Today
was completed devoted to our project. We went to Lowes and Pet Smart
and spent a lot of time looking at pvc components as well as items for
our fish. We had to look and find bulk heads, pvc pipes, pvc pipe
cutters, elbows and t-shaped pvc . That was a unique experience.
After buying everything we went to Essat to begin the construction and design of our system.
We
first made a hole in the “aquarium portion” for bulk head and screwed
our bulkhead in and added a rubber flap to ensure a water-tight seal. We
did the same for the plant reservoir so that we could control the water
level using the ebb and flow method. Ebb and Flow is a form of hydroponics
that is known for its simplicity, reliability of operation and low
initial investment cost. Pots are filled with an inert medium which does
not function like soil or contribute nutrition to the plants but which
anchors the roots and functions as a temporary reserve of water and
solvent mineral nutrients. The hydroponic solution alternately floods
the system and is allowed to ebb away (wikipedia).We then worked on
attaching the grow lights to our set up. After a lot of cutting and
measuring we were able to build a support structure for the grow lights
using pvc piping and shop rope. This structure will be strengthened by
pouring sand into the pvc pipe openings.
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