Do I use the autopots?

Luckyfrank

Active Member
Hi, I’m considering using the autopots for my next grow. So far I’ve used wilmas, iws and hand fed. This will be my biggest setup yet and I’m looking for ease but at the same time I don’t want to lose in yield. I will still be checking everyday.

hand feeding I found very time consuming and a pain to get rid of the run off

Wilmas I didn’t like the recycling of feed

and iws I’m finding some plants are drinking quicker than others so I’m either under feeding some or over

my next one I want it to run really smooth, which I know is impossible lol but any advise would be great
 

BaginsZA

Well-Known Member
Hi, I’m considering using the autopots for my next grow. So far I’ve used wilmas, iws and hand fed. This will be my biggest setup yet and I’m looking for ease but at the same time I don’t want to lose in yield. I will still be checking everyday.

hand feeding I found very time consuming and a pain to get rid of the run off

Wilmas I didn’t like the recycling of feed

and iws I’m finding some plants are drinking quicker than others so I’m either under feeding some or over

my next one I want it to run really smooth, which I know is impossible lol but any advise would be great
I switched to autopots and never looking back. Get the pot socks if you can as I always have issues with roots growing through the control pads. RH was stable due to not having water at the surface of the pots and yeilds have been excellent. The main reason I switched was to save time and effort on manual watering. These day I top up my res once a week, with a pump to keep everything circulated. You have to maintain the 5mm tubes with a flush to rid the salt build up, and in my case, between grows was enough to keep things flowing great. You can't use organic neuts (most of them out there) so stick to Hydro neuts, and a flush every few weeks to cleanse the pots. They come in 2 sizes, XL for big growing strains and normal size for typical strains. I did find the smaller pots would not hold up heavy buds well, and needed to use supports, other than that, autopots are amazing and well worth the upfront costs.. After all, bottom fed pots are one of the best ways to go. Happy growing!
 

CannaOnerStar

Well-Known Member
I recently got autopots and really liking them thus far. Havent finished plants with them yet tho. I went with biotabs and was planning to feed water only and add some pk at the end, but i ended up vegging for too long and medium was coco, so the nutes kinda started running out. So i started feeding it with remo nutes and that seems to be the way to go. First make some sort of super soil to coco or something, light enough to carry through vegging and maybe bit more and then start feeding it liquid nutes and add beneficial bacteria with them to keep things alive in pots and to get rid of stuff that could decompose and start rotting, and/or enzymes for this.

With biotabs you can avoid running out of nutes so easily by using some regular soil in the mix or other stuff that can offer food for microbial life that turns into plant food. Also if you dont veg them super long, it wont be a problem. Also you could top feed with silicum flash to add slow release nutes if you want to keep only water in the tank.

I spec'd the liquid nutes quite long and hard and at least out of the ones available near me, Remo seemed like the best choice for this. Remo himself uses autopots with his nutes, so its proven to work well. He has posted quite a bit of stuff about his grows on youtube.
 

Luckyfrank

Active Member
I switched to autopots and never looking back. Get the pot socks if you can as I always have issues with roots growing through the control pads. RH was stable due to not having water at the surface of the pots and yeilds have been excellent. The main reason I switched was to save time and effort on manual watering. These day I top up my res once a week, with a pump to keep everything circulated. You have to maintain the 5mm tubes with a flush to rid the salt build up, and in my case, between grows was enough to keep things flowing great. You can't use organic neuts (most of them out there) so stick to Hydro neuts, and a flush every few weeks to cleanse the pots. They come in 2 sizes, XL for big growing strains and normal size for typical strains. I did find the smaller pots would not hold up heavy buds well, and needed to use supports, other than that, autopots are amazing and well worth the upfront costs.. After all, bottom fed pots are one of the best ways to go. Happy growing!
Thanks for the reply dude, they sound pretty good. Did u use soil?
 

calvin.m16

Well-Known Member
AutoPots are not going to give you the best results possible.. Remo doesn't mention that you have to establish the plants fully & perfectly prior to the system even working. The pots require constant cleaning depending on nutrient solution, enzymes, additives and such.. You're going to end up just spending more money and time in the end from my experience. I would just get bigger pots or use a more water retentive medium if your concerned about having to frequently fertigate/irrigate.

The plants are always going to drink water differently, that is why you will always have to tinker with these things to make sure they are actually working, some plants might barely cycle with these type of systems. For example I had a Gelato that barely drinks at all and this system wouldn't even properly reset for it to thrive like top feeding straight from a 5 gal bucket..

If it sounds too good to be true, it almost always is. Also remember, Remo is a salesman, salesman aren't to be trusted.
 

Star Dog

Well-Known Member
I don't know who Remo is but there's a design flaw in the ones I've got, the plant does have to be established because of the fault but it's easily fixed so that you can put in a clone and leave it :-)

The absolute maximum the pot can take up still leaves enough to prevent the cycle it'll dry out, poke a piece of capillary matting out of the bottom of the pot... Problem solved.
Another way is to raise the valve just a couple of mm enough to allow the recycling
 

CannaOnerStar

Well-Known Member
AutoPots are not going to give you the best results possible.. Remo doesn't mention that you have to establish the plants fully & perfectly prior to the system even working. The pots require constant cleaning depending on nutrient solution, enzymes, additives and such.. You're going to end up just spending more money and time in the end from my experience. I would just get bigger pots or use a more water retentive medium if your concerned about having to frequently fertigate/irrigate.

The plants are always going to drink water differently, that is why you will always have to tinker with these things to make sure they are actually working, some plants might barely cycle with these type of systems. For example I had a Gelato that barely drinks at all and this system wouldn't even properly reset for it to thrive like top feeding straight from a 5 gal bucket..

If it sounds too good to be true, it almost always is. Also remember, Remo is a salesman, salesman aren't to be trusted.
The only thing you need to do in the beginning is top feed if your plant is too small to have roots that reach the more moist parts closer to bottom of the pot. You dont need to do this many times, because young plants dont drink too much. So hand water for few times before turning the system on. Its not that hard or complicated thing to do imho.
If you first use rock wool cubes and clones, im pretty sure you could get away with one hand watering before roots are big enough to drink from autopots.

No they dont require constant cleaning. Same as with any pots, clean after use. Or buy new pots if you are too lazy to clean the old ones, they dont cost much more than regular pots(you dont need to buy the whole system). and according to what everyone has told, its ok to clean the pipes after each grow, like with any hydro system. Much less work in my opinion than with most other hydro systems.

You dont need to use enzymes any more than with other hydro systems, actually im pretty sure than enzymes are more important in some other hydro systems than with autopots. Especially considering that you can make a living soil in autopot and build a whole beneficial bacterial life thing in there, which make enzymes on their own and break up dead organic matter. You could even go as far as doing whole living soil in autopot and only need to feed water and then there would definitely be no need for enzymes or any additives or adding anything but water for plants.

It doesent matter how much plant drinks, it gets the amount of water it needs. If it drinks less, then its given water less frequently. These autopots work by opening a valve when the water level drops under certain point. It will keep the soil as wet all the time, because if it tries to dry, more water is given. It doesent matter how often it is filled, it is filled when it is needed to fill. It wont dry up any more or less if a plant drinks more or less.

Remo is a very well respected old timer in the field of cannabis nutes and really knows his thing. If you look at nutrient lines, you wont find many that are at the level of Remo. He posts his own grows to youtube to show how it works(he has chosen to use autopots, even tho he could do what ever he wants, he gave them a go and like them) and if you google what growers thik of his nutes, i doubt you will find much bad things about them.

Yea yea you can grow with some simple cheap nutes or you can make your own and get cheaper, but thats not the point.
 

calvin.m16

Well-Known Member
The only thing you need to do in the beginning is top feed if your plant is too small to have roots that reach the more moist parts closer to bottom of the pot. You dont need to do this many times, because young plants dont drink too much. So hand water for few times before turning the system on. Its not that hard or complicated thing to do imho.
If you first use rock wool cubes and clones, im pretty sure you could get away with one hand watering before roots are big enough to drink from autopots.

No they dont require constant cleaning. Same as with any pots, clean after use. Or buy new pots if you are too lazy to clean the old ones, they dont cost much more than regular pots(you dont need to buy the whole system). and according to what everyone has told, its ok to clean the pipes after each grow, like with any hydro system. Much less work in my opinion than with most other hydro systems.

You dont need to use enzymes any more than with other hydro systems, actually im pretty sure than enzymes are more important in some other hydro systems than with autopots. Especially considering that you can make a living soil in autopot and build a whole beneficial bacterial life thing in there, which make enzymes on their own and break up dead organic matter. You could even go as far as doing whole living soil in autopot and only need to feed water and then there would definitely be no need for enzymes or any additives or adding anything but water for plants.

It doesent matter how much plant drinks, it gets the amount of water it needs. If it drinks less, then its given water less frequently. These autopots work by opening a valve when the water level drops under certain point. It will keep the soil as wet all the time, because if it tries to dry, more water is given. It doesent matter how often it is filled, it is filled when it is needed to fill. It wont dry up any more or less if a plant drinks more or less.

Remo is a very well respected old timer in the field of cannabis nutes and really knows his thing. If you look at nutrient lines, you wont find many that are at the level of Remo. He posts his own grows to youtube to show how it works(he has chosen to use autopots, even tho he could do what ever he wants, he gave them a go and like them) and if you google what growers thik of his nutes, i doubt you will find much bad things about them.

Yea yea you can grow with some simple cheap nutes or you can make your own and get cheaper, but thats not the point.
Price isn't a factor for me. I've looked into the autopots maybe I need to give them a chance. I'm set using Advanced Nutrients. I had someone tell me they very easily stop working and you still have to check them constantly. PERHAPS they were wrong? How many runs have you done with the autopots, how many plants at once and how big of a res if you don't mind me asking? Thanks.
 

Star Dog

Well-Known Member
I've used auto pots for mothers and smart trays for veg and flowering, the smart tray is part of the autopot range it's basically a bigger version I used them for many years with hassle free growing, with the auto pot, the 2 x1.5 gallon I kept mothers in needed a few roots cleared occasionally.

If you like DIY there a breeze to make one to your own spec, a tray, a lid with holes cut to the right size and a smart valve.
Eta...
Fwiw out of all the diffrent systems I've used I've never found any significant difference between them, i go for simplicity now and the auto pot ranks highly for simplicity and yeild, i wouldn't hesitate to recommend them, i used perlite with my set up again I'd recommend it, it clean and totally inert.

I used a 20 gallon tank running 4 trays and 16 plants however the tank size is almost irelevant providing it holds enough for a couple of days, it certainly doesn't need tinkering with or could possibly not supply the required amount to the plants.
Someone has been talking out there @rse.
 
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CannaOnerStar

Well-Known Member
Price isn't a factor for me. I've looked into the autopots maybe I need to give them a chance. I'm set using Advanced Nutrients. I had someone tell me they very easily stop working and you still have to check them constantly. PERHAPS they were wrong? How many runs have you done with the autopots, how many plants at once and how big of a res if you don't mind me asking? Thanks.
I have been using them for like 4-5 months and just finishing the first plant and i got another one in early stages of flowering.

Remo used to work for advanced nutrients and the problem with AN is that they sell you tons of different products separately, even tho those could be combined into single product. They do this sothat you would need to buy as many different nutes as possible. Im not saying that they are bad nutes, but the way they operate is aimed to make as much money as possible and you pay extra for that. Remo when he started making his own nutes, took the knowledge he had from working at AN and made his nutrient line in a way that everything that can be combined into single bottle will, so that you dont have tons of different products like you do with advanced nutrients, but still have all the stuff. Except there doesent seem to be much silicon in remos nutes and he recommends using soil with enough of it, but you could just add rhino skin or what ever silicon for example. If you think that its needed, Remo does not add any and he grows fire with his nutes in autopots.

I dont know if they stop working easily, but if you would use some organic nutes or perhaps some salt based nutes could also cause it. Adding enzymes should help to not get blockages as easily. Im using fabric pots on my autopot, so its easy to just tap on the side(lower part of pot) and see if its wet or not. You can also easily lift the lid that houses the aquavalve. Also if its not a small pot and a big plant, it wont dry out in a second. Those big pots im sure could easily go 2 days without watering before getting any signs of dehydration, even if the plant would be big. But big plants in the smallest autopots would naturally dry up quite fast. But cannabis doesent mind too much even if it dries up a bit, cannabis will perk up fast to normal even if its wilting quite badly. But if you have a living soi land you let it dry completely, you might kill the beneficials etc and cause trouble
 
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CannaOnerStar

Well-Known Member
I've used auto pots for mothers and smart trays for veg and flowering, the smart tray is part of the autopot range it's basically a bigger version I used them for many years with hassle free growing, with the auto pot, the 2 x1.5 gallon I kept mothers in needed a few roots cleared occasionally.

If you like DIY there a breeze to make one to your own spec, a tray, a lid with holes cut to the right size and a smart valve.
Eta...
Fwiw out of all the diffrent systems I've used I've never found any significant difference between them, i go for simplicity now and the auto pot ranks highly for simplicity and yeild, i wouldn't hesitate to recommend them, i used perlite with my set up again I'd recommend it, it clean and totally inert.

I used a 20 gallon tank running 4 trays and 16 plants however the tank size is almost irelevant providing it holds enough for a couple of days, it certainly doesn't need tinkering with or could possibly not supply the required amount to the plants.
Someone has been talking out there @rse.
I have been thinking of doing some DIY setup based on the aquavalve from autopots for my next grow. I was thinking of 60x60cm tray with 8 6L pots and aqua valve in the middle. But im still considering different options. I need to grow as many as possible in small space because im going to make seeds from regular seeds. Because about half would be male, i would get some extra room in it, i was thinking of getting few extra vegged ready to replace males on it. Then maybe start to do a sort of perpetual harvest on it for a while when i had pollen collected and searching for suitable females.

Im worried that the pots would not be high enough and would stay too wet. This is why i was thinking of adding air domes, but then if i were to put airdomes on every pot and grow some extra to replace males, i would be wasting tons of money on airdomes alone, which is not ideal.

Do you have some pics of your setup you could share? Would be nice to get some ideas around this
 

Star Dog

Well-Known Member
I have been thinking of doing some DIY setup based on the aquavalve from autopots for my next grow. I was thinking of 60x60cm tray with 8 6L pots and aqua valve in the middle. But im still considering different options. I need to grow as many as possible in small space because im going to make seeds from regular seeds. Because about half would be male, i would get some extra room in it, i was thinking of getting few extra vegged ready to replace males on it. Then maybe start to do a sort of perpetual harvest on it for a while when i had pollen collected and searching for suitable females.

Im worried that the pots would not be high enough and would stay too wet. This is why i was thinking of adding air domes, but then if i were to put airdomes on every pot and grow some extra to replace males, i would be wasting tons of money on airdomes alone, which is not ideal.

Do you have some pics of your setup you could share? Would be nice to get some ideas around this
I've tried air domes and air pumps with bubble tube imho a waste of money.
I'm sorry I don't have any photos that was a few years ago but if I can help with advice I will.
One thing I'd say is don't worry about the plant no being wet enough, I wouldn't describe perlite as the the ultimate in capillary but it sucks enough up to go green around the top, i actually used lids on my pots to stop it and stumbled onto roots growing up over the surface (photo available) a drop in humidity and sort of ruling out salt build up through the top drying out, it was an unexpected bonus + another bonus :-)
 

CannaOnerStar

Well-Known Member
I've tried air domes and air pumps with bubble tube imho a waste of money.
I'm sorry I don't have any photos that was a few years ago but if I can help with advice I will.
One thing I'd say is don't worry about the plant no being wet enough, I wouldn't describe perlite as the the ultimate in capillary but it sucks enough up to go green around the top, i actually used lids on my pots to stop it and stumbled onto roots growing up over the surface (photo available) a drop in humidity and sort of ruling out salt build up through the top drying out, it was an unexpected bonus + another bonus :-)
Oh im more afraid that the pots would stay too wet if they are too low compared to wight. I was thinking airdomes to combat the lack of oxygen in case they would stay too wet. I was also thinking of making a sort of coco/clay pebble/perlite supersoil mix with biotabs that would be light enough for small plants in the beginning and would release enough nutes till some point of flowering, when i would start to feed it Remo nutes to supplement nutes running out of medium(when the beneficials etc dont have any food left in soil). I did this by accident with my current plants by vegging them for too long and it seems to work like a charm, also ill be saving money since i dont need to feed anything except water until at some point of flowering, most likely before half way. Besides remo im adding silicon, enzymes, root stuff and a bit of beneficial bacteria to supplement some that might had died due to lack of food in soil by now.
 

Star Dog

Well-Known Member
Of course you can experiment it's part of the fun, I'm only trying to assure you that the smart tray/valve set up works great ime with and equally without air domes.
If you are afraid of them being to wet the smart valve accommodates a capillary system, it's the same thing with the plants on platforms to keep there roots out of the nutrient.
Put some cap mat over a platform ie a brick a box whatever then put your plants on it and water its then self regulated with valve.
Eta...
When I used the auto pots I used coco and perlite 50/50 but had 1.5" of 100% perlite in the bottom of the pot, I'd expect its like mud without the perlite acting as the capillary.
The trays I used 100% perlite sat in the solution.
Due to space I had to put a quick one together for a mother plant, it spent years with it roots submerged most of that time, again that was 100% perlite.
 
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Wizzlebiz

Well-Known Member
If it sounds too good to be true, it almost always is. Also remember, Remo is a salesman, salesman aren't to be trusted.
Bro. Everyone everywhere is selling something.

Your trying to sell him on your statement,
I'm trying to sell you on mine,
I try to sell my wife into anal daily
She trys to sell me into doing the dishes.

Every disagreement where you tried to get your point across is a sale.

Not all salesman are scumbags. Some are good and some are actually there to help.
 

Oakiey

Well-Known Member
Ain't nothing much better than a 5 gallon bucket

Them Auto pots were made for trees, weed don't grow in a bucket long enough to worry about the roots
 

calvin.m16

Well-Known Member
Ain't nothing much better than a 5 gallon bucket

Them Auto pots were made for trees, weed don't grow in a bucket long enough to worry about the roots
Speak for yourself. 10 gallon pots drink 2-3 gallons of fertilized water a day each.. I veg for 60 days and practice topping. Look closely at the picture of the stalk and you will see roots EVERYWHERE in the pure coco. Its hard to break down the cores after I harvest. Those puppies are about 5 feet tall week 1 of flower after 60 days veg.

IMG_2307.jpeg1599641028303.pngIMG_2323.jpeg
 

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Idvw

Member
AutoPots are not going to give you the best results possible.. Remo doesn't mention that you have to establish the plants fully & perfectly prior to the system even working. The pots require constant cleaning depending on nutrient solution, enzymes, additives and such.. You're going to end up just spending more money and time in the end from my experience. I would just get bigger pots or use a more water retentive medium if your concerned about having to frequently fertigate/irrigate.

The plants are always going to drink water differently, that is why you will always have to tinker with these things to make sure they are actually working, some plants might barely cycle with these type of systems. For example I had a Gelato that barely drinks at all and this system wouldn't even properly reset for it to thrive like top feeding straight from a 5 gal bucket..

If it sounds too good to be true, it almost always is. Also remember, Remo is a salesman, salesman aren't to be trusted.
This is not my experience with autopots. Do you have any pics of your grow with Autopots where you experienced all these things your very own self?
 

Idvw

Member
Thanks for the reply dude, they sound pretty good. Did u use soil?
I am finishing a harvest now in Autopot smart pot xls, using coco and perlite with hydroton on the bottom, with air domes in each pot. It’s working out very well! But I got annoyed prepping the coco. This time I’d like to avoid coco and use only perlite/hydroton/possibly rock wool. Thoughts?
 
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