Transitioning from soil to hydro

I"ve been growing in soil for 4 years now never had any real issues other then a random herm here and there. Id really like to switch up to hydro maybe dwc set up. Is dwc the same as a flood and drain technique ? What are my pros/cons in hydro to soil?

More yeild ?
Less stress?
Faster nut intake ?
More efficient?

I do feel confident with my grow skill to partake this on but i would really like any other input.
Ill be running 3 1000w, roughly 15-20 plants, big bud(fem) from sensi seed, 1 month veg/ 2 months flower.

p.s. Ive been growing under 600w hps and can pull close to a lb per lamp which i was told is pretty good.
Should i expect to meet a 1.5 to 2lb return on a 1000w lamp?
How likely is it to get the full gram per watt on 1000's?

Thanks for any info or tell me i said something wrong anything will help

I ain't no expert, but here's is what I did. I grew outside for almost thirty years, and then the kids moved out and thought okay now is a good time to try indoors. So I grew four cycles with soil, and did pretty good. But I had always wanted to try hydro so I started a dwc bucket and it did pretty good, next I built a rdwc and then I couldn't afford a chiller so I disabled the system and went back to soil.

The point is if you have the whole system you'll probably be able to do great. But if you don't have the whole thing don't even try. I have a small fortune tied up in RO, pumps, res, buckets, hoses, fittings . But I do run the one bucket with a small air pump and it produces well .

Thank you very much for that!! I'll look into more about dwc and rdwc setups see it's even in my price range THank you again! If i can afford it then that would be awesome and ill mos def follow up with a journal.

I looked into the rdwc I probably wont do that just because of the extra parts needed and I guess its more susceptible to disease? I glanced over a few other articles and some comments mentioned that I dont know if you have to be doing something complete wrong or maybe you're chiller breaks and you have warm water. I guess is more sustainable for bacteria or whatever but it didnt sounds good to me.

sybn said:

I looked into the rdwc I probably wont do that just because of the extra parts needed and I guess its more susceptible to disease? I glanced over a few other articles and some comments mentioned that I dont know if you have to be doing something complete wrong or maybe you're chiller breaks and you have warm water. I guess is more sustainable for bacteria or whatever but it didnt sounds good to me.

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Yeah I thought you might want to check it out,bc it can be really productive, but really unforgiving. My single bucket works but I actually use two buckets one has the plant in it, the other has my water and nutes conditioning, and I swap buckets once a week, clean the used bucket and start over. Repeat every week.

I switched from coco to NFT and I won't go back to buckets now. Technically their both hydro but NFT is faster with better results

sybn said:

I"ve been growing in soil for 4 years now never had any real issues other then a random herm here and there. Id really like to switch up to hydro maybe dwc set up. Is dwc the same as a flood and drain technique ? What are my pros/cons in hydro to soil?

More yeild ?
Less stress?
Faster nut intake ?
More efficient?

I do feel confident with my grow skill to partake this on but i would really like any other input.
Ill be running 3 1000w, roughly 15-20 plants, big bud(fem) from sensi seed, 1 month veg/ 2 months flower.

p.s. Ive been growing under 600w hps and can pull close to a lb per lamp which i was told is pretty good.
Should i expect to meet a 1.5 to 2lb return on a 1000w lamp?
How likely is it to get the full gram per watt on 1000's?

Thanks for any info or tell me i said something wrong anything will help

Click to expand...

probably not the response you want, but it's a super common mistake to mess with something that's already working, especially with cannabis..
if I were you i'd start small, do 80% of your grow the way you already are successful with (soil) and then tinker with the remaining 20%
that way worse case scenario you have only 20% of your crop disappointing (potentially)
I don't like to have all my eggs in the same basket when I change something

why are you changing it up?

3eyes said:

I switched from coco to NFT and I won't go back to buckets now. Technically their both hydro but NFT is faster with better results

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Ill have to look into nft never heard of it before thanks for the input ^^!

greasemonkeymann said:

probably not the response you want, but it's a super common mistake to mess with something that's already working, especially with cannabis..
if I were you i'd start small, do 80% of your grow the way you already are successful with (soil) and then tinker with the remaining 20%
that way worse case scenario you have only 20% of your crop disappointing (potentially)
I don't like to have all my eggs in the same basket when I change something

why are you changing it up?

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Thats makes complete sense 80/20 ratio just to prevent complete failure and still have a return. Im glad you said that its something to think about. The reason why im changing is I just obtain a new spot to grow so I was gonna have to rebuild my set up or try something new.

f.y.i. This is my first run with 1000's. So hopefully it wont be to much of a environment change I assume a little warmer in the room but i can equate for that.

3eyes said:

I switched from coco to NFT and I won't go back to buckets now. Technically their both hydro but NFT is faster with better results

Click to expand...

How big are you growing them? When I hear nft I'm thinking vertical systems

greasemonkeymann said:

probably not the response you want, but it's a super common mistake to mess with something that's already working, especially with cannabis..
if I were you i'd start small, do 80% of your grow the way you already are successful with (soil) and then tinker with the remaining 20%
that way worse case scenario you have only 20% of your crop disappointing (potentially)
I don't like to have all my eggs in the same basket when I change something

why are you changing it up?

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Gmm you always give solid advice, thanks for being a cool dude.

Bareback said:

Gmm you always give solid advice, thanks for being a cool dude.

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hey man that's cool for you to say, means a lot
i'm glad I can help anyone at all

sybn said:

Thats makes complete sense 80/20 ratio just to prevent complete failure and still have a return. Im glad you said that its something to think about. The reason why im changing is I just obtain a new spot to grow so I was gonna have to rebuild my set up or try something new.

f.y.i. This is my first run with 1000's. So hopefully it wont be to much of a environment change I assume a little warmer in the room but i can equate for that.

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if I may make a recommendation...
out of those three 1000w lamps, put the middle one as a 10k metal halide bulb..
the overlapping spectrums make for some trippy smoke, very visual, and you'll literally see larger trichomes
not to mention it seems to make my grow powder mold free, since I switched one of my bulbs to the 10k, NONE of my plants get PM anymore
just run it with an open reflector, and have the exhaust blow OUT through the bulb into the room
I grow in a redwood rainforest, and always had PM in some sort, but none since I changed
it's purely conjecture, but the theory behind it is based in science, that bulb does crank out the UV, and UV (uv-c in specific) is used to sterilize many, many things, hospitals, meat cutting utensils, coral reef tanks..
the bulb is maybe 80 bucks, and i'm confident you'd like the results

-edit-
I forgot to mention that I have a ventilation fan blowing right into the open hood too (for two reasons, one, that MH gets much hotter than a closed hood HPS, and two, I like to swirl the air around it to sorta double the UV exposure

cool2burn said:

How big are you growing them? When I hear nft I'm thinking vertical systems

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I bring them up in just a 4" cube for 3 weeks then put them in the tray vegging for anything up to a week (strain dependant) then 12/12 they finish between 4-5' I also use netting for support

I just had my first Hydro run using a method called" Captain Style " it was super easy, no root rot, pulled over 500g off 1 plant. It works follow the recipe. Btw it was under one 600w hps.

I grew for years and switch to rdwc last year. I wouldn't go back to soil. Just so much easier and much better growth rates. I hardly even tend to my garden now. Maybe spend about 30 mins a week if I'm lucky tending to them and that's just to refill the res

For my first 6 years of growing I ran hydro. Did an ebb and flow flood and drain system. Loved it. Once you set it up, get all of your timers dialed in the only thing you really need to do is change the reservoir and add or subtract feedings. ( and obviously tie, prune or whatever you do to the actual plants). plus side to flood tables are they come in all different sizes to fit different needs. Would always start my clones in 1"X1" rockwool and then transplant into 6"x6" Rockwool. The growth is a lot faster than in soil. Only downside of running the type of system I did was you depend on timers todo your feedings, so if one craps out on you and goes overlooked for a couple of days it could turn bad, but if your garden is close then shouldn't be a problem. I can't speak on side by side yield hydro compared to soil. Best way to see if something works is to experiment is all. Good luck to you.

GrowinRIte said:

For my first 6 years of growing I ran hydro. Did an ebb and flow flood and drain system. Loved it. Once you set it up, get all of your timers dialed in the only thing you really need to do is change the reservoir and add or subtract feedings. ( and obviously tie, prune or whatever you do to the actual plants). plus side to flood tables are they come in all different sizes to fit different needs. Would always start my clones in 1"X1" rockwool and then transplant into 6"x6" Rockwool. The growth is a lot faster than in soil. Only downside of running the type of system I did was you depend on timers todo your feedings, so if one craps out on you and goes overlooked for a couple of days it could turn bad, but if your garden is close then shouldn't be a problem. I can't speak on side by side yield hydro compared to soil. Best way to see if something works is to experiment is all. Good luck to you.

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I've done a side by side about 8 years ago. Got more/ looked better in hydro, tasted better in soil, same strain. Seems to be the norm

SimonBarSinister said:

I've done a side by side about 8 years ago. Got more/ looked better in hydro, tasted better in soil, same strain. Seems to be the norm

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This has been my experience as well. Larger plants, growth and yields with hydro and less fuss once you get all the automation dialed in. I spend less than 10 min a day in my rooms, and 5 of that is just looking. Soil may give smaller yields than hydro, but I will agree that the flavor profiles come off better in organic soil grows.

Thank you everyone for the info!! All of this helped so much i have some knowledge saved up in my memory bank now
I been looking a lot into bigger yields mainly from veg. time and lights I was wondering with say a 80-90 day flowering time plant is veg for 2 months and flower for 1 month will this give me a bigger/properly mature end result or is it plant specific genetics saying it has to flower for 80-90 days?