Grow Mediums 6 bucket DIY DWC -- need good air pump for indoor operation for 6 buckets

[flat9]

Hi everyone. I'm looking for a good pump (high power) that also at least makes an attempt to be quiet. I can't quite deal with the 60 db + of the commercial pumps I've seen. I'm willing to pay a bit more for it, by the way.

So my two questions:

1) For ideal conditions, what's the minimum flow rate per bucket you'd recommend? I figure there must be a point of saturation in terms of plant response, and you get diminished returns for added flow.

2) With this mind, what would you recommend for a 6 bucket RDWC that also manages to stay quiet (i.e., ideally about 40 db or less)?

 

[flat9]

FYI, my buckets are 5 gal.

 

[Groff]

Air flow or water flow? I have no first hand experience though, but really taking my time as I have very limited funds

I myself am on the same boat. I want to build me a 4 rdwc with main epicenter. I have a Hailea 9820, I think is slightly better than the V60, not sure, but it is very very quiet.

Dissolved 02 is a bit of a myth, many theories around say mega bubbles vs micro bubbles etc. there seems to be no "too much air", but water temperature is by far more important than lots of bubbles.

For water, I have no clue about pumps, but I've see numerous accounts that a minimum exchange of 4x volume of 1 bucket per hour is the minimum, but don't really understand why

In any case, are you building yourself or buying ready-made? I'm designing a system where I could isolate each bucket individually so I can run autos in them

 

[Groff]

oops, air pump on the title lol...

 

[flat9]

It's a six 5 gal bucket rdwc system with a 27 gal tote as a res and control that I'm building myself. Will use a 400 gph submersible pump to draw water into/push water out from the res. The buckets will be arranged in a loop.... one hose in and one hose out in each bucket. Figuring in typical use of about 3 gal in 6 buckets and 22 in the res, that's 40 gal. So it will circulate about ten times every hour, or once every six minutes. I'm sure more flow and circulation is better for keeping temps cool, but the tradeoff is the heat the pump generates.

Anyway, about air, I was actually reading in other forums that the bubbles don't matter at all! They were saying that water displacement at the surface is most responsible for nutrients being absorbed by the roots, and they recommended using waterfall or flooming or something:
http://www.rollitup.org/dwc-bubbleponics/491985-dwc-no-air-stones-you.html

Getting by without the cost of all these air stones and air pumps would be pretty awesome. Also, check out this video on using a venturi water pump to oxygenate the water... makes air stones and pumps seem like a waste.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4czczYnuM_w&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Regarding the pump you have, I think it is equivalent to the v-60 in terms of displacement and sound damping. I just bought one of these (the 100 liter/min model) but I'm wondering if I didn't even need it:
http://www.charlesausten.com/Files/charlesaustenpumps/pdfs/88505.pdf

 

[flat9]

Oh and yeah, as the thread topic suggests, I was talking about air flow.

 

[flat9]

https://www.thcfarmer.com/community/threads/flooming-vs-airstones.34550/

 

[flat9]

Well, if anyone is interested, I'm sticking with the air bubbles, mainly because I'm in awe of Seymour Buds' results and want to attempt to replicate them as much as I can. To that end, this is the pump I went with since I couldn't find anything else that matched the performance both in terms of lpm (100) and db (< 45) for the price I found it for on ebay ($170). The power draw is 80 watts, which puts me at about 2 watts per gallon over the entire system including res (typical use will have about 40 gallons total... 3 in the buckets, 22 in the res).

http://www.charlesausten.com/Files/charlesaustenpumps/pdfs/88505.pdf

It's the ET100 model.

All that being said, I'd still love to see if you can do this without an air pump. It'd be quieter at the very least...