Need Ideas on How to Set Up RDWC

I would like to convert from DWC to RDWC in my one plant system. Reasons: I have only approx. 55 inches of vertical grow space and would like to use a larger res that can be kept out of the grow space. Also I have my light (150w HPS bare bulb) suspended vertically and intend to either FIM or LST to achieve a vertical ScrOG surrounding the light. I am on a fairly tight budget and my hopes of the vert ScrOG are just not realistic if I have to move the plant around to perform res maintenence. I am usually pretty creative and handy but just cannot seem to think of a viable method. Could also have to do with the Ghost Train Haze I'm bong ripping. Shit has me just staring down at these letters. Typing is painfully slow. Anyway... Thanks for reading and if you have an ideas, please share.

buy a couple 1 1/2inch uniseals and a piece of 1 1/2inch pvc or abs and you should be good to go. throw up a pic of your setup.

Unfortunately one of the binding conditions of my being allowed to grow is that I am to take no pictures. My lady is a bit on the paranoid side. The negotiation of my STARTUP alone took a year. This is also the reason for only having one plant and the limited grow space. It is still highly illegal to grow (or posses or smoke or distribute) MJ in my area.

I am just confused on how to return the water from the net bucket to the pump/res without using gravity as both res and bucket would be on floor level. Would this require a pump in both?

When doing a RDWC you need to have the res lower then the rest of the containers so that gravity will cause the water to go into the res easier.

Bummer. Lol. Im having a bit of an idea form. What if I ran line from the pump out the top of the res to the top of the single net bucket; Then ran line from the bottom of said net bucket to bottom of res. Would this create the needed current or would it cause my net bucket to be constantly flooded? I have absolutely no experience with pumping water. The only pumping I've ever done in hydro is air. I am going to attempt to make a diagram of sorts to help illustrate my setup and ideas.

I would just do a RDWC sort of like the flood and Drain tables. easier to do then trying to rig some thing up.

Please forgive my ignorance, but would that be a matter of some sort of hempy pot in a tray with a pump on a timer to flood every so often? Also would the drain/return need to be gravity based as well? Would the tray need to be light-proofed? Again sorry for the 21 questions. I am just very intrigued by this method and would like to find a way to adapt it to my set up. I have done my research (trust me) but just haven't come across anyone using the method on my scale and with only one site. If its not going to be possible I will accept defeat and stick to my regular DWC and limited options/yield. But first I need to make sure I leave no stone unturned.

the idea you hatched a couple of posts up is perfect. its now just deciding on and then sourcing the parts. i prefer pvc and uniseals for my bottom connections and 3/4inch black hot water heater hose for return, but there are many viable options especially if it will just be a plant container and res only.

^ yes. Point is to keep setups simple for many reasons. Also make sure you have a good air pump and air stone(s) in he plant's res.

I will try to expand on that idea then. On Monday I will go to the hardware store and get the connections and pump. Any idea what size pump I should use. I will probably use a 5g bucket as the res, unless I can find something a little bigger. Maybe a storage tote or something. If the res is outside of the grow area, do I still need to worry about light-proofing it? I have some diagrams of my current set up and of what I would like to do with it. The hoses for the RDWC, I have the feed line (in diagram) going up and over the top of the net bucket, and the return going out the bottom of net bucket and along the floor to the res. What would be the suggestions for hose sizes and materials. Also, the feed line: should it be feeding nutes/water directly over the hydroton, or down into the bucket? Thanks so much for the help everyone. I hope to have this set up squared away and have this grow started by Saturday one week from today.

Here's the current setup:


And here's the RDWC concept setup:

you would want the container that the plant is in to be up higher then the res to help with the draning and you want to be running a air stone in the container that the plant is in.

Wow. And everyone told me that RDWC will eliminate airstones. So far I've been told to put airstones in both the res and the net bucket. Also, due to height restrictions, I would only be able to elevate the netbucket 2 inches max. Unless I can find a more shallow container to use for the net bucket.

I wouldn't worry about having an air stone in the res because if you have the right one in the container that the plant is in you shouldn't have any problems. If you run a cool tube for your light then you can have your plant(s) closer to your light with out burning them.

I've been researching cooltubes for quite a while now, and have come to an overwhelming conclusion that they are not worth the trouble at my scale and with my low wattage. If I were to upgrade to 400w (MAYBE even 250w) in this grow space, I would run a cooltube no doubt.