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hydroponic Hydroponic Nutrient Strength: What works well?

Y

Yani

So I am planning on doing a soil, organic grow, and a hydroponic grow. I have been doing a lot of research but am coming on either conflicting information or information not quite sufficient for what I'm looking for.

What I have gathered so far is that chili peppers do not want or require high EC levels. Ok, simple enough. Perhaps around 1-1.2 EC. However, I have questions regarding what the best ratio of NPK is best during vegetative growth and then fruiting/flowering. In this regard I've found that it is ok to feed low N moderate P and higher K throughout.

Does anyone have a link or enlightening information of what is working well? I'm new to this and would appreciate some direction.

I am using an Autopot system which is something of a "hybrid" system in that it uses a soilless medium but feeds from a nutrient tank that provides constant supply of water/nutrients regulated by a type of float that simulates fill and drain cycles.

Thanks for the help!
 
Appreciate the info. Could you explain to me though what "10% by runoff volume" means? Sorry for the noob question. Also what ratio of nutrients are you using roughly?
 
i run the howard resh profile for all my plants.
 
im going to try melons this year... ill use the same profile. its not great for junk other than peppers, but its good enough to get good results.
 
i even use it on my cactus's in between osmocote applications.
 
id link it, but the link is dead atm .
 
10% runoff means you get 10% of the volume you irrigate with running out of the bottom of the container.
 
the runoff is usually like 3ec. maby even 3.5ec.  i target somewhere between the two for rockwool. i dont usually collect or measure runoff in other mediums because its too hard.
 
So for something like the Autopot, if I want the plant to receive .8 or 1 EC of nutrients, that's exactly what I would put in the solution since it would all go to the plant's roots correct?
 
How should I manage nutrient accumulation, if at all? Maybe mix in half strength every once in a while?  
 
the rootzone EC is pretty much always higher than your nutrient solution. 
 
how much higher ive no clue. its a good idea to build in  a way to test this btw... but yea, you would dilute down the mix untill you find a stable regime that results in the root zone EC that you want.
 
imho, you want your rootzone ec to be above 2 at least, but you can experiment how you wish.
 
most capsaciums respond to higher salinity favorably, annums especially. 
 
Ok, I will have to experiment then it seems and do some reading into the matter in the meantime. Any links or good articles would be greatly appreciate – I'll be searching as well. 
 
By the way, we have some of our closest friends living in College Station, TX. 
 
Thanks for the help so far guys! 
 
just google greenhouse cultivation bell pepper, or hot pepper, or chilies etc.
 
most greenhouse cultivation will involve fertigation which is basically hydroponics.
 
you might also search for bell pepper/chili/hot pepper + fertigation or soilless culture etc.
 
you will find that im not pulling that 2ec number out of my ass if thats what you are after.
 
you will find that most people on this website are being very very conservative with fertilizer because : a) thats just how they do things, or b) because they are using an organic mix that has some nutrients of its own.
http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/hs228

i used to keep these files and shit neatly somwhere... but ive never had to look at them so ive lost them at this point.

oh wait its not lost.
 
these are just PDF's though.
 
if you really want them i can get them to you via email? or drop box or something? IDK. computers are hard.
 
Queequeg, that's good info, thanks. I didn't think you pulled it out of any orifice I'm happy to hear and consider as I continue to do research what works well for everyone and why that may be.

Willard, I will have to try that as well since it would make things much less complicated.
 
willard3 said:
I run the NPK ration 1:1:1 at about 400-500 ppm from start to finish.
 
I have changed ratios in the past but see no benefit.
Click to expand...
500 ppm seens very low? do you get runoff at 500 ppm?
 
ever measure your root zone ec?
 
I'm in coco and run mine at 1-1-2 ratio and tend to keep it around 500ppm until I can get them out into the full sun of summer.

Neil
 
Blister said:
I'm in coco and run mine at 1-1-2 ratio and tend to keep it around 500ppm until I can get them out into the full sun of summer.

Neil
Click to expand...
yes 500 ppm i understand this, but what is your runoff like?
 
you can water your plants at 1ppm with an eye dropper 247 and still get a high enough root zone conductivity by limiting the runoff.
 
from what i recall reading you need something close to 1ec in the soil less mixes to support any healthy growth at all.
 
No idea what runoff ppm is. I've never measured it. I have no experience on the actual topic and what measuring runoff ppm actually means, though there are varying opinions about it. Like most things some say it's the bee's knees, while others say it's a fools errand. I don't know.

From what I've experienced up to this point, 500ppm NaCl has worked for me in the early stages.

Neil
 
what do you mean by 500ppm NaCl? some sort of calibration standard? never heard of that.
 
you just dip your ec meter in the runoff.
 
since runoff is usually a small fraction of the irrigation water, its going to be higher. how much higher depends on how mature the plants root system is and how much volume you are irrigating.
 
queequeg152 said:
yea thats it.
 
its not complicated if you start with the raw salts and not preformulated bottled nutrients.
 
x grams calciumn nitrate, x grams mono potassium phosphate etc. very simple to mix together.
Click to expand...
 
 
So I am a bit confused.  How do you measure these out?  It says you can use some of the same stuff to cover multiple areas.
 
Calcium Nitrate for example.  It is in the 190ppm NO3 and the 18ppm NH4.  So would I add 208ppm?  Plus another 170ppm for Ca?
 
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