I have one of the manufactured systems (I was a Kickstarter supporter) and have to say it’s incredibly awesome!! My older water bottle one made it’s way quickly to the recycling bin!!

My issue is that the output of water at the top of the airlift spews droplets all over my window. It makes one heck of a mess. I ended up taking a pill bottle, cut off the bottom half, then drilled a hole in the lid just large enough for the airlift tube, and this has helped stem much of the mess.

The issue is that when the bubble of water gets to the top/end of the tube it is actually a bubble and it *pops*, making a little mess of droplets (2-3 of them) spray out. I don’t see another way around this from what I’ve done, but it’s apparent you have to let the bubble burst, and containing it inside a larger sealed vessel as I’ve made is the way to go.

What have you done to help this issue?

This is my first time with my new windowfarm.

Based on weather in Chicago, I couldn’t buy any seedlings so I went for already decently sized (~5 in.) basil, lavender, sage and oregano.

How often do you set the timer to water these? I think they said every hour for 15 minutes, but not sure if that is correct? I’m pretty nervous that these won’t grow!

Also, does anyone suggest any type of nutrients? I’ve never grown anything ever and I want this to work out!

Please help. Thanks.

Hi,
I transferred some strawberries form soil to my window farm and they started loosing their leaves and becoming brown.
This is my 2nd attempt and I don’t want them to die anymore.

Any help?

Too much water?
Not enough love? Nutrition? Light?

So, now it has happened to me to. Algae has started to grow in my windowfarm, or rather in the tubes. I knew it would eventually start to grow algae because the tubes are transparent, but that was what my local pet store had. The plants doesn´t seem to have suffered.

Now I have washed all the tubes with very warm water and soap and re-installed them. To reduce the possibility that it will come back, I covered the tubes with white tape.

Hi,

does anyone have any experience with the use of General Hydroponics’ Mineral Magic ? Is it good in use against algea and bacteria in the system?

Regards
Georg

How do you deal with different plants that have different water needs?
I imagine rosemary (dry) and Basil (humid) just to mention extremes…

Is it a problem at all in Hydro culture since as I understood the concept, the water runs through instead of staying in the single compartments for the plants?

A few days ago I noticed some problems with my setup: when the pump would turn on sometimes the airflow would go back down through the source tube and start bubbling up the reservoir rather than lifting water up the lift tube. I could fix it by releasing the air pressure in the lines and letting the water re-prime itself.

Over the weekend I didn’t have much time to work with it, but thankfully every time I peeked into my office things seemed to be moving smoothly.
Today when I sat down to do some work, I heard the pump click on and once again the bubbling sound of air coming into the reservoir. I was perplexed as to why it only seemed to fail when I was around.

I didn’t have time to debug / re-prime the system at that moment, so I just ignored it for a few minutes. Then to my great surprise, it suddenly fixed itself and started delivering water to my plants again.

My theory is that sometimes, after the pump shuts off, water runs back down the lift tube and sits stationary at a height above the t-joint. When the system first turns on, the pressure from this thin, tall water column is too much for the air pump so the air starts to backflow into the reservoir. In a few minutes, the water stuck in the lift tube flows back down below the t-joint, and which point air starts flowing up again. The system resets itself and everything works.

Since I use black hose for my lift tube I can’t quite see what’s going on, but I’m curious if anyone else has run into similar problems.

Greetings all.

Just as I; I am sure many of you have had problems getting your setup up an running reliably.

I have done some testing with various types of tubing, pump settings, reservoir setups etc.

I attempted a type of pump set up called a “geyser hybrid” which is in my opinion a waterlift with a little more complexity.

                                                                                                                                                              I had some trouble getting this setup to work at all.Maybe with a little more head pressure it would but the end result I was trying to get was more water movement with less air.

Next I attempted the setup with the needles.This works but I am worried about the jury rigged connection at the needle juncture and it proved to be no more effective than replacing the needle with a “T” connector.

It seems to me the point of the needle”no pun intended” is to insert the air further up into the column of water and to reduce the chance that the air may back up and bubble into the reservoir.

As stated in some other articles and online at sites like U tube.Th more head pressure the better the result.Air has a springy quality and when you have sufficient head pressure you can sometimes see air backing up into the inlet tube but it slows and returns the the junction and feeds the output line.

I used a two liter bottle with a fitting in the lid and the bottom cut off.a short section of head(feed)tube.about a foot worth.

A “T” junction. and a discharge tube to the height of about 6 feet.All tubing is semi rigid.i think this works better as some energy can be lost to flexing.My “T” junction I may add was a 1/4 outside dia fitting with a short length of tubing attached to feed and discharge sides to enlarge it to the size of my rigid tubing.the air line is just the standard size purchased at pet stores.

I placed my reservoir at a height of about 18 inches above the floor.or that is with my water starting surface level at 18 inches above ground.This gives a head of 18 inches but I find I don’t need that full head space.It just works better.I may be able to eliminate this with a larger reservoir say maybe a 5 gallon bucket with a fitting in the bottom. In my tests putting the tubing into the reservoir like a dip tube is troublesome and unreliable.

In my future setup I am going to attempt to use compression fittings that snap on and off with ease and fit on the outside of the tubing to make use of the full diameter of the inside of the tubing.and since I am planning on using a larger reservoir I may fit a charcoal filter to keep water from stagnating.

I may add that I am planning on using this to water my orchids and I am concerned about stagnation.

More later….please feel free to give me your input and experiences.

Bye for now.

Phillip

I am wondering now if a larger reservoir may eliminate the need for more head tube.

Left my plants unattended for a week.  Plants sure bounced back when finally watered on the 7th day.

Its playable in HD 1080p, so be sure to turn up the quality setting!

Windowfarm Timelapse

Hello everyone,

I just finished my windowfarm system last night. I started with the 2.0 instructions, but made quite a few adjustments along the way. One thing I really want to showcase is the airlift system. Seeing how many people are frustrated trying to build submerged airlift systems, I really recommend using an external system instead. I skipped using inflation needles, and went straight for the t-joint. But I figured there had to be a better, more reliable way than submerging a t-joint.

I got a 3-gallon water dispenser from Walmart, the kind that has the pouring spout. I took regular 1/4″ tubing, and wrapped a ton of plumber’s tape around it, and stuck it in the spout. (the spout screws apart, so you can actually pull the tube through) The water drains through the tube very well, it gets full water pressure since the spout is at the bottom, and you can even use the lever to stop water flow. I put a check valve on the water tube, so no air could bubble up into the tank, and I connected the tube to the perpendicular part of the t-joint. Then air comes in from one side, and the air/water mixture goes out the other. It’s helpful to keep the water tube perpendicular to the ground, and the air and air/water tubes parallel to the ground.

The system is incredibly reliable, and adjusting things and taking things apart is really easy, because it’s all out in the air and easily accessible. No wet hands!

Here’s a video of my entire setup, you can see the airlift system:

Lincoln’s Windowfarm on YouTube

(I’ll add pictures later)

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A few quick questions, since I’m new at this:

• What kind of water should I use? Is tap water alright, or should I use distilled water?
• What kind of nutrient solution would be best for green veggies? (lettuce, swiss chard, peas)
• Would aeration of the nutrient water help? (via airstone)
• I’ve been reading a lot about the benefits of kelp, and I was wondering if that could be used as a nutrient solution alone, or if it was just supplementary.