T

tilopa

Well-Known Member
I'm thinking about doing a DTW. I've been doing recirculating ebb and flow and finding I often struggle with nute lockout for some reason.

Problem is I live in an area where drought is a problem and don't want to waste the water. I was thinking I could catch the waste water in a barrel, but need advice on how I can filter it so that I can reuse it in my reservoir again. I would need to filter out all the old nutes and salt and start clean. Can this be done inexpensively?
 
gr865

gr865

Well-Known Member
I would not reuse it. I add it to the rain water I use in my garden, my beds, and potted plants.
I tried it early on in my Hempy pots added half DTW, 0.25 rain and the rest RO. Plants always looked funky, growth was funky, and the final results was funky. did not do it again.
:lol: :-Pbongsmilie:lol::peace:
 
Nizza

Nizza

Well-Known Member
tilopa said:
Interesting. Can you explain how that is.
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Ok so after double checking I was thinking about aeroponic DTW. Regular DTW uses 10-15% more water than most recirculating setups but you will save yourself so much hassle with the control of DTW. It really doesn’t use As much water as it seems

my 27 gallon res ends up giving me 3-5 gallons of wastewater
 
EvilScotsm@n

EvilScotsm@n

Well-Known Member
Re-using the run off in coco is only dangerous if the nutes were wrong to start with.
Otherwise Wilma systems, oxypot and ebb n flow tables couldn't possibly exist could they ;)
 
dlbmed

dlbmed

Active Member
tilopa said:
I'm thinking about doing a DTW. I've been doing recirculating ebb and flow and finding I often struggle with nute lockout for some reason.

Problem is I live in an area where drought is a problem and don't want to waste the water. I was thinking I could catch the waste water in a barrel, but need advice on how I can filter it so that I can reuse it in my reservoir again. I would need to filter out all the old nutes and salt and start clean. Can this be done inexpensively?
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I do the recirculating hydro. I use only perlite, No coco or anything else. I use a #8 size when I can get it but #4 also works
 

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Bunnybrew

Bunnybrew

Well-Known Member
This is a important subject guys. We need to band together big time on this one. Water conservation is a real thing and states are now mandating grows must use a reclaiming/recirculating system. For instance California this goes into effect 2021
 
Bunnybrew

Bunnybrew

Well-Known Member
The key will be to innovate a reclaim method for the soil guys. The law is structured in a way that it favors existing hydroponic methods
 
Renfro

Renfro

Well-Known Member
tilopa said:
I'm thinking about doing a DTW. I've been doing recirculating ebb and flow and finding I often struggle with nute lockout for some reason.

Problem is I live in an area where drought is a problem and don't want to waste the water. I was thinking I could catch the waste water in a barrel, but need advice on how I can filter it so that I can reuse it in my reservoir again. I would need to filter out all the old nutes and salt and start clean. Can this be done inexpensively?
Click to expand...
Stop running DTW and setup a recirculating type system. Saves a lot of water and nutrients.
 
T

tilopa

Well-Known Member
Renfro said:
Stop running DTW and setup a recirculating type system. Saves a lot of water and nutrients.
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Recirculating flood and drain does not save a lot of water. When the plants get fed most of the water in the rez is pumped out to the buckets so much that if the rez was only half full to start with their would not be enough water to pump out and the pump would burn up. When I change my rez weekly I have to dump about a half full rez. I know, not all recirculating hydro systems have this problem.
 
Renfro

Renfro

Well-Known Member
tilopa said:
Recirculating flood and drain does not save a lot of water. When the plants get fed most of the water in the rez is pumped out to the buckets so much that if the rez was only half full to start with their would not be enough water to pump out and the pump would burn up. When I change my rez weekly I have to dump about a half full rez. I know, not all recirculating hydro systems have this problem.
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hmm, I beg to differ, I dont run buckets, but trays and I run my res for the whole grow without dumping it.
 
R

RGconsulting

Member
don't run to waste .. i did it for years and it's uneccessary .. plus it can bring you more problems than anything .. because you will always do the smaller runoff possible .. and it will lead to salt accumulations

it's fine to recirculate, if you work fine you dont have to dump your res .. same res from start to finish
be sure to use water containing a bit of disinfinctant agent .. to keep it pathogens free (ex: water from the tap containing a bit of chlorine, or condensate/RO water with a low dose of h2o2 )

ideally you dont want to use substrate like coco .. because they decompose with time and then the npk ratio of your solution will slowly change, rockwool is the best for this

a reservoir kept out of the room (far from fan/air circulation) without air pump mixing it will allow you to keep the h2o2/chlorine in your solution without adding some every day)

if you want to push the thing farther, with sealed room condensate water from AC /dehumidifier are all recovered in a second reservoir out of the room. you also recover the runoff of your room inside this reservoir
you just need to add a dose of h2o2 before pouring it inside the main reservoir, then a pump will suck it and send it through the irrigation line/drip emitters through your plants

with this method you never use any water from the tap .. never

plants use less than 5% of the water you give them .. all the remaining water is transpired and recaptured by the AC/ dehumidifiers.. the co2 burner of the room is also giving some more water in the air

for your nutrient lockout problem, the key is to give a big runoff everytime.. the problem of ebb/flood method is that it have tendancy to lead to salt accumulation, because flooding from the bottom without top feeding push the salts to the top ..
the best are hybrid systems .. with ebb flood and a line of drippers at the top
never get any salt buildup this way .. thats how the professional dutch growers do it .. with mapito ( rockwool)
 
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