Yeah your right. My buckets connect to eachother via 1 inch silicon pipes. It’s a commercial system that I modified to suit my needs. To be honest I’m a tight fucker and figure bigger is less likely to break as the internal parts are more substantial and will need replacing less often.
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I do this but in reverse as it helps me to manage running the buckets in a tent with external reservoirs. I have 50L buckets in the tents with an external res. The pump moves water from the res, through a chiller then into the buckets with a top feed for aeration. Then the buckets have a 50mm out take from the top which is at the outlet height of the tent. They gravity feed back into the res with a waterfall. I have aeration heavily in the buckets and decently in the reservoirs too. This setup also keeps a constant level of the nutrient in the buckets covering all the roots all the time. Only the level of the res changes as they use the nutes.
I have used 2000 L/H pumps and am currently using 2200L/H pumps and both seem fine. The temp, EC and pH in the buckets are always identical to the res and I am not sure what else would benefit from larger pumps. Would love to hear if anyone thinks so.
yeah, my top feed system has capacity to run the Hoover Dam Hydroelectric. I was so paranoid about roots blocking the top feed.
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All for the sake of stability. And of course, it’s easier to dial things back with a ball valve than it is to buy a bigger pump and install said pump. Especially if you never thought you’d need a bigger pump so you never installed unions and ball valves for an easy fix/replacement, so you’re cursing the damn thing while blocking the pipe with your big toe. Lmao
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Pardon if I missed something, but how did you manage to do that? What sets the water level, in the control reservoir and the banks?
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So the pump pulls nutes from the res and feeds to the buckets in the tent. The buckets in the tent have a 50mm pipe that comes out the side just below the height of the bottom of net pot so that the nutes gravity feed out the pipe into the 90mm pipe that feeds it out the tent outlet and into the top of the res. That is why i need such large pipes out the buckets. Because the pump is constantly trying to top up the buckets and it is relying on draining from the top which has close to zero pressure because there is literally no head pressure. So it would be very prone to blocking and overflowing without such a large outlet.
So the level of the buckets are constantly draining at the perfect height and the level of the nutes in the res slowly drop as they are used up.
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Maybe, but there’s no harm in extra O2 in the nutes, so I run both a big pump and six airstones (one in each plant, two in rez).
Gravity. With pumps off, the water level will be identical for all the buckets/plants/resv/etc. Whatever the pump youre using to recirculate, you need enough capacity in the return piping to carry the same amount of water (but slower, because it’s fed by gravity only. I have 3" PVC returns.
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Yes that is close to what i have. The only difference is the pipe coming out the side of the bucket is nearly level so that it pours into the res from the top.
Ask Heath where he gets his software. Looks state of the art!
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Hahaha
I use heath Autocad 30 days free trial edition, I am not getting the same results !
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Looks like Staples. Maybe Michael’s. 
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I’m curious to know if your top feed is direct from the pump or did you put a wie after the return on the pump to dial the flow?
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If you mean the top feed into the buckets? I have 15mm flexible lines from the pump that go through a heater/chiller then through a Y and have a 15mm tap at each bucket just before it feeds in. I have the taps slightly restricted at each bucket. I figure that way, if something builds up in one of the pipes and starts to restrict the flow, it will not be able to flow all the volume through the other tap. Instead it will build up pressure and keep flowing through the blocked one or unblock it completely. Rather than just start flowing into the one bucket.
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maybe even better.
- MORE MOVEMENT = MORE BETTER.
- Round buckets = nightmare; Square = Dream.
- 2" or less = Clog risk, 3" or more = JAZZ HANDS.
All the best!
EDIT: @MrWizard , this is what I built and my ONLY complain is the EXTENDED TRIM JAIL FROM HIGH YEILDS! 
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Gary knows his shit!
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Surely he does.
But I don’t understand (and didn’t build it that way) why he has the 3" returns going via other plants. It costs lots of additional bulkhead fittings, and I can’t see why it’s necessary. I used one bulkhead per container, and ran a 3" return with pvc sanitary Ys and 4-way Ys. Works great!
I’ve also found that a 3" netpot makes a good filter between the container and the return. It’s not perfect, but it helps keep adventurous roots mostly out of the PVC. Of course, the PVC is big enough that it isn’t likely to clog.
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less chance of a flood is all i can really think of.
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I like it.
Ok first off love your build and your board with meters and shut offs…I just want to hug you it’s so nice.
Net pot idea I think is good but I haven’t found a need. I have 2 of there big fallponic systems but roots clogging the returns s has been a issue (yet).
As to why he has the returns the way he does it reminds me of the undercurrent hydro systems but I doubt alot of current is being generated.
I did add air stones to the rez of mine. Just to keep the surface tension broken. No still water anywhere any time.
I have ran his system with a straight piece of 3 inch and his caterpillar piece. One let’s the water flow between all sites and allows the water to mix freely the caterpillar let’s you adjust the height of the water to the sites and kinda hold it there.
Curious to see that thing in action.
Can you give any more info on a waterfall setup without airpumps? Rate of flow, heights?
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