With summer setting in & temps cracking 100 I'm starting to have to water my plants more often. I've been feeding my plants Maxibloom 1tsp/gallon of water just using a 2 gallon watering pail but it takes quite a while to water all 14 plants.
So to speed things up a bit I finally built this system I've had kicking around in my head for a few years.
Parts list:
Large heavy duty trash can or barrel
1/2" PVC pipe
(1) 1/2" T joint
(2) 1/2" slip fit to female threaded adapters
(1) 1/2" slip fit valve, plastic
(1) 1/2" threaded metal valve
1 pond pump (I think this one is 1/5 hp)
Optional:
Teflon tape
PVC primer
PVC glue
Pretty simple to rig up. Just need one of the female threaded adapters at the bottom to screw on to the pump, T fitting about 3/4 of the way up w/ the plastic valve, then one more female threaded piece at the top to accept the metal valve. Make sure the tube sticks up above your lid a couple inches. Use a small hole saw to make a hole in the lid for the pipe.
I found that simply press fitting everything works well enough, no need to actually glue it.
Lower valve is for mixing the nutrients. Just close the top one & let it recirculate for a bit. It also serves as a pressure relief for when you have the water wand connected. This pump is an impellor driven pump, not a piston pump so it does alright with back pressure but the bottom valve also lets you kind of adjust flow.
Even with the bottom valve open all the way you still get pretty good flow out of the top.
With hose & water wand attached
So did some flow testing, with the water wand attached I get about 2 gallons per minute. With just the hose & no wand I get about 5 gallons per minute. Looks like it will work pretty well, only took maybe 20 minutes to cut and assemble.
So to speed things up a bit I finally built this system I've had kicking around in my head for a few years.
Parts list:
Large heavy duty trash can or barrel
1/2" PVC pipe
(1) 1/2" T joint
(2) 1/2" slip fit to female threaded adapters
(1) 1/2" slip fit valve, plastic
(1) 1/2" threaded metal valve
1 pond pump (I think this one is 1/5 hp)
Optional:
Teflon tape
PVC primer
PVC glue
Pretty simple to rig up. Just need one of the female threaded adapters at the bottom to screw on to the pump, T fitting about 3/4 of the way up w/ the plastic valve, then one more female threaded piece at the top to accept the metal valve. Make sure the tube sticks up above your lid a couple inches. Use a small hole saw to make a hole in the lid for the pipe.
I found that simply press fitting everything works well enough, no need to actually glue it.
Lower valve is for mixing the nutrients. Just close the top one & let it recirculate for a bit. It also serves as a pressure relief for when you have the water wand connected. This pump is an impellor driven pump, not a piston pump so it does alright with back pressure but the bottom valve also lets you kind of adjust flow.
Even with the bottom valve open all the way you still get pretty good flow out of the top.
With hose & water wand attached
So did some flow testing, with the water wand attached I get about 2 gallons per minute. With just the hose & no wand I get about 5 gallons per minute. Looks like it will work pretty well, only took maybe 20 minutes to cut and assemble.
