Ok, I made the leap to DWC. I built my own 100 litre tote and plan to grow one plant first time through. I’ve had successful grows using ProMix HP. I use AN and have a question regarding water changes and adding nutes. In ProMix I would water 4 liters every three to four days on a feed feed water schedule. In 4 litres AN feed chart states adding 16 ml of base nutes and 8 ml in additives. Now in DWC I have read to change the res every 7-14 days veg and weekly in bloom. Since I have a 100 litre tote that means adding 400 ml base nutes and 200 ml additives. If I am doing this weekly that is using a lot more nutes then I would be in ProMix HP. Therefore a lot more money spent on nutes. Am I correct in saying that DWC uses a lot more nutrients then a ProMix HP grow or do I have this wrong. Please help a newbie to DWC. Thanks @dbrn32 and anyone else that could help.
200 liters for one plant is way overkill. My whole system holds 34 liters and I grow two at a time.
I also use AN art 50% the chart. However, I have been pondering going to full strength.
I perform a water change every 2 weeks.
Doing 1 plant, your res is probably quite a bit bigger than it needs to be. No harm there though. 100 liters is about 25 us gallons right? When you put net pot into lid and leave gap between that and top of water level, how much can you fit in? My guess is probably only 60-75% which means in 100 liter tote you would probably be running 60-75 liters of solution. From there, you need to learn to top off instead of replace. Should last every bit of 2 weeks with minor additions if any. Maybe even longer.
I currently have my first ever DWC it is a 5 gallon square style from lowe’s and I am about to move her to flower. I also am using only the parts A and B from the PH perfect from AN. I have only changed my bucket out once, and most recently only added 1 gallon to it to carry me over into flower. Now I don’t know how this will relate to the size your using but I can tell you this much I have been using full strength from the start and have had no problems. I believe instead of entirely switching my bucket I could have just added to it and it would have saved me some on nutes. I would watch your plants and just top off if you are using that size res. Just my 2 cents.
If you want to take a look at my thread you can see the progression of my first DWC. and where it is now. 