Auto pots, thoughts please.

[Goud S!]

What did you learn lol?? Spill the beans. Basically can you get away with just adding the nutes to it and not messing about too much?? Of I'm to use just a b and bloom would that work well in it??

I actually learned a number of things and if I didn't say it before I will say it again never use A circulating pump 24/7 in your reservoir as it will lead to unwelcome growth and crazy PH swings! I also have crappy private water company supplied water and was forced to get a reverse osmosis filter... I have to say that is one of the best things I have ever done in all of my time growing as my water comes out at 12 or 13 parts per million at the base. If you choose to do that and are unfamiliar be careful ph adjusting your water because there are no buffers in the RO water and a "normal dose" of PH up or down will go a very long way. I got greedy and was running around 775PPM but thanks to the kind folks on this site (after I burned them a little bit) I backed down to about 485. I could go on and on but it's all trial-and-error so good luck keep us posted.

The key things to remember with autopots, from my limited experience: never top water once you've started bottom feeding, and keep the PPM under 550 for the reasons Olderfart mentioned above,
nces will go to the furthest extremes.

 

[terp182]

Top notch advice man. Love it from all you guys. I'm going to run 8 pots with the 100l tank what ppm should I be looking for in that as I don't have a clue about this kind of thing, I'm not going tk have to be too careful coz I'm going to run autos on some clean mineral nutes. So they are obviously going to take more nutes than autos. Any advice on that please.

When using autopots, even with photo plants, stay easy on the nutes. The situation you want to avoid is having to flush your plants. It’s a PITA. They’ll do just great in soil with 500ish PPM, and increasing beyond that will definitely increase the probability of some kind of build up and lockout at the end of the line. You don’t want to flush in flower, trust me. If they’re deficient, they’ll show it. Err on the side of lower nutes, just like salting a dish at dinner - it’s a LOT easier to add a little more than to take too much out. Hardest lesson I learned my first grow in autopots.

 

[Watweed_2009]

When using autopots, even with photo plants, stay easy on the nutes. The situation you want to avoid is having to flush your plants. It’s a PITA. They’ll do just great in soil with 500ish PPM, and increasing beyond that will definitely increase the probability of some kind of build up and lockout at the end of the line. You don’t want to flush in flower, trust me. If they’re deficient, they’ll show it. Err on the side of lower nutes, just like salting a dish at dinner - it’s a LOT easier to add a little more than to take too much out. Hardest lesson I learned my first grow in autopots.

Superb. How do i know how much nutes 500ppm is gonna be when I put it in lol. If you get what I mean.

 

[Watweed_2009]

I actually learned a number of things and if I didn't say it before I will say it again never use A circulating pump 24/7 in your reservoir as it will lead to unwelcome growth and crazy PH swings! I also have crappy private water company supplied water and was forced to get a reverse osmosis filter... I have to say that is one of the best things I have ever done in all of my time growing as my water comes out at 12 or 13 parts per million at the base. If you choose to do that and are unfamiliar be careful ph adjusting your water because there are no buffers in the RO water and a "normal dose" of PH up or down will go a very long way. I got greedy and was running around 775PPM but thanks to the kind folks on this site (after I burned them a little bit) I backed down to about 485. I could go on and on but it's all trial-and-error so good luck keep us posted.

The key things to remember with autopots, from my limited experience: never top water once you've started bottom feeding, and keep the PPM under 550 for the reasons Olderfart mentioned above,
nces will go to the furthest extremes.

Great advice, I'm in the UK and my waters hard. So it's got a lot of minerals in already. I normally ph 6.5 and heat to 23 for my soil hand watering. But I'm using led lights and Im not sure they are man enough, wakyme ones off amazon 90 pound each using four of them 1200watt apparently. On 14 autos I've had some ups and downs but they seem to be leveling off now some are massive some are small lol. But this auto pot buisiness seems the best way to go, how do i know how much feed will come out at 500ppm like when u measure it out or do I have to do a bit then check etc.

 

[Goud S!]

Great advice, I'm in the UK and my waters hard. So it's got a lot of minerals in already. I normally ph 6.5 and heat to 23 for my soil hand watering. But I'm using led lights and Im not sure they are man enough, wakyme ones off amazon 90 pound each using four of them 1200watt apparently. On 14 autos I've had some ups and downs but they seem to be leveling off now some are massive some are small lol. But this auto pot buisiness seems the best way to go, how do i know how much feed will come out at 500ppm like when u measure it out or do I have to do a bit then check etc.

Ok for sure you need at least a TDS Meter. I have a Milwaukee TDS 75? I calibrate it often and do the math for EC...but TDS should suffice. I see you're using a large size rez so mb consider getting a continuous read monitor with an indwelling tank probe. IDK your finances etc...but at the very least a TDS pen and a dependable PH Pen...everyone has their favorite brand so poll out if you don't. I think I'm using a Dr. Meter ph pen.
I have a feed schedule for coco photos that I base off using 1/3 -1/2 strength nutes but again I grabbed the R.O. filter so dialing in nutes is cake!
P.S. make sure you use a good amount of perlite in the soil AND a bottom layer mb 2 inches for good aeration. Cheers!

 

[terp182]

Superb. How do i know how much nutes 500ppm is gonna be when I put it in lol. If you get what I mean.

My method is super simple. I have good water so I just dechlorinate overnight. When the res is low, I’ll turn on the recirc pump, top off with water, with some headroom remaining. Then I’ll add the right amount of drip clean, and start adding the pre-mixed concentrate I have in a quart jar, titrating up to 500 ppm. Just quick spot measurements with the TDS meter will get you there. Then I’ll adjust the pH up to 6.4. Recheck the TDS one more time and if it’s over 550 I’ll dilute a bit more and that’s it. No pre-calculations needed.

 

[Watweed_2009]

My method is super simple. I have good water so I just dechlorinate overnight. When the res is low, I’ll turn on the recirc pump, top off with water, with some headroom remaining. Then I’ll add the right amount of drip clean, and start adding the pre-mixed concentrate I have in a quart jar, titrating up to 500 ppm. Just quick spot measurements with the TDS meter will get you there. Then I’ll adjust the pH up to 6.4. Recheck the TDS one more time and if it’s over 550 I’ll dilute a bit more and that’s it. No pre-calculations needed.

So you mix a small pot of nutes then add to the tank?? Surely that would be way weaker added to such a vast amount of water? Or am I getting confused lol??

 

[Olderfart]

So you mix a small pot of nutes then add to the tank?? Surely that would be way weaker added to such a vast amount of water? Or am I getting confused lol??

You mix it up at far higher concentration than your intended fertigation mix. For example, if you mixed it up at 10x your reservoir concentration, you would then add one liter of stock to 9 liters of reservoir content. Your actual stock mix would likely be stronger than this so it would go farther.

To do a stock solution like this, you need to confirm that your particular nute will stay dissolved and available with this set up, and exactly how to mix it up without causing problems.

 

[St. Tom]

I make 40 litres at a time in a big bucket and truth be told sometimes I got a bit lazy and was topping it up from a 3rd and that has caused me problems so now I empty it completely so a fresh 40 ltr. also don't ever use an airstone as it can cause havoc with your pH I found small pumps worked ok just to keep it mixed but using a big pole like paddle I've also stirred it a few times daily

 

[St. Tom]

Also one last thing I have a bluelab combi meter and the pH probe stays in the solution in my Res so I just adjust as needed