I just have an 18 gallon rubbermaid tote sitting outside the tent with the water line running through a bottom vent. I have a small pond pump on the bottom to keep the nutrient solution circulating. I go entire grows without cleaning it and don't check the pH only what I mix up and add to it. It's not recirculating the nutrient solution like a flood and drain setup. The nutrient solution stays stable depending on the nutrients you use. I wouldn't use anything but clean dissolving salt base nutrients. I checked the pH for a couple of weeks when I first started using it but it always stayed right at 6.0 so I stopped checking. I just set the pH of what I'm adding and dump it in.
I never hand water or flush anything through the pots by hand. How stable your solution stays is going to depend on the nutrients you're using. When I run the blumats I just use a micronutrient blend, calcium nitrate, and maybe some MKP in flower. If you add anything organic you wouldn't be able to avoid cleaning now and then.
But I literally do just set them and forget it. I'll literally go days without doing anything including looking at the plants. And then when I do it's a quick peek and pest inspection when I add more solution to the reservoir. I have no desire to stand around looking at some cannabis plants in a tent. I prefer as hands off as I can get. If I could get away with doing nothing I would. Which brings me to my most hated aspect of growing which is harvesting. I despise trimming weed. The lady helped me one time and lasted less than an hour before she said enough. She wants nothing to do with it either. Last time I asked her to help she told me to go to hell and continued to sit in her chair knitting.
