Make your own silicablast cheap

Ok so according to MBferts 5mL of silica blast per gallon results in a 30-35ppm solution of silica (plus potassium).

You can purchase Agsil 16H through them or other retailers. It is 24.64% silica and 26.89% potassium.

So how do we make our own gallon of silica blast?

Get a gallon jug and fill half way. Add 406.816g (or 407g if you only have a gram scale).

This gets you to 35ppm Si and 38.196ppm of K with 5mL per gallon, just like silica blast.

Calculations done with hydrobuddy.

ShirkGoldbrick said:

Ok so according to MBferts 5mL of silica blast per gallon results in a 30-35ppm solution of silica (plus potassium).

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should be 48ish ppm

- Jiji

Ok, so now you made me do the math.

It's 2% silicon. 7.86lb a gallon marked on the original bottle. That's 0.1572lb of silica per gallon w/w, or approx 71.45g, which gives 0.0189g per mL of concentrate. Add 5mL and you get 94.38mg. Divide by 3.7854L per gallon and you actually end up with 25ppm final solution.

So I guess mbferts is wrong too.

Let's check hydrobuddy now.

If you add 406.816g of Agsil into a gallon of water to make a concentrate solution you get 100.24g of silicon or 26.48mg/mL of stock solution. If you add 5mL into a gallon of final solution you'd get 132.4mg but that's 3.7854L so 34.98mg/L which is 35ppm.

If you want a weaker solution closer to the 25ppm of silicablast just download hydrobuddy - or reverse engineer my math.

Bleh I was thinking something else with the 48ish ppm.

I got around your numbers 35ppm, and 26ppm for silica blast.

Actually, I corrected them before, about the agsil dosage, they screwed up Si and SiO2. But its fixed now.

- Jiji

Yeah the numbers will depend on your rounding, and what conversion factors you use. Just gets pretty close to the original. I think Silicablast actually is potassium and sodium silicate or whatever.

Similar deal with Calmag by botanicare. MSDS lists both magnesium and calcium from nitrate and sulfate substances yet I thought that would precipitate. Not sure how they do it but I get pretty close with just magnesium and calcium nitrates caveat being that my nitrates are a little higher than theirs.

ShirkGoldbrick said:

Similar deal with Calmag by botanicare. MSDS lists both magnesium and calcium from nitrate and sulfate substances yet I thought that would precipitate. Not sure how they do it but I get pretty close with just magnesium and calcium nitrates caveat being that my nitrates are a little higher than theirs.

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Yeah. I wondered the same thing. Never figured it out. Finally took @churchhaze advice and put them in separate bottles.

- Jiji

Don't go with mbferts.com, I ordered 5 products from them and only 4 came in. I emailed them about there mistake of not sending me what I paid for and they spat in my face. There an untrustworthy nutrients dealer. The Stretch Stopper I ordered and paid for never came in the mail, a value of $30. They refused to correct there mistake and called me liar. I'll stick with bulk of it means I don't have to deal with there I professionalism and it was all over a $30 Stretch Stopper, what business does that. It would have been so easy for them to own there mistake.

They've forgotten stuff from my order before too. I called them and they didn't even question it they just sent it out immediately. Not sure what your issue was. Should probably not be using that stretch stopper either as I'm pretty sure it leaves some nasty residue but I could be wrong.

in my opinion the best silica for your dollar that is actually available to your plants is RAW Soluble Silica! They call it biogenic silica...? Not exactly sure what that is except I know it has 45% soluble SiO2. Also it is ph neutral so you can add to your res at any time without risk of lockup. This is because it doesnt have potassium hydroxide like most of the liquid silica out there. Especially in soil I use raw silica because it promotes beneficial microbes where as the hydroxide kills them.