DTW or recirculation

[Beil]

I'll suss out the building of each after; pumps, levels, air, reservoir, google, bunnings etc. Ill figure it out most likely fot which ever route I go.

But, for those that use either or have used both... which do you prefer and why?

Recirculation seems easier from a "well i dont have to discard anything and can just top up as needed" POV, but theres likely something that I'm missing there..

And DTW seems easier because you just fill up every time and wait till it depletes... again, unless im missing something.

Haven't looked into the EC and ph of reservoir nutes yet, but if that's applicable please mention.

My first run i was planning on just using soil like outdoors whilst I sussed the hydro aspect, so got time to get the knowledge required.

 

[Goonie Goat]

I'll suss out the building of each after; pumps, levels, air, reservoir, google, bunnings etc. Ill figure it out most likely fot which ever route I go.

But, for those that use either or have used both... which do you prefer and why?

Recirculation seems easier from a "well i dont have to discard anything and can just top up as needed" POV, but theres likely something that I'm missing there..

And DTW seems easier because you just fill up every time and wait till it depletes... again, unless im missing something.

Haven't looked into the EC and ph of reservoir nutes yet, but if that's applicable please mention.

My first run i was planning on just using soil like outdoors whilst I sussed the hydro aspect, so got time to get the knowledge required.

Recirculation works fine for myself but it can be a waste of space.

When I did drain to waste in my 5×5 I constantly had issues with the timer not switching off and completely flooded the tent atleast 7-8 times.
I'd say it doesn't matter but the better question - how easy can I make things on myself..

I started with the flood table my very first grow on here and people told me it wasn't gonna work because the roots were exposed to light.



Don't think I failed too much, besides the plants looking a bit ratty on the lowers...

Anyway that was a very simple setup but algae would take over and stain the roots, so I moved onto dripper halos and coco instead.

Tried going back to drain to waste, issues with the timer not turning off and flooding whole tent... Then I bought the flood table back out and decided to just stick with it. Don't need to worry about flooding tent, the maintenance is minimal, don't even need to do res changes most the time, I can leave the plants for upto 2 weeks depending on the stages they're at, which you probably couldn't do with a dtw or a more intricate setup like dwc

 

[Goonie Goat]

2 of these should fit snug in your 90×90 https://growkings.com.au/products/r...MIz479zYuElQMVZWAPAh1PhR7PEAQYBCABEgIybPD_BwE

A few members here use them..
You could possibly run a storage box underneath for a reservoir, use drippers and just have the runoff drain directly back into the storage box..
Or if you need the extra head room you could have have a reservoir sitting outside of the tent and hook a small bilge pump up to push runoff from a collection container back out of the tent and into the reservoir..

Many ways to skin a cat, even autopots could be the go but I have no experience with them

 

[Beil]

2 of these should fit snug in your 90×90 https://growkings.com.au/products/r...MIz479zYuElQMVZWAPAh1PhR7PEAQYBCABEgIybPD_BwE

A few members here use them..
You could possibly run a storage box underneath for a reservoir, use drippers and just have the runoff drain directly back into the storage box..
Or if you need the extra head room you could have have a reservoir sitting outside of the tent and hook a small bilge pump up to push runoff from a collection container back out of the tent and into the reservoir..

Many ways to skin a cat, even autopots could be the go but I have no experience with them

Mate, I've just been looking on ebay for those and coming up with bloody $60+ (after clicking yoir 2025 thread it clicked).
Thats perfect.
My alternative cheaper diy was fabric pot on wooden risers in a cut off bucket or just a tote on a milk crate with some poly fittings to return to the 40L tote I already have.
Not going to lie, despite the thread title, recirculation seems to be my preference (especially as it have a mate who I just found out does the same so i can pick his brains when he's over).

If i can keep everything in the tent it'd be my preference.

 

[Goonie Goat]

Mate, I've just been looking on ebay for those and coming up with bloody $60+ (after clicking yoir 2025 thread it clicked).
Thats perfect.
My alternative cheaper diy was fabric pot on wooden risers in a cut off bucket or just a tote on a milk crate with some poly fittings to return to the 40L tote I already have.
Not going to lie, despite the thread title, recirculation seems to be my preference (especially as it have a mate who I just found out does the same so i can pick his brains when he's over).

If i can keep everything in the tent it'd be my preference.

Yeah recirculating is great, the only thing to watch out for is rising ph from plants eating, the bigger the res the better but I'd say 40L-50L should be good enough, a bigger reservoir will keep things more stable like temps etc..
The ph will take a while to creep up with a decent sized res compared to a smaller one.

Automate irrigation with timers and the plants will basically grow themselves, once a week just top the res up and add more nutes and theyll do their thing.

 

[Beil]

Yeah recirculating is great, the only thing to watch out for is rising ph from plants eating, the bigger the res the better but I'd say 40L-50L should be good enough, a bigger reservoir will keep things more stable like temps etc..
The ph will take a while to creep up with a decent sized res compared to a smaller one.

Automate it with timers and the plants will basically grow themselves, once a week you just top the res up and add more nutes and theyll do their thing.

Yeah I like automation, all my garden beds are on timers (and the feeding of the fruit trees etc have a venturi fertigation system set up so i can just fill it, send it, then turn off after a beer and back to normal watering) even my brew rig i have on a timer to get it heating before I wake up to brew.
So this will definitely have timers to automate as much as I can. First grow likely won't, although now I've got my mind in it I'll probably manage to make time to suss it out and get it sorted in the next couple week whilst they germinate.
Was at bunnings today buying cables, power boards and bungee cords for the inline fan, I have a couple timers already so the light timing etc will be good to go from the get go.

My brewing ph meter shit itself so I'll be needing to get a new one of them regardless and I have a TDS/EC meter I got for my aquarium that collecting dust.