Nearly perfect environment STILL PROBLEMS please help

[FlyingToast]

Greetings, I run a RDWC 6 plant system and I am doing most of the things correctly, yet I have problems, I will list all the details of my environment here and maybe you can help me identify what's wrong with these guys cause I am absolutely lost...
So 6 plant RDWC 70liters of water in total

Environment:25 Celsius during the day 20 during the nighttime
60 RH at day 70Rh at night
Ambient Co2 400ppm unless I'm in the room (which is not often)
Water change every 15 days sterilising buckets every time with small amounts of antiseptic gel)
VPD is almost constantly at 1.1 (I have the pulse pro thingy so I am monitoring it and I can be sure that the environment is consistent)


I have an automatic pH controller so it is at 6.0 ALWAYS no fluctuations ever not even for a moment, it's rock solid.



Nutes : GH Trio at equal quantities ( nutrient order : first atami cal mag, then micro, then grow, then bloom (cal mag 1ml/lt) it all amounts to about 750ppm (see picture of ppm meter) then fulvic acid (NO SILICA because I could never get it to not fog/crystallize no matter how much I tried)

LIGHTING : lumatek Zeus 600w pro led
Growing space 1 square meter
(Plants are recieving 300ppfd see picture for full data about the light ppfd DLI spectrum etc)

Water temps 23-24celsius

Used to have airstones but they clogged up and now I have just the end of the plastic tube in the water(but directly underneath the roots so the bubbles go right on the roots this could be an issue)

I have a fan gently blowing on the leaves (they are gently dancing)

Looks like a deficiency to me, and it showed up when I was feeding 400ppm
So I upped the feed to 750ppm gradually, saw a little difference, they were more yellowish before, and they got green and perked up slightly but stopped kinda "in the middle" of the process to full health/praying
I also should mention these are photoperiods.

I've been collecting data about almost everything any other questions I'm happy to answer please help me

 

[Trash_2002]

Greetings, I run a RDWC 6 plant system and I am doing most of the things correctly, yet I have problems, I will list all the details of my environment here and maybe you can help me identify what's wrong with these guys cause I am absolutely lost...
So 6 plant RDWC 70liters of water in total

Environment:25 Celsius during the day 20 during the nighttime
60 RH at day 70Rh at night
Ambient Co2 400ppm unless I'm in the room (which is not often)
Water change every 15 days sterilising buckets every time with small amounts of antiseptic gel)
VPD is almost constantly at 1.1 (I have the pulse pro thingy so I am monitoring it and I can be sure that the environment is consistent)


I have an automatic pH controller so it is at 6.0 ALWAYS no fluctuations ever not even for a moment, it's rock solid.



Nutes : GH Trio at equal quantities ( nutrient order : first atami cal mag, then micro, then grow, then bloom (cal mag 1ml/lt) it all amounts to about 750ppm (see picture of ppm meter) then fulvic acid (NO SILICA because I could never get it to not fog/crystallize no matter how much I tried)

LIGHTING : lumatek Zeus 600w pro led
Growing space 1 square meter
(Plants are recieving 300ppfd see picture for full data about the light ppfd DLI spectrum etc)

Water temps 23-24celsius

Used to have airstones but they clogged up and now I have just the end of the plastic tube in the water(but directly underneath the roots so the bubbles go right on the roots this could be an issue)

I have a fan gently blowing on the leaves (they are gently dancing)

Looks like a deficiency to me, and it showed up when I was feeding 400ppm
So I upped the feed to 750ppm gradually, saw a little difference, they were more yellowish before, and they got green and perked up slightly but stopped kinda "in the middle" of the process to full health/praying
I also should mention these are photoperiods.

I've been collecting data about almost everything any other questions I'm happy to answer please help me

they look oxygen deprived, "overwatered". the air pump is strong enough ? the air stones are good quality?

for dwc i would go 5.8ph
6.0 is better suited for coco
6.2 for peat
~6.5 for living/super soil

750ppm for this young age is kinda high, lower to 400-500ppm

 

[Trash_2002]

Also you absolutely need good quality air stones and a strong air pump, a lot of oxygen is required for dwc tho, good air stones will split bubbles into very tiny bubbles that oxygenate the water much much better.

 

[LoveGrowingIt]

Wow! That's an impressive operation you have there. I don't know much about that style of growing, so I can't help much at all. Looking at the leaves, though, there sure looks like there are some nutrient problems. At first look, I thought Mg or the PPFD might be too high. That's coming from an organic soil grower, however, so it's not worth much. Good luck with your grow!

 

[FlyingToast]

they look oxygen deprived, "overwatered". the air pump is strong enough ? the air stones are good quality?

for dwc i would go 5.8ph
6.0 is better suited for coco
6.2 for peat
~6.5 for living/super soil

750ppm for this young age is kinda high, lower to 400-500ppm

The air pump could be an issue, it's the next thing I am going to upgrade to try fix the issue, I don't know exactly how powerful it is,but I made sure it's adequate for 6 plants, I just had to trust the growshop guy for it..

I can easily lower ph to 5.8 since it's automatically regulated no problem

400-500 ppm had this problem WAY worse, when i gave them more food they responded positively ,just not all the way to max health...are you positive that the nutes are too high? In the nutes schedule it says it should be 1.5 EC

 

[FlyingToast]

Yea

Wow! That's an impressive operation you have there. I don't know much about that style of growing, so I can't help much at all. Looking at the leaves, though, there sure looks like there are some nutrient problems. At first look, I thought Mg or the PPFD might be too high. That's coming from an organic soil grower, however, so it's not worth much. Good luck with your grow

Hey thanks man! Appreciate your kind words,there are some nutrient problems for sure, I'm trying to find out what's wrong too

 

[FlyingToast]

Also you absolutely need good quality air stones and a strong air pump, a lot of oxygen is required for dwc tho, good air stones will split bubbles into very tiny bubbles that oxygenate the water much much better.

I did mention that my airstones broke so I have to literally have the airline by itself in the water, just making sure it's right under the roots, so yeah I understand the concept of the air stone and most definitely I'm doing a bad job on this...do you think this could be the sole issue? And if yes I understand the "over watered" look, but what about the burned leaves and the supposed nutrient problem?

 

[Teslajuana]

My .02 cents are, something is hindering nutrient uptake. Could be too many salts from too many nutrients, a rez clean and sanitize and maybe lower ppms to half or maybe lower of what you are using if starting off with 0 ppm RO water. Try to lower Water temps at 20-22c, lower light your light intensity to lowest setting, get some air stones and more air in the roots a high capacity air pump will suffice maybe 2. Not sure about your nutrients but bloom type probably can wait till you are in flower but not sure. I’d start off with that as a base just to see how they react. Make sure roots are not slimy or smelly. If thay are you could have root rot with the high water temps. Check your roots.

 

[Trash_2002]

The air pump could be an issue, it's the next thing I am going to upgrade to try fix the issue, I don't know exactly how powerful it is,but I made sure it's adequate for 6 plants, I just had to trust the growshop guy for it..

I can easily lower ph to 5.8 since it's automatically regulated no problem

400-500 ppm had this problem WAY worse, when i gave them more food they responded positively ,just not all the way to max health...are you positive that the nutes are too high? In the nutes schedule it says it should be 1.5 EC

I've seen monsters in rdwc in veg with only ~1.2ec< cultivar dependant of course. But for that size plants 0.8-1.0 EC is plenty.

Yep proper air pump and proper big round air stones with suction feet's to hold them in the bottom of the bucket would be my first move.

What teslajuana said too, check roots for healthy and all the Dwc routine checks.

 

[Trash_2002]

I did mention that my airstones broke so I have to literally have the airline by itself in the water, just making sure it's right under the roots, so yeah I understand the concept of the air stone and most definitely I'm doing a bad job on this...do you think this could be the sole issue? And if yes I understand the "over watered" look, but what about the burned leaves and the supposed nutrient problem?

At first look they looked like "overwatered", in deep water culture this is equal oxygen deprived, and reading your post made me think even harder that's a probable high priority issue.
Oxygen deprivation cause a lot of problems, deficiencies, slow grow, yellowing , droopiness even plant death at some point of no return.

Air in dwc is never enough, get the best and most powerful air pump and air stones your wiling to spend, you want prolfic and abundant air bubbles in your buckets.

 

[FlyingToast]

My .02 cents are, something is hindering nutrient uptake. Could be too many salts from too many nutrients, a rez clean and sanitize and maybe lower ppms to half or maybe lower of what you are using if starting off with 0 ppm RO water. Try to lower Water temps at 20-22c, lower light your light intensity to lowest setting, get some air stones and more air in the roots a high capacity air pump will suffice maybe 2. Not sure about your nutrients but bloom type probably can wait till you are in flower but not sure. I’d start off with that as a base just to see how they react. Make sure roots are not slimy or smelly. If thay are you could have root rot with the high water temps. Check your roots

the rez is cleaned and sanitized every 10-15 days, but i can do it again for a fresh start
unfortunately i dont use RO water, but my tap water is fairly soft about 150ppm , i can use the the tap water without letting the chlorine evaporate first, and that can help with disinfecting everything aswell, unfortunately i dont have a chiller, so lowering water temps means i have to go to growing temperatures of something like 22 celcius in the daytime and 17 celcius in the nighttime, what do we prefer here? an overall colder environment for the plants combined with lower water temps, or it would be an overall net negative?

i will also see what i can do with the light, but i will leave that for last, i will implement the changes one by one, so i know what was the change that fixed my situation.. thanks for your input!

 

[FlyingToast]

At first look they looked like "overwatered", in deep water culture this is equal oxygen deprived, and reading your post made me think even harder that's a probable high priority issue.
Oxygen deprivation cause a lot of problems, deficiencies, slow grow, yellowing , droopiness even plant death at some point of no return.

Air in dwc is never enough, get the best and most powerful air pump and air stones your wiling to spend, you want prolfic and abundant air bubbles in your buckets

sounds like its the best place to start, i will go get the strongest pump there is, and the circular "halo" type of air stones, i hope this will work and i will let you know if it worked... they should look better in 3 days right?

 

[Trash_2002]

sounds like its the best place to start, i will go get the strongest pump there is, and the circular "halo" type of air stones, i hope this will work and i will let you know if it worked... they should look better in 3 days right?

yep in 3-7 days you should see improvements for sure!
did you checked the roots for color, slime and smell?
if possible do a flash photo of your roots system in the most affected one

 

[FlyingToast]

yep in 3-7 days you should see improvements for sure!
did you checked the roots for color, slime and smell?
if possible do a flash photo of your roots system in the most affected one

i will provide root photos, yes some discoloration/slime is there,but no smell whatsoever, (ive encountered root rot in the past, i dont think that this is root rot i think its just nutrient stain) ive been cleaning it with my fingers gently

since we are down this road, i might just add some hydroguard or something just for safety

 

[Trash_2002]

i will provide root photos, yes some discoloration/slime is there,but no smell whatsoever, (ive encountered root rot in the past, i dont think that this is root rot i think its just nutrient stain) ive been cleaning it with my fingers gently

since we are down this road, i might just add some hydroguard or something just for safety

hydroguard is good stuff as a prevention and helps with healthy roots environment too, yep brownish ferts will stain roots.
hydroguard and proper aeration i think will solve your problems
and get the nutrient mix down to ph 5.8, 0.6-0.8EC, up to 0.8-1.0EC in a week or two

 

[FlyingToast]

So, installed new air stones

dropped ppm from 850 to 600-620 (I would drop lower I just didn't want any drastic changes, I believe the newfound aeration will give me time to correct further)

I think this is enough oxygen (look at the surface of the water on the photos,before you could BARELY see bubbles in the surface of the water)

Also dropped the light a tiny bit to now 200+ ppfd just to ease up on them a little

Here are root pics @Trash_2002

 

[Trash_2002]

Definitely a root problem, hydroguard and much more oxygen, let me know how it works out.

 

[Trash_2002]

Air pump still the same? If so try to get a stronger one.

 

[FlyingToast]

Definitely a root problem, hydroguard and much more oxygen, let me know how it works out.

they dont sell hydroguard in my country, best i could do was diluting the 850ppm mix with tap water without letting the chlorine evaporate,
heres exactly what i did : emptied a bit more than half the water, replaced it with 150ppm fresh cold tap water, solution was then 270ppm (i thought this is too low too suden, and added a bit of GROW of GH trio, and a bit of calmag, and a healthy dose of enzymes to clean the roots) it is now sitting at 600+ ppm

also the airstones were shitty and clogged i replaced them with bigger and better ones and the difference is huge
the pump is a HAILEA ACO-318 and some of the specs are :
Output: 60 L / min
Power: 32 W
Noise: 60db
Voltage: 110-120 / 220-240V
Frequency: 50 / 60hz
Pressure: 0.03 Mpa
Dimensions: 182 × 95 × 116mm
Weight: 1.65kg

I think it is enough, when i get the chance i will upload a video of the surface of the water just so you can let me know if you think the bubbling is enough

 

[Trash_2002]

they dont sell hydroguard in my country, best i could do was diluting the 850ppm mix with tap water without letting the chlorine evaporate,
heres exactly what i did : emptied a bit more than half the water, replaced it with 150ppm fresh cold tap water, solution was then 270ppm (i thought this is too low too suden, and added a bit of GROW of GH trio, and a bit of calmag, and a healthy dose of enzymes to clean the roots) it is now sitting at 600+ ppm

also the airstones were shitty and clogged i replaced them with bigger and better ones and the difference is huge
the pump is a HAILEA ACO-318 and some of the specs are :
Output: 60 L / min
Power: 32 W
Noise: 60db
Voltage: 110-120 / 220-240V
Frequency: 50 / 60hz
Pressure: 0.03 Mpa
Dimensions: 182 × 95 × 116mm
Weight: 1.65kg

I think it is enough, when i get the chance i will upload a video of the surface of the water just so you can let me know if you think the bubbling is enough

enzymes will do the job too.
I think 10L of air/min for each pot should be good enough with the new air stones.
yes a video would be cool to see how's it working.