Here is a root GIF of the first 9 days sense transplanting this baby to the torture chamber.
Edit: oops the first one was messed up.
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Pretty amazing growth.
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Nope, not the only one. Thanks for spearheading this geekiness
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I am enjoying this so much, I would do it even if no one else gave a crap, but it really helps to know that, so thanks!! 
I may have just found and eliminated another problem with the system. I’ll know in a day or so I think.
I have been worried about the browning and tip die off in the upper part of the roots, just below the net pot. I had thought that it was caused by lack of mist hitting those areas. The top of the chamber gets less mist, and is the first to ‘dry out’ or have the mist disappear as it settles to the bottom. So, it makes sense that those roots will be the driest.
But looking closely at the pics, there were water droplets accumulating at the top. That tells me they were getting more than enough water.
Then I remembered reading somewhere that air leaks in the chamber would cause browning and air pruning of the roots. After looking closely at the pics, I think thats what has been going on. The worst area is right near where I have my access hatch cut into the top. It was a tight fit at first, but the foam has gotten compressed from repeated in/out cycles. I had seen light gaps when taking pics inside the chamber earlier, and I added a cover over the whole thing to block the light, but it is not air tight, so Im sure air was also getting through.
So, I went back and taped over the entire access hatch. I can remove the tape if I need to get in for maintenance. I can still take pics through the access hatch I added to the side of the root chamber. That one is well sealed I think. I also taped over the net pot itself, and the other two holes I had in the top, and taped over all the seams in the white plastic covering, and anywhere else air might be getting in.
Next grow cycle, Im going to have to come up with an access hatch that is both air and light tight, and easy to open.
If that was the problem, I should see good changes in a day or so.
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Good catch. I’m reworking my lids now as well. We’re adding weather stripping along the top of the tubs, we were doing it to ensure no light leaks but it should also be pretty damn airtight when we’re done.
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Just thinking out loud here, but are you sure you want your tubs 100% air tight?
You need some fresh air exchange in the chamber to help aerate the droplets, plus the roots need O2.
Atomizer talked about that at one point. When he was using air tight, rigid foam to build chambers, they needed a way for air to get in and out. He said it was typically the drain pipe, and leaks around the net pot that provided the air exchange, but that those same air leaks around the net pot could cause air pruning of the roots. The air flow being too concentrated, and drying out the roots locally.
He switched to the fabric chambers partly for better air flow that didnt cause air pruning, and partly for the evaporative cooling effect. The fabric pots Im using let air through easily, and you can see light through the fabric. Thats why I had to build a light shield around the chamber from rigid foam. The cooling works so well, I had to put a heater inside to keep the temps up in a good range. I left small openings in the rigid foam light shield so air could get in/out, but made sure they were in places where there was no light - the back of the area under my work bench.
Your tubs would be the equivalent to a soil grow with a solid plastic pot to grow in vrs an air pot or fabric pot. One lets the roots get plenty of O2 and one doesnt.
Might be something to consider.
I thought this was interesting. This is a GIF of the last 48 hours. I was particularly surprised by the amount of length added by some of the single long roots that are heading down. Also of interest, if you look closely at the middle section of the roots, you can see the lateral root hairs really spreading out sideways while new ones pop out on the same root working their way down from the top.
I wish I had a good way to hold the camera in the same exact spot, angle, etc each time I took a pic. That would work so much better for this.
The reason for so many pics over the last two days is Im down to .4 seconds of ON time. I started at 30 seconds OFF, and Im working my way up to longer off times, one second at a time. Im up to 36 seconds of off time and the roots still look good. The brown areas dont seem to be growing any more since I sealed up all the air leaks I could find, so Im going to continue to increase OFF times for a while longer.
At these timing levels, there is still a LOT of mist hanging in the chamber from the middle of the root mass on down when the next pulse hits, so they are in a constant mist environment. That should be good…
The most recent root pic.
Im real curious about what the roots will do once they reach the bottom. Im going to have to do something about my drain to keep it from getting plugged up.
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I have the same problem. I have had to direct the water flow so that it goes in a circle in my tank away from the pumps because I always end up with about 4ft of root in my tank. this is after it went along 3tf of guttering, down 2ft of downpipe and another foot of pipe.
This is two weeks after putting the plant in with 4-inch roots. You can see about a foot of root out of the end of the right hand pipe.
They have 9 more weeks to go…
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Roots are amazing, and they can be a real pain about growing where they are not wanted. Your long roots are growing about the same speed mine are - 6" per day more or less.
Its interesting to me that different parts of the roots can sense whats going on and react differently. In my case, those water droplets collect on the tips of some of them. That seems to make the root think its found a water source, so it keep growing longer, rather than getting fuzzy. The upper parts of the same root, or parts that dont collect those big fat drops, dont have sitting water, just the micro droplets, so they develop the fuzzy hairs instead of getting longer.
Not totally airtight, just the tops to prevent the light leaks and mist from escaping. The drains are all connected and open, and with the secondary/constant flow of water I was hoping that would draw in enough air. I also have large air stones with quite a bit of aeration in the res that was left over from the DWC and if needed I could drop a stone in each grow bed. (Not for bubbles, just for fresh air injection.)
I was thinking about this when I had heat problems in the grow beds and I read through Atomizers thoughts. While some of what he says makes sense, I am not a fan of his “you have to do this” methodology. NASA didn’t use permeable materials in their grow pyramids and plenty of people use the solid 4x4 fence posts with success, so there has to be something there.
Good thought, but for me the benefits of the solid containers outweigh the cons when I compare against fabric, so I will solve each issue as I come across them. 
The long tap root problem is why I started looking into the root trellis idea. The spread of roots once they hit the hydroton in my last dual setup was incredible. But I also had to deal w/ the clay clogging the drain. Next time I’ll have the trellis to help fan things out, plus the material over my drain will prevent any root from getting too big and stretching all the way to the res. Still playing, I want as much root mass in the spray area as possible.
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In my case, a blocked drain wont be a deal breaker. The excess water will just pass around the drain if its plugged up, and through the fabric bottom of the chamber, and still drip into the over flow pan. I wont have any puddles. The problem will be that the TDS monitor probe - inside the drain tubing - wont get enough water to register properly.
Speaking of tubing - I just discovered another interesting thing. When I added the new 200 micron filter, I placed it inside the space that encloses the root chamber. I left extra tubing on both sides of the filter so I could easily pull it out to change the element, flush it etc. I Noticed yesterday that the tubing does a pretty good dance when ever the solenoids fire. That extra motion has to be taking energy away from the water flow, and possibly adding some extra lag into my mist timing. So I decided to do a quick check. I took a short video of the spray and checked it in Movie Maker.
Turns out my 0.4 second timing is actually a full 0.5 seconds of mist coming out of the nozzles. All that excess tubing is adding an extra 0.1 sec to the ON time. I was wondering why the droplets were not getting smaller or fewer after I went down from 0.5 to 0.4.
Im going to have to see if I can take some of that extra out and fasten the tubing down so it cant move as much when the solenoids fire.
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Ah interesting. I noticed the jump in the tubing as well, but never thought about that changing the timing. Most of my tubing is secured down using the c-clamps but not on the top. This will get solved when I migrate to the new nozzles that are hard-mounted on the side of the tub instead of in the lid though, I’ll definitely make sure I secure the tube now though. Good catch.
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From the sounds of things, if your tubing was stiffer it would tighten up your timings and increase pressure at the nozzle, which is where you want it. If you are currently putting in pressure at the bottom end, the temporary expansion of the tubing might lower that to below spec and cause uneven spray patterns…
I had a look back through the thread to see. It was sad watching the plants get less and less healthy 
Am I right in thinking you are using plastic piping to feed your solenoids?
Metal tubing would keep the pressure at the nozzle closer to the pressure feeding it.
Plastic tubing can act a bit like a rubber balloon would but less extreme, you feed pressure in at one end and it expands a bit and then releases the liquid over more time at a lower pressure at the other end. You may find that at the pressure you are using, 0.5 seconds is the fastest the piping will allow the pressure to be released. Either it would not get to the right pressure, or it would take that long to release it.
I don’t know the exact size of it, but something like brake line might be more suitable for your purposes. Can be bent to shape, designed for very high pressure etc.
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@anon32470837 - Do you happen to have a link to the part you used to connect from the tubing to the nozzle? I know it’s a sharkbite -> 10/24 connection, just can’t seem to find those locally so I need to buy online.
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Which nozzles are you using? I posted links to the parts Im using from Aeromist earlier.
Im not using any adapters - I couldnt find any in-stock that went from 1/4" push fit to 10/24 - except for brass ones.
Im just screwing the 10/24 base of the nozzle swivel directly into the 1/4" tubing. You do have to take a couple of extra steps to do this so it will last. If you dont do this, they can get blasted out and it makes a mess
First, I wrap some Teflon plumbers tape around the 10/24 threads, but I dont do it the way you’re supposed to do it. I leave the threads near the tip exposed, and pile up an extra layer or two close to the swivel body. This is sort of a poor mans O-ring kind of thing. I want the base of the swivel to at least try to seal against the end of the tubing. Its added insurance for the next part.
I add these 1/4" hose clamps to the very end of the tubing, lock them down as tight as I can get it, then screw in the nozzles with the teflon tape. The clamp keeps the tubing from expanding when the nozzle threads in.
This technique is working great at up to 120 PSI feeding the nozzles, but Im back down to 100-110 PSI to keep from killing the solenoids.
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You are right about all that. I considered using metal tubing, but it would need to be stainless to be safe, and that pushed the budget just a bit. Im not sure if brake line tubing is stainless or not. It would also need to be the exact same outside diameter as my plastic tubing so it would seal into the push-fit connectors. All of that was enough to make me stick with the plastic.
However, Im using several things in the system to help mitigate those issues you mention - the goal being to create as crisp, and well defined spray cycle as possible. You are quite correct that varying pressures makes for sloppy mist generation. A slow build up, or a slow fall off in pressure will make the droplet sizes vary a lot. The initial burst of droplets and the final part of the cycle will all be larger than they should be if the pressure varies a bunch during the cycle.
First, the tubing, all valves, meters, regulator, etc, are fastened securely every where I can do so. The exception was the new filter. Thats now fixed.
The other main thing is to keep the solenoids as close to the nozzles as possible. That minimizes the run-on spray as the tubing de-presurizes. Im using one solenoid on each nozzle and the nozzles are only about 3" from the solenoid. I had to do that to keep the solenoids outside the root chamber for moisture issues.
The next biggie is using the anti-drip valves (ADV’s) in the nozzles. They are supposed to stay closed until the pressure reaches a certain minimum level, based on the springs used. Then they close down and stop the water flow before the pressure drops to zero. They also prevent the nozzles, and tubing, between the solenoid and nozzle, from draining between ON cycles. That will all make for a much better defined and controlled mist cycle.
Thats the theory anyway. In practice, I think the ADV’s that came with these nozzles are too week. These open at around 25-30 PSI, so Im going to order some stronger ones soon - 70 PSI or so.
Finally, using an accumulator tank, with a pressure reducing valve, keeps the pressure more uniform at the nozzles between cycling of the main pump. The pressure in the accumulator tank can drop from 135 PSI down to 110 PSI but the pressure reducer/regulator lets the nozzles see a constant 100 PSI the whole time. Well, close. The pressure reducer Im using is a little sloppy, but it was the only one that was all plastic and cheap. I set it to about 110 PSI on the gauge, and it drops to 100 when the solenoids kick on. Its close enough I think.
Now that the filter, and tubing are mounted properly, and 3 ft of excess tubing removed, I will have to wait a few hours before I can re-test the spray duration. There is still air trapped in the filter. That air makes for a very sloppy mist cycle. I can tell when there is air in the system because the needle on the pressure gauge moves down from 110 to 100 very very sloooowly. Once it is all purged, the needle responds very crisply.
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hahahaha! Yup. Thats why Ive been calling it the torture chamber instead of root chamber
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@SuperiorBuds almost forgot - you can get those 1/4 nylon hose clamps at most hardware stores, auto parts or a marine store. My local HomeDepot didnt carry any that small, but Ace Hardware did.
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I went ahead and ordered a full set of the Aeromist nozzles as well. I did the spray test w/ the old ones and while I didn’t mind the cone or droplet size, I had one clogged already so I figured I’ve give these a round.
Aha, gotcha. I believe I ended up finding the correct part I wanted, I’m just picking through the options now. Funny thing is I can get 10 cheap tees for ~$10 or I can get 10 better tee’s w/ cheap nozzles for about the same cost. I might have to pick up a few before I find which tees I like the best.
While doing this research I also came across a cool little diagram that made me think of what @MicroDoser was just talking about.
Notice all of the SS parts available here? Hitting their site you can see everything – but it’s quite a bit more expensive for some items. More than anything I’m interested in a possible switch to SS lines so if nothing else this gives me a good idea of parts so I can search out cheaper alternatives.
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I would imagine the mechanical anti-drip would be a bit “sloppy” as the pressure bleeds on the off cycle. One way around this (if it remains an issue and you want crisp cut-off) would be the use of pressure bypass solenoid that reroutes the pressurized fluid back into your reservoir. The solenoid is activated at the point you enter the “off” cycle. But, that may lead to water hammer as a downside.