Cheap DIY grow set up

RIXUK

Active Member
I posted this on a reply to some ones thread but I think it deserves its own.

I thought I would add as Ive recenty lost all my equipment which would easily been £5k.
Ive had to start out fresh with very limited funds to get started,feel free to edit you original post and place it in there so others can see straight away.

1x 1metre aqua tray with matching 1m rock wool slab £5-7 for both
View attachment 1555177
Ignore the top rockwool cubes,the matching 1m rockwool slab is wrapped in the white wrapper there sitting on,drip system is a option if you can afford a timer,if not manual feed is fine,watch what I show you.

Water pump £5-7.
View attachment 1555183

air pump £5-7.
View attachment 1555199
Flourescent light Tube,fixture and bulb £10,go with a 6500k and change bulb to 2500k in flower.I got the 5 foot T8 65w 6500k as it is same lengh as the aqua tray.
View attachment 1555201
Tubing for both pumps,1 metre lengh of each and a air stone £2-3?
PH water colour tester £3 (VERY important).
W01581.jpg


Now you need like a retrangluar storage container to use as a resevoir and some thing to leane the other end on (I used a speaker).
You want the tray to sit at a angle so the water can drip back in to the resevoir.
Heres mine,a bit ghetto but its done the job.


Nutes is another cost but it is OK to go 2 week from seed with no nutes.
Starter nutes are cheap,I used,
Vita link plant starter for seedlings £3 and then I got Vita link max A+B 1litre bottles for £10.
Oscilating fan £5

Only thing I can really say with these type of set up,is you could probably do 2 or 3 max for a full grow in 1 tray,keep them small and let roots drip in to reseviour.

This was temparory for me and now they have moved in to this.

There under the 600w,this willl allow me time to get other HPS lights and bigger buckets.

This is the cheapest I have found and not a lot I would of changed.

Ive bought 7x 10litre buckets for £7 which I will use 6 of,the 7th will be for topping up or reseviour change.I bought like 10cm plant pots for real cheap too,cut hole in lid of bucket and fit them in like this,
.
All I need for them is 4 airstones.
As you can see there is 8 plants,2 will go in 90litre buckets (the one you see in last picture),the rest in 10 litre buckets.

Picture is actually the ready built oxy pots that are like £20-25 each,I basicly made mine for £2 quid!!they do come with a air pump,the poxy £5 ones but that still equas £7 in total if I bought that pump.
I brought a bit of a better pump which will work 8 buckets £15.
I wont be bothering with the water pump but it will come in handy when I do reseviour changes,you could skip the water pump completely if you wanted too and let root sit in reseviour.

I will get a few more 600w HPS lights while these grow under the 1 at the moment,I now have my big fan and filter and all I need is my vita link max bloom A+B and Vita link Buddy for when I go in to fower.
I will add mylar.

What Im explaining is,you dont need every thing at once and you dont have to go big at all.
I will go big with 2 plants in 90 litre buckets and do the rest small in 10 litres.

My advice is buy what you can afford but some things,for example the ph water testing colour thing,as soon as you can,buy a digital PH meter ASAP,that is the most important thing I would say.

As you can see its worked for me so far and it has allowed me time to buy the rest of my kit,PH digi meter was the firdt thing by the way,then it was my carbon filter and fan
I have virtually every thing now and all I need to do is mylar the wall,get more lights and ducting pipe.

One real big thing ive learned is DIY is the best way,Ive easiy replaced some stuff,for example buckets 7x for £7 quid,I payed £20 each for oxy pots before.

A hydroponic bucket demands a premium over a normal bucket purely because they say hydroponics.Truth of the matter is a bate bucket is the same thing !!!! So be cautious when your in your hydro store and buy if its apsolutely necessary (if not have a look around).

Some thing I noticed with them aqua trays too,You need to cover the rockwool,Use the original packaging to the rockwool slab,this is because the direct light to the rockwool creates algae.
I would say just chop the bottom of the wrapper off and put holes in top just the size of your seed and plant the seed straight in,thats what I would do If I ever use these trays again,the rockwool slab was also cheaper then say 4x 4inch rockwool cubes.There handy for just about any thing,I cut 1 inch cubes for clones/seeds out of a slab and then place back in the brick shaped rockwool I cut out.Again I wouldnt do this again as algae from the ligh,I would do wqhat I previously mentioned as its much easier and less hassle or cut bricks with wrapper on and place revealing rockwool down in tray and then make hole for seed ;-)

I dont keep a public journal but I think members can click my account and check my journal.
Hope this helps a bit.
Good luck
 
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