...a container on it's own is not enough to increase yields. You need to veg longer to fill the space.
Totally agree.
When I bought my gear initially for growing I decided to use a camping cooler for my res after reading BloomerBoomer57's posts on the subject.
However, after deciding on a 15-gallon/60-liter res to grow out 2 clones, I now realise I could have actually gone for a smaller res than that if I really wanted to.
Reason being is that I grow Scrog and I don't veg that long due to my screen above the plants being set at 10" above the res so that means about
4 weeks in the cloner and 3 weeks of veg before swithcing to 12/12 lighting for my current strain.
My roots on last grow and this grow are nowhere near filling up my 15-gallon res, although I know the res size defintely contributes to maintaning more stable res temps and pH levels, so for that reason alone I'll stick with the 15-gal res for now.
Next grow though I might put 3-plants under the screen for my space instead of just 2-plants, as my screen still has a few gaps after training plant stems for the first 2-weeks of 12/12 that perhaps 3 plants might have filled.
So the advantages of a larger bucket/barrel/cooler over a smaller res are:
- res nute solution temps stay lower for longer
- pH is more stable
- more scope to change grow style to add more plants if you want (e.g. try SoG instead of Scrog, etc.) - especially if you have cabinet height to play with.
As with a lot of things in life, it is better to have too much res space than not enough.