Whats your ideal Coco/Salts setup?

TCH

Well-Known Member
CANNA Coco Brick 40l Expandable Natural Plant Medium Soil Substrate, 40 Liter Expanded - 8 Liter Dry, Reusable (1) https://a.co/d/dLpw1fh

HM Digital COM-80 Electrical Conductivity (EC) and Total Dissolved Solids Hydro Tester, 0-5000 ppm TDS Range, 1 ppm Resolution, 2% Readout Accuracy https://a.co/d/7heckyj


Apera Instruments AI311 Premium Series PH60 Waterproof pH Pocket Tester Kit, Replaceable Probe, ±0.01 pH Accuracy https://a.co/d/a7Hc4Tx

These 3 are what I would recommend for starting out. Along with the proper storage and calibration fluids for the meters. Of course, you can use the drops and strips for ph testing, but I can never tell exactly what color the solution is and I get confused. I like a digital readout. The coco expanded, rinsed and buffered way easier than some cheap stuff I had originally bought. As far as an actual system, I'm a diy kinda guy. I ran blumats for a couple runs and am getting ready to setup a drip system for the next run. I am still piecing that together, but should be fairly inexpensive to finish up.
 

DrDukePHD

Well-Known Member
CANNA Coco Brick 40l Expandable Natural Plant Medium Soil Substrate, 40 Liter Expanded - 8 Liter Dry, Reusable (1) https://a.co/d/dLpw1fh

HM Digital COM-80 Electrical Conductivity (EC) and Total Dissolved Solids Hydro Tester, 0-5000 ppm TDS Range, 1 ppm Resolution, 2% Readout Accuracy https://a.co/d/7heckyj


Apera Instruments AI311 Premium Series PH60 Waterproof pH Pocket Tester Kit, Replaceable Probe, ±0.01 pH Accuracy https://a.co/d/a7Hc4Tx

These 3 are what I would recommend for starting out. Along with the proper storage and calibration fluids for the meters. Of course, you can use the drops and strips for ph testing, but I can never tell exactly what color the solution is and I get confused. I like a digital readout. The coco expanded, rinsed and buffered way easier than some cheap stuff I had originally bought. As far as an actual system, I'm a diy kinda guy. I ran blumats for a couple runs and am getting ready to setup a drip system for the next run. I am still piecing that together, but should be fairly inexpensive to finish up.
So you don't suggest the pre rinsed/buffered coco? If I do it by hand, instead of a watering system how often will I need to hand water? And does pot size make a difference with that?
 

coreywebster

Well-Known Member
CANNA Coco Brick 40l Expandable Natural Plant Medium Soil Substrate, 40 Liter Expanded - 8 Liter Dry, Reusable (1) https://a.co/d/dLpw1fh

HM Digital COM-80 Electrical Conductivity (EC) and Total Dissolved Solids Hydro Tester, 0-5000 ppm TDS Range, 1 ppm Resolution, 2% Readout Accuracy https://a.co/d/7heckyj


Apera Instruments AI311 Premium Series PH60 Waterproof pH Pocket Tester Kit, Replaceable Probe, ±0.01 pH Accuracy https://a.co/d/a7Hc4Tx

These 3 are what I would recommend for starting out. Along with the proper storage and calibration fluids for the meters. Of course, you can use the drops and strips for ph testing, but I can never tell exactly what color the solution is and I get confused. I like a digital readout. The coco expanded, rinsed and buffered way easier than some cheap stuff I had originally bought. As far as an actual system, I'm a diy kinda guy. I ran blumats for a couple runs and am getting ready to setup a drip system for the next run. I am still piecing that together, but should be fairly inexpensive to finish up.
$29 for 40ltr of canna block?

Is that common over there?

It's about £13.50 for a 50lt bag in the UK
 

curious2garden

Well-Known Mod
Staff member
My local grow stores have all stopped carrying the Canna Coco I loved. So I've been buying and using this:

It's about 1/2 the price of what I was paying for Canna and works fine.
 

coreywebster

Well-Known Member
Don't have a ton to spend but would you spend it on? Autopots, Octopots? What kind of PH/EC/PPM meters? What kind of coco?

Whats a good starting part list? Hoping to spend $350 total or less.
The best method for coco is drain to waste.

Building an automated set up is pretty cheap.

Personally I do Recirculating , but DTW is far more straight forward and recommended.

As for nutrients.. pick one that's cheap.
I own the fancy gadgets but you don't need more than a basic few dollar ph test kit. It will never lie to you.

Unless you need silent operation don't dabble with autopots.
 

PopAndSonGrows

Well-Known Member
The light

The majority of ANY money i spend, will be on lighting. I use cheap pots, cheap coco, cheap tents, hell even cheap fans and cheap nutrients (General Hydroponics FloraNova). I'll even grow cheap genetics, lol.

Lighting is PARAMOUNT. You can get an "affordable" light, but don't cheap-out on that
 

ec121

Well-Known Member
Don't have a ton to spend but would you spend it on? Autopots, Octopots? What kind of PH/EC/PPM meters? What kind of coco?

Whats a good starting part list? Hoping to spend $350 total or less.
Arguably the best way to grow in coco is to use a drain to waste setup.

As for coco, you can use cheap brick shit that's loaded to the gills with salt and coco peat (coco dust and coffee grounds sized coco). It just means you'll need to rinse out the salt (doesn't take long) with a garden hose and sift out all the peat and impurities. After you do that, you'll want to do one or two 12-hour soaks in a strong solution of calmag (like 7ml per gallon of water) to buffer it. After that, you'll be left with high quality coco.

So you don't suggest the pre rinsed/buffered coco? If I do it by hand, instead of a watering system how often will I need to hand water? And does pot size make a difference with that?
The Canna coco bricks he suggest are rinsed and buffered before being compressed into bricks.

Whether you hand water or auto water, you'll want to start out by watering at least once a day. As you get into flower, you'll want to water at least twice a day. This is just the minimal optimal way to grow in coco.

One could use a 5gal pot and water every few days to a week, but that is not taking advantage of the opportunities coco provides and you should just use Pro-Mix or some other peat-based medium if you can't be bothered with feeding frequently.

Pot size does make a difference. Tall and narrow is better than wide and short. The smaller the pot, the more often you'll need to water because it will become rootbound sooner. I use 1g pots.
 

crimsonecho

Well-Known Member
probably totally unhelpful to the op but i use coco as a base in my organic mixes and have been using plagron bricks and i got nothing to complain about. so if it somehow makes it easier to stay in budget you can dyor on plagron bricks. again tho not using salts.
 

secretmicrogrow420

Well-Known Member
The light

The majority of ANY money i spend, will be on lighting. I use cheap pots, cheap coco, cheap tents, hell even cheap fans and cheap nutrients (General Hydroponics FloraNova). I'll even grow cheap genetics, lol.

Lighting is PARAMOUNT. You can get an "affordable" light, but don't cheap-out on that
i have been reading all the comments and yours is the one i agree with the most!
after growing with my brother for years and doing a couple grows by myself i have realized that lighting is the most important thing also your genetics dictate the smell of your weed so if you have genetics that have crappy terpene profiles your gonna hate life at harvest.
and
i use nutrifield coco i get it in bricks cheap on amazon and i have had great results! i don't use the coco with perlite just the coco in bricks. i hear that if you add perlite into the coco you can feed more frequently but im scared of changing anything because what im doing is currently working!
here is a picture of my plant that i grew with nutrifield coco im pretty proud of how healthy she is <3 ;3
20231020_045439.jpg
 

DrDukePHD

Well-Known Member
The light

The majority of ANY money i spend, will be on lighting. I use cheap pots, cheap coco, cheap tents, hell even cheap fans and cheap nutrients (General Hydroponics FloraNova). I'll even grow cheap genetics, lol.

Lighting is PARAMOUNT. You can get an "affordable" light, but don't cheap-out on that
Yea I've got a couple Mars Hydro FC-4800's & all the stuff for growing in soil. This Coco/Salts is just new to me.
 

Kola_Kreator

Well-Known Member
The most important part of a coco dtw set up is the auto watering system. You can try and hand water but the results won't even be close to what can be achieved with auto watering. Coco should be watered to run off anywhere from 3 to 12 times a day, everyday, if you want kick ass plants.
 
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