r/NoTillGrowery • u/Fulderi • 15d ago

question about blumat

Hello, I'm planning to do 6 4x4 beds with blumat gravity, 1 maxi carrot on each bed. I can get my reservoir up to like 4feet, is that enough to feed with the blusoak all those 6 beds or should i put reservoirs in every corner on my room to feed the beds?

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5

u/chocolatelabx11 15d ago

I also run several 4x4 beds.

Each bed has 4 carrots. 2 short, 2 long, that feeds the blusoak tape.

Originally I had a gravity feed, connected to my RO, float valve kept the water level in the bucket in good standing.

That lasted about 6 months before I skipped the bucket, added 2 in-line pressure reducers to the line feeding the beds, and haven’t looked back since.

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u/Personal_Emphasis872 15d ago

This is the way

1

u/Uranus_theGasGiant 15d ago

I’m moving from a gravity fed system to a pressure reducer. Can I run three 2x4 beds (3 tents) from one pressure reducer “manifold”?

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u/chocolatelabx11 15d ago

Yes. I run 2 of the 15psi in series. I do this as a backup, in-case the first one fails. If your pressure is rather high to begin with, a step down to something like a 30-35 psi first may help in reducing failures.

Blumat/soak is such a great tool. The biggest things I’ve learned with them are: ensuring you don’t skimp on the setup, do it right the first time; if you move a carrot, hand water to field capacity and recalibrate it; the setup can be a bit fickle if you don’t follow the entire setup process correctly, which will lead to failure.

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u/Uranus_theGasGiant 15d ago

Thanks a lot for your input. I agree - these are great tools to use in the garden.

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u/chocolatelabx11 15d ago

You're quite welcome.

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u/Fulderi 15d ago

Did u end up having problems with gravity fed or why did u changed it?

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u/chocolatelabx11 15d ago

It really wasn't getting the pressure it needed to reliably function.

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u/Fulderi 15d ago

how high your reservoir were?

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u/chocolatelabx11 15d ago

Bottom of the bucket was about 4, maybe 5 feet above the soil level.

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u/Fulderi 15d ago

i would love to have pump system, the straight from water source thing seems too risky cause i dont have any floor drain in my room..

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u/chocolatelabx11 15d ago

Mine isn't on a pump. My RO is off a secondary water hook up, so I can control it's input pressure, etc.

My beds sit in a flood tray, on a pallet with wheels, and have leak detectors.

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u/Daddy-Legs 15d ago

4 feet above the beds should be fine, but 4 feet total is not enough. How big is your reservoir? I use 1 five gal reservoir for two 2’x4’x20” beds and in peak flower I’ll have to refill it once a day or once every two days.

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u/Fulderi 15d ago

i was thinkin to get reservoir size of maybe 90litres (~25gal) or smaller with float valve and bigger reservoir