Hydro in the Tropics

[elchupacabra 670]

My last grow was as close to a failure as a successful grow can be. I didn't even bother to measure the yield. The taste of the buds is nice, but the high was far from satisfying, which can be expected when you are forced to cut a sativa leaning hybrid 2-3 weeks early. Could have been worse though.

 

Fortunately, I made some much needed changes, and I think I'm on the right path this time.

 

Sowed 3 Auto Gambians on 3/12. We all know that the Auto Gambians come from one man only, so I don't even think it needs to be mentioned!

 

Started in Rockwool, the infamous 'white hook' showed up at the surface of the rockwool on the 5th, at which point i put them into the 6" net pots. I think they're 6", never bothered to measure them. They were placed in the setup which has space for 3 net pots in a top feed DWC method in a 40L Rubbermaid tub. To the water I added Canna Rhizotonic at ⅛ of the suggested concentration. Set the lights on 20/4.

 

I went out of town and came back in a few days and they were looking like any other seedling. nice and happy.

 

Here they are on the 13th:

 

 

 

And on the 15th:

 

 

 

 

Fast forward to 20/12/14

 

 

 

 

No change in the reservoir at all. Roots are looking nice and white.

 

There is one bigger than the other two; this is purely because the water beneath its roots is receiving an unevenly large share of oxygen. This should all be sorted out when my new air pump arrives and when i move these three to my small trial top feed RDWC setup:

 

 

 

This little "elbow" elevation pictured below is to maintain a minimum water level in the buckets:

 

 

Will test run it in the daytime hours today for a few hours to make sure there are no leaks and it's all working well and then 'transplant' these autogambians into their respective buckets.

 

But wait, there's more!

 

 

will be setting up an aeroponic grow in a 12 gallon tub with 5 sites in 3" net pots to see how it works out.

 

This will also leave the initial tub (which the auto gambians are currently residing in) empty for more work/experiments.

 

I am also in the process of building my own LEDs and seeing which works best - 3w diodes or 10w ones. I am going to be using a combination of cool white/warm white. I think I will lean towards the 3w because they generate less heat.

 

 

and we are done...for now. more later amigos

 

Now for a joint of the best charas in the world....

 

Boom

 

El Chupa

[Dawiet420 4]

hello,

 

nice project. i have build my own led panel with 3w led chips. i have a 60w panel for vegi. in the next days i can give you some more information about my panel, when you want.

 

greetings dawiet

[elchupacabra 670]

hello,

 

nice project. i have build my own led panel with 3w led chips. i have a 60w panel for vegi. in the next days i can give you some more information about my panel, when you want.

 

greetings dawiet

 

Thanks dawiet, I'd appreciate it. some pictures of your LED would be great. I'm going to be using an aluminium heat sink that looks identical to this one below as the base for the LEDs. They will be attached to the flat with thermal adhesive to maximise heat transfer.

 

[elchupacabra 670]

Update:

 

1) LPA system is ready to go and 100% functional! we are all set, will sow some seeds in rockwool tonight!

 

2) LED light is ready, but not ready to go. I managed to get the electrical bit down but I feel the 10w LED is running a bit too hot, as expected. Will try the 3w LEDs shortly. The reading just 1-2" under the 10w LED on my luxmeter read 56,000 lux. Not quite sure what to make of that in terms of lumens/watt. Don't know if i'm approaching this the wrong way. 4-5" under the LED it drops to about 35,000. Not too bad. I am hopeful for the 3w LED but hope it will have sufficient penetration.

 

3) RDWC system is almost ready to go, test ran it for a few hours, and apart from a couple of small, very very slow leaks, which were to be expected without any glue and soft tubing, are present at a couple of joints, but nothing a bit of plumbing sealant can't solve.

 

Well, that's that. more soon!

 

Boom

 

Adarsh

[Dawiet420 4]

hi,

 

here are some picture from my led panel.

 

 

 

 

i used 20x Led a 3w

 

4x Blue

4x Red

4x Cool White 10000k

8x White 6000k

[starinhazy 2,938]

Nice work ElChup, I build some hydro system too, really lots of fun to experiment and see what can be done with water. I built a RDWC system last summer for my tomatoes and produced way more than expected. Learning lesson on that one, is to spread out the bukets, plants started overlapping themselves and fighting for space too early. Next year it grow from a 10 foot area to 18-20 spreading out should allow for better individ plant development.

 

Havent tried the LED, but very interested,

 

Great success to you on your projects, and thanks for share.

[webeblzr 2,205]

Fine set up!!

I dont know if this artical will help your endevor or not. It helped me to understand LED's a bit better.

 

http://www.animations.physics.unsw.edu.au//jw/EMspectrum.html

 

It can be a bit dry reading, but I found it enlightening for me.

[elchupacabra 670]

sorry i've been busy setting up my outdoor farm as of late.

 

 

this is the main cola from the small autogambian. i maybe got 8 grams off of her but i wasn't expecting much. the high is very sativa, a couple of drags is what it takes to get it to hit the center of the forehead.

 

will tell more about taste when it dries, but i don't think it's anything great in the terpene department. that, i'm counting on the other one. pics soon.