I have several waterfarm set-ups. Each has 8 buckets, all connected together and fed from their upper and lower reservoir set up.
When I first bought the waterfarms, I wasn't on the internet and didn't have access to great forums such as greenpassion. I wasn't remotely aware of flushing as often as I am now learning should be flushed. Previously I only flushed when I harvested.
What is the best way to flush an entire waterfarm? I tried putting a T fitting on an end bucket and was hoping I could drain it into a bucket, but as soon as I lift the hose off of floor level the water flow stops. So then I tried raising my reservoirs almost a foot off the floor, but that didn't create the pressure I was hoping for.
I bet there is someone out there that has had the same issue and has a clever solution. I'd love to hear it if that someone is you.

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Hi K,
If the waterfarm system you have is the GHE (E&F), I do have a similar system built by IWS, and what I do is I flush each bucket though the hydroton with Ph´ed water (about 2x the size of the bucket) and let that ph´ed water drain directly to the drain. I do keep a double set of hose for each bucket and for the whole system, and when I do a flushing I do change the hoses to the system and put the "used" hoses in tap water with H2O2 at 35% (a lot H2O2!!!), to kill any germs, mold or whatever that could bring problem to my crop (this saved me a lot of problems that I was having at the beginning with mold)
Here is a picture of the waterfarm system I am talking about and a picture of the E&F system that I have
I hope this can help you
Peace


waterfarm


IWS E&F

Idea:

You can use a wet/dry vacuum or one of those Bissel rug cleaners that has the roll-about tub that collects the dirty water. (not the upright model)

A wet/dry vac will suck the water out in a minute or two....

the other way is to build a wood/plywood platform and raise the entire system up so it will drain properly....say on bricks or concrete blocks. If you want you can add those t's on the last bucket on each side and run tubes to a second res. (can be a 26L tupperwaretub) This res can be sat on blocks HIGHER than the other lower res....and will be empty until you drop it to the floor....where it will start pulling water out of the system.

After a good amount of water has filled in the tub, you simply place the res back on it's stand and it alll drains back into the system.

I don't run a waterfarm per se', but I do run a non-circ DWC with WF columns as drips. This system has the same challenges/problems as WF's do...and that is that the Ph/ppms can be quite a bit different from bucket to bucket and are in no way the same all across the 8 buckets.

By adding this end "res" and dropping in/raising it as described above you can MIX the water in the system easily (or use it as a drain point for the wet vac) and keep things stirred/a bit more even from bucket to bucket/day-to-day.

I dunno why they use the clear blue tubing that grows algae. If possible, grab a rolll of the black stuff at the hydro store/etc. and replace that blue tubing. It'll save you a lot of hassles.

good luck

ww

I have 1 extra waterfarm bucket. I use it to change my water, clean the old one and then replace the next and so on. It makes it pretty easy to do but the wet vac sounds good too!

Thanks WWatson,
Everyday I learn something new here in GP, I will use your technique (wet vacuum in the end of the hose at time of flushing) plus hose changing, both methods together will give me a totally peace of mind to eliminate clogging, mold, etc
Peace and best of lucks

I tried raising my res, but all it did was flood my buckets. Nothing came out of the hose that I hooked to a T on an end bucket. a Wet vac sounds like it might work, OR I was thinking maybe I could hook a really long hose to the T at the end of the bucket, and run that tube on the floor to outside and let it drain in the gutter.
The tube on the T will drain the WF as long as the tube stays on the ground.
I also wondered if I wut an inline pump on long tube if that would maybe pump out the entire system?

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If you raise the buckets you must also raise the res.

I have my DWC system raised about 8" off the floor at present. One of the mods I'm doing before reloading the system with new clones this time around is to raise the entire platform up on concrete blocks stood on end.

This should help alot in the scheme of things and should make draining the system much easier.

A pump may work if it isn't too large. If it is, it will drain the water faster than it can pour into the bucket and will run dry/will have to be turned on and off as the water level neccessitates it. Better than scooping though...

ww

I use a little giant water pump[$109] that i hook up to garden hose's and pump the water into washing machine drain. When i first started i used a drill pump and it worked good as well but it was bit slower.

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PEACE

I'm thinking I may use my washing machine drain as well, just seems to be the easiest, cheapest solution. All I will need to do is use a T on the 2 end buckets and add enough tubing to reach to the drain. It seems that it would empty all the buckets and the reservoirs as well.
Thank you everyone for your input.

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Well, I hooked up a looong piece of tubing to the T fitting and ran it to my washing machine drain, but I'm not seeing any drainage yet. The end of the tube is lower than the ground, I thought for sure that would make it drain, but nothing so far. Maybe the almost 100' of tubing is too long of a length for suction to start?

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