MY True HP Aero Plug&Play Pods

By every thing I have read, and I surprisingly found quite a few good reference text and studies on Google scholar, it is not unusual for the root mass on 5 to 6 50 micro misted root masses to be upt to four times larger than any other root masses from any other growing methods. I am still planning on two to three feet deep chambers 36 inches square. I figure on making several different tops. One set for for a plant every square foot and one set for a sog at 4 per square foot. By what I have read the SOG should be so tight that the bottoms will be pretty much self pruning due to minimal light shading. I am hoping with high temps to catually get 5 weeks budding cycles and with more selective care with some new mothers to maybe get down to 1 week of heavy veg lighting and four weeks of budding with afghani/indica crosses. I heard in Amsterdam they have been growing 4 foot white russians (white Widow and AK47 crosses) in two weeks veg from rooted clones and 5 week bloom with air atomization chambers, CO2, temps at high 80's to low 90's and warm water nutrients (82 degrees). They are using low level chlorine constantly because the root masses are so thick. Four nozzles to a chamber for the last 3 weeks. A grower friend of mine just spent 9 weeks over there. His operation was closed down 6 months ago so he is doing serious seed shopping.

fatman7574 said:

By every thing I have read, and I surprisingly found quite a few good reference text and studies on Google scholar, it is not unusual for the root mass on 5 to 6 50 micro misted root masses to be upt to four times larger than any other root masses from any other growing methods. I am still planning on two to three feet deep chambers 36 inches square. I figure on making several different tops. One set for for a plant every square foot and one set for a sog at 4 per square foot. By what I have read the SOG should be so tight that the bottoms will be pretty much self pruning due to minimal light shading. I am hoping with high temps to catually get 5 weeks budding cycles and with more selective care with some new mothers to maybe get down to 1 week of heavy veg lighting and four weeks of budding with afghani/indica crosses. I heard in Amsterdam they have been growing 4 foot white russians (white Widow and AK47 crosses) in two weeks veg from rooted clones and 5 week bloom with air atomization chambers, CO2, temps at high 80's to low 90's and warm water nutrients (82 degrees). They are using low level chlorine constantly because the root masses are so thick. Four nozzles to a chamber for the last 3 weeks. A grower friend of mine just spent 9 weeks over there. His operation was closed down 6 months ago so he is doing serious seed shopping.

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i dont know yet if the finishing times will be quicker. i usually let things go a little longer than is probably necessary because i only do one or two runs a year. i can say that from my LP days there is no way these chambers would have filled up. LP roots go to the bottom and there they just create a mat. with this system the roots get real fluffy with large air spaces between them. kind of like cotton candy. and the majority of the root fluffyness only has occured in the last 2 weeks since ive got the thing more dialed in. (way less misting, especially at night. only 2 sec every 30 minutes at night. 2 sec every 10 during day.)

im thinking i will use these chambers for veg and get me some 100 gallon or larger to finish in. Now i know that pump based HP aero can generate the same fine root systems that ive seen in the atomix. you just have to get it dialed in.

I might go for the air atomizing though anyway in the 100 gallon chambers if time permits this summer to manufacture a setup. If not ill go with the same system just bigger chambers.

I know i mentioned it before but even with small girls sog style i would incorporate a way to keep all the roots out of the runoff. you can see a marked difference in the roots above the runoff and those in the runoff. and if you try to decrease the moisture level to accomadate the runoff roots the others suffer somewhat from too little moisture. im going to go with the silk screen bottoms no matter which way i go on the new chambers. (pump based or air compressor based.)

Im sure those roots in the runoff act like NFT or DWC roots. they certainly look like them. maybe they are benifical in that they can pick up large amounts of water to meet the needs of large plants but i think a large mass of the fine roots could probably accomplish the same purpose.

I still havent cut my ibc tank yet for the chamber. From what i am reading though i think i am going to cut it about 24 inches and use a couple different tops for different grow ops. I am going to put one of the netafim 4 head foggers in the chamber first and see how that works. I might go ahead and install all my misters. just have each with a valve to shut off, so i can run one set at a time.

Sounds like ibc`s would make perfect root chambers for trees, 35 cubic feet should be big enough.You probably need 10-12ft ceilings to accomodate them unless you can dig them into the floor

travish413 said:

I still havent cut my ibc tank yet for the chamber. From what i am reading though i think i am going to cut it about 24 inches and use a couple different tops for different grow ops. I am going to put one of the netafim 4 head foggers in the chamber first and see how that works. I might go ahead and install all my misters. just have each with a valve to shut off, so i can run one set at a time.

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i think you should keep it as big as possible to allow the most room. i actually think now that it would be better for me to have 6 nozzels in the chambers but with half the flow as these. the reason being the roots have crawled right up the vertical walls of the smooth sink walls and have attached themselves to the tubing that feeds the misters and have started to close in on the misters. so basically they are starting to attach themselves to the chamber roof now.

id also really suggest you keep the misters so that you can access them from the outside of the tank. i should have circled the tubing around the top of the lid on the outside instead of the inside and then drilled holes to let the nozzels drop thru the lid. the reason being i have had a few nozzels. (5 out of 16) clog. and even though i have the access ports to reach thru to the nozzels to change them, now that the roots are closing in on the nozzels there isnt much space to get to the nozzels to change out if necessary.

of coarse i dont know how big you plan to go with them. this is with 4 week veg.

Atomizer said:

Sounds like ibc`s would make perfect root chambers for trees, 35 cubic feet should be big enough.You probably need 10-12ft ceilings to accomodate them unless you can dig them into the floor

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i was thinking of these as they are only 25 inches tall(180gallon) and would drain completly under the silk screen fake bottoms. id just put them on wheels and insulate them. self supporting sidewalls also. about 20 cubic feet. could still get 6ft tree and 2 ft container so 8 ft ceiling
http://www.polytankco.com/semi-square_tanks.html

They look good, the cone bottom is a nice feature too no doubts they are quite pricey?
I was thinking you may be able to use a large but fairly shallow chamber with pvc tubes pushed through the sides (like some kind of magicians prop that would use swords hehe) and just keep hanging the roots over the tubes as they get longer.
You`d convert the bulk of initial vertical root length into the horizontal plane and still keep it suspended. It would inevitably grow downwards too but at that point it would be covering a large flat area as well. You could pack at least 10ft of drop into a fairly compact expanding horizontal square or circular spiral.

I have ten feet of space if i wasnt using the damn tent,i thought was such a great idea... Anyway the tank is about 36 in so I may try two different sides of the spectrum and cut a 22in chamber and a 14in chamber. I will use the 14in for the tent and i plan on trashing the tent after this last grow and just build my own grow area.
Then i could use the bigger chamber. But with the light hanging down say a foot or so I figure i will have about 8ft. is 24in still too big? If so, I will think of a way like you were talkin about with the pipes stuck all in the chamber. Im not a magician but it sounds like a good idea

I am going to cut the tank at 16 to 18in. I think i will try something similar to atomizers idea with the pvc for the roots to hang over. See what yall think about this... I will cut around 4 / 3in holes on a 3x4 top. The chamber measures 3x4 also... was just going to plant one every foot... Put the 4 holes on one end and as the roots grow use atomizers idea and put pvc or something to hold the roots up and just continue along the side of the chamber as the roots grow and just let them hang down at the other end of the chamber... Sound like it would do ok to yall?

18" seems like a reasonable compromise and it gives you two chambers.
If you need more height you could probably fix a waterproof skirt to the top panel that holds the plants and extend that down into the chamber to prevent any mist escaping. I picture the top panel something like a 4-legged table with a waterproof tablecloth that sits inside your ibc You could make the root support tubes part of the leg framework to add rigidity.

Most of the orginal set ups used in intial federally funded academic research were just plastic tents over agalvanized pipe frame works with a rigid top thrown over that. The top had spaced holes and they would just cut slits in the plastic film where needed. The also though initially believed that the hair root development was a bad thing and that it was a result of under watering. They consider it a bad thing because the thick mass prevented adequate watering of the inner mass of roots leading to root death. They then decided the hair roots were good then decided to just deal with the root die off in the roots mass center and in the drainage water through continual use of low chlorine concentrations.

I hope that minimal watering, drain matting, and drain to waste along with deep chambers will allow for very large hair root masses with minimal chlorine use. I however have no qualms about low level residual chlorine usage. After all it would be at levels below the residual levels that are used in U.S. tap water drank by millions of people daily. There have been no plant tissue tests that have shown chloride accumalation in plant tissue form chlorine use and it is used my many thousand of commercial green house growers on a continual basis from rooting to harvest. The reagents for testing water chorine levels total and residual are only about 20 cents so monitroing levels would be cheap enough.

One thing that has surprised ne is in the research documents there is a fairly regular mentioning of the advantages of adequate venting of the chamber. Also a lot of talk about nozzles (both high pressure and air atomizing) made of polymers that greatly decreased the clogging issues.

One of the good things about the retailed units seemed to be the use of externally installed nozzles. With my chambers actually filling the areas confines that only allows nozzles being inserted from one side. As I plan on a solenoid with in inches of the nozzle due to gravity feed I am considering a few acryclic plastic boxes installed along the other outter walls on the inside of the chamber that extend to the top. They will have there own covers. These will be plumbed with a nutrient fed solenoid and air line so that nozzles can be a simply plug in affair. I assume nozzle clogging will be an issue so I expect to rotate nozzles on a two week basis need it or not. Means keeping a full extra set of nozzles and adapters, but considering the products value that does bnot seem unreasonable.

Time will tell. In the mean time half of my nozzles and none of my adapters have shown up yet.

Atomizer said:

18" seems like a reasonable compromise and it gives you two chambers.
If you need more height you could probably fix a waterproof skirt to the top panel that holds the plants and extend that down into the chamber to prevent any mist escaping. I picture the top panel something like a 4-legged table with a waterproof tablecloth that sits inside your ibc You could make the root support tubes part of the leg framework to add rigidity.

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I was actually thinking of something similar, but instead the leg and framework be on the outside. The reason being is bc i was going to incorporate some foam insulation and needed something to hold it. But who knows what itll end up looking like when i am finished

travish413 said:

I was actually thinking of something similar, but instead the leg and framework be on the outside. The reason being is bc i was going to incorporate some foam insulation and needed something to hold it. But who knows what itll end up looking like when i am finished

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You can put the frame work on the outside put at lest the bottom of the tent materila should hang inside the chamber so that the nutrient solution is contained. I have always been amazed that the grow tent manafactures do not sell thir tents wiy th a layer of insulation between the outter black layer and an inner white layer. Even an inch of fiberglass insulation would make a huge difference. What would it take, maybe attaching the inner to outter layer of covering once every 6 inchs or so. It would increses the shipping box size quite a bit though.

New toys!!!! My adapters finally arrived along with the smaller nozzles. Well machined, even the adapters. Definitely industrial weight. Looks like they are made heavy enough to be worked on by heavy equipment mechanics or apes. Weight of 93 grams for just one 2 inch long adapter.

here is some pics of HP aero roots for you guys. as you can see they are closing in on the misters. you dont get roots like this with LP aero.

Very nice roots, TF
They are a far cry from the usual half drowned, straggly looking roots normally associated with "aero"
As nice as they are i`m sure you`ve only tapped a very small percentage of the potential performance..its almost a frightening thought

About how many weeks did take to reach that root ball volume? And this is also considering the root development has gone through ups and downs as you have tested for best spray times etc? And no special DO enhancment or great efforts at temp control etc? And using low EC nutrient water?

Them small micro droplets sprayed intermittant are not likey going to be out performed by any other type of system anty time soon, if ever. That seems obvious.

Another thing that stands out is the quantity of nutes. It may be somewhere around 1.8L (0.5 gallon) a day per chamber judging by TF`s current cycle timings. Thrifty in all departments except growth rate.

Atomizer said:

Another thing that stands out is the quantity of nutes. It may be somewhere around 1.8L (0.5 gallon) a day per chamber judging by TF`s current cycle timings. Thrifty in all departments except growth rate.

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How much does he thinks goes to drain i.e. how much does he thinks the roots are taking up. What is the ph and EC of the presently used nutes.

Humidity, temp etc. GIVE ME, GIVE ME. I love food. I am an emperical data hog.

fatman7574 said:

About how many weeks did take to reach that root ball volume? And this is also considering the root development has gone through ups and downs as you have tested for best spray times etc? And no special DO enhancment or great efforts at temp control etc? And using low EC nutrient water?

Them small micro droplets sprayed intermittant are not likey going to be out performed by any other type of system anty time soon, if ever. That seems obvious.

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well fatman that is 4 weeks veg 4 weeks flower but im going to show you a picture of what the first 4 weeks of veg and 2 weeksof flower looked like. now im not proud of this pic but i want peeps to learn so they dont have to go thru the same trail and error. i was using 2 sec 2min,2 sec 4min, 2 sec 6min for most of the 4 week veg and 2 week flower and you can see from the pic the roots were shit. the tremendous fluffy root explosion only started when i went to 2 sec 10 min and now im at 2 sec 10 min for 9 hrs of light cycle and then 2 sec 15 min for the last 2 hrs light cycle then the lights off cycle is 2 sec 30 minutes.

.5 conversion ppm is 600 going in and runoff is coming out around 300ppm. there is only about 1/2 to 3/4 gallon runoff during lights off cycle but during lights on cycle it usually is around 1- 1.25 gallon. ive been using the Lucas formula but am not happy with it as i feel its not giving quite the right ratios for DTW. im not sure what is not quite right with the ratios but i know there not right on. im still trying to figure the correct levels for EC and ph that work best. Even though i have had many ups and downs trying to figure this out the ladies are still doing quite well and i expect they will finish well also.

90 percent of the browning has went away. the only browning that remains is on the roots that are on the very chamber floor. thus my recommendation to keep all the roots off the runoff. which i will do when i run the system again but that might not be for awhile.