Best grow method for sog?

OzyM8 said:

After re reading I can see how that could be read.
It’s a top feed to coco filled fabric pots, using the corrugated sheet as a low table and to handle the run off, DTW.

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Ahh, I didn't see the top feed part. So he's going to need to use something akin to the floraflex setup to feed the sites.

The major downside here is all the plumbing required to hit that many plants, doable but messy. Anyway he goes, some compromise is made to fit in that space.

Renfro said:

Ahh, I didn't see the top feed part. So he's going to need to use something akin to the floraflex setup to feed the sites.

The major downside here is all the plumbing required to hit that many plants, doable but messy. Anyway he goes, some compromise is made to fit in that space.

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Yeah there is definitely going to be compromise with movement but it’s worth the hard work when you have amazing smoke at the end of the day.

I considered coco but 1000 individual drip emitters and all that coco to dispose of would be a pita.

I’m also considering building a custom water cooled air handler above the plants to save space.

I think I may be set on the flood and drain option with custom tables 4m long with wheels that move back and forth.

Max size res I could get away with though would be 750l (200 us gal) I need to go and get net baskets that fit together perfectly and fill as much of the space with clay balls as humanly possible to do a test.

How many m2 of mother plants do you guys reckon I’d need for 1000 clones every 8 weeks?

George2324 said:

Max size res I could get away with though would be 750l (200 us gal)

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Nothing says you have to flood all your trays at once. Perhaps you could stagger timing so as to conserve reservoir capacity?

George2324 said:

How many m2 of mother plants do you guys reckon I’d need for 1000 clones every 8 weeks?

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Well I used to pull 200 every 20 days off a 1kW HPS and about a 4.5x4.5 foot area, big bushy DWC mothers. If you were to stagger the production and run it perpetual (I hate saying that) then you would need less than if you wanted all 1000 at once.

Renfro said:

Nothing says you have to flood all your trays at once. Perhaps you could stagger timing so as to conserve reservoir capacity?


Well I used to pull 200 every 20 days off a 1kW HPS and about a 4.5x4.5 foot area, big bushy DWC mothers. If you were to stagger the production and run it perpetual (I hate saying that) then you would need less than if you wanted all 1000 at once.

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Full of good ideas cheers never thought about staggering the flooding. Ideally I want to have a single harvest as I don’t know if it’s a good idea to try and manage 5 different trays at different stages, different ppm ranges etc. I imagine it being a nightmare.

Perpetual is something that would be good if I could pull it off somehow without too much hassle with nutes

George2324 said:

Perpetual is something that would be good if I could pull it off somehow without too much hassle with nutes

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Well I didn't change anything back when I ran perpetual. I was using lucas formula. I would imagine you could do the same, eliminating the need for different feeds. I always went straight to 1000 PPM & 12/12 with my very well rooted clones. Thing with perpetual is you can't get pests or mildews or you pretty much never get rid of them without starting from scratch.

Renfro said:

Well I didn't change anything back when I ran perpetual. I was using lucas formula. I would imagine you could do the same, eliminating the need for different feeds. I always went straight to 1000 PPM & 12/12 with my very well rooted clones. Thing with perpetual is you can't get pests or mildews or you pretty much never get rid of them without starting from scratch.

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I need to research Lucas formula never really looked into it. I was gonna use megacrop after I run out of what I’ve got since it’s so cheap.

Got any recommended reading I should do on Lucas?

I use a essential oil diffuser now a commercial one where I plug in a 475ml bottle of essential oil and it lasts 24 weeks. On off timer and I’ve never had mold/mildew or pests since. I should be ok in that regard.

George2324 said:

Got any recommended reading I should do on Lucas?

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Well I haven't used it in over 10 years but it's all around, pretty basic 1:2 ratio of GH Flora Micro and Bloom. There are several modified version, definitely add some epsom salt for coco.

Ok this is what I have so far

5 separate trays 4m Long each by about 60cm wide on wheels

An arduino controller with the following ideas

Loop
Open solenoid valve 1
Turn on fill pump (delay time required)
Turn off fill pump
Turn on drain pump (delay time required)
Close solenoid valve 1

Open solenoid valve 2
Turn on fill pump (delay time required)
Turn off fill pump
Turn on drain pump (delay time required)
Close solenoid valve 2

Open solenoid valve 3
Turn on fill pump (delay time required)
Turn off fill pump
Turn on drain pump (delay time required)
Close solenoid valve 3

Open solenoid valve 4
Turn on fill pump (delay time required)
Turn off fill pump
Turn on drain pump (delay time required)
Close solenoid valve 4

Open solenoid valve 5
Turn on fill pump (delay time required)
Turn off fill pump
Turn on drain pump (delay time required)
Close solenoid valve 5

Backup mechanical float switch high and low that breaks the live cable connection if the float is triggered for the fill and the drain pump respectively just incase for some unknown reason the time to fill or drain changes

750l reservoir with a 50l control bucket

60 day harvests

13ft x 2ft trays with either 234 clones per tray or if too crowded 104 clones per tray

Clones taken every 12 days

I have a 3.4m x 0.6m area I can have devoted to mothers so around 2sqm and 40w per sqft of led for fast growth they will again be low height but I’d probably put a net infront of them and keep training them behind the net to force them into bushy monsters

New consideration - stick to 4 plants per sq ft
Which would mean I’d only need 576 clones every 8 weeks.

Im thinking I can build the tables strong enough so that I can walk on them. That way I don’t need to make a pathway and I can do a total of 4m x 4m of growing area.

Walk on the tables pot up the plants far side first and work my way toward the end. Then set it and forget it for 8 weeks . At 8 weeks you take a machete and chop your way through the jungle.

Only issues I thought of with it is that if I get a hermie I can’t remove it. Although tbh I’ve never seen a hermie yet in the last 10 years of growing.
And I’d probably not see it until it was to late anyway with all the plants in here even if I had access.

Any further thoughts on this?