Can I still use rockwool qith damaged fibers?

Some of the rockwool got damaged (I would say about 70 out of 220 I used) while I was pre soaking to get the right ph levels. I had to shake out all the water and re soak my first 70 rockwool about 8 times and alot of them got squished since I had to shake the water out every time. I got the ph levels to a 5.7 and stuck about 70 babies into them. Some of them got alot softer after I did this, but I did not have the money to go out and buy new ones. Will they still root or did I just mess up REALLY bad?

They should be alright as long as they arent mangled...they might dry quicker than the rest of them so try and keep them grouped together so you can analyze them more often...

unlucky said:

only one way to tell, think you will be ok with them .....take your time on the next run, why are you fecking about with them, did some knobhead on here tell you that you have to rins them and then ph them ?

next time just get a res of water ad a little feed and ph the water in the res and dip your rockwool in and thats it, its as simple as that......a little tip.... only dip the cube half way up from the bottom as it helps keep the green algae away

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I dont submerge them in a full amount of water. I fill up a tray about 1/3 of the way and i stick them in. that sufficiently soaked them without over saturating the rockwool. I was shaking out the water since I thought getting the water that was too high of a ph out of the rockwool would help. I would end up getting a better ph result than having to adjust the water (that was a 6.3) already in the cubes. I never pre rinsed the rockwool, that would really cause some complications imo. But Ihave not cloned in over 3 years so I was just being a rusty douchebag with my rockwool and I should have been more sensitive. The weird thing is the rockwool I had previously, made by A-Ok (were my first 70), had a very high ph that was a problem to adjust. Also they were considerably flimsy and they broke easy when I shook them. I went to the Discount Hydro store by my house and picked up these for $3 less, http://www.discount-hydro.com/products/Plant-Comfort-Starter-Sheets-.html, Came out to be VERY firm and they ph'ed to a .1 or .2 above what my water was reading. from what I am seeing the cheaper ones are a bit better of a buy than the A-OK ones. Maybe I got a crappy batch that found the shelves

thinn said:

They should be alright as long as they arent mangled...they might dry quicker than the rest of them so try and keep them grouped together so you can analyze them more often...

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I am thinking after day 5 or so I will check to see how they are doing. Now do you think they might dry out by day 4 or 5 instead of 6 or 7? The clones in the domes seem to be feeding their humidity cravings quite nicely off of the moisture in the rockwool. What I learned that was most important from cloning a while back is never spray the babies directly. I did that when I first started and could never understand why they would always mold up and die lol.

And I have a little over 50 in each tray using the smaller cubes, is that cool or will I have mold problems from them being on top of each other?

When I prep by rockwool blocks , I soak them in tap water for about an hour. I then adjust the PH as needed and check again in another hour. I do this until I get the PH where I want it. If you do the PH first , the rockwool will change everything and you will need to adjust anyway. I have been doing it this way and I have never wasted not one block in my three years of growing.