This is (kind of) a How-To on Hydroponics. You remember my mentioning that I’m building “workstations” for senior living, right? How cool it would be if you could have everything right at hand to make indoor growing a treat instead of a chore?
But water indoors is problematic. So this is also about Designing and Building and offers some useful Old Man Perspective (OMP). “To the Wayback Machine, Sherman!” We’ll go back 30+ years to when discrete components still roamed the Earth…
I worked for a couple of years for a (now late) fellow who was arguably one of the top SSB/RF engineers in the world. I learned some things from him – and I imagine he learned a bit from me. But there was more than selling SSB radio gear to places like, er, Tonopah, Gakona, and Indonesia. Sure, he made some money (I was running sales) but I got some schooling in return. Which came down to two simple (but indelible!) points.
First: There is no magic. The laws of physics – of the well documented and in public sort, anyway, not the breakaway civilization stuff – are not orphans of string theories or other such hocus. If a piece of radio gear isn’t working right, it’s because you missed applying one of the Laws of Physics. Simple as that. They are laws after all.
Second: Invention doesn’t mean Happy Design. Just because I was always coming up with great ideas, it didn’t mean too many would become real “winners.” The new thing that would survive grueling review and work in the field. Which deposits us in front of the lesson, in fact, that I spent a couple of hours “relearning” this week.
Invention Discussion First
OK, I’ve probably bored you with our whole “focus on personal workstations (or you can call them dedicated workspaces if you like). We have workspace (or sites) for music, ham radio, oil and acrylic painting, model building, gunsmithing, ham radio (operating), electronics repair, and of course music and writing longish columns. So far, so good.
But what turns a “workstation” into a site where magical things happen is more than a table and a chair. It’s the right suite of tools along with jigs, materials, and depending on which workstation might include air handling, specialized lighting, access to racks of paints (or Hoppe’s #9) or whatever.
I noticed this week some “Internal Resistance” to working on my hydroponics workstation. Whenever you don’t just naturally flow from inspiration into action, it’s always worth pausing for a cup of tea or coffee and deeply asking “What’s wrong Partner? Why you sloughing off? What’s-a-Mattah U?” (If you’ll pardon the Bullwinklese.)
“Well, it’s the damn water.”
(Hard to have hydroponics without water, so I roughed my Inner Self up a bit more and waited for the Answer.)
“Which is a problem WHY?”
Water is heavy, it spills easily, going outside to get it when it’s cold and rainy. Plus if I trip it’s easy to slosh a half gallon onto the studio floor and yeah, that’s a damn mess to clean up. Which usually ends with me running a washer and dryer load of the old cleaning towels and…well, waters fun if you have a boat, but..oh….
“Invent some Great Solution, you lazy prick!”
Which I promptly did.
I wanted a nice-sized reservoir so I clicked a Coleman five-gallon water jug.
The Inner Self wouldn’t let up: “That’s going to weigh 41 pounds when full, so you think THAT will be a graceful solution????”
“Well, it will be when I drop in a rechargeable liquid transfer pump!” Laughing at the simplicity of the answer one of these was clicked.
A Test That Failed
The system integration failed because the Seaflo pump and the Coleman jug don’t match up. None of the adapters would work.
In a WTF moment, I decided to fill up the five gallon jug, just dump the pump in loosely (putting a cap on and off would be a pain anyway) and just use it “sitting free in the jug.”
Bad move.
When I got done, there was about 2-cups of water on the floor – and my “projects that create more projects” fears were going into high gear.
A few minutes of towel time and a toss into the waiting washer and I was off to pump forensics.
Thing is,while it worked to fill a couple of containers, it was really dandy.
So on my list of things to Design is a modified funnel-type devise which the pump assembly will slide down into and which will have a 3-4 inch outflow pipe at the bottom.
Nope, not a “happy design.” Be nice if Seaflo had a list of compatible food safe containers, but remember, the hydroponic refill pump is a specialized mission, in the house, food grade plastics and I don’t think Coleman will be changing their design, either.
Besides, when I get around to designing this new “whizzy” maybe I could sell it online and become an Etsy billionaire, or something?
It’s not a Happy Design yet, but every failed invention is progress with its clothes on.
Meantime, Under the Grow Lights
Spinach is in the back rows and celery in the smaller (12 site) system in the front row on this end of the workstation.
When you get around to buying one of these systems, if for nothing other than getting a head start on those $4 seedlings at the Big Box store in the spring, here are two useful suggestions.
One: Make up Seed Papers
Ah, back to the old days of Zigzag‘s and roach clips? Heavens no, this is Texas! Copy paper and a wooden toothpick to push seeds into media…
Seeds cost money and no point in wasting them.
The other hint is to get a small flashlight if your eyes aren’t sharp because it makes it much easier to see your water levels:
This being Sunday morning, and this workstation comes up for a one-hour visit on my schedule today, I will likely start one 18-plant site system with bamboo giganticus because it would sure be fun to have a 60-foot tall hedge, or grow my own quad antenna spreaders for the 40-meter ham band!
Write when you get rich,
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