Old Hippie dirt farmer looking to go hydro got a few ??

Ok go ahead and slam me for being a dirt farmer. old habits ya know. oh and i cant spell either so light up a fatty and laugh why not i am
any way im in Hawaii and allowed 7 plants only 3 can be "mature",
im looking to set up a perpetual hydro grow.
ive been looking at a 5 gal bucket continous drip set up
my idea is to set it up to harvest 1 plant per month. and replace w a clone.
so ill have a mother plant and 6 others in various stages,
so my questions are has any one used one of these set ups they sell um on ebay and amazon
just 5gal buckets w a net pot and LECA for media, a pump and the proper tubing.
i have closet aprox. 5'X5' and plan to use the cfls i have been using [ at least for now]
i will also be setting up a smaller place to house a mother plant, i have a rapid rooter
can i place the pucks from that and just put it in the LECA or do i need to use rockwool or something like that?
im well aware that alot of this is personal preferance, but any advise will help.
im thinking of going w the fox farm, it stuff looks like a lot of u use it
so any disadvantages to the drip thing or would i be better off w a DWC set up ??

sorry I havent figured out this mac thing yet so pics ?? well someday .....maybe
my mind is stuck in windows office

i saw a quote a while ago it was something like " dro is like fake tits, they look awsome untill you get your hands on them. you realize something isnt right" i really agree with that statement. i always found dro was nice and dense and covered in trichs, but tasted iffy and always burned my tounge and throat.

A friend of mine recently converted to dro because she thought it would be easier. well i asked her how much easier it is and she thinks its more work. (all the res. changes and checking ph and tds. and adjusting) Not to mention all the water you use and the pumps/airators and fans its just alot of stuff that can go wrong.

i would say if your in it for the $$ go for it. and yes keeping track of the ph and tds will create optimum growth but im not a big fan of the taste, and sometimes dro just gives me a headache....this is just my opinion, but good luck +sry to be a buzzkill.

bud nugbong said:

well i asked her how much easier it is and she thinks its more work

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All depends how your system is setup - set it up right and hydro should be way easier. Just common sense stuff like running a pump from the res to a drain, running water lines to your res's, ect.

Three plants is pretty shitty. I'm normally not a fan of the 5 gallon bucket systems, but they might not bad bad if you are only doing three plants.

Thanks guys, im still just studying on it
my current grow is just going to 12/12 so I got time

I use a waterfarm single and pulled 7.1 zips off 1 plant my first time and see no reason to go back to soil.

I suggest keeping some of your soil going while you experiment and learn with 1 or 2 hydro. That way if things go wrong, or it is more of a learning experience than a production attempt, you will still have what you already know works.

Good luck grower.

Hey!

If you can only flower 3 at a time, you'll want them to be big ones.
CFLs arent going to cut it

WELL thats 3 mature plants, a total of 7 so i can have 4 more in veg

OH I am running 1400 watts of cfl. swithchin between 27k and 65k bulbs for veg and bloom.
always worked in the past. someday when ILL buy the HPS set up. right now i have cfls