That’s looking good! Now the veg space is a bit more manageable
Thanks!
Totally. And I saved those beans for 'ya not wanting anything back, it’s your pollen!
Wow. That’s a micro-size reveg. Nice work! I really enjoyed the 907 Blue Genes, been thinking about getting some new beans just to save.
Thanks! That ease of manageability was already ending this morning. Did quite a bit of topping today
So I made my micro flood/drain for the veg side. It’s two extra-heavy-duty propagation trays, some silicone hose and a $10 pump from Amazonia. It holds about 1.75 gallons dangerously full. I made some custom aluminum supports for the upper tray that give it about 1/4" slant over the length of the tray.
The silicone hose made it easy. Drill too small, jam the hose in and self-seal. There’s a drain/overflow and about 6 small holes I used to balance the flood/drain times. Shorter drain time, more holes but means longer fill time. It’s about 10 minutes for each now. I set it up in the kitchen and did my drill “tuning” to make it easier once I filled with nute juice.
Just because I’m sure someone is wondering whether I laid this directly on the floor or not: There’s a reflectix mat below the heater mat, with the catch basin above it. So, no, it’s not straight on the floor. “Gently heated”
The girls were back at it with the vegetative growth already. They’re down to 18hrs a day as I attempt to slow their roll.
Pre-prune:
Did quite a bit of topping and some fan leaf removal to improve penetration. Readjusted PAR for about 400 in the canopy.
Things looking good now that I’m done for the day.
My “reservoir” tray is filled with about 1.7 gallons Megacrop 2-part (3g of each per gallon). pH 5.8, EC 1.9
I’ve been hand watering about a liter a day, so I expect this to go 2-3 days without refills. It takes about a gallon to flood the top table. I’ll check the reservoir everyday and keep the EC/pH consistent. Good practice for flower time.
Now, for clarity, because I’m a hydro newb giving this thing full gas and trying to learn along the way. I assume best practice is maybe totally dump the system every few weeks, flush the rockwool, rinse the system out and start new. Keep the nasties from growing. I’m going to be depleting the reservoir pretty quickly. Is my approach of keeping tabs on pH (nominally hovering around 6) and EC correct? EC a little low I add some nutes, EC a little high I add water, pH adjust as necessary. That about it?
That’s about it yep.
Indeed they seem to have catch up quickly. They sometimes jump a lot after being shaved.
Nice lil’ addition to the setup. Soon this will be on autopilot
Thanks @funkyfunk and @Turpman
I smoked some 907 yesterday. Mmmm. That’s some incredible-smelling weed. It smells like the boiling blueberry/sugar mixture to put into a pie. I regret nothing with my mom selection for the crosses that are running now. Weird leaf mutations are fine as long as they bring this heat. It feels like a warm fleece-lined blanket for my mind.
Update: Nothing really. Random ramblings being recorded for my own clarity.
Watching pH twice daily in my micro-res. 5.94 this AM, it’ll feed when I’m at work in a few hours. When I check it twice a day, the fluctuations really seem minor to neglibible. I’ve come up with an easy system to encourage this monitoring, although the temptation to outfit my tent with continuous monitoring is very real.
I’m thinking about designing an ESP32 WiFi dual-channel pH/EC monitor. I’d just have them built for me rather than bare boards. I enjoyed this (having boards fabricated and assembled overseas) so much with the lights I may do something people would actually want because they won’t have to build it. A few switched output channels with relays for heatmats/dispenser pumps. It looks like the populated control boards would only run $20 or so based on my preliminary poking around yesterday. For whatever reason this is much more easily justified in my mind than just buying some Bluelab or Hanna monitors. Good probes range $50-$200 each for pH, EC can get away with less.
The cuts are in varied states of minor unrest. They’re all green, but some a little sideways. Today was the first time I’ve taken the tray out to check moisture levels so added a little nute water to the plugs and a spray of distilled before the cover went back on. 4 days down. Some of them are all perky like they are already starting to pop some little root nubs but nothing visible on the exterior of the plugs. I’ve managed to LITFA pretty successfully here. I thought I took a pic but I don’t have one.
I’ve been thinking about making stock solution with the MegaCrop to make mixing nutes a bit easier - I have accurate pippetes for small amounts. I’m thinking 200g to a L of solution, or 5mL = 1g of nute. I know for the Calcium Nitrate that is about half the solubility limit, but not sure for the Part A whether it’s too much or not. For my 8.5 gallon flower reservoir the recommended dosage is 32.3g A, 27.2g B. That would equate to 162mL and 136mL. I have a 250mL graduated cylinder indicated in 2mL increments. Seems reasonable to do that. Any reason not to?
Anyway, enough rambling. Here’s a pic of the tent today.
As always, appreciate any input.
Stock solutions work well.
Add your weight of powder first then top up to required volume.
I was doing it the other way and you end up with slightly different volumes.
I really need to get building with an arduino.
I’d like to automate my 2 rooms RH and temp better with day and night changes.
I use an air to air heat exchanger, dehu., and direct air return from out to in. It’s partially automated to not use the air to air when the room is cool, using the dehu. to add some heat. And I only use fresh air in summer when I don’t need the air to air. Bit to totally automate would be nice.
Would be nice to measure all variables and use the most cost efficient way.
Pretty much have all the parts. The programming is holding me up.
What are you going to use for your ppm PH control?
Absolutely weigh out the dry ingredients first. Add water to make desired volume.
Arduino is convenient in ways but difficult to add complexity to. I regret using an Arduino rather than a Raspberry Pi for my drying cabinet. The only reason I’m entertaining an ESP32 is that I can program it like an Arduino, connect it via WiFi, and display readings on my phone.
What programming experience do you have?
At this point I doubt I would automate control but it would be nice to know when it requires attention. I’d add some switched outputs just to permit connecting pumps or heaters if I wanted to down the road.
For environmental control the Controller 69 Pro is doing really well. I like the app interface and programming flexibility.
Programming verry little. Basically look for a shared program that I can use/modify.
So far I have a temp /RH sensor hooked up and a display up and running.
Luckily most of what in am doing is basically an on-off signal to relays just need 2 more pairs of sensors. And much mor programming. My son is taking computer science so I’m hoping he will give me a hand when it comes time. May make on for the greenhouse to control vent out/fan/Vent in and DEP eventually.
Fun stuff.
Nice bud picture, funny to see some french with it Is that outdoor?
What temp/RH sensor is that? Finding a good one enough is what blocks me in my rpi project.
I like the https://www.dfrobot.com/product-2014.html humidity/temp sensor for my dry/cure cabinet. Precise and fast.
I think the hardest part is setting up a user interface if you want to change parameters without a computer. Portions of my dry cabinet code could be helpful for you. I made a repository with Arduino code, schematic, and PCB layout. May be a good starting point, and if you ever need help with your project I’m happy to lend some eyes to help
Thanks! LOL I was wondering if you or fuel would say something about it. That’s the outdoor mother of the seeds I selectively pollinated last summer. Really enjoyable smoke to me, hence the continuation of her genetics now. Let’s hope her daughters are also fantastic smokes
Thanks I’ll look at it!
Was hard to overlook
Well, good idea to reproduce it, buds are nice and are well grown, congrats.
Hey @FieldEffect did you buy that extender for your clone dome? I could use one of those.
It’s this setup which came with the extender pieces:
@Turpman Do you know about Mycodo?
Nope what is it?
Hey buddy you might be interested in this project:
With your level of detail and technical knowledge I bet @firehead would consider you for a free beta system
Interesting stuff @Dirt_Wizard and @Nitt. I’ll take a better look at these systems this weekend.
Garden Updates
Cuts are doing well, still practicing LITFA and not really doing anything other than peeking in here and there to check plugs are still moist.
My mother tray is doing well, although I noticed in this morning’s pre-flood EC/pH check that we were at 2.6EC and 6.2pH. Yesterday I had added 0.5mL pH up to equalize pH at 6.0. This morning I topped up with RO water to reduce EC and 0.25mL pH down, pretty much exactly on target now EC 1.85ms, pH 5.8.
Yesterday I listened to this podcast that @Nitt was kind enough to push my direction:
There’s quite a discussion about pH and it’s relationship to micronutrient excess/deficiencies. Mn toxicity in the case of low pH and Fe deficiency in the case of high pH. Bugbee running 6.5 pH. Interesting. For the moment I plod the known course of pH 5.8-6.2. Going to do more study on this topic. He also mentions how low P content they have been running without deleterious effect. Also a nice discussion of EC/PPFD/CO2/temperature/water efficiency and the fundamental relationships involved.
Cheers everyone, have a great weekend!
YUM!
Looks and sounds fantastic!
Happy weekend…
We the Growers is excellent!