Hopefully this is all phrased in a positive manner. Its not meant to piss peeps off. For every 10 rave threads there could be 1 contrary thread, just to add some perspective. Just in case someone down the road is looking at autopots and wants to know the pros AND cons, not just the pros.
I have used two 4 pots systems for four grows now. Two reservoirs, 8 pots including some of the smaller 2.5g ones. And airdomes as well. I have had great success growing with autopots but I swear it was other factors that made that success, not the autopots. I do have one guy who looked at my setup and went out and bought all the gear for it and he loves it. As do many others.
The pros for autopots? There is only 1 that I can come up with.
The cons? These are based on my own opinion, but I think they are pretty legit. They are things that took me a while to realize. You might not realize these at first. And some of the cons below could be said to be true of other systems too. Its not all black and white.
I have used two 4 pots systems for four grows now. Two reservoirs, 8 pots including some of the smaller 2.5g ones. And airdomes as well. I have had great success growing with autopots but I swear it was other factors that made that success, not the autopots. I do have one guy who looked at my setup and went out and bought all the gear for it and he loves it. As do many others.
The pros for autopots? There is only 1 that I can come up with.
- Automation. Self regulated watering and feeding. Can go away for a week and the plants will water and feed themselves as long as the res lasts.
The cons? These are based on my own opinion, but I think they are pretty legit. They are things that took me a while to realize. You might not realize these at first. And some of the cons below could be said to be true of other systems too. Its not all black and white.
- Not really a con per se, just a fact I guess. U should hand water from the top for 20 days before you turn on the system. so first 20 days is not automated. If you want that, you probably need drip stakes. I bought in to autopots at first because I was a newbie guilty of over watering and these seemed to be the answer. But I now realized over watering is more of an issue in the seedling phase when the systems isn't even turned on. So the con is they don't really help address watering issues (other than when someone is away for days at a time and needs automation).
- I don't like having to lift the pots out of the trays when I want to put one on the bench and work on it. Its messy and cumbersome, especially with the airdome and irrigation lines getting in the way. I switched to regular pots for my current grow and its so much nicer to have a simple pot in a saucer.
- Its hard to customize feeding with autopots. If you want to feed one plant differently than the others, you'll have to find a way to do that like top watering in something. Especially if you stagger your grows and have plants in veg and flower at the same time.
- Can't use some thicker or carbo based nutes in the system because they will clog it. Got to manually add them.
- A few points of failure that could either clog the lines or flood the trays. Could be a big issue for some unfortunate peeps.
- If you don't use RO water, you might get some calcium buildup in the lines and trays and valves.
- More cleaning to do after a grow. Clean the trays, airdomes, valves, lines.
- Not cheap. Airpots are way cheaper and people consider those to be expensive.
- Flushing. You really should stop using the autopot system at the end when you are going to flush. Don't rely on the res to flush as you could get lockout and I did. that is if you are a believer of flushing. you can just eliminate the trays and put the pots in saucers at this point so it's not technically really a con.
- There are a lot of parts involved that you should have stock of. I have so many shut off valves, splitters and tees and silicon tabs, tubing etc. True of any hydro system though.
