Originaly from Just4Grower's. How To Build Your Own Flood and Drain (Ebb and Flow) System


Master hydroponicist and chilli fanatic, Jukka Kilpinen, shows us just how easy it is to custom build your own flood & drain (ebb & flood) hydroponics system!

After growing chilli plants with different hydroponic systems for nearly ten years, one hydroponic system still stands clearly ahead of them all: Flood & Drain aka Ebb and Flow.

Before using it or seeing in action, it may seem a little complicated but after you get it, I believe that it's probably the most simple system there is!

Flood & drain offers many advantages:

- efficient yet still very simple! Gives unbelievable crops with decent nutrients and in a location with plenty light.

- possible to use any growing tray sizes you want with the same principle from trays for tiny seedlings through to systems several meters long! You don't need super powerful pumps for flood & drain either, any low-power aquarium pump will do, as the objective is simply to have the growing container flooded with nutrient solution for a few minutes or even seconds.
•Plants can be transferred directly to flood & drain systems after germinating.
•Flood & drain develops very strong decent roots with chilli peppers that make it perfect for transferring the plants when needed. I believe that flood & drain achieves this much better than any other hydroponic systems.
•You can grow all of your plants in one system and easily re-arrange or transfer them to other hydroponic systems or even soil.Nno hydroponic pots of any kind are needed.
•Flood & drain's simplicity makes it very reliable so plants can be left alone for even weeks. (If the nutrient reservoir is big enough.)
•Easy to integrate into balcony, a table or growing corner. It's an incredibly versatile system that can be built as you like to use it and as you want it to look.
•Very easy to maintain, if you build your ebb properly, changing nutrient solution after each two weeks or so will be very easy and quick.
•Very safe which makes it ideal for indoor growing. Properly planned flood & drain won't leak the nutrients to the floor of your apartment as the growing container rests directly on top of the nutrient container. All inlets and holes are in a place where dripping doesn't matter.
•Flood & drain is also ideal for indoor growing as it's very silent even when the pump runs.

Okay, let's get started with some planning:

First you need to work out what kind of space you will have available for you plants so you can scale your system accordingly.

It's also important to remember that your plants can grow HUGE meaning high water and nutrient requirements! A smaller reservoir will mean that you need to add water more often.

No matter how small or big a system you build, the principle is exactly the same as shown on this building example.

The growing container (the upper part) can be any shape you wish. For practical reasons, sizes like 60 x 60cm or 80x80cm and bigger are a good plan. If in doubt go for squares or near square rectangles. Be sure to leave adequate space around the system. Your chilli plants will thank you for it.

For bigger systems I would recommend a long (but not too wide) system. My "monster" 30 cm x 5 meter flood & drain system has been ideal for efficient and easy growing.

Back to the basic principle: the plant container (upper part) will be filled with expanded clay pebbles. Some growers mix in 50 / 50 diatomite too for added plant-available silica. (If you go this route, be sure to reduce the frequency of your irrigation as diatomite is more absorbent than clay pebbles.)

I usually start my seedlings off by germinating them in rockwool cubes and then transferring into rockwool blocks. Sometimes I plant aeroponic cuttings (without rockwool or any other propagation media) and that works also well. Just be extra careful with those roots when transplanting.

How the System Works

The timer is first set to pump nutrient solution to the upper tray twice a day.

It floods the upper tray and waters the roots and expanded clay balls with nutrient solution. After a minute (or any time suitable for your ebb) the timer will turn off the pump and the nutrient solution drains back to nutrient container back through the pump. (Make sure your pump allows water to drain back through it. Don't worry - those beautiful people at your local grow shop will sort you out.) An overflow drain ensures that any excess water drains back to reservoir before the expanded clay starts to flow. Best practice is to set the timer to stop the pump when the water reaches overflow tube. A digital (rather than segmental) timer affords the grower more accuracy in setting irrigation times. The overflow should be adjustable so as to make the incoming nutrient solution deep enough to reach the roots of the plants.

Errrr … that's it!

So why it is so efficient then?

First of all, with a digital timer, the watering can be adjusted for different chillies as some like it more wet and some like more dry conditions. And of course its good to water more during the summer when it's hot and less during the winter.

Flood & drain seems to be especially ideal for growing chilli peppers, tomatoes, peas, melons etc. Allowing the growing media to dry out more between irrigation cycles encourages your plants to flower. Keeping the media wetter will generally produce a more vegetative effect.

Second: Whilst some growers are building very complicated aeroponics systems at home, I'm not so keen as you need expensive pumps that consume more electricity and tend to also make quite a bit noise.

When your root zone is flooded in a flood & drain system, any stale air is forced out. When the system drains, fresh air in pulled back in. Happy, happy roots! Another reason why it's so important to have a well-ventilated growing environment.

Anyway, back to the build. You need to find an appropriate container to house your plants in. The one chosen here works very nicely as an example. Transparent containers (for either the upper or lower tray) may look quite funky but they are far from ideal because roots and your nutrient solution don't like light at all. This can be prevented by covering the container with plastic but why not just go for an opaque container in the first place? :-)

I love DIYs. Nice work
. The only problem I have with Flood and Drain is growing more then one Strain can cause problems due to the Different needs of the plant.Some Strains can handle stronger Nutrient feeding then others,,and if ya screw up you can kill all your plants instead of just one that you would have in a 5 gallon DWC Grow. I find Flood and Drain a very good way to grow 4 or 5 Girls of the same Strain though. Gonna have to try Flood&Drain one of these days.

I liked this diy because you can use the info for any size you want and the is semi clear so you can see all the parts inside, although I would use a non- tranparent container or paint it with a can of spay paint made for plastic so the paint doesn't flake off right away.

Thanks Chubby. I was about to make the very same comment. Cool DIY but opacity is key. Dark blue or black plastic would be ideal to stop from any light getting into the reservoir.

He mentiones roots don't like light. That is why I posted this diy so you can see the inner workings.

I found this DIY very helpful when I built the small unit I did. Being able to see inside was great. Thanks for the help,

Quote: Weedhopper wrote in post #2

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I love DIYs. Nice work
. The only problem I have with Flood and Drain is growing more then one Strain can cause problems due to the Different needs of the plant.Some Strains can handle stronger Nutrient feeding then others,,and if ya screw up you can kill all your plants instead of just one that you would have in a 5 gallon DWC Grow. I find Flood and Drain a very good way to grow 4 or 5 Girls of the same Strain though. Gonna have to try Flood&Drain one of these days.

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I really do like the idea of F&D. Ive just never ran one. You guys say its cool to run more then one strain,,who am I to argue. Can argue about something I aint never tried. I was just going by what I have heard several times by growers that we all like. But hey,,i think it would be cool not to have to change out several DWC buckets with different strains.

WH, I'm not comfortable running several strains from the same res. I am going run the same strain, at least for a while. I want to get down to 3 or so strains and simplify things. I would have no problem running different res if I needed. But running multiple strains with 1 res would really simplify things if I could make it work for me.

Here is a video to go along with the pictures. Good info here.

Cool DIY,,but that guy bores the crap outta me. LOL

Yeah when he got to the end and showed the ways it can be used, I thought that was cool.