Help designing DIY Volksgarden

http://www.omegagarden.com/ Take a look if you haven't seen 1 of those before, without a doubt the best producer for the area it takes up. The only problem, the $2000 pricetag and you may have concerns about shipping something that large.

So I'm looking for input from the rest of you guys, how would you go about constructing a DIY version of these.

It seems pretty basic, a small motor turning the wheel holding the plants and as they spin around they dip into the reservoir at the bottom, and a light with a cooltube in the center.

As basic as that all sounds, I'm not extremely knowledgable in the area so a little more detail would be nice.

I wouldn't bother with one. You could probably do more than that thing with two plants in a DWC system SCROG with almost the same floor space.

Nah man these things are godly at growing, look up a couple of journals with them. Think it probably holds most of the g/w and g/sqft. records still, I haven't seen much better. I remember reading a while back about a guy running 8 of them in his house getting as much as 5lb each unit, using a 1000w.

You've no doubt seen how succesful alot of vertical grows are, this is basically the same thing just on its side with an innovative hydroponic delivery system. The wheel slowly rotates completing a full rotation every 45 minutes and dipping into the nute solution at the bottom. So its basically the same concept as a flood and drain system flooded every 45 minutes.

i think ur main problem would be keeping the part where the plants go in water-tight, I would have to check one of these things out for a better idea, but it seems like when it was upside down it'd be hard not to spring a leak,

Theres not any water in the wheel itself, the wheel just holds rockwool cubes in place and they soak when they reach the bottom and slowly dry during their 45 min rotation, don't think there would be any leaking issues though.

The plants are not watered with every rotation, that wouldn't work. The ebb and flow tray below the wheel fills on a timer like any other ebb and flow tray and you water maybe 3x a day (when things are really going, not for starting) for one revolution of the wheel *NO MORE*.

4' diameter wheel which must be strong enough to hold it's shape and not deform. The wheel must only dip the rockwool in 1/4" or so of water and if it's even the tiniest bit off level, bent, or sagging, then some plants get too much water and some get not enough or none.

Check out some bbq rotiserie motors, they can be found new on ebay able to turn 50-100lbs for $50 or so. Lighter power ones are cheaper but when you figure the weight of a ton of wet rockwool and all that vegitation and the wheel...

DIY can be done, I was going to do it, but after comparing to a few of the best vertical grows on here vertical won for my tastes because I just don't want to be locked in to running only indica or only plants that fit and respond well to that machine.
I love me some sativas too.

hazetastic808 said:

Nah man these things are godly at growing, look up a couple of journals with them. Think it probably holds most of the g/w and g/sqft. records still, I haven't seen much better. I remember reading a while back about a guy running 8 of them in his house getting as much as 5lb each unit, using a 1000w.

You've no doubt seen how succesful alot of vertical grows are, this is basically the same thing just on its side with an innovative hydroponic delivery system. The wheel slowly rotates completing a full rotation every 45 minutes and dipping into the nute solution at the bottom. So its basically the same concept as a flood and drain system flooded every 45 minutes.

Click to expand...

g/w is a moot measurement - with lots of time I could do the same thing with a 400w HPS and light mover, and have done so.

Also, have you seen the Krusty Bucket grow? Kilo+ off a single plant. Buds the size of your HEAD.

See the pic attached to this post

Ditch your Omega garden, spend the extra saved money on a few more lights and some DWC buckets.

KaliKitsune said:

g/w is a moot measurement - with lots of time I could do the same thing with a 400w HPS and light mover, and have done so.

Also, have you seen the Krusty Bucket grow? Kilo+ off a single plant. Buds the size of your HEAD.

See the pic attached to this post

Ditch your Omega garden, spend the extra saved money on a few more lights and some DWC buckets.

Click to expand...

...Well the whole idea was to not spend money on it and build one myself.

And like I said, just look up some grow journals with them the final result ends up looking like a giant 4 foot bud donut.

You have 80 plant sites in a 2'x3' area, although from what I've read, it depends on the strain but 60 sites is the ideal amount to use usually.

Also your argument is one usually used when the subject of g/w comes up in scrog/LST long vegging grows, part of the key to this thing is keeping all the plants short, so your probably putting your clones straight into flower ideally. Its just a sog rolled up into a wheel. And up until this point I have yet to see a sog under a single 1000w HPS yield 5 lb in 8 weeks, half that in a normal flatgrow would be considered great, that of course was from an experienced grower who probably had everything dialed in and perfect strain for the setup etc. Thats probably the only drawback of these is being limited to only growing short bushy indicas.

Lol I wish I could afford and had a place to put one of those industrial sized ones haha those things look badass.

Anybody have a link to the real krusty bucket grow?

hazetastic808 said:

And up until this point I have yet to see a sog under a single 1000w HPS yield 5 lb in 8 weeks

Click to expand...

I have YET to see a single plant besides lowryder that only takes 8 weeks. Hello FLOWERING ALONE usually takes 6-10 weeks. Where's your veg cycle?

And lowryder isn't a great yielder, either.



That's 11 months with a single 400w HPS and light mover. Over a pound per plant. And that's just ebb and flow.

Had that been a 1000w HPS and DWC, I could have done about 10 pounds and in three months flat, without SCROG. Five pounds in two? No thanks, I'll double that for just an extra 50% time.

Rotary will surpass vertical grows yield wise, yes, but they are not zero veg and an ideally set up vertical aero or hydro grow of the right type can in fact come very close to matching those kinds of yields. You load them (usually) with rockwool plugs and barely rooted cuttings so it can fit into the channel and then into a full size rockwool cube. That's how most of them lock the plants in. Then you veg them around a month, then you flower. Search google on "b-pod rotary garden" and you'll find many sites with links to the manuals for those. Read both operating and install and you will then know enough to build one guaranteed.

And you shoudln't ever bother with a lowryder in them, because they won't be consitent enough to work and you can't control the final flowering size so you can't optimize theyield anyway. No plants from seed work, only clones, and only clones that are perfectly matched in size.

Theres also an article about them in Popular Science, I don't know how much more legit that makes it, but hey its something. I looked up the article it talks alot about Orbitropism which is the effect of having the plants constantly rotating upside-down as they are. Apparently combined with the effect of gravity it causes the plant to become short and compressed with very little space between internodes allowing for very thick dense growth in the small area it takes up, combined with every single one of the 60 plants being equally distant from the light source recieving maximum lumens it allows for such crazy yields.

Do you mind if I ask how many other hydro systems you have built?

For me its about 10. I have learned that I get bigger harvest by keeping it simple. This setup is super complex, and very cool, but complex things are prone to problems. If your goal is not to produce a lot of weed, but instead design a bad ass hydro system, I would be willing to help, because a project like this sounds fun. If your goal is to produce a lot of weed, I would recommend something more simple that will work about as well.

KaliKitsune said:

g/w is a moot measurement - with lots of time I could do the same thing with a 400w HPS and light mover, and have done so.

Also, have you seen the Krusty Bucket grow? Kilo+ off a single plant. Buds the size of your HEAD.

See the pic attached to this post

Ditch your Omega garden, spend the extra saved money on a few more lights and some DWC buckets.

Click to expand...

Holy Moly those are some big ass colas.

Thanks for the link to that b-pod thing, trying to figure out what would be a good thing to use as the wheel. Lol while I was thinking about it I had a crazy idea, about a giant sized 8 foot version made with one of those cheap outdoor swimming pools, and youd have like 40 full sized 3' plants rotating around maybe 3 1000w HPS with like a dirtbike motor turning it lol.

KaliKitsune said:

I have YET to see a single plant besides lowryder that only takes 8 weeks. Hello FLOWERING ALONE usually takes 6-10 weeks. Where's your veg cycle?

And lowryder isn't a great yielder, either.



That's 11 months with a single 400w HPS and light mover. Over a pound per plant. And that's just ebb and flow.

Had that been a 1000w HPS and DWC, I could have done about 10 pounds and in three months flat, without SCROG. Five pounds in two? No thanks, I'll double that for just an extra 50% time.

Click to expand...

you can skip the veg cycle and go 12/12 from seed or 12/12 as soon as the clones are rooted.... isnt the grow in the photo a bubbleponic set up, not ebb n flow? i see an airpump and i dont see a resivoir??? either way nice results!

https://www.rollitup.org/hydroponics-aeroponics/149998-heaths-flooded-tube-vertical.html

This might be the solution to your problem.

smokiedog said:

you can skip the veg cycle and go 12/12 from seed or 12/12 as soon as the clones are rooted.... isnt the grow in the photo a bubbleponic set up, not ebb n flow? i see an airpump and i dont see a resivoir??? either way nice results!

Click to expand...

Reservoir is out of the picture, it would have been a bit further down. I bubbled everything as I flooded the system, and there's two air lines - one to the root tank and one to the reservoir. Reservoir constantly bubbled, and I adjusted the other air line to the roots manually.

DWC is far simpler, though, and you can't beat the yield. Even for herbs. I was harvesting basil just a little over a week from transplant, took half the plant matter away and it still didn't look like I had touched the plant at all.

I live in Hawaii so I've done a majority of my growing up in the mountains, but have grown indoors before. I used to have just a small setup 3'x3' ebb n flo under a 600w HPS, well I still have it kind of its just at my old apartment with my friend who I grow the plants with. We just set it up to veg the plants nice and big before we put them out last season, but we did do a couple of full grows with if afterwards up until we started getting the plants ready for this year. I'm more just looking to setup something of my own to get going in my new place again and its between this and vertical for me, and it being complex I don't really see as being a drawback because I kind of get in to trying out and experimenting with new stuff. Worst case scenario I'm stuck with only the big juicy outdoor sativas too smoke, but I want to get something indica going inside as well, Indicas don't really do well outside here cuz of the dampness and humidity especially guerrila. The only time we attempted one we lost the whole thing to mold and budrot :/.

building this would not be that difficult... if you had deep pockets and access to industrial equipment. you would need a serious workshop with a pipe bending machine, 3 inch diameter steel pipe, a welder, brackets to attach the vertical planters to the 2 wheels, 4 inch vinyl fence post might work as planters, an electric wheel chair moter converted to 110 volt with a variable speed control, fabricate a res out of lexan, a rubber tire to drive the steel outer wheel from the wheelchair motor (kinda like the tire that drives the ferris wheel at the traveling town fair) and a flat bet truck to move it to your house and a contractor to remove your doors and put holes in your house to get in the position you want. it all seems pretty straight forward and reasonable to me!

there are exactly 3,187 easier ways to grow pot than this. although if you could pull this off, it is probably most effecient (but least practical)

if your set on this style, do a verticle grow, same yeild, less moving parts, samller footprint too