Round 3 - Capn Style - Automated

[Skybound]

My concern for crud is the slimy stuff that sticks to the plastic walls of the res when I empty it after a week or so. I usually drag out the tote after it's emptied and take it to the bathroom and give it a good once over washing with chlorinated city water. But because I want to to fully automate the grow, this might lead to other problems if I am unable to clean the tote after a few weeks, though I don't quite know how that will play out.

Regarding using an inline pump that plumbs into the tote at the lowest point, would the pump be able to hold the water back when not energized? I know the little ActiveAqua pumps do not hold anything back and water can be pumped right through one of them. I also considered using a valve, but that brings me back to a current subject that I have been banging my head against the wall for a little more than a year with, finding a 2 way plastic valve that can be controlled with a micro-controller. There are a lot of little solenoid valves on the market, but most are only one way flow, and all require a minimum of 3 psi water pressure which my little pumps, nor the static weight of 10-15 gallons of water are capable of producing. I could use a plain jane PVC valve, but that puts me in the same spot I'm in now, that is needing to be at the grow to do the res change.

A little back ground. I am as blue collar as you will find, and have spent years working physically tough jobs. Well, at 41 years old, all of that is catching up to me and I find my body is hurting everywhere all the time. That said, the rigors of managing a stealth grow can be very tedious, this I learned in my last journal. Near the end of that journal, I stumbled onto the idea of pluming all the water in and out of the grow which made life a lot easier, but running back and forth opening certain valves and closing certain other valves wasn't so easy either. Not to mention that none of my equipment worked together well. RH sky rocketed at night time and temps plummeted, and not being an avid weather watcher, my grow suffered due to my ignorance. All of these reasons and more lead me to seek full automation. So I jumped into that to keep me busy (back after I shut down my last grow) till I can find a new place to grow. I already succeeded in building what I envisioned, and am extremely close to working that into the grow.

For your DTW system, is the just water into soil, or nutes into soilless media? Also, do you have a pic of that manifold you speak of?

 

[Weaselcracker]

You know, you've put so much more effort interesting this area than me that I probably don't have much help to give. I have a way better grasp of stuff that I've got my hands on and worked with personally. The shit I haven't done yet continues to be more mysterious than it should be.
I don't know if those kind of pumps can function as a valve and hold water back.

It's strange that you can't find a decent controllable 2-way valve. Seems like it would be a popular item somewhere besides just your place.
Here is an overly dramatic picture of the manifold.

And another. The bumps on top take a screwdriver and are supposedly for controlling valves but never worked really.

But I wouldn't recommend it. It's just cheap crap. I got a whole bunch of watering stuff from a neighbour I worked for once. A few of these manifolds and lots of 1/4" line and a kit full of various line connections and sprayers, drip emitters, and whatnot. It's all cheap junk but it's the cheap junk I had in hand.

My impressions, besides it being cheap Chinese junk, are that it's made to function (if it's even made to function at all which I actually question) with way higher pressure than an 85 gph electric pump can give. Basically nothing works at low pressure. That's why I kept the lines open ended, along with the constant risk of clogging.
I looked around for something better, and also some decent ball valves, but couldn't find anything of quality in 1/4" size. I thought if I bump up to 1/2" I might start finding well made products.

The DTW thing is a mixed res of nute solution with a bubbler, and coco, perlite, or a combo of both (so far).

 

[Skybound]

The DTW thing is a mixed res of nute solution with a bubbler, and coco, perlite, or a combo of both (so far).

That's gotta get expensive. I would throw up if I had to only use my nutes once. I get it for seedlings, but once in solo cups or larger, I need recirculating.

I am very well aware of using "junk on hand". Story of my life really. I bought a ten pack of cheap half inch valves to see if I can connect a servo motor to (servo only turns a 1/4 turn or 1/2 turn). Anyways, when I opened the pack and took out a valve, I put one end in my mouth and blew to see how good the seal was and don't ya know, I was able to easily push air through the closed valve. JUNK! I went on the site IO ordered from to leave a product comment, but the comment wasn't approved yet. I said "if you were under water with only this closed valve to breathe through, you would not die".

 

[Skybound]

Update;

I am getting impatient at the bits of time I am able to visit the grow, but this I was able to work hard these past 2 days and am very close to having 1 bloom room complete and I plan to get a veg plant in there ASAP! I also put together the bare bones automation project I've been working on. Time is accurate, air temp and humidity is read every 2 or 3 seconds and the relays went to their programmed position. I even lit up an HID connected to the power box to test the behavior of the microcontroller in close proximity to the noisy ballasts. I say noisy not because of the noise we hear, but electromagnetic noise that cheap digital ballasts are well known for, it has been said to make sensors or other sensitive electronics act buggy. At any rate, all went fine and the web communications worked well also. There are a few minor bugs I need to work out, but I'm confident to have this resolved by mid week, and hopefully by then I will also be 100% finished with the first room.

This past week, I executed the runt which was one of my new Bubblelicious I just bought. Had to clear some space as that small DIY flood table was overgrown. The remaining 4 have since overgrown the space, hence my strong desire to get the largest into bloom. I also suspect the largest may be a male due to the leggyness of it and long node spacing. Still, I can't risk the chance that my fastest grower may be male and discard now, so if I lose 2-3 weeks to find out, it will give me that much time to dial the room in while also finishing the 2nd bloom room.

I swapped rezes today and started transition feed schedule which for General Hydroponics 3 part, is equal parts each. Previously, I augmented their old schedule of 3 parts gro, 2 parts micro, 1 part bloom into 3-3-1 which gave an added boost of N all throughout veg and the Recharge really did wonders to the root zones as the plants up top look ever so happy.

8 gallons of RO / 004 PPM
Silica 1.5ml/gal
Flora Blend 4ml/gal
Calimagic 3.5ml/gal
250 PPM

FLora Gro 12ml total
Flora Micro 12ml total
Flora Bloom 12ml total
530 PPM

Recirculate for few minutes and correct ph down to just above 5.0. The increasing silica doses along with the already high RO water (@ roughly 7.4), I am confident the ph will rise to the desired range.

Some pics;

The suspected male, though I'm gonna find out for sure in a few weeks.

 

[Skybound]

I found a few hours after work today to do some work and was able to get one plant into bloom FINALLY! I expect some wrinkles to be ironed out, she might even be a he as s/he originated from gifted seeds, though I cant remember if he said they were fems or regulars. Topped her and threw her into bloom. She still needs to be potted up a size or two, but I am going to wait till the sex is revealed and the lot of "the stretch" is finished. Sorry no pics, I was literally too busy to take a few.

Transition PPM is just under 600 and PH was holding at 6.0.

 

[Light Addict]

Glad to see ya back at it Skybound me old pal

 

[Skybound]

LA, that's a mutual feeling my brother, very glad to BE BACK! And very glad to see you along for my journey!

 

[Weaselcracker]

Nice work dude. Getting it done Looks like those plants won't be waiting around for you if you fall behind, either.

That's gotta get expensive. I would throw up....

I was wondering about this because here I am it costs me about $70 for a gallon of silica after tax and shipping. I like using it for pH plus but really it's too expensive to do all the time. You must get it cheaper.

 

[Skybound]

$10 a quart before shipping and believe me, my budget is severely thin! I DTW for seedlings, but after that, it's recirculating till harvest.

 

[Weaselcracker]

I remember now, the GH nutes need way less ph+ to bring into balance. I'd forgotten that, since I've only used them a few times. I usually use Botanicare stuff, and to balance that with silica, I'm pouring in ridiculous amounts - like half a cupful or more, 2/3 of a cup, for a five gallon bucket of nute solution. Sometimes I pour in about as much silica as I can stand to watch, then bring it up the rest of the way with a little ph+ (phosphoric).
I did a couple mixes with the GH nutes last year, and I couldn't believe how little it took to balance it- I overshot in both directions, multiple times.

 

[Skybound]

I remember now, the GH nutes need way less ph+ to bring into balance. I'd forgotten that, since I've only used them a few times. I usually use Botanicare stuff, and to balance that with silica, I'm pouring in ridiculous amounts - like half a cupful or more, 2/3 of a cup, for a five gallon bucket of nute solution. Sometimes I pour in about as much silica as I can stand to watch, then bring it up the rest of the way with a little ph+ (phosphoric).
I did a couple mixes with the GH nutes last year, and I couldn't believe how little it took to balance it- I overshot in both directions, multiple times.

Eeek, that's almost 158ml/5gallons=31.6ml/gal. Is that in DWC?

 

[Weaselcracker]

I don't grow DWC, mostly soilless in peatmoss/perlite. Some DTW in coco, or perlite. If I'm making a very weak nutrient mix then sometimes I'll use the silica to balance it. If the stuff was dirt cheap I'd use it for ph+ all the time, though probably I'd just be wasting it in those amounts.
For ph+ I use the pool stuff- sodium hydroxide. I've used it for ten years and it works fine. Yes it's sodium- but the total ppm used is tiny and it doesn't cause a salt issue.
For a silica source I may buy some powdered stuff. Also looking into experimenting using dried powdered horsetails (plants), which I think will work well, based on what some organic growers say. I just have to wait for spring to arrive for those horsetails to grow up and I'll run a side by side test - it'll be very easy to tell if the horsetail silica source works or not. None of this probably already applies to a DWC setup though. and is

 

[Skybound]

Do you just mix the horsetail into the media, or mix with feeding stock?

 

[Weaselcracker]

From what I read - dried, powdered and mix it in with the medium. This was coming from the perspective of an organic soil grower.
I'll give it a try when the horsetails are in season. It's an easy test and will be easy to see if it's working, by the plant's reaction. I looked into making my own silica solution, but it turned out to be rocket science.

 

[Skybound]

Progress update;

Just a few days into bloom, ppm is holding around 600, ph was 6.4 and I gave it a single milliliter to the 8 gallons of res of PH down and left it at that. I remember when I first got into hydro, they used to say that hydro was so much more complicated and the specs had to be near spot on, but the way I see it is that there is still a lot of breathing room in most of the variables. I guess the learning curve is learning how flexible things are and what the margins are. I can't wait till I have a better idea of how to structure the code for feed schedules. I'm eager to be able to adjust the schedules till the output is perfect plants throughout a grow. Different variations of a schedule for a specific brand of nutes can be saved and shared. Indica or Sativa dominance can be accounted for and feed schedules be dialed in accordingly. I shit you not, these past 2 months have been like a never ending Christmas for me in the respect that this project I started roughly 2 years ago is starting to finally come together and I know the closer I get to my goals, the less effort and time will be required of me while also exceeding my previous abilities. I will make less mistakes and not have to worry as often ruining my high.

Here's the temperature/humidity sensor located just above and exhaust port to the filter. There will also be another in the other room when I finish it in the days/weeks to come. I also intend on running some wire over to veg and get one in there as well.

5th day in bloom and I stepped the HPS output up to 75% (450 watts) and will leave it there for another 3 or 4 days. I hope to see some pistils soon, and fingers crossed there wont be any balls!

Don't know why, but the "My Photos" tab below the reply box all of a sudden stopped working. I will attempt to attach the other 2 pics in a separate post.

 

[Skybound]

This photo was meant for the last caption above.

The final photo is the beginning stages of my first attempt at cramming in the filter and ducting. I still need another piece to join the Wye to the fan, but as it appears, I dont have enough head room to make all that work so I will attempt to stand the heavy ass filter on the Wye (upside down). Though, because of the way the ballasts and outlets box is, I don't think there's enough room to stand the filter up straight behind all that crap. Don't you worry weaselcracker, good ole Murphy has a long list of laws that are sure to keep a bunch of problems to sort through. The struggle is REAL!

 

[Weaselcracker]

My current filter is hanging at the top of my flowering room. It weighs at least 80 pounds and was a pain to get up there. I have a new fan and a lighter but much longer filter waiting to be installed (didn't come with all the right parts so I'm back to waiting for the mailman). I can tell it's really going to be in the way when I do get it in.
Does it not have to be at the top of the room? Obviously more effective if it is, but I'm guessing many people are not able to hang those things from their ceilings.

 

[Skybound]

Woo hoo my humidity fell below 70% in bloom! 8-| As you can see, I am taking flack again, and another overly demanding job for shit pay is sucking up my time. I gave them almost a year to do right by me, but I drew the line last week and told them that they have till as late as May 1st to adjust to life without me, cause my ass is on to better things. I work at a body shop for a family of 3, so in that village, there are 3 chiefs and 1 indian (me). The 3 chiefs agree on almost nothing and I am the rope that they settle disputes with. My body is hurt, but the need to keep living and sinking $ into my grow is what keeps me going back into the gauntlet on a daily basis, but this May however, I will be starting a business in a different trade doing substantially less physical work for an estimated twice what the chiefs give me. By then I'll have all the medicine a guy could want so my street guy will also see much less of me.

All that aside though, I am a little depressed that I can find enough time during the week to put the finishing touches on the room in use and also bang out the 2nd bloom room and get it running too. The room in operation has no in/out venting and I merely need to drill an inlet port, and get my fan and filtered mounted to the wye fitting. It's the little things that are such a big thorn in my side. There is a slight chance of good news. I stopped by the grow yesterday for just enough time to check res stats, and I got a decent look at the bloom plant (Bubblelicious) and I'm pretty sure I saw the smallest calyxes and some pistils which tells me it might be a lady after all. Now I regret not potting her up prior to bloom, and also topping her a few hours before sticking her right into 12/12. Oh well!

The screenshot is the Blynk app on my phone. It currently displays 12 hr formatted time, date, temp/humidity readings of Bloom B. Light is also connected to Bloom B and the room I will put a plant into in 3 or so weeks will then become Bloom A. I am currently writing the code for the 8 dosing pumps. Each pump will be responsible for a different nutrient, of which I have GH 3 part, 4 amendments and PH Down. If I need to adjust PH up, I can use silica, but my experience tells me I will mostly only ever use DOWN. The screenshot will then become a lot busier as there will be buttons and value selectors for me to type in the value on my phone, press the button and the pump will precisely produce it's respective nutrient down to two tenths of a milliliter. I could go all the way down to a single tenth, but the counter goes slow so when trying to dial up a high amount of ml, I don't want it incrementing too slowly.

Edit - Also why I need to get there for some QT, is because I updated my code for more realistic values. If the humidity high value is exceeded, the exhaust fan turns on. I have mini 12volt dehumidifiers that will each remain on indefinitely, but high temps can be decreased with increased air flow, and humidity can also be dealt with the same way. The use of an Arduino microcontroller to a grower is invaluable, the addition of Blynk to that is just a no brainer for me. If anyone wants to build something similar, I'll share my code and circuits for free. Some soldering will be required, and knowledge of electricity is also very helpful, but I'll be happy to assist if I can.

 

[Skybound]

I took a hell of a beating today (metaphorically) in the grow. Turns out when I was there troubleshooting a code conflict with the change of the clocks, my dumbass forgot to plug the light back in, so essentially she went for about 30 hours of lights on and almost 24 hours of lights off. Add all that onto being put into bloom an hour after being topped and excessively high humidity, I just left the light unplugged. What's worse is that just the other day I saw quite a few pistils and calyxes. I knew she was gonna be a test dummy, but I turned her into a punching bag. So I will be taking her down tomorrow as she was likely over stressed and I just don't want to take the chance. I have 2 other candidates that are plenty bushy in veg, plus rooted clones behind them. This buys me the time that I lost (2 weeks) to get my shit in order over there.

Both sad and happy! Aint duality a bEEotch?

 

[Weaselcracker]

lol. I have to laugh at myself when I do shit like that. The plant I won potm with was a special one- halfway through revegging it and I got in a funk and just forgot to water it so it died. Always clears a little much needed space in the room though when that stuff happens. ...

The reason I asked about putting the filter down low is because it looked like that's what you are going to do. Talked myself out of that one though- I think with enough contortions I can get it up high.