Hey
Stifling,
I love what you did with Stinkbud's aeroponic design that you posted on page 279. I plan on building something similar this summer. My workspace will be 2ft by 4ft. Could you give us some pointers how you constructed yours? I'd really appreciate knowing what mod's you did and how it all fit together.
Thanks!
Shrike
I appreciate your interest. I mostly did anything I could think of to minimize the vertical and horizontal footprint. To start I made it so that nothing would protrude from the end caps, and they are in fact sealed with silicone inside and out.
In the first picture you'll see the fitting I made for a modified drain. It's a grommet I got at the hardware store used to make hollow rivets, I think. It was a bit too short so with a C-clamp I pressure fitted a 2" piece of brass tubing that I got at a hobby shop. This is then epoxied to the bottom, from the inside, so that it lays perfectly flat on the inside. I squeezed it down tight with a clamp until it hardened a bit since I don't want any water pooling inside the post. Using a hose clamp I attach tubing to direct the draining water back into the reservoir.
Also, the water inlet is attached thru the top of the post, and not the endcaps. It's at a slight angle so that the hose won't go directly over the post but more along the side of it. I cut pieces of garden hose to length, and added fittings, to attach each post inlet to the pump outlet splitter. I use the garden hose instead of hard fitting pvc pipe because it allows me to switch out posts easily, so I can move plants easily to even out the growing without having to take them out of the holes.
These two modifications probably save 6-12 inches of horizontal length.
The nozzles are the same, one in between each two pot holes, so in these posts there are actually only 3 nozzles between the 4 holes. The water drains slowly enough that the roots get plenty.
To save vertical space, I use a 28 quart generic Sterlite storage container, spray painted black on the outside. These aren't the most resilient containers, so I nest it inside another. You can't tell in a picture, but I laid a strip of tape vertically on the front of the tub before spraypainting, then removed it when the paint dried. This allows me to see the water level inside the reservoir.
In the third picture you may notice that I drilled a tiny hole in the post by the end cap. Because the post and pump is a mostly sealed system, without this hole air pressure builds up and pushes the pots out of the holes.
I only fill it to 4 gallons, which I marked on the tub, and top it off when it falls to 3 gallons, which I also marked. This way I don't have to take the top off or anything since it's a real pain in the ass.
You may notice the wooden frame is much smaller than you would think. I did this purposely so that by angling the tub correctly I can slide the tub out from under it and out the closet door. If I had not done it this way I would have to remove the whole system every time I needed to get into the tub. In fact, if i need to top off the reservoir I just do it through a pot hole, as I avoid moving the tub if at all possible.
Make sure you caulk the endcaps only at the very last, as once it is sealed you can't really change anything without removing them. It's not actually hard to remove them with a utility knife, but then you may have to wait another week for the silicone to dry after you caulk them back on.
Besides that, everything else is the same. Same nutrients, same timer, same spacing of seven inches in all directions. Since this is only for personal use growing and I don't really want plants taller than two or three feet, I got rid of all plant supports. The friction of the pot in the hole is enough to hold it up and the plants seem fine.
I don't think I've wasted a single inch, but it does lead to the problem that it's more difficult to clean the inside of the post. Luckily, I've not really had any grime build up to the point where I've had to do anything drastic.
So there you have it, a 12" tall system with a 21" by 28" footprint good enough to handle a dozen 30" plants. I'm quite proud of it, but I'd never had done it without the wonderful information from our benefactor Stinkbud.