My basement corner Aero garden!

Hey everyone! I spent a lot of time reading and absorbing information throughout this past year before finally arriving here. I love the community and all the knowledge sharing that goes on here.

I'm more knowledgeable in electronics engineering and chemistry than biology and genetics so this has been a great learning experience and hope to keep it going!

I constructed a large BOM before making any purchases and revised it several times based on what I learned from other people's mistakes and shared knowledge -- ty to Atom & all the others who shared their years of experience!

I was going to do my write-up on the MIT OpenAg site, but their future sounds uncertain so I'm just going to avoid it for now.

This is only my second MMJ grow. My first one was this summer, in soil pots in my back yard. After having to pick so many random seeds out of my herb I decided to take it inside.

I have some Cookies 'n Kush seeds as well as some Super Bud seeds and will be starting with a couple motherplants and will take cuttings as soon as they are big enough. I also bought a few packs of kale and stevia to try growing if there's any extra space outside the flowering tent.

So far I've got everything except the flower tent lighting and ventilation. I plan to order lighting from Digi-key in the next few days. I'm really liking the sounds of the Gen3 Bridgelux strips that don't require a heatsink when run at low power levels.

I'm not sure how much of a problem the negative air pressure is going to be with approx ~200CFM exiting the flowering tent. The basement isn't directly connected to the house, you have to go through the garage to get down here, but there is a vent into the basement from the furnace/AC.

Here's my BOM and design document: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1PBExDBjCWoRktsUr1cME1Rk_sxHIM531YJPWgXNTr10/

I think I am just about ready to mix my first nutes, germinate some seeds in rockwool, and get started but there are a couple final things I have sort out starting with how many more misters I need to order (if any) and what that means for water usage.

If it's possible to situate the misting nozzle directly in the middle of the 32 gallon trash bin it might provide enough coverage to get everything, but when it is connected to 12 inches of tube, facing directly upward it doesn't always produce mist because after a misting or two a bead of water begins forming in the center of the Tefen mist head and on subsequent mistings it just makes the bead bigger instead of spraying outward. (woops!)

Having the mist head at a slight angle eliminates this problem, but the bulk of the mist cone ends up being slightly lop-sided for the container. It does seem to cover most of the container when fixed against the wall, but I have a feeling when it's full of roots it may not work so well.

The other option I considered for the Tefen misters is purchasing a solenoid with 1/8" threads and sealing it with silicon tape and placing that in the middle, again held in place with a guide-wire or something else but I think it may have the same "bead problem" anyways. Air-assisted might be the way to go but I don't really have space for an air-compressor here.

Here are a few photos of the bins with active mist. I had to turn the lights off and use a flashlight to really see the spray pattern. There are more here: https://imgur.com/a/UbWZK7s




Here's a better view of what the actual grow space looks like, I still have to finish wrapping it in vapor barrier and constructing the tent:

The room itself is 12' x 5' but I only plan to make the flowering tent 4x4.




Any advise, suggestions or tips are highly appreciated. I'll try to take pictures any time I make a major change or see something noteworthy.

Cheers!

stackmachine said:

Hey everyone! I spent a lot of time reading and absorbing information throughout this past year before finally arriving here. I love the community and all the knowledge sharing that goes on here.

I'm more knowledgeable in electronics engineering and chemistry than biology and genetics so this has been a great learning experience and hope to keep it going!

I constructed a large BOM before making any purchases and revised it several times based on what I learned from other people's mistakes and shared knowledge -- ty to Atom & all the others who shared their years of experience!

I was going to do my write-up on the MIT OpenAg site, but their future sounds uncertain so I'm just going to avoid it for now.

This is only my second MMJ grow. My first one was this summer, in soil pots in my back yard. After having to pick so many random seeds out of my herb I decided to take it inside.

I have some Cookies 'n Kush seeds as well as some Super Bud seeds and will be starting with a couple motherplants and will take cuttings as soon as they are big enough. I also bought a few packs of kale and stevia to try growing if there's any extra space outside the flowering tent.

So far I've got everything except the flower tent lighting and ventilation. I plan to order lighting from Digi-key in the next few days. I'm really liking the sounds of the Gen3 Bridgelux strips that don't require a heatsink when run at low power levels.

I'm not sure how much of a problem the negative air pressure is going to be with approx ~200CFM exiting the flowering tent. The basement isn't directly connected to the house, you have to go through the garage to get down here, but there is a vent into the basement from the furnace/AC.

Here's my BOM and design document: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1PBExDBjCWoRktsUr1cME1Rk_sxHIM531YJPWgXNTr10/

I think I am just about ready to mix my first nutes, germinate some seeds in rockwool, and get started but there are a couple final things I have sort out starting with how many more misters I need to order (if any) and what that means for water usage.

If it's possible to situate the misting nozzle directly in the middle of the 32 gallon trash bin it might provide enough coverage to get everything, but when it is connected to 12 inches of tube, facing directly upward it doesn't always produce mist because after a misting or two a bead of water begins forming in the center of the Tefen mist head and on subsequent mistings it just makes the bead bigger instead of spraying outward. (woops!)

Having the mist head at a slight angle eliminates this problem, but the bulk of the mist cone ends up being slightly lop-sided for the container. It does seem to cover most of the container when fixed against the wall, but I have a feeling when it's full of roots it may not work so well.

The other option I considered for the Tefen misters is purchasing a solenoid with 1/8" threads and sealing it with silicon tape and placing that in the middle, again held in place with a guide-wire or something else but I think it may have the same "bead problem" anyways. Air-assisted might be the way to go but I don't really have space for an air-compressor here.

Here are a few photos of the bins with active mist. I had to turn the lights off and use a flashlight to really see the spray pattern. There are more here: https://imgur.com/a/UbWZK7s

View attachment 4430554
View attachment 4430555View attachment 4430557

Here's a better view of what the actual grow space looks like, I still have to finish wrapping it in vapor barrier and constructing the tent:

The room itself is 12' x 5' but I only plan to make the flowering tent 4x4.

View attachment 4430560


Any advise, suggestions or tips are highly appreciated. I'll try to take pictures any time I make a major change or see something noteworthy.

Cheers!

Click to expand...

Might as well go 4X5 or 5X5 and avoid building that extra wall? You can still keep your canopy in a 4X4 space If you'd want to though.

The only problem is the entrance to the crawlspace is smack in the middle of the room....I didn't consider blocking it, but in the 3 years we lived here the only time someone even entered this back room was when we added insulation under the house so I suppose it isn't that important.

However, I was depending on the EMT tube-cube to support the lighting, but I'm sure there's another way to hook it up. Hmm.

Here's what it looks like without the vapor barrier:

Looks like a pretty cool system and I'm guessing these plants are going to be trees by harvest time?

How light-proof are the blue containers? Might want to black them out.

And have you thought about a downward cork-screw placement of the misters to hit more of the root mass? I'd worry about a dead zone in the middle of the root masses too.

@dstroy is a good source of info here for HPA and @Atomizer too

Good luck! Pics for sure.

I'm planning to run SOG-style with 4 plants per barrel, going to 12/12 as soon as the cuttings have a root system.

I'll definitely be putting a layer of foil over the top as they are not quite light proof. Go with black bins next time for sure.

Yeah, I've tried to read pretty much all of Atom's posts at OpenAg. He convinced me to think outside the box and get these round trash bins. They're about 30" tall and 20" across.

I think (hope?) 4 plants per bin will work.

Haven't tried pointing the mist downwards...the cone is wider than I thought it was going to be so that might be the ticket.

Hooked a nozzle up and played around with the angle. If it's pointing straight down it looks like the cone becomes narrower and it just shoots all the mist at the bottom of the bin.

It looks like placement near the top of the bin, pointing at a downward angle is going to be closer to ideal.

Here's a couple pics that I think came out good. I uploaded a total of 12, u can check out the rest here:

stackmachine said:

I'm planning to run SOG-style with 4 plants per barrel, going to 12/12 as soon as the cuttings have a root system.

I'll definitely be putting a layer of foil over the top as they are not quite light proof. Go with black bins next time for sure.

Yeah, I've tried to read pretty much all of Atom's posts at OpenAg. He convinced me to think outside the box and get these round trash bins. They're about 30" tall and 20" across.

I think (hope?) 4 plants per bin will work.

Haven't tried pointing the mist downwards...the cone is wider than I thought it was going to be so that might be the ticket.

Click to expand...

If you plan on flowering everytime that early,bottom placement of nozzles might work just fine. You're going to hook up drains to these bins that drain back to a central res?

Also, just buy the black rustoleum spray paint that bonds to llastic and do a good coat or two. No need to buy new black totes.
Get the lids too. Just the outside. Do not use paint on inside

I want to run DTW. I have quite a few sets of Solid-state relays that can operate the solenoids as quickly as they're capable of opening and closing. As long as the tube from the valve to the nozzle is short like in the recent pics, the mist seems to be very responsive with almost no spatter.

I did kind of cheap out on these $10 24V solenoids, but I can't really tell if they're better or worse than the more expensive brass ones. So far the one I have hooked in the the line isn't leaking at all. So at least that is a good sign.

I'll grab the Arduino and hook up a relay later today if I have time. Sun is almost down and I gotta run. Thanks for stopping in!

Airwalker16 said:

Also, just buy the black rustoleum spray paint that bonds to llastic and do a good coat or two. No need to buy new black totes.
Get the lids too. Just the outside. Do not use paint on inside

Click to expand...

i don't know crap about HPA but i was thinking light proof insulation to keep the root zones cooler and help avoid root rot.

and speaking of rot @stackmachine are you running sterile or with beneficial bacteria?

stackmachine said:

I want to run DTW. I have quite a few sets of Solid-state relays that can operate the solenoids as quickly as they're capable of opening and closing. As long as the tube from the valve to the nozzle is short like in the recent pics, the mist seems to be very responsive with almost no spatter.

I did kind of cheap out on these $10 24V solenoids, but I can't really tell if they're better or worse than the more expensive brass ones. So far the one I have hooked in the the line isn't leaking at all. So at least that is a good sign.

I'll grab the Arduino and hook up a relay later today if I have time. Sun is almost down and I gotta run. Thanks for stopping in!

Click to expand...

Might as well reuse the water man. Really no point in DTW. It's so quickly touching the roots and dripping off.

@rkymtnman I don't know much about bacteria. I may have done a search or two but the conclusion I tentatively came to is that if I flower the plants as soon as possible, grow strains that are known to ripen fast and do a reasonable job keeping the system clean I could avoid any problems with root rot. I wouldn't be surprised if I'm wrong...

Are the bacteria something you can just spray into the root zone?

@Airwalker16 I'll definitely try to reuse the water somehow, but I don't want to deal with pH buffers and all the extra calculations that would involve for an automated system.

I think I might get a couple air stones and run a DWC upstairs in a window, but hopefully there isn't that much run-off. At my guess of 1 second on/1 minute off that is around 1/3 a gallon per 24 hours for each mister head (also considering they need less at night).

In fact, I actually almost went the recirculating route and attempted an NFT system, but after finally learning that the root ball would turn it into more of a DWC than a true NFT, I abandoned the idea and decided to check out aeroponics, which I thought was a gimmick but after reading the NASA paper I was pretty much sold. I really wanted to do air assisted, but I don't think it's appropriate for the scale I'm growing at. Maybe I'm wrong!

If things go somewhat close to plan I'll eventually add in a dosatron or find a similar solution. The only thing the operator should have to do is tend to the plants and occasionally refill the nutrients, sanitize plant matter plus change water filters. I'm also afraid that if I recycle the nutes, it will clog faster if some of those hydroxyl ions start feeling froggy. Leave it to me to forget to change out the rez on time...at least I won't feel quite as bad if some strawberries get a little nute lockout or nute burn.

Ok! D&D was cancelled tonight so as promised, I was able to get a test relay set up for the one mister and get a feel for what the spray pattern will actually look like.

At the end of the video I tried to move the camera up but it was pretty awkward and I only have a close-up lense for that camera so it got kinda blurry but you can still see a pretty good amount of detail.

I think 1 mister per bin will work.....I'm sure if it's only 2 plants on either side it should be able to get most of the roots. Maybe with 4 plants a second mister will be necessary just to penetrate everything.

There doesn't seem to be much of a difference between a half-second and a full second on the solenoid. It does look like a bit more sprays out and it might spray just a tad further on the 1-second open loops, but it could just be placebo.

For the next test I'll only open the relay for a quarter second and just keep going down until the solenoid won't open any more.

Whew! So it took longer than I expected to get the LEDs assembled. I should have just ordered everything from Digi-key but I didn't want to pay their prices since I'm trying to keep this under budget...Some eBay sellers ship from China even though it doesn't mention it on the sales page so I had to wait a bit longer and almost asked for some refunds.

In the meantime I found this great piece of work on github that can be adapted to my setup:


He's doing more of a DWC-aero setup, but the code is well-commented and easy to edit. TY sir.

I obtained one of the esp-arduino combo boards and will be working on the code today and finishing the grow room assembly this weekend.

Here are a few pics I took of the LED setup. I will test the big strips this weekend since I don't want to cut that much wire until I can measure how much will actually be needed (assuming they work just fine, lol).

I ended up using 1" aluminum angle bar for the strips. Even though I'm only running them at around the nominal 700mA and they shouldn't heat up much, I figured having a little heatsink is better than none at all.


I'll be soaking some rockwool cubes overnight tonight and dropping in a couple seeds tomorrow. Wish me luck!

I'll definitely keep an eye on this thread. Exciting build ahead of ya!!!

Finally got everything together....holidays seem like a great time for relatives to bonk their heads and end up in the hospital, so there were a few unforeseen delays getting everything hooked up, even though I had the parts.

I soaked the gro-block cubes in EC 0.4 nutrient solution that I formulated with HydroBuddy and measured with a home-made mg scale. The only micro-nutrient I added was the DTPA iron since anything else would be near-impossible to measure since I only made a gallon.

I never would have guessed that rockwool cubes had a common "mildew problem." I figured the first set that I "tested" got the mildew smell because I left them for a good 2+ weeks and never really smelled them or anything after the initial pH testing. (they are completely pH neutral, btw) I noticed it with the seedlings, however, but most of the google research I did suggests that it's no big deal and totally normal for rockwool.

I have doubts about that, but the smell isn't too strong, and I'll only be taking cuttings from these plants anyways. Also, maybe the heatpad wasn't necessary since it's a steady 75 degrees in here, but the humidity is super low and I thought they might need a boost. Not sure if that had anything to do with the mildew but they popped up much faster than the batch I did in soil last year.

One of cookies seeds didn't "pop" so this morning (day 5) I decided to give it a little help and finished the job removing the hull from around the cotyledon with some fine tweezers....I think it got a little bit of "greenness" from the light today, but I don't want to say more until tomorrow morning.

The video LED panel I'm using for the seedlings is set to 10% brightness at 5600K shining on them (which still seems pretty bright) but they kept stretching even though the light was only inches away. I went ahead and bumped it up to 70%. At 100% it was getting warm, but 70 doesn't seem bad. Hopefully the extra photons are what they were after.

The ESP-LINK website is working and I've tested all the relays and sensors so the system is ready for production.

I went ahead and put the gro-block cubes into the 3" net pots and put the foam rings on to support the stretchy girls. Once I see roots coming through the bottom I'll put them in the tank.


Next update in a week or so or if anything goes really wrong xD

Was starting to see root tips at the bottom of each net cup yesterday so moved them over last night and filled the tank this morning with EC 1.3 nutes at about 2:1:2 with all the micros added this time.

Been giving them half a second on and a full second off all day and the cups were staying damp, even though you could barely see anything if you watched for the sprays.

I tried popping another cookies seed but I tried some sandpaper on the shell and either I killed it or was another dud. Both of the duds from that batch were a lot darker than the other 3 seeds....Since that is the strain I am most excited to try out, I'm just going to hold off and make sure the system is fully working before risking the either of the remaining 2 seeds.

By the look of it, the 3 plants in there are doing very well so far. Lots of root growth in just a single day. I'm getting ready for bed and am going to flip off the lights soon. Not sure when I should just go to 24 hours for the mothers. Figure I'd give them a few weeks of 6-8 hour nights first.

I wish there was more information about these Shurflo pumps online. I've read a few different user guides and maintenance guides but there isn't much practical knowledge out there. Yesterday I filled the entire system and drained it a couple times with fresh RO water just to make sure it was working and cleaned out.

At one point I thought the pump was broken somehow, but I guess it lost its prime and I should have just let it run longer. I took apart the head assembly and examined the diaphragm part and there was nothing wrong with it. Just put it back together and it started pumping immediately.

Today I filled the system to ~100psi and it has been spraying through the one nozzle all day but barely made a dent in the pressure level. I tried to turn the pump on to top off before bed, but it just came on for half a second (or was it the solenoid for half a second?), then turned off immediately and won't even start pumping now when I give it power. I'm assuming the pressure switch is activated...starting to think I should have just got a bypasss version of the pump, since the computer controls it anyways....there's an adjustment switch for the cutoff. I've tried going both ways and it still won't kick on. I'm guessing there is just too much pressure in there still so will just have to wait till the morning. The soonest I could get a replacement will be Tuesday most likely from Amazon if that's what it needs.

Looks like we're already seeing some hairs on a few of these root tips. I'll get my close-up DSLR out once there's more to see.

Amazing that they grew so much in just a single day!

Ok....woke up nice and fresh. Guess I was a little paranoid about the pump. You can just unplug the terminals from the pressure switch and bypass it yourself. Pump is just fine! xD

Filled from 90-100psi in about 20 seconds. The first 9 gallons move the sensor from about 0-40 psi and the last 2 gallons go from 40-100.

stackmachine said:

Ok....woke up nice and fresh. Guess I was a little paranoid about the pump. You can just unplug the terminals from the pressure switch and bypass it yourself. Pump is just fine! xD

Filled from 90-100psi in about 20 seconds. The first 9 gallons move the sensor from about 0-40 psi and the last 2 gallons go from 40-100.

Click to expand...

What are you explaining here?

Just some observations...I guess you can't really expect these industrial pumps to really break that easily.

Quite a few things I've read about people with debris inside their diaphragm pumps jammed up. But after I disassembled it Thursday I realized they're pretty well-made. The entire time I visualized that the pressure switch would reset to the "on" state if you de-energized the pump.

TL;DR: When you're filling the accumulator, it will pump up to ~100PSI then stop. If you de-energize the pump, then re-energize it above the low-pressure level it still won't come back on.

The only reason I got a pressure switch model was for redundant safety backup in case the microcontroller somehow stopped sensing pressure with the pump in an "on" state.