Automated feed and drain system for coco

I started with the Mars Hydro auto watering setup.  You can probably piece it together for cheaper, or maybe the same price with spare connectors and drippers.

I would suggest using a digital timer that allows control down to the second,  rather than a timer that only does as fine as a minute.

Ive also used hydro halos (with the mars hydro pump).  These work well, good distribution.  If going this route I'd suggest ball valves at each halo for fine adjustments.

I wouldn't suggest recirculating with a drain to waste system.  However, i don't know enough to say why not...  would be interested to hear your experience if you do, as it would be nice to save water.

For the drain system, i dont yet have an automated setup.  I drain into large garden trays then wet vac it out the tent.

I run automated watering on most my set ups pretty easy to do recirculating it tho I wouldnt as you will have the ec drop as the plants use up nutrients and can cause alot of problems easier to let it run off to a waste reservoir to automate it isnt very hard get your self a nice size reservoir two pumps one to feed one to keep water moving around an air pump and stone to keep it oxygenating the res a good digital timer that can do seconds and multiple times trick is the piping one the res need it so it comes out into a t peace then one section will go to the tent to feed other section will have a tap on it and return to the res trick is keep the tap just slightly cracked so it doesnt syphon your res into your tent I can grab some photos if need be for you 

@jdog have to say your set up for watering is easy as. Had mine set up in about an hour and havnt had to play around with it since 😎 

I have mine running to waste collection and give it out to mates that have vegie gardens going. They cant get enough of it as they know i dont recycle water so there is still plenty of good shit left in it for what they are growing

Thanks for all the useful info its given me food for thought for the future.

I have had to change my initial plan for now so I will do my first coco grow in a 2X4 using 9 litre air pots and water them by hand as I want to grow 6 smaller auto plants of different strains to get a mix of minor cannabinoids and terpenes for health reasons.

What are your views on watering once per day in that size air pot or are they too small and would require two water/feeds.

I went back to listen to the HOHG coco grow guide so I am starting to get my head around EC and measuring what goes in and what goes out etc.  I was planning to use canna A&B and canna calmag as it seems to be highly rated.  However Canna recommend using RO water and then adding calmag to get the EC to 0.4.  I live in a hard water area and cannot afford an RO machine at this point.  Other brands such as Shogun just say to add calmag throughout vedg and flower.  Can anyone offer any advice on this please so I can try and get it straight in my head.

Finally would using a large pipette work for draining run off from the saucers rather than having to disturb the air pots at each watering.

Thanks again folks

@organicviper Google Dr Coco and you'll find the website I use.

@organicviper hey brother! Lots to unpack in that one 😜

Sorry you have to hand water again but honestly in my auto systems I usually hand water when the plants are small. This is because they don’t need to be watered daily (not drinking enough)

so I didn’t see where you were in your grow (week of veg) but for me I water only when the pot needs to be watered. I only really water daily in flower when they are slurping it up. I use the lift the pot method to judge the pot and I like to let them dry back some

as for the drain, you can use a turkey baster if ya want, just takes a bit if you have multiple pots and larger pots. I used to do that

as for your hard water, if you can or they have it available, try to rent an R/O system. I pay like $38/month for mine. I also live where my water is about 650ppm and I have no idea what is in it. If you can’t rent one then I suggest using a lower feed schedule. I go off of ppm and not ec and when I was using my tap water I would feed at about 2/3 of whatever the schedule says. Then I watch the plants to see what they tell me. They will let ya know what they need more of or less of. Just gotta pay attention to them. Also if you have hard water like mine, I feel like you need to runoff more when you are watering more like 15% or so and also throw in just a plain watering after every second or third feed

hope this helps man and don’t fret 😎 you got this! 😁

@johncarlson21 Thanks for that great and encouraging advice.  Unfortunatley where I live it's illegal to grow so that makes everything more complicated with temp and humidity etc (always looking over your shoulder)  Eventually I will get an automatic feed and drain system but for now I just have time for two auto grows before I will be getting major work done on my house so I will go ahead and water by hand.  I also live in a hard water area so the plain water trick is good to know.  I will test the EC of my tap water add the nutrients test again PH balance it and test again and then test the run off and record it all so that I can monitor the whole cycle.  Most people advise to start the nutrient levels lower than manufacturers say and then build up as required so I will do that too.  Whats your opinion about adding PK to your solution, I never did that in my soil grow.  Thanks again for being so helpful.

Regards

Morning everyone, I’m not a coco grower, so I don’t have much to offer.

There are some nute companies that have specific nute packages based on water quality, as suggested knowing what your background EC is, and subtracting that from your adds should work, caveat- unless your water is horribly bad. If your background is under 0.4 then bring it up with calmag. 

everybodies budget is different, but I’ll give this info for anyone that thought RO was maybe more expensive than it is, but it’s still not Dollar Store cheap! 
The white RO system pictured below, that’s a 7 stage 90 gal/hr system for our drinking water and cooking, that was $350, filters once per year, although one of those filters is every 2. Pressure tanks are needed for delivering water to a faucet. 

The next RO filter is for our gardens (we also grow hydro veggies and microgreens indoors). This is 150 gal/hr. If your incoming water is less than 0.4EC this filter has a 1:2 waste ratio, above 0.4 like me, the filter has a 1:3 waste ratio. We don’t use pressure tanks with this setup, we have it plumbed to two reservoirs with $15 float valves. This one costs a bit more today, but was about $200 when we got it. Filters are rated for 2000 gallons I think. 

if anyone is entertaining a RO system just for their garden, I highly recommend not using pressure tanks. Tanks are a limitation, even though my white system is 90 gal/hr. You won’t get that, I’m limited by my two 4 gal pressure tanks, then it takes a while to fill. So RO stats can be misleading. 
plumbing your RO into a rez with a float valve, you’ll have way more RO on hand. And if you’re running a house RO with pressure tanks, you can still T off before the pressure tank and run a line to a rez w/float valve.! 

@organicviper I use Bud Explosion in flower and that is on top of my flower nutrients. So I run Mega Crop 2 part so part A is more PK and part B is more N and Calcium/Mag, part A is more during flower giving a bump of PK and lowering the N and then I hit it with a bit more PK with the bud explosion all the way through flower.