New set up NEED help

So this would be my second attempt in about a month to try and get my set up going. I was able to sterilize my whole system, but I've hit the same problem I did before with problems with the stems turning purple and obvious deficiencies. The temp ranges from 71 degrees to 80 throughout the day. The res temps range from 68 to 71 degrees. I try to keep the PH range from 5.5 to 6.0. All four are clones and I was unlucky to pick up one with root rot problems to begin with. To begin with to fix that problem I put 60 ml of 3% h202 in the 4 gallon res starting today and will add 15 ml every day until the next nute change. To try and fix the ones that seemed to have a phosphorous deficiency I flushed the system and added a slightly stronger nute regiment for the new batch. For the one that seems to have some manganese deficiency I cleaned out the res and added more nutes for the fresh batch.

400 watt hps/mh light
AC unit
4 5 gallon dwc bucket
GH nutes florabloom, floramicro, floragrow
Root Excelorator (drop per gallon)
Super Thrive (drop per gallon)
4 inch air stone
*note: one had purple genetics

As far as I know I feel that I may be going in the right direction, but any advice that could help improve this set up would be greatly appreciated.

Also my PPM for all my plants are around 600 with no signs of nute burn

1 drop of super thrive per gallon. Not sure how much you have used, this can kill plants in excess. Also lots of air is good not sure on size of your air pump. GH is a good mix but can get confusing for first grows. Try Supernatural aqua grow. easy to use, PH stable and works great. I am not knocking GH, but save it until you get a better handle on your grows. Also is your PH meter calibrated? Whats your orig ppm of h20. As far as root rot, I use bleach daily, and its and works better (IMO) than H2O2. Not to many variables to change, seems like you are doing things right. Root rot will cause PH swings (up or down depending on offender) and will also cause nute deficiencies...

sbirch said:

1 drop of super thrive per gallon. Not sure how much you have used, this can kill plants in excess. Also lots of air is good not sure on size of your air pump. GH is a good mix but can get confusing for first grows. Try Supernatural aqua grow. easy to use, PH stable and works great. I am not knocking GH, but save it until you get a better handle on your grows. Also is your PH meter calibrated? Whats your orig ppm of h20. As far as root rot, I use bleach daily, and its and works better (IMO) than H2O2. Not to many variables to change, seems like you are doing things right. Root rot will cause PH swings (up or down depending on offender) and will also cause nute deficiencies...

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Yup I'm at one drop per gallon. My PPM for reg water is around 130-140. I got 2 3 watt 2 outlet activeaqua air pump, so one line per 5 gallon bucket.(2 pumps in total) Outputs at 7.8l/Min, pressures >3.768 psi. As for measuring the PH, I understand getting a meter works best for DWC, but I'm short on cash so all I can use atm is the liquid PH tester from GH. Same goes for the nutes, but i'll check them out.

PH strips can be more accurate than cheap meters so save your funds and get something better when you can...Sounds like everything is ok though. Maybe wait to see if the phos and H202 turn things around for you?

That's about where I thought I'd be standing now. thanks for your two cents. I'll post some pics in a couple days to get a second opinion from yall on how they're doing.

WAY too much super thrive for young plants!!! I use 1 - 2 drop per 12 gallons of water...

You said a 3 watt 2 outlet air pump and ure splitting that between two 5 gal buckets. That is no where close to enough air. As a general rule u need at least 1 watt per gallon of water. U got at least.12 gal in there minimum probably more and ure only pushin 6 watts. Of course more is better. Also h2o2 is good for cleaning and Sterilizing after u see root rot but to get rid of it go to the first sticky under dwc/bubbleponics how to cure slime its heisenberg's tea and its the best thing for u. Also dont use bleach u are smoking this stuff remember.

Imo I would also get rid of super thrive and the root stuff because nobody knows what's in super thrive its actually illegal in a couple states because of that and nothing organic should b in your res. It can cause root rot

This last part might just be me and my strain, not sure if yours can handle it, but i use gh also and if u follow their chart at 15-10-5 for veg. That is grow-micro-bloom and those numbers are ml per one gallon i get a ppm of close to 1000 on a .5 conversion, thats an EC of 2
and i have not had a problem throwing fresh rooted clones in a bucket with that amount of nutes. Now that i think about it if your ppm of 600 is on a .7 conversion that is for sure too low and why u have a deficiency problem.

Definetly raise it to an EC of 2 maybe 1.5 to be safe. That is 1050 ppm at A .7 or 750 ppm at a .5 conversion. Those are an ec of 1.5 so dont b afraid of slowly going higher than that and checking for burns. Check your ppm tester u have to know what u got and understand these numbers. When i flip to flower i addback with the lucas formula thats 0-8-16, cut out the grow and raise ppm. Last thing, ALWAYS add the micro first.

Good luck cuz hope i been helpful to u. Make sure u read on the tea if anything heisenberg can teach u ALOT about the Algae bastard slime suffocating your roots

When ppm is mentioned in threads, which conversion rate is usually used?

So just to give you guys an update 2 of the plants are showing nice new growth, while the other two are still lacking. I seem to have found the sweet spot for ppm for 3 of them. The only problem I'm having is with the last one, the right ppm is difficult to find. What I'm clueless on is why one out of the three that have the perfect nute ppm isn't growing in height. I do see some new growth, but not much. Ill upload pics tomorrow when I have time.

Thanks for the advice about the pumps frosty, I'll get on that when i get the money

iFreeSki420 said:

When ppm is mentioned in threads, which conversion rate is usually used?

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Depends on the person's ppm meter it goes by .5 or .7, mine does both

update- killed off golden goat because it wouldn't take nutes in the slightest had it at 40 ppm of nutes and no luck. drank a jank load of water and nothing else

Was the 1 u killed the one u got with root rot? If it is then thats your answer to why it wouldnt take in nutes and grow.

It's been a bit since I put up some pics so here they are. They're all showing nice new green growth. Moby Dicks at 270 ppm, The purps and Bubba kush are at 330 ppm.(at the .5 scale and not counting the water ppm of about 140) Each took well to topping and have grown a good bit in height. Interestingly enough the purps top turned into 3 tops , buuutt it is still growing the slowest compared to the others. I've been using the Lucas formula recently and it has done my grow a lot of good. Any tips, advice, or comments are always appreciated.

Frosty is spot on with the air pumps. I too think your not running enough air. The more dissolved oxygen in the water will increase nutrient uptake. You can change the res all you want but with out the proper oxygen you'll get slower growth and will be prone deficiencies. If you can't afford a more powerful pump, try dropping the water levels to expose some roots to air.