Germination Machine

[mattkeddie]

In the early 2008 I was working with an ionic transducer to create an accelerated germination system with technology NASA developed using ultrasonics to vibrate nutrient-rich solutions into fog. The pioneer of the technology had some unrelated legal troubles causing me to fall out of contact and halting any further progress. I was unsuccessful in sustaining lasting tomato life with salted based nutrients because they did not "carry" well in fog. Amino acid chelated nutrients worked flawlessly but for me hydro/aeroponics was just a hobby and I had no avenue to distribute my work... so I pulled the plug.

Fast forward to a couple weeks ago.
Lots of seeds were coming in for a seed supplier review venture I'm working on and after sowing what was needed for the research I had plenty of extras to play with!

Enter the "Germination Machine"



Basically it is a 95 qt rubbermaid tote with a 1020 tray cut into the lid with a humidity dome. The vapor is created by the ionic transducer on a float.

As the humidity and temp are easily controlled, if you want it cooler add more water to the reservoir or if you need less humidity run the transducer on a cycle timer.

I plan on building a "cleaner" design so i'll be sure to take step-by-steps and write a tutorial for it.

In past trials I could germinate better boys in rockwool in about 24-36 hours. I am using 2" cups with potting soil. I have never used soil as media in this setup so this will be a new experiment.

Experiment Details
Seed Source: www.sampleseeds.com
4 Ananas Noire
4 Cherokee Green
4 Berkeley Tye Dye
4 Goose Creek
4 Green Doctor Frosted
4 Chocolate Stripes
4 Gajo de Melon
4 Pork Chop
4 Grub's Mystery Green



I will update upon seed sprouting!

Thank You

[JamesL]

Matt,
Welcome! And that is very cool. Yes, please post your results!

[Cole_Robbie]

Neat! Ultrasonic foggers have been around for a while in hydroponics. But they tend to salt up with traditional nutrients. I did not know about the carrying problem. In dealing with adult plants, there is also the problem of containing the mist within the root chamber. It likes to goes up through hydroton pellets, because it is so fine, creating humidity problems. But obviously for germination that is not a problem, so I think you are using the technology very well.

[RayR]

That is a pretty cool experiment. What amino chelated nutrients are you using? Is there a theory behind the nutrient fog encouraging germination vs. plain water?

[mattkeddie]

Originally Posted by Cole_Robbie

Neat! Ultrasonic foggers have been around for a while in hydroponics. But they tend to salt up with traditional nutrients. I did not know about the carrying problem. In dealing with adult plants, there is also the problem of containing the mist within the root chamber. It likes to goes up through hydroton pellets, because it is so fine, creating humidity problems. But obviously for germination that is not a problem, so I think you are using the technology very well.

Traditional brass discs never played nice with salt nutrients, depending on what transducer you have you can switch to teflon coated discs and the problem is solved. The original design used a fan to lift the fog up to the roots I changed the delivery placing the transducer in a separate container above the plants and plumbing the fog into down root chamber. 15 seconds on 3 seconds off cycle eliminated the humidity issues. Another idea never implemented was to take the transducer, place it at the top of a hollow vinyl 6x6 and have it go to waste in a collection bin. gravity would draw the mist down. In theory that would of been an amazing design but i never got that far. I may work with it this season but its unlikely unless there is a demand for it here.

Originally Posted by RayR

That is a pretty cool experiment. What amino chelated nutrients are you using? Is there a theory behind the nutrient fog encouraging germination vs. plain water?

The amino chelates I used in the past were Humboldt Master A & B
http://www.humboldtnutrients.com/blog/master-a/

In this experiment I am using rain water. If I was rooting cuttings I would of added Olivia's Cloning Solution into the mix. I always wanted to try Humboldt's Myco Madness or Roots but never bring myself to purchasing it.


I checked on the seedlings this morning, I am holding a steady temp of 78° with a humidity of 94%. It is rather cool this morning and I did not have a fire last night so the house is only 57°

I am afraid this might set back the germination time by several hours, in past trials with rockwool 85°-90° at 90%+ humidity proved to work best.

[mattkeddie]

Day #4 No seedlings have sprouted...

Germination / Name
0/4 Ananas Noire
0/4 Cherokee Green
0/4 Berkeley Tye Dye
0/4 Goose Creek
0/4 Green Doctor Frosted
0/4 Chocolate Stripes
0/4 Gajo de Melon
0/4 Pork Chop
0/4 Grub's Mystery Green

However the following seed stock started in the same media/soil placed on a 75° heat mat 5 days ago

Germination / Name
3/3 Remy Rogue
3/3 Allegheny Sunset
1/3 Gajo de Melon
1/3 Goose Creek
1/3 Grub's Mystery Green
0/3 Matt's Wild Cherry
1/3 Pork Chop
1/3 Green Doctor Frosted
2/3 Chocolate Stripes

Clearly there are no benefits using a potted soil mix with an ultrasonic fogger

[ginger2778]

Matt's was very slow to germinate for me too, last place basically. Cool experiment.
Marsha

[RayR]

Matt's Wild Cherry was also the very last to germinate for me too, 3 or 4 days behind everything else.

Maybe the soil is too dense for the fog to penetrate well.

[mattkeddie]

Some germ magic happened last night.
So i basically gained a 12 hour advantage over a heat mat.

[RayR]

What a difference one day makes

[Delerium]

Very cool indeed! Which variety germinated first?

[mattkeddie]

Originally Posted by Delerium

Very cool indeed! Which variety germinated first?

Goose creek in the germ machine and remy rogue on the heat mat

[mattkeddie]

I threw a few cuttings of Mojito, Orange, Chocolate mint, some lavender and pineapple sage in. the mints had roots in 3 days the sage had it 4. lavender isn't playing nice.

[RayR]

I wouldn't expect a woody cutting like Lavender to play as nice as mints and sage. That's pretty nice results for 3 days on the mint. Were you using Olivia's Cloning Solution?

[lakelady]

This is all over my head when it comes to hydro and technology, but very cool experiment! Thanks for sharing it with us!