Would like to run a perpetual hydro grow. How to do so?

[Hotwired]

Hi hydro people!

I've been running a perpetual soil grow for years and I'm thinking about switching over to the water side. I know you can run a perpetual from clone but what about doing it with a 2 or 3 week veg?

Is there a way I can get a 2 or 3 week veg using any old hydro method and then placing them into a small bucket system for flower?

What I would like to do is get 25 clones into veg for 3 weeks. Then get them over to the flower room and do this every 3 weeks.

Is this even possible or a waste of time?

If it is possible what would be the best system to place 25 plants at a time? I would need a system for the ones in veg and a system for the ones in flower and be able to "move" them from one system to the other. Not sure how big of a root ball there will be after 3 weeks.

Thanks for any help.

 

[Praetorian]

Depending upon how much light you're using for veg, and how much light during flower, will very much dictate veg period. Generally, I clone for 2the weeks, veg for 2.5-3, til my plants are no more than 12". I veg under 150 hps and bud under 400w hps, 6 plants aero/nft. The plants will grow way faster than you are use to with soil. I grew for a year in soil before trying my hand at hydro. Explosive growth

Also, look at the stink bud aero/Nft setup, 3 week perpetual setup. Try stinkbuddies.com. 14 plants per unit, three units, 1 lb every three we

 

[Hotwired]

I use 400's for veg and 1000's for flower.

 

[Chadness]

I was using NFT for my perpetual grow.

I would take 20 cuttings every 2 weeks and harvesting every 2 weeks.

I had 60 cuttings in the veg room at any given time (newly cut clones up to 4 weeks veg.)

It would take 6 weeks before my cut clone was put into flower.

And i would harvest 20 plants from my flower room which had 80 plants at any one time all 2 weeks apart.

So every 2nd weekend i would harvest and move into bloom and cut more clones.

I'm not sure the strain i was growing ( i was told it was white widow but I don't think it was) but it would finish at exactly 7.5 week like clock work.

i was flowering under 4 x 600w HPS and veging under 1x250w cfl and 1x600w HPS.

The plants were fairly compact going into flower but they would often stretch to triple their size and would harvest approx 1 oz of each plant give or take.

Only problem was it was a lot of hard work and I found my social life was suffering for it so i had to give the perpetual grow up.

I would do it on a smaller scale next time.

Hope this helps some.

Take it easy.

 

[Weedo Bandito]

Hotwired - check out Al B. Fuct's sticky entitled: "Get a Harvest Every 2 Weeks" on the Hydroponics/Aeroponics forum main page. Al is a legend and has been growing for 20 years or so.

 

[Hotwired]

Thanks for the replies guys.

I know about Al's grow. I've been around a long time. That's why I said in my first post that I know it could be done from clone, but what about a 2 to 3 week veg first.

It sounded like Chad knew what I was talking about but he didn't say how he transferred his vegged plants into flower.

What kind of system could I use to veg 25 or so plants for 3 weeks and then move all the plants to a different 25 bucket system for flowering? Is this even possible with hydro? Can you veg for 3 weeks in one system and move them to another system to flower?

This is what I'm looking for.

 

[Hotwired]

I'm going to try to clear this up a little better.

Let's say I have only 1 veg room with 24 one gallon buckets in it under a 400 watt bulb

Let's say I have 3 flower rooms each with a 24 bucket system with 2 gallon pots under 1000 watts each.

So let's begin my experiment. This works for plants that take 3 weeks to root, 3 weeks to veg, and 9 weeks to flower. Works like clockwork in soil. I want this to work in hydro if possible.

I start off by taking 30 clones and wait 3 weeks till rooted. I put them in a small hydro system that supports 24 plants and veg them for 3 weeks. Meanwhile I took another 30 clones to keep my perpetual grow going. After 3 weeks my second batch of clones AND the vegged plants are done. I move the vegged plants out of the veg room and into flower room #1. I moved the finished clones into the now empty veg room. Then I take my third batch of 30 clones.

Is everyone getting this so far?

After 3 more weeks my clones and vegged plants are done and I move the second batch of vegged plants into flower room #2 and I move my third batch of clones into the veg room. I then take my fourth batch of 30 clones and wait another 3 weeks.

Once my fourth batch of clones are done after 3 more weeks I move my vegged plants out of the veg room and into flower room #3. I move the clones into the veg room and I take another batch of 30 clones.

Now every single room is full. Flower room #1 has plants that are 6 weeks old. Flower room # 2 has plants that are 3 weeks old and flower room #3 has brand new flowering plants.

Now I have it all setup for perpetual. Once my fifth batch of clones are done it will be 9 weeks in and flower room #1 will be finished. I can then continue on without a hitch every 3 weeks.

So basically I will be getting a harvest every 3 weeks instead of every 2 weeks. You get zero veg time with the 2 weeks method. You get 3 weeks veg with mine.

So how can this be done with different hydro systems? This is what I'm looking for guys. It's simple in soil and I've been doing it a very long time. How can this method get done in hydro? Whoever makes it work is gonna be one happy mofo

 

[Chadness]

Ok When i cut clones i put them in rockwool cubes and into 2 inch net pots.

They then went into a home made 20 site bubble cloner.

Thats where they would stay for up to 6 weeks.
When they went into flower i would just take the net pots and put them into my system.

My flower area was some corflute trays with holes cut out on the top the size for the net pots. I would then just put the net pots in these holes. My plants at this stage were not very big maybe 12 inches tall.

I had 8 trays all up with 10 holes in each making an 8 week cycle.

I was feeding 4 trays with 1 3000L pump and its own reservoir.
I had 2 of these set up.

I would change my nutrients every 5 - 7 days.
Also had an auto top up system set up so i could forget about them for a few days.

Like i said i was running NFT instead of DWC but it could be made to your needs.

Good luck and take care.

 

[burrr]

6" rockwool blocks are as good as a gets for portability. Plants really take off fast in rockwool using topfeed or ebb and flo. I'm test driving some top feed rockwool over dwc.

 

[burrr]

You can run blocks over top of a dwc bucket

 

[Hotwired]

I totally see how you get portability with those. Very nice advice thanks a bunch everyone!

Looks like a very simple solution to the veg situation. Now I need either a 25 pot system or a system that can support up to 50 for flowering.

Any ideas? I see that this could actually be fun if I have enough room and the proper flooring to drain easily.

 

[IN33DW33D]

You can run blocks over top of a dwc bucket

You don't cover the rockwool? You just have your plants just like that with no hydroton on top of that rockwool? What about under it, do you put hydroton under the rockwool or does the rockwool sit on the netpot?

 

[burrr]

You don't cover the rockwool? You just have your plants just like that with no hydroton on top of that rockwool? What about under it, do you put hydroton under the rockwool or does the rockwool sit on the netpot?

The plants growing in the tray are growing in just a rockwool block, nothing over or under. The algae is not a problem for me.
When I move to flowering I set the blocks in a basket of hydroton. hydroton under and around the block. I've combined DWC with ebb and flow as well as top drip. It's all good