Hi all! Thought I'd chime in with my first space bucket grow build. Have been reading the community for a few months, gathering as much info as possible.
Finally built my bucket about 2 weeks ago, and I couldn't be happier with the results. I'm living in a place which doesn't have much available in terms of electronics and growing supplies, so I had to make a couple of shortcuts, but will be improving my build with time. I think that is the true bucket spirit! The first upgrade is to add better fans, which are already on the way.
DESIGN SPECS
The fans were hacked from a laptop cooler, the only fans I could find in my location. Have found someone to bring me some 120mm PC fans to replace these.
Planning to put a fan on the top exhaust too, so it'll end up with 3 120mm fans (2 at the bottom, 1 on top). For the plant lighting I have 2x 38watt LED grow bulbs, and a
5050SMD LED strip on the walls of the bucket. Will be adding a second 5050 roll of LEDs once my fans arrive. The second LED strip will go below the intake fans. I added pictures of my LED strip spacer so you can copy my design (currently turned off until the plant gets a bit bigger). Temps are good, averaging 80f for the whole daily cycle. Humidity ranges between 50-50%.
The pipe on the left leads to a water reservoir in the bottom of the pot.
The design is inspired by the global bucket and the hempy bucket. The basic idea is theres a section of soil that touches the water and wicks moisture up to the plant. The majority of the soil is raised above the water, as I understand the need for a wet/dry cycle and avoiding drowned roots. This is an experiment, but is important because I often go away for 2-3 days.
