should I have a layer of hydroton on flood table?

for my flood table I have a sog with 5in pots in hydroton but nothing on table to cover roots. will this cause problems? I've done a few grows and they have been good but it does seem like when the roots start coming out of the pot they don't get as fat as they should be

No it won't cause problems, but it will light prune the roots and plants wont grow to full potential

You can fill table with hydroton, and your roots will grow larger.

However you will hate yourself when it comes time to clean after harvest

Its a lot easier to cover the entire table panda paper and cut out insert holes for the netpots. This works well with netpot bucket insert types that have a wide overhanging lid in a table.

- Jiji