AC Infinity Self-Watering Fabric Pot Base

I tried DWC last year and I get pythium because of high temps in summer. It's not worth it at this stage to get a cooler. I imagine any other method such as autopots would have the same issue because of the res. I also can't run a tap water line to the grow room so I have given up on automation for now.

I saw these pots and I thought maybe they could be the solution. I searched around and the online community is not a big fan of it, a bunch of youtube influencers think it's great (being sponsored by AC Infinity) and these pots are selling well (sold out in many places).

I have many thoughts and questions about these pots, wondering if someone has experience with them or the technique and can give some insight. Lets say we are using the recommended medium for these pots, well aerated coco + perlite in a 5 gallon pot. Feed is liquid salts. These pots are not advertised as water only pots, they are made for nute water.

How thoroughly do they they soak the medium? Only the bottom, half of the pot or all the way?
I imagine there would be less chances of developing pythium? But that 1 gallon space that the water is wicked from is in fact a sort of res with smaller capacity and no oxygen.
Does the nute solution and it's PH etc get negatively affected by going through the wick?
Will these wicks crystallize from the salts and their wicking capacity get affected through a grow?

How thoroughly do they they soak the medium? Only the bottom, half of the pot or all the way?
I imagine there would be less chances of developing pythium? But that 1 gallon space that the water is wicked from is in fact a sort of res with smaller capacity and no oxygen.
Does the nute solution and it's PH etc get negatively affected by going through the wick?
Will these wicks crystallize from the salts and their wicking capacity get affected through a grow?

Click to expand...

The wicking will bring the salts to the top of the medium and you will have to handwater it from time to time. If the wicking happens frequently enough then aeration of a 1 gallon res shouldn't be an issue in regards to pythium/anaerobic stuff in the res. But how is this better than auto feeding the coco from a res? You say you don't have access to tap which idk what that means here, but this bag thing requires more effort to maintain than a regular drip res.

I can't see the benefit over any other system and if your having problems with pythium just use a sterilisation method and move the water about.

H202 isn't expensive, pool shock isn't though I can't find that shit on my side of the pond.

beefninja97 said:

The wicking will bring the salts to the top of the medium and you will have to handwater it from time to time. If the wicking happens frequently enough then aeration of a 1 gallon res shouldn't be an issue in regards to pythium/anaerobic stuff in the res. But how is this better than auto feeding the coco from a res? You say you don't have access to tap which idk what that means here, but this bag thing requires more effort to maintain than a regular drip res.

Click to expand...

coreywebster said:

I can't see the benefit over any other system and if your having problems with pythium just use a sterilisation method and move the water about.

H202 isn't expensive, pool shock isn't though I can't find that shit on my side of the pond.

Click to expand...

This obviously isn't as good as a traditional hydro method with a big res but I think it might be some sort of middle ground with some benefits over hand watering.

With training methods that produce a flat canopy close to the surface of the soil it gets very hard to water at some point, this would help with that. It would take some guesswork out of it too as the wick base has a meter that shows how much water it has. Also I magine that if for whatever reason one wants to reduce the frequency of feeds or be out of town for a few days etc they could water the plant the traditional way and let the runoff fill the wick base/water the plant and then fill the base too and it would last longer.

coreywebster said:

I can't see the benefit over any other system and if your having problems with pythium just use a sterilisation method and move the water about.

H202 isn't expensive, pool shock isn't though I can't find that shit on my side of the pond.

Click to expand...

I've tried different ways for sterilization and nothing worked, it came back like a plague.

beefninja97 said:

The wicking will bring the salts to the top of the medium and you will have to handwater it from time to time. If the wicking happens frequently enough then aeration of a 1 gallon res shouldn't be an issue in regards to pythium/anaerobic stuff in the res. But how is this better than auto feeding the coco from a res? You say you don't have access to tap which idk what that means here, but this bag thing requires more effort to maintain than a regular drip res.

Click to expand...

howdy. i got 8 of them . although they fit the regular 5 gall (actually 4 gallon) bags, my real 5 gall bags are wider than the entire device. i think the answer is no but - if i put on my larger 5 gallon bags, with the wicks set up at 2 feet or so, would with wicking work? the directions say up to 7 gallon but ...

it's a bit hard for me to get around at the moment so i'd rather not experiment and find out it all for naught.

any idea?

fatboyOGOF said:

howdy. i got 8 of them . although they fit the regular 5 gall (actually 4 gallon) bags, my real 5 gall bags are wider than the entire device. i think the answer is no but - if i put on my larger 5 gallon bags, with the wicks set up at 2 feet or so, would with wicking work? the directions say up to 7 gallon but ...

it's a bit hard for me to get around at the moment so i'd rather not experiment and find out it all for naught.

any idea?

Click to expand...

Up to 5 g's

i've never used coco before. i have 2 bricks worth soaking in water with cal/mag in it. it's been soaking for days as i've been gone. i'm going to rinse it a couple of times. then mix with perlite. i'm going to assume it's still good but i'm searching for info.

i'm wondering if i can only use perlite in the bottom 1/3rd of the 5 gall bags and happy frog with a lot of perlite mixed in in the top 2/3rds. any idea?

fatboyOGOF said:

i've never used coco before. i have 2 bricks worth soaking in water with cal/mag in it. it's been soaking for days as i've been gone. i'm going to rinse it a couple of times. then mix with perlite. i'm going to assume it's still good but i'm searching for info.

i'm wondering if i can only use perlite in the bottom 1/3rd of the 5 gall bags and happy frog with a lot of perlite mixed in in the top 2/3rds. any idea?

Click to expand...

I wouldn't use any FF soil with this. Upon further research I found out that these wick trays only soak about 1/3 of the pot, so if you put the FF on the top layer it will never get wet. You could feed from the top and let it fill the bottom but I don't know how to feel about that, I sense disaster and it gives me anxiety to be honest ...

I'm finishing my current run and will start a run using the wick pots next. I will follow the instructions, they do make sense. 3 gallon pots, coco + perlite mixed to 70/30. Cropsalt nutes. I know it runs super clean as I know people who brag all the time that their drip lines are pristine running this stuff. No mycos, nothing organic, no additives.