Cool technique. I'm curious about the benefits of fogging. Does the fog contain nutrients or is it just H2O floating around?

In my experience a strong air pump/air stone will splash lots of water up to your net pots, and hydroton will wick it up from there. That's how I start my rooted clones in my buckets, at least. It's kinda like aeroponics! You seem to be keeping your water level lower than I do though so it might be different. Is that beneficial bacteria on your roots?

I also use GH nutes. The Flora series though. I've heard that the Flora Nova series is great too, but I've never had a reason to try it.

1. Fogging has been used by NASA and yes the fog contains nutes as it is the soup that gets fogged, not just the water.
Similar to "misting" or forced (high pressure spray) I like it because of the "no moving parts" so no clogging, just outright failure!

2. I do not have airstones in the tank, as that was displacing the fog as that air has to go somewhere.

3. What I do is aerate the soup in another tank and that gravity feeds into tank1.

4. Since I am constantly circulating the soup and chilling it, the soup is "saturated" with oxygen better.
(This is from Jorge's book)

5. I was running some bacteria and since lowering the temp, all that stuff is proving to be not needed.
The crap you see on the roots may have been from junk growing in the embarrassment I was using for a cloner.
It worked is all I can say.

6, Try the Flora Nova on a grow or two and you might like it. I just try to keep all the variables within a range so I can figure out WTF is going on with my grows.

This is a "hobby" medical supply project for me and under constant improvement/review ergo the LED and new cloner (with a chiller even!).
I just couldn't waste all that Six Sigma training I was forced to attend. LOL

As long as the solution has enough dissolved oxygen (DO) you don't have to use air stones in each bucket but beefxer is also right that the fogger isn't required if the air stones/pump create enough bubbles to keep the bottom/sides of the net pots wet. However, hydroton isn't a great medium for "wicking." Once the roots are actually in the water the fogger doesn't do a lot though. I use mine mostly for clones.

As I've often said, growing is part science and part art so there is no one single right way to do it. There are several versions of "dwc."

You wouldn't believe the # out there that think MJ is a balloon and the more bubbles the better.

Here is a link to a paper on temp and oxygen in hydroponics:

http://www.simplyhydro.com/nutrient_temp.htm

You are correct, once the roots hit the soup, the fogger doesn't add much, however in my application it keeps the area below the net pot and the soup "moist" for the roots.

I could get around the fogger altogether by raising the soup level till it touched the net pot (which is what I do in the cloner), but that would require almost 50 gallons of soup and chilling it also.

This is good for a laugh.

My old cloner.

It did work and for several years.

Yeah, I know quite a bit about oxygenation and the same holds true in hydroponics, aquariums, lakes, ponds and even the oceans. The higher the temp the lower the ORP which is the ability of water to hold oxygen. Also, in a system like yours, where the remote reservoir is oxygenated instead of each "bucket" the longer the run from the remote to the bucket the more DO loss occurs. Since this isn't the first grow in your system and you use a chiller you obviously aren't having DO issues. Many people underestimate the effects of water temps.

The more bubbles the better is true in the situation where you want the breaking bubbles to splash the bottom of the net pots. However, the more bubbles the more agitation and the rolling of the water is actually better for oxygenation than the bubbles themselves. Very little DO occurs from the bubbles rising from bottom to top, most of it comes from the roiling of the surface. Aquariums often use "wave action" pumps instead of bubbling type air pumps. Needle wheel pumps work in a way that agitates the water so much that it cavitates and micro-bubbles are formed which are also used in protein skimmers.

Many people do just that, they start the plants, in DWC, with the water level touching the bottoms and after the roots are better established in the water they lower the level below the net pot. The roots that are in the water provide enough nutrients that whatever small amount that is provided by the fogger wouldn't be needed after, even with level below the pots. The amount of roots out of the water provide more oxygen to the root system and are not adversely effected by not being submerged as long as there are roots established in the nutrients. Other people water top down with drip type systems until the roots are established.

There are a 1000 ways to skin a rabbit...

Only 1000?

You want a laugh?

Listen to the old Monty Python routine about how to measure the height of a building with a thermometer.

Start of week 5, halfway point.

I twisted the opposing two of each tank against each other for LST as the height was gonna be a problem.

Ran some "Bushmaster" for 4 days also.

Those are some bushy plants there dwcled!

What do you mean by "the opposing two of each tank"?

beefxer wrote:Those are some bushy plants there dwcled!

What do you mean by "the opposing two of each tank"?

Each tank holds three plants.

I took the two farthest from each other (per tank), bent them at 90 deg and intertwined them with each other.

My cheap way of doing LST. lol

I still have to clear out some bottom growth.

The light is spread more evenly on the canopy so the chamber is full.