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Martha
Martha
4 years ago

I really enjoyed this show.  I would love to hear you talk more about M3…..maybe an idea for a future show.  Thanks!!

 

 

Insidious
Insidious
4 years ago

Jack, are you going to flood and drain with the VM due to algae/mold issues?

Brain has been working on how to make it work since listening yesterday.

V.1 – Float valve that works the opposite of toilet float (closes valve until full, then opens valve)

V.2 – Sprinkler valves on timers. Use valve on drain pipe. Drain into ‘next’ tray. Really these are only on the deep trays. So pump the water into the top and let drain into the 1st deep tray (same as now). Let it sit for x minutes. Drain into next tray, repeat. This version takes 2 valves & timers (pricey). Was thinking you could do one valve connected to both deep tray drain valves, but this has the same problem as the current system…too much draw down on the reservoir.

Which made my brain go to…

V.3 Just get a bigger reservoir =)

If you’re stuck with a ‘small’ reservoir, I think you’d call this ‘new’ type of system ‘sequential flood and drain’. Would be very easy with a microcontroller & some valves, but I’d prefer something simpler if possible (brain still working on it).

Looking forward to seeing what you come up with.

Working on my own v.2 system with LESS greens (can’t eat them all) and LESS microgreens (ditto. really can’t fill up that shallow tray, need less than half that much space) but with some added tall trellised plants (cucumbers and tomatoes. cucumbers grew fine in the bottom deep tray, trellised up the back of the regular VF but will choke everything else out if you don’t manage them).

2″ pots got pretty choked with stalks/roots so I get going to 4″. When the plants get big they tend to topple or pull out the 2″ pots (IME).

Insidious
Insidious
4 years ago

Thinking in comments… =)

The sprinkler valve idea was to use it on the ‘drain’ pipe (not saying this will work for you). System same as v.1 except add ‘drain’ to both deep trays. Drain line to res, with sprinkler valve at end of pipe. Valve is closed during cycle. Opens between cycles to drain trays. (still doesn’t work for 40 gallon reservoir).

With ‘sequential flood & drain’ (more complex!)  you still need 20 gallons to flood + 4″ for pump + 5 gallon draw down. If you stick with the 40 gallon container, that’s still 34 gallons of water (283 lbs). A smaller footprint tub would lower the amount of water needed to keep the pump under water (with this tote 9.2 gallons, or 77 lbs of weight are because the pump isn’t in a sump).

 

For those thinking about this, roughly 4.4 gallons per inch of water in the deep trays.

2 trays x 4.5″ water = 39.6 gallons

+ maybe 1″ for shallow tray = 4.4 gallons

So your 40 gallon reservoir is going to be mighty empty (it’s a wee bit less as the trays taper).

40 gallon commander tote is 17″ deep, so about 2.3 gallon per inch. Pump is about 4″ tall (9.4 gallons). Transpiration loss per week for me is about 5 gallons.

Math suggests I can raise the water height during the cycles in the deep trays 3″ max

 

On Weight:

v1 VF – 17 gallon reservoir + 39.6 gallons in deep trays (472 lbs.)

v2 VF – 40 gallon reservoir + 22 gallons in deep trays (if 2.5″ water held in trays) (517 lbs.)

More weight at the bottom for moving though.

Insidious
Insidious
4 years ago
Reply to  Insidious

I may be misunderstanding here though, because you may be lowering the net cups & the flood level so that total flood depth (2.5″ held + 2″ flood) is LESS than 4.5″.

Insidious
Insidious
4 years ago

With two pumps could split the reservoir into two bins (reuse the one from v1). Would allow more water if needed, and allow different nutrients/depths/water change times.

Seems like the single giant reservoir walls might bulge more (don’t know that they change the wall thickness based on bin size).

Insidious
Insidious
4 years ago

Or…could create a ‘faux’ sump by taking up space around pump at bottom of 40 gallon container. 2″ Styrofoam x2 with a rectangle cut out for the pump. Hold it down mechanically or glue it. Would reduce water weight by 70-75 lbs & get total water weight to around 210 lbs. =)

I may actually do this in my current reservoir, as any liquid volume below the pump isn’t getting me anything except extra system weight.

Insidious
Insidious
4 years ago

It doesn’t help with the water volume needed to flood, it just reduces the overall system weight.

Insidious
Insidious
4 years ago

@ another VF idea…

pump water like current system (into top tray)

overflow drains into middle tray. add drain/return line, but put a cap on it with a 1/4″ hole in it. overflow remains the same.

same on bottom tray.

so pump/flow is higher/faster than can be drained out of the 1/4″ drain/return line, but after the pump stops the trays will drain completely.

In theory, you could just use the existing overflow pipe, but drill a hole in it at the base, particularly if you’re going to leave some of the water in the tray (0.5″). This would save some bulkheads and piping.

=) – still mulling this over