Top fed DWC - Top feed through whole grow or no?

juanbahama

New Member
Hello! Ive got a top fed DWC bubbleponics setup going and was wondering if youre supposed to keep the top feed in throughtout the entire grow?

As I understand it, top feeding isnt necessary, but helps a lot in the seedling phase. If that's true, should I remove the top feed tubes as they get older?
 
( should I remove the top feed tubes as they get older? ) Only if you have airstones in the bottom of each bucket.
 
( should I remove the top feed tubes as they get older? ) Only if you have airstones in the bottom of each bucket.

thanks duke, yeah ive got two airstones in each reservoir. im following the growweedeasy/roseman top fed dwc/bubbleponics guide.
 
If you have the stones then everything should work out great.

Just make sure you are putting something with your nutes and water to protect your roots.
 
If you have the stones then everything should work out great.

Just make sure you are putting something with your nutes and water to protect your roots.

ive got some hydroguard in there with gh nutes and calmag. had a white substance show up in my rapid rooters in week one that i used .3% h2o2 to deal with, then added the hydroguard in the first water change with the nutes
 
Hydroguard is good stuff.

I have used it and it worked pretty good for me.

I now use Z7 water treatment instead. It takes care of my root issues and it keeps everything clean at the same time.

I use botanicare kind Z7 and tap water that starts out at 9.1ph and 160ppm that is set out for 24hrs.

I moved from GH to Botanicare kind because it holds the ph much better.

Gh will work,it just takes a little more work.

It is very rare for me to use any up or down with kind.
 
I'll have to check out z7. I wish I could use tap water, right now I'm hauling 5 gallon jugs of ro water from a water store nearby. My tap water reads around 225 ppms, plus I just read that they've been replacing chlorine with chloramines so I can't evaporate it away. The RO water is 0 ppms so I add calmag, and is a high 6 pH, though I've noticed that after I add nutes/calmag/hydroguard that it reads around 5.8, so I haven't had to use pH down yet either.

Interesting point about gh nutes, I'll have to keep an eye on the pH. I just went with what the growweedeasy guide uses.
 
My tap water is 260 ppm so I'm packing RO from the store as well. It made a huge difference, sure makes hauling it worth while.

yeah, kind of a PITA but quality > convenience. looked at installing an RO filter but didnt like the idea of drilling into the rental's plumbing, plus the nature of the system is that it wastes 2 gallons for every 1 gallon of RO water it produces, plus it would take forever to fill a 5 gallon jug with one of those little home systems
 
yeah, kind of a PITA but quality > convenience. looked at installing an RO filter but didnt like the idea of drilling into the rental's plumbing, plus the nature of the system is that it wastes 2 gallons for every 1 gallon of RO water it produces, plus it would take forever to fill a 5 gallon jug with one of those little home systems

Yeah my water from our well is around 750 ppm. I used to haul water from the store as well but that really gets old like you said a pita. I finally gat a stealth ro300 and mounted it in the laundry room, unhooked the washer machine hose and put a double female adapter on the faucet and screw the hose back on and the adaptor hose that came with the ro300 and boom baby no more hauling water. I was really surprised that it took my 750 ppm water down to 0-10 ppm. I did have to install a booster pump (which was no big deal) and it takes about 25 minutes to fill a 5 gallon jug. It has already paid for itself as far as buying water(not to mention the gas). You should really check it out. I know the wifey sure hell likes not dragging gallon jugs of water home.
 
Yeah my water from our well is around 750 ppm. I used to haul water from the store as well but that really gets old like you said a pita. I finally gat a stealth ro300 and mounted it in the laundry room, unhooked the washer machine hose and put a double female adapter on the faucet and screw the hose back on and the adaptor hose that came with the ro300 and boom baby no more hauling water. I was really surprised that it took my 750 ppm water down to 0-10 ppm. I did have to install a booster pump (which was no big deal) and it takes about 25 minutes to fill a 5 gallon jug. It has already paid for itself as far as buying water(not to mention the gas). You should really check it out. I know the wifey sure hell likes not dragging gallon jugs of water home.
Interesting I'll check it out, how much did that all run you? When I was looking at RO systems it looked like 2-300ish?

Unfortunately the only place I could install is under the kitchen sink and I can't drill a hole into the plumbing for the the waste water.
 
For the ro300 with power supply it was 265.00. For the pump and shut off switch it was 120.00. And depending on your water pressure you may or may not need the pump. Our well is around 125 feet from the house and the pressure will drop way down when the water softener kicks in so I have to use the pump. Now I have found out just 2 days ago our pressure switch on the well pump was the real reason for the low pressure so I replaced it and man what a difference it made. I'm going to make water with the ro300 for the first time since we replaced it in a few hours. I'll try first without the pump to see how it goes. But the total of all of it was damn well worth it for us, saves a lot of time and money and sore backs for use old farts.

You could install it under the sink to make it out of site. You can get an adapter to go from you spigot to the water hose adaptor on the ro, and simply runs the waste water tube to the drain in the sink. Problem solved. ;)
 
I have. Stealth 150 mounted in the laundry room. I use much of the waste water in my washing machine. It takes about 35 minutes for a five gallon fill up. Far better than hauling it in. I love my RO filter.
 
Best place I have found is a water station that fills jugs for offices you can take your jugs there and fill them for 25c a gallon and there ppm are really low in my area they r at 7ppm but make sure you add trace minerals or cal-mag
 
You really only need to top water till the roots hit water. I don't even have a formal top watering device, just a 1 gallon milk jug with a few cups of RO in it... That would last me a week. once your roots are on the drink the pool of water will keep em' wet but the bubbles popping will also splash them and keep the humidity above the water very high.

I use an overdone air supply. I have 2 pots 17 gallons each. And i have an Air Force 80 liter linear pump with 2 12 inch diffusers. It may sound rediculous but it changed my yield substantially.
 
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