PK Perpetual Grow Journal 2020

[PK]

I had a old battery laying around but you can also purchase a old battery and take the stickers off of the top. This will reveal certain amount of plastic round caps showing. Depending on the size of your battery the amount of caps changes. However, you only need to open one of them from one side. I got the cap open with two screwdrivers. Just get the flat head under the cap and try to bring it up. took me few tries and the cap was off. Once the cap was off i made sure that i had a clean dry glass and i put it outside on the asphalt. "DO NOT DO THIS ON ANY PAINTED SURFACE" Grab the battery handel if it has one other whys just make sure you have the batter in hand and just tilt it until the fluid comes out. You now have battery acid which is on the left jar of the 2nd picture. Since i didn't know how much liquid i had, i grabbed another glass jar that was identical and filled it so that it matches the line of the battery acid jar. Once it was to the level, I then dumped the water into my plastic measuring jar that i had on hand and can be seen on the left hand picture. 100ml on the dot. "YOU DO NOT WANT TO MIX THE ACID INTO A PLASTIC CONTAINER" If you don't have the right tools on hand this will be a extra work as you need to measure the acid and water out. I grabbed my plastic measuring cup and measured 100ml of water and put it into another glass jar. This is just to keep the numbers easy I grabbed a surainje with a small glass tube from my aquarium. I then measured 7.5ml of water into the suranj and emptied it into the glass tube. I know that 7.5ml is upto the second line of the word H on the bottle. I then emptied the water out of the glass tube and cleaned it. While holding a rag and the glass in between i slowly emptied the acid into the glass tube until it got to the second line on the word H. Now all you have to do is make sure that the 7.5ml acid goes into the glass jar that is holding 100ml of water. Based on the calculations given by shed this mixture should be now 6.9767% and i just round that up to 7% @InTheShed brought @FelipeBlu post to my attention and walked me through it. I also wanted to thank everyone else who give me suggestions and ideas to make this work.

 

[oldsmokey]

Looks good PK!

 

[PK]

Looks good PK!

thanks Smokey! looks even better this morning
ph 6.5

 

[oldsmokey]

So the ph is still rising? I would bring it down to 5.8 -6.0 range. I don't mind a little bit of pH swing like that. your water is going through the whole PH range in a 24-hour period making all the nutrients available to it at some point in that 24 hour period. Now just readjust and keep monitoring it.

 

[PK]

So the ph is still rising? I would bring it down to 5.8 -6.0 range. I don't mind a little bit of pH swing like that. your water is going through the whole PH range in a 24-hour period making all the nutrients available to it at some point in that 24 hour period. Now just readjust and keep monitoring it.

yes, nutrients are absorbed by the plant at certain ph ranges. My issue was how often i had to ph, as every hour is not correct. Maybe everyday or two days. i'm not sure.

i just did 2ml of solution and it brought my ph to 5.8
Will see how long it would take to hit ph level of 6.5

 

[oldsmokey]

Having to adjust hourly is no good having to adjust in a 24-hour period slightly is okay.

 

[PK]

how often do you adjust smokey?

 

[oldsmokey]

My system is a little different because it's recirculating and I have a float that automatically tops up the reservoir with fresh ro water. The water top up throughout the 24-hour period during full growth is enough to make my pH go from 5.8 to 6.3 so depending on the growth I may be adjusting the pH daily. But in early veg I might not have to adjust the pH for a week or more.

 

[PK]

i knew you were running rdwc but didn't know you had autofill to RO connected. I was thinking of an autofill system but i don't have or need RO system.
I was thinking of putting my tap water into a seperate bucket with a hole at the bottom so that the water can escape through a hose to the main rez. This way whenever the water level goes low, the fill valve would open and allow water from the bucket in. I think with gravity this should be easy and no pump would be needed.

 

[InTheShed]

Looks like you're starting to get it dialed in! Amazing what the right nutes and good pH down can do.

 

[oldsmokey]

i knew you were running rdwc but didn't know you had autofill to RO connected. I was thinking of an autofill system but i don't have or need RO system.
I was thinking of putting my tap water into a seperate bucket with a hole at the bottom so that the water can escape through a hose to the main rez. This way whenever the water level goes low, the fill valve would open and allow water from the bucket in. I think with gravity this should be easy and no pump would be needed.

I do it a similar way I use a large garbage can and I fill that with ro water. It is elevated off the floor a bit and runs on gravityand then I have a line from the garbage can to the reservoir running on a float. the reason I do it this way opposed to just running the ro line straight to the reservoir float is I like to have RO water on hand for reservoir changes and I like to keep track of how much water they are using. I'm not sure how a float would work in the bucket there is a lot of things to interfere with it airlines roots it needs to work freely and not be hindered by anything that might stop it from closing our opening.

 

[Trala]

No idea, but your pibbles are very expressive!

OMGGGGGGGGG

L O L L I N G !

That happy face made me aspirate on my morning coffee!

So funny!

 

[PK]

I do it a similar way I use a large garbage can and I fill that with ro water. It is elevated off the floor a bit and runs on gravityand then I have a line from the garbage can to the reservoir running on a float. the reason I do it this way opposed to just running the ro line straight to the reservoir float is I like to have RO water on hand for reservoir changes and I like to keep track of how much water they are using. I'm not sure how a float would work in the bucket there is a lot of things to interfere with it airlines roots it needs to work freely and not be hindered by anything that might stop it from closing our opening.

why are you using RO? We have one of the best water filtrations and i live in a building that is decate old

 

[PK]

OMGGGGGGGGG

L O L L I N G !

That happy face made me aspirate on my morning coffee!

So funny!

i am glad he spotted that! Its a good sign to see in a nightmare grow that is turning around lol

 

[oldsmokey]

why are you using RO? We have one of the best water filtrations and i live in a building that is decate old

I switched to ro water to bring my ppm's down. My city water is 160 - 200+ depending on the time of year. That and switching to a calmag without nitrogen has lowered my ppm's 300 or more.

 

[PK]

I switched to ro water to bring my ppm's down. My city water is 160 - 200+ depending on the time of year. That and switching to a calmag without nitrogen has lowered my ppm's 300 or more.

oh really, That's interesting!! you are letterly 2 hours ferry ride lol

 

[The Phantom]

@oldsmokey are you worried about your initial PPM and the overall increase in PPMs it creates or do you disregard that number?

I guess what I'm asking is does having a starting PPM of 0 make a difference versus having one of 200 PPM, knowing that it's mostly attributed to general water hardness?

 

[PK]

my fish tank water ppm is at 200. I've got a seed that's getting germinated at the moment., I was thinking of doing a aquaponic for @Joshualuck with the mc, z9 and home made PH. i love saying that

 

[Joshualuck]

my fish tank water ppm is at 200. I've got a seed that's getting germinated at the moment., I was thinking of doing a aquaponic for @Joshualuck with the mc, z9 and home made PH. i love saying that

Go for it my dude. Can not fail with the fish tail!!!

 

[oldsmokey]

@oldsmokey are you worried about your initial PPM and the overall increase in PPMs it creates or do you disregard that number?

I guess what I'm asking is does having a starting PPM of 0 make a difference versus having one of 200 PPM, knowing that it's mostly attributed to general water hardness?

The levels I was running was high and I wasn't maxed out on the base nutes yet and sometimes I might add other nutes in flower. Part of the problem was the cal mag with nitrogen and the amount of it I was running up to 150% of a manufacturer's suggested dosage. The TPS cal mag I'm feeding at the manufacturer's suggested maximum dosage. That alone lowered the ppm almost 200. If I would of went that route first I probably wouldn't of needed the ro. As you know Phantom I had to order the calmag from the USA and in the end ups ended up screwing me with brokerage fees. Anyways I have it now so using it.