I’m stuck! Is this a def or lockout? Please help

Old Salt said:
Coco or coco/perlite is a drain-to-waste hydroponic system. At the stage you are at, you should feed at least two times per day until you get 10% - 20% run off. The extra waterings can get to be a pain. To solve this, I built an automatic watering system for under $50. Now I can leave home for up to a week, or as long as the reservoir has nutrient solution for. With automatic watering, coco/perlite is probably the most hands free growing method.
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Thanks old salt I almost did go with drippers and wish I did now only didn’t because when I used them before I used to get a lot of blockages in the lines I’m guna have a read up on your journals to see how and what you feed, ive actualy had really good results in this system over a g per watt I’d say 30% of the time and I can’t work out anything I’ve done differently hence the frustration. I will try the drippers as you described on a few of them as I have enough equipment to do 6 plants already and see side by side if that solves it. I don’t doubt top fed is better it’s just I have a lot invested into this easy feed and it’s has and sometimes still does a great job just can’t get my head round it lol

thanks again I’ll have a look at your journals now:Namaste:
 
10gal said:
not even close... ebb and flo is the true lazyboy method
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Do you not have to keep an eye on TDS and pH with Ebb and Flow?
 
Old Salt said:
Do you not have to keep an eye on TDS and pH with Ebb and Flow?
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I mean, theoretically...
I mea I check mine... every 2 weeks when I change, unless I have been having drift issues.
 
MrMackey said:
Anyone know how to upload a short video on here might help show a bigger picture?
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click the 3 dots in the tool bar and then click insert?
 
Google 'ebb and flow hydroponics' That will bring up videos and explanations of how the system works. This one is pretty good at explaining the basics:


This one explains the difference between recirculating systems and drain-to-waste systems.

 
let the top 1” dry out within 24hours before the next feed
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This is EXACTLY what I was doing when I got this problem. I'm new to this but from what I understand (mainly through people's advice here) this applies to soil because soil needs time for the water to drain and oxygen to reach the roots, but in coco most of the water drains instantly and there's always oxygen at the roots... and other stuff to do with soil naturally balancing its pH whereas coco's pH will go suuuuper high if you let it dry.

I fixed the problem by flushing 60 litres through the coco, then increasing my watering to 3x daily. I recently went back to 2x daily but increased each watering by 50% (so 3x 1l per day, or 2x 1.5l per day).

If you've got the same issue as I did, the yellowing on the old growth will stop spreading pretty much overnight (but won't go green again) and new growth won't get yellowing again.

EDIT: I found a post I put up when I had the issue: Plants showing a combination of different symptoms ... have a look at some of the advice I was given in there :)
 
d42zero said:
I had a similar issue and on some advice from here, I increased my watering from 800ml twice daily to 1l three times daily and the problem went away. My plants were roughly that size when the problem occurred. The explanation given was that I wasn't flushing enough through to wash the salts out so the EC and the pH in the coco got too high, I tested runoff and it was through the roof.

No idea if this is your problem too but worth looking into.

Good luck :)
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That's his problem not flushing enough.
 
d42zero said:
This is EXACTLY what I was doing when I got this problem. I'm new to this but from what I understand (mainly through people's advice here) this applies to soil because soil needs time for the water to drain and oxygen to reach the roots, but in coco most of the water drains instantly and there's always oxygen at the roots... and other stuff to do with soil naturally balancing its pH whereas coco's pH will go suuuuper high if you let it dry.

I fixed the problem by flushing 60 litres through the coco, then increasing my watering to 3x daily. I recently went back to 2x daily but increased each watering by 50% (so 3x 1l per day, or 2x 1.5l per day).

If you've got the same issue as I did, the yellowing on the old growth will stop spreading pretty much overnight (but won't go green again) and new growth won't get yellowing again.

EDIT: I found a post I put up when I had the issue: Plants showing a combination of different symptoms ... have a look at some of the advice I was given in there :)
Click to expand...
Cheers for this mate some good info coming in here, when I calculated how many plants I have attached to a 500l res and how quick it empties they r taking around 3-4l per day from 1 watering it’s weird with the bottom feed system because they will be sat in water for a few hours once the tray is filled and just empty before the next feeding 24 hours later and to be honest it’s not often the tops to dry out only happens when there a good 5 weeks in and growing fast and healthy but I’m going to start top feeding some extra in every other day there getting a much more standard feed now after the flush of 1.6ec ph of 6.0 cal mag is going in at 0.5ml per l I’ll keep you posted
(Wanted to put a video on which shows a lot more than the pics but it’s saying I need to upload to YouTube and put the code here not sure if that’s safe or not)
 
MrMackey said:
with the bottom feed system because they will be sat in water for a few hours once the tray is filled
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So I sat down and thought about bottom feeding a while back and I decided I didn't like the idea as the water left sitting in the trays would evaporate, but the salts would be left behind... if 50% of the water evaporates then your EC/ppm would double (in theory). I'm not really sure what it means for pH, that's not quite as easy to understand as EC. The plants will take up some of the salts yes, but they would need to take the salts in at the same speed the water evaporates (i.e. 50% of the water evaporates in the same time it takes the plant to eat 50% of the salts) otherwise the EC would go all over the shop.

You can test this by putting some nutrient solution in a cup and testing the EC, then leaving it out on your bench for a week or so and testing the EC again... you'll see a higher EC once some water has evaporated off.

I would test the EC of the water in your trays and compare it to the nute solution you're putting in... if you are feeding the plants from the trays then you want the solution in the trays to match what you're supposed to be putting in your plants. There are be ways of mixing weaker nute solutions that take into account evaporation (@Barney86 was working on something I think) but it all got too complicated for me and I just decided to keep top feeding lol.
 
d42zero said:
So I sat down and thought about bottom feeding a while back and I decided I didn't like the idea as the water left sitting in the trays would evaporate, but the salts would be left behind... if 50% of the water evaporates then your EC/ppm would double (in theory). I'm not really sure what it means for pH, that's not quite as easy to understand as EC. The plants will take up some of the salts yes, but they would need to take the salts in at the same speed the water evaporates (i.e. 50% of the water evaporates in the same time it takes the plant to eat 50% of the salts) otherwise the EC would go all over the shop.

You can test this by putting some nutrient solution in a cup and testing the EC, then leaving it out on your bench for a week or so and testing the EC again... you'll see a higher EC once some water has evaporated off.

I would test the EC of the water in your trays and compare it to the nute solution you're putting in... if you are feeding the plants from the trays then you want the solution in the trays to match what you're supposed to be putting in your plants. There are be ways of mixing weaker nute solutions that take into account evaporation (@Barney86 was working on something I think) but it all got too complicated for me and I just decided to keep top feeding lol.
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Checked it all today and the solution in the trays is exactly the same as the tank both ph and ec and the water is absorbed within a few hours so pretty sure I can rule that out, I have some results from the room I showed pics of here which surprised me. So they was fed on 2.9 ec with ph of 6.0-6.2 since start of 12/12 pretty much (ec started lower 2.4 and increased as signs worsened) the day I posted this thread and the next 2 days they were fed just ph’d water (I now know this is bad) from the bottom via the system. Yesterday they were flushed from the top with 10l each pot with 0.8 total ec made up of 0.3ec tap water +0.1ec calmag rest ionic coco bloom and ph set to 6.0 the 1st bit of run off was coming out at 1.2-1.4 ec and ph 6.3-6.5 this was measured from a few of the plants and they was all in this range. From today they are getting 1.6ec and 6.0 ph and have had there bad looking leaves removed
 
Now for a few which have only been flipped for around a week if that I’ve got them being fed exactly like cultivators feed schedule 1.4ec plus flowerburst (1.6ec max I guess) only 0.3 ec of this is calmag (0.5ml per l) with 6.0 ph and in my opinion it looks like magnesium def? I’ve sprayed today with 1tbsp Epsom salt per 4l water and added 0.2 ec worth of dissolved Epsom salt to the res this is a food grade quality salt what do you think? Side note these were perfectly green and happy when flipped this is what always happens within a week of flipping this gorrila glue hence I ended up on so much cal mag :lot-o-toke:
 

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Minor update more for my own records... put calmag in at 1ml per l on the 2nd tank of feed and sprayed foilar Epsom salt at 1tbsp per 4l. Had a few power cuts resulting in fucked up light schedules which made them pissed off at the same time after 3 days of lights being on at the right times and the new feed they seem to be improving will see in another 3/5 days if I change anything they still look pissed off my all means but seems a step in the right direction
 
I'm in the 4th week of my first grow and have been experimenting with watering frequency. I'm home all day recovering a broken leg so I have time. I'm finding that 4 x watering with a minimal runoff is working the best. When I added a 4th watering before going to bed, I noticed a lot more growth when I woke up.
 
MLDgrower said:
I'm in the 4th week of my first grow and have been experimenting with watering frequency. I'm home all day recovering a broken leg so I have time. I'm finding that 4 x watering with a minimal runoff is working the best. When I added a 4th watering before going to bed, I noticed a lot more growth when I woke up.
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Thanks for the info :) What kind of timing are your waterings, are they evenly spaced during lights on?
 
I water once when lights go on, roughly 6hrs later before I go to sleep, 7 to 8hrs later when I wake up, and 4hrs later (2hrs before lights go off).

Ideally is like to space the watering out more evenly from when the lights come on till they go off. The temps in my tent get up to 37c in the daytime though. So I'm going lights off at 1pm to 5pm. This has worked to keep my temps below 32c, and usually sitting around 28 or 29c
 

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