3D Printed Hydroponic Garden: One Month Update 

One piece of advice for preventing sunburn and heat stress on your plants you moved from inside, to outside. Seedlings need to be conditioned and this is usually done in a greenhouse for about two weeks in a commercial nursery. In your case though, All you need to do is have "starter towers" and "finisher towers". The starter towers should have 30% shadecloth draped over them for about a week or two. This allows those plants to acclimate to the sunlight and not get burned. Now move the pots to the "finisher tower" for growth and fruiting. This frees up your starter tower, with shadecloth over it to move your next set of seedlings into for acclimation.

I have been doing DIY hydroponics for a few years and have learned a lot. You explain a lot of this very clearly and anyone that watches this will save a lot of time and headache listening to these basic steps. Congrats!

Been running tower gardens for a few years now. 15 min on and 30 off works indoors under lights but 15 on and 15 off is the best outdoors. Many plants will extend roots into the bucket but you don't want the roots to excessively dry. Also keep an eye on the nutrient solution temperature. It can get too hot or cold because the bucket size is small.

Super dope, great update garden looks great

Nice work clean setup better looking than most hydroponic setup the wife must be happy

seems to be working pretty well.

Great video follow up! Thanks

I imagine you could also get a pre grown plant from a nursery and cut different stems from it to grow individually, thus multiplying your yields.

Taste is even better!

love your work, also great idea using a pot

thinking of doing this myself

Nice Hydroponic Setup! Continuing to follow your Channel.👩🏾‍🌾👨🏾‍🌾🏡🌱🌱🍆🍆

in the previous video you mention rockwool, that has a ph of 8.0 which always needs to be counteracted and when replacing water as well. Many people think that it is neutralized permanently, but its just in the water environment.

A video on mixing nutrients & emptying/refilling your water reservoir would be really helpful to see if you have the time :)

Hoping for an update on your systems

to prevent leaking ad staining in the seams of the modular pieces, plumber's tape might help

I live in Denver too and just built this system! Great video, thanks!

Where did you get those giant pots that the whole system is sitting in? I want some just like it for the one I printed.

Would you be interested in providing a new update to this? How were the veggies once you got some from it? Etc.?

Really cool system. Do you still use the 5 gallon bucket? What is the white planter that you are using as the base?

I would avoid those fully printed locking netcups, root mass will shatter/delaminate them easily and they are just not cost effective. There are a few remixed adapters designed to use normal netcup all over the place. Outside of that, go with black filament for the towers and paint them with white to keep temps down. Light creeping in will cause algae issues after awhile.

Nice you have a Reef tank too? Do you put the full RODI water or the waste water from the RODI system?

Would you mind sharing the (cura?) settings you used for this Overature PETG? I bought the same but have been finding mixed reviews on what settings to use for the Ender 5 pro (w/ 0.4mm Micro Swiss hardened steel nozzle). Any help or test print suggestions are welcomed!

In going to the thingaverse site where the part files I am seeing allot of various pieces. Is there of list of which parts and files you built your system from?

Thats interesting, my rodi unit water is at 7.5 ph.

What is you bucket setup? It looks really nice.

Hey, Brian. Your design is very cool. Have you thought about printing a pump?)

What about the plastic leaching into the water and essentially, your food? It happens faster at higher temp. We probably are running on 5% plastic blood content anyway thanks to the invention of plastic drinking storage and cups etc. Should have stuck with glass.

I noticed there are different set-ups that can be printed, i.e. 1, 2, 3, or 4 plants per piece. And there are 3-4 different pieces listed for each number. Can you tell us what the differences are between the pieces? For example: 1-Way_Planting_Module_Hollow_Without... and then I noticed there are different file sizes. Or what are the differences between OESTLIG_Plant_Pot_12_12_Adapter.... and OESTLIG_Plant_Pot_13_12_Adapter....?

ever try the copper rod in the water thing?

With moving plants from soil to the pots, did you still put rock wool in the pot? Or did you just thread the roots in by themselves?

I really love your channel! Please give me the name of the printer filament that you used? Hope it is save for food, thank you for all your advice. Watching from South Africa

Would lemon or limes juice adjust the PH? I was thinking of doing this system as a gift for my sisters, both who have extra fruits from their trees. SoCal area has 8+PH water. Would UV light in reservoir help or hinder?

Hey! I've gathered the materials for this build and plan to start this weekend! Are you able to rotate new seed starters into the pods as you harvest the fully grown pods, or do you only get one harvest from a pod per/ season? What's the harvest cycle time? I'm new to gardening in general so I'm not sure how productive the tower can be so any information is appreciated!

Where did you get that planting pot?

Is there a chance we could get an update please?

I can attest that White Vinegar, nor Baking Soda, is a good idea as it has absolutely no buffers to them so you bring down, or up, the pH to 5.8 to wake up in the morning to 7.5. As soon as you use the pH up, or down, it stays around 5.8. I was so hoping that baking soda, and/or white vinegar would work.

I have heard white may let light through allowing algae to grow. It may be better to print black then paint white.

Is the plastic for the 3D printing BPA free? Would the plastic leach into the water and therefore the plants?

Aeroponics, not hydro. The roots of your plants live primarily in the air and have water thrown at them. In hydroponics, the roots live in water to which we add extra oxygen if needed. Great job!

The Bucket top Adapter appears to be 1 lid not in sections. Is there a file for the sliced one for smaller print tables?

This is pretty cool. Have you had any issues with algae on the inside of the towers? Been growing kratky for years - found this video an hour ago, already 1/4 way in printing four of the jiffy pots. Looking forward to getting it going. Thanks.

Where did u get those bases from? They look great

How many gallons per hour does the pump need to be

Ph question. We have a hot tub. Can we use the same ph up and ph down chemicals ??

What about plastics oxidation over time, entering your food plants?

I wish the holes for the net cups were smaller so I can utilize my aerogarden to start my seeds.

I bought an Ender 5Pro in order to develop a prototype for an invention, and then was bitten hard by the 3d printer adventure! I started printing that inferior sytems from Thingiverse before spotting this one. I've already printed half of it in white, but may keep it indoors, so I might not have a green problem. When I look across the internet generally at hydroponic towers built by the 3D folks, I always see everyone mixing up their types of plants! I would think that you'd be much better off growing one type of plant in the entire tower. I'm going to try all romaine lettuce in my first tower, and then try all strawberries in my 2nd. I know that strawberries won't mind the angled opening and will dangle down. Not certain what romaine will do. I went to Ace Hardware and picked up a 5 gallon White Bucket, and will be going to harbor freight to pick up one of their small framed roller stands, so I can turn the tower and move it, if so desired. I bought the harbor frieght 260 g/p/h pond pump for this project. I am going to search for an inexpensive timer as well. I took the part that fits under the lid down to Ace, to get 7 feet of plastic Vinyl tubing, and the nozzle on the 3d printed part broke off! LOL! I'm going to drill out the hole in the center and utilize a threaded tube and keep it in place with a thing nut on both sides. It was a learning curve, moving from PLA to PETG and I've become much better with nozzle and bed temp than I was when I printed some of the early stuff! Yes, I'm using PETG for the tower parts! By the way, before I forget, I really like you video! You should be able to spray over your neighbor's roof with that 800 GPH pump! Matbe you should drain his pool while he's at church? LOL!

I live in a Freedom state so I just collect rainwater for low pH base material.

Did you use the standard brass nozzle or did you update to a stainless steel nozzle. I’ve read concerns about the brass nozzle wearing down and not being “food safe”. Seems to me it would be so minor it wouldn’t be a concern?

You embarrassed those plants by showing everyone their roots publicly on social media!!! 🤯🤯🤯

hows this stuff going, are you still using it? would be great to see what its like a year on!

Where did you get those white planters? Is your 5 gallon bucket just sitting inside of it?

For your timer settings, you need timing in minutes, or better seconds.

This seems more like an aeroponic system FYI but nice work.

I'm a bit late in seeing this and someone may have already asked so I apologize if this is a repeat question but do you still need the rockwool cubes if you get a plant that was started in dirt and is being transitioned to a hydro system like this?

I wanted to try print this one but, seeing 1 modules will took 21 hrs to print hold me up for now until I get a 0.8mm nozzles, but cool stuff

I see oter people have mentioned 2 hours off is probably too much for indoors in the AC. Id do 15min on, 30min off.

I will be new to 3D printing, mechanically and electronically savvy, what printer would you suggest? I’m thinking about creating your hydroponic system and wish to have a printer that will last for some time.

The big white pot that holds the bucket did you 3D print it or buy it... if so what's the brand of it

Does anyone know how much the power bill goes up to run the the pump? I was looking to make this for Mother’s Day but don’t want my grandma to just have a higher bill due to it.

quick tip ... dont plant tomatoes nor cucumbers in these : their root system will fill the bucket. cucumbers and tomatoes need about 5-10 gal of water to go trough their seasonal cycle. about the same for cucumbers. the problem you get is these towers are too small for their root system. if you want to grow tomatoes they grow well in their own 5gal bucket with the kratky method... you will just need to progressively refill when you get about half way. (in the fruiting period it will start to drain pretty quick. ) these are great for various lettuce and small plants however.

Nutrient 🔐 out ain't no joke😂

What are you using for your 3D printer?

Why not double the height of the towers?

did you print this in ASA ?

Brian: "Be wary of using something like black cuz of heat issues" Also Brian: Continues to use black net cups

12 month update?

Update to this video?

When the tomatoes set fruit the branches wont be able to support the weight.

mmm, look at you in your nice little house! i sure wish i had bought one of these in Denver about three years ago... Thought that the prices were ridiculous back then, was hoping the pandemic would fix something.. Boy, am i stupid! We live in a 3rd world country now.. If you think otherwise, please, ask your kids! Damn boomers, and their voting habits..

Your audio is out of sync.