Yeah, if the air is bubbling through water, that will help a lot I think. Or that humidifier gizmo - or both
Hmmmm. I wonder how expensive one of those oxygen machines is? Small amounts of humidified O2 would be even better?
Yeah, once you get the flow rate lowered down, the water can end up sitting in the accumulator a loooong time. My ā5 gallonā tank only holds around 3.7 gallons, but at my current flow rate, that will last about a week before its empty. Way more than long enough to negate any chilling in the rez. It might be more efficient to just chill the accumulator tank? On the other hand, you do still need to keep the rez cool or it can grow nasties before they ever get to the system, so maybe you need to do both?
Im lucky - my room temps are almost always below 70, so my rez, and everything outside the tent, stays at a reasonable temp.
You have a much more difficult situation to deal with that I do.
Oh those things are nasty expensive, like $3k. Iāll stick with the air pump haha.
Another good point. Since I have a separate loop for the cooling system already thereās nothing stopping me from running a copper line around the tank. I hadnāt thought about that, but I really think thatād work.
The small room here stays whatever temp I want really. Since weāre so far north it only really gets hotter in there during the late summer. Right now Iām actually heating the room to even keep it above 60. The root zone temp problems were during the summer, though, so I should prepare for that eventuality.
How much trouble would it be to partition off, or enclose a section of the room to separate the plants from the equipment? The lights should keep the āplant sectionā warm enough when the lights are ON, and the rez, accumulator, etc, could stay at a cooler, safer temp?
There are very different issues from summer to winter here. During the summer there are few days of 80+ outside but thereās always high humidity, the air system in the room does a good job keeping that in check though.
In winter it is extremely cold and even a fully insulated room like mine cannot be heated w/ LEDs alone (even with the drivers attached). I also donāt heat the garage the room is located in ā so having any water out there would lead to all sorts of problems.
I do have the cooler setup so in the winter it is located in the room to help offset heat costs, but it is relocated outside the room during summer. I wonāt really have a heat problem for a few more runs though ā well into summer.
I think this run will be a whole other set of challenges due to the season change, but I have enough runs under my belt here now to know about what to expect. I just want to ensure I keep the roots in the proper range this time around, not too hot and not too cold.
I have another ideaā¦ how about using the glycol chiller to chill a tub of working fluid to your ideal temperature, then run a heat exchanger, as simple as a stainless coil, on the high pressure side right before the nozzles? Like a poor manās beer keg chiller - an ice box with 30ā of line in it.
That way, your HP output to nozzles would be very damn close to the setpoint on your glycol system, and with such low flow rates and long-ish off-times, the solution would have the time to come to temp.
Great thought. I need to lay everything out so I can get a high-level view, but it might be possible to use the waterfall PVC feed line as a cooling loop as well. Itās already feeding every grow bed and the water moves a lot faster through that from the res, and itās the right temp. Maybe something as simple as running the HPA lines along that and wrapping them both in pipe insulation will help keep the HPA spray cool enough after the accumulator.
Hopefully later today I can get back out there and start seeing what goes where again. Iāve got a 5 year old in the house for the next 2 weeks so itās been a bit tough to get out there lately and get work done.
I am finally back and starting to feel like myself again. Iām buried with some work projects prepping for the holiday shopping season, but I am planning on getting the room together in the coming week or two.
While I was downstate I ran across a brand new Hydro store in Detroit. Amazing shop, like a candy store for growers. With that I picked up a few items even cheaper than I could get on Amazon.
I already have an ActiveAqua chiller but now weāre headed into winter and our well water comes out of the RO system at about 40 degrees. Now that weāre auto-topping the res via the RO system and a float valve I wanted to ensure that the water temps were stable during the coldest months, so I went ahead and picked up a heater to sit alongside the chiller. This will keep the water in the exact range I am looking for.
I also finally gave in and picked up the Bluelab Guardian Connect. I am a data-whore and I hated manually having to go out into the room to take measurements. This also lets me build more automation around things which will be even more important as we move this system into the larger rooms.
I also picked up some short sections of 1/4" SS straight pipe. Everything from the solenoids to the nozzle tees will be SS, so no more hose flexing this time around.
Right now Iām waiting on someone to come out and fix a problem with the house water system before I can continue. I am only getting 20-30psi from my home accumulator (bad pressure switch). With that low of pressure I canāt run the RO w/o a booster pump, so Iām at a standstill until that gets corrected.
Almost every other piece of the new setup has arrived now. I just need to build a new enclosure for the two reservoirs and chiller then plumb up the SS cooling loop ā then we can finally move into the room. Still need to add a new light rail on the ceiling and setup the valves so we can auto-drain the system, but itāll all move quick once I really start going.
The room is now fully disassembled and everything is soaking in a strong bath of cleaning solution. I have the new reservoir placement all mocked up so I am ready to begin building the new workbench in the garage that will house and hide the entire water system. Moving the res outside of the room allows me to relocate the chiller (which was heating the room) and also keep the large volume of water away from the light and heat of the room. I also can then monitor and change water w/o opening the room ā so nighttime res changes are possible once again.
I have a few more parts incoming that will finalize my heating/cooling loop. This took a bit longer to find exactly what I was looking for ā but I believe I have what I want now. Taking a cue from the home-brewers I found this gem.
I was worried about just dropping the SS coil into the tank, especially since the loop I bought before was 10" in diameter and the inlet to the tank is only 5". With this I can install a 4" tri-clamp fitting to securely mount the coil to the res, keeping it sealed from dust/debris while also holding it tightly in place.
Unfortunately the biggest issue Iāve had in getting restarted this time around has been other people. Iāve been waiting more than a few weeks now on a contractor to come over and complete some work in the room. Heās going to run all new electrical so I can eliminate some extension cords, but those could wait if needed. Really I am waiting on him to replace the old water heater thatās taking up so much space with a small new on-demand unit. (Iād do this myself, but I am not messing with LP lines.) And lastly he is replacing the pressure switch on the house to fix a problem Iāve been having, then tapping into the water in the room and installing the RO system. This is the problem with living in a very, very small town in the middle of nowhere. I have to rely on locals for some of the workā¦
Really hoping that after Thankgiving I can light a fire under their asses and get this knocked out. Iām dying to restart this monster!
I am planning on it, yes. Last time as soon as the system was tested I had clones dropped on me, but this time around Iām taking it much slower and making sure I get everything exactly where I want it before I start the run. Iām going to resist all of the external pressures and make sure I can fully test everything before starting.
Yeah small-town BS sucks for sure. Got into it with the guy last night at the bar, so looks like Iāll just take the hit and find someone else who can actually show up to do the jobs. I seriously cannot stand slackersā¦
Every year it seems like the same thing. I spent nearly 6 months prepping for holiday web traffic, making sure the servers were going to be good to go and that our production facility would be able to keep up with demand. We were in a great placeā¦I thought.
Then holidays hit, traffic is up 4x from last year, weāve hired an additional 350 people, moved to 3 shifts running 24/6 (with one day a week for machine maintenance), and weāre keeping up, but itās taking a LOT of my time.
Today we knocked out one of the projects that was holding us back and finally got the water pressure fixed for the entire house.
Come to find out both my pressure switch and bladder tank were bad. Took a bit of work and some changes to old fittings but we finally have a stable 50psi in the entire house.
A few more steps closer to finishing up the rebuild of the room.
Yesterday I laid everything out and then started taking notes of which adapters and fittings I needed. It took quite a bit of digging on the Internet to find everything at a single site where they didnāt cost $8 / fitting and didnāt try and charge me $20 for shipping. In the end I still paid more for shipping than I did for the parts, but this is the cost of living in the middle of nowhere.
Today we hit the local lumber yard and grabbed everything we needed for the combination workbench / reservoir enclosure. We have the main structure set now and all thatās left is adding the T&G to the outside of the reservoir area and hanging the pegboard.
The top of the workbench over the reservoir was built to come off, giving top access to the pump and nutrient/glycol reservoirs. The chiller sits outside the enclosure so itās heat does not affect the system.
We finished up the reservoir enclosure last weekend and today I finally had a chance to get out there and start putting the pieces together. (Donāt mind the messy workbench.) Since these walls are removable I didnāt worry too much about fit and finish ā as long as they keep the light out and shield the reservoirs from the cold of winter and heat of summer Iāll be good.
For the nutrient reservoir I was able to find the perfect chiller coil by tapping into the homebrew beer market. I couldnāt keep it in place on its own, but by using a tri-clamp ferrule and a heavy duty clamp I have a really stable mount. If needed I can silicone the ferrule to the tank but itās already pretty snug in there.
I picked up some insulated tubing and a small, submersible pump that was recommended by the coil manufacturer to make the connection from the res to the coil. The pump keeps the glycol moving slow enough to ensure adequate heat transfer.
When I was cutting the bulkhead fitting into the nutrient tank I somehow went a bit too big. I made up some gaskets and āIām sure it wonāt leakā ā but before I end up in a nightmare of 30+ gallons of nutrients all over my garage I figured I can just increase the bulkhead to 1 1/2" and install a reducer to 1 1/4" then call it a day.
So tomorrow the new bulkhead fitting will be here along with a few more ball valves and unions. Then I should have everything on hand to finish up the PVC connections. Iāll make a whole other post on that ā thereās a whole bunch of crazy things I have planned there to ease my maintenance.
I may have to UN-friend you if thats your idea of a messy work bench! Plus, I just noticed you even have pegboard on the walls!! Fortunately, you have one slightly less than perfect miter joint, so I guess your ok after all
Yessir. I am sure you would be able to find it for a better cost, but I picked this up at Spike Brewing for $22. (Along with most everything else for the cooling loop.)
I also picked up a new temp probe for my Inkbird controller that will be used to power the aquarium heater or the chiller/pump. (I am planning on the glycol pump running constant.)
Haha I had to go w/ the hyper-organized garage. Too many projects to spend 30 minutes looking for a tool every time.
LOL yeah lining things up in a log home is a bitch. I started cutting all the v-channel T&G the same length only to discover the walls I was mating against are NOT perfectly level.
And if you think that is too neat, you should see the crazy chicken coop I built. Talk about over-engineering everything I do, itās a perfect example.
I was able to do a quick nozzle test last night in the room as well. The new Aeromist nozzles are producing some really great mist for me, but it looks like the solenoid I picked to test with went out on me. (Glad I bought all those extras when you had a problem, @anon32470837) The solenoid stuck open for me at pressure so I made a bit of a mess, but I am extremely happy with the spray itself. Should be much easier to dial this in this time around.
More pics today hopefully as I want to really start getting things ready now.
