How to Build Your Own Water Culture Hydroponics System

by Kevin

Ever wondered how it would be like to build your own water culture hydroponics system from scratch? This article will help you out in achieving this goal, taking you through the process step by step.

If you’re new to the hydroponics industry, it’s probably best if you buy a pre-made system or at least a kit to start off, since you might not have the understanding required to build your own hydroponics system from scratch.

Once you see how the pre-made water culture system works, or if you already have experience with these environments, all you need is a small amount of cash, a few spare hours and some power tools to start setting up your own hydroponics system.

Water Culture Hydroponics System – How it Works

Water Culture Hydroponics System – How it Works
Water Culture Hydroponics System – How it Works

There’s nothing fancy about a water culture hydroponics system and the way it works. Basically, you’ll have your plants suspended in a StyroFoam platform, floating on top of a container, filled with water and nutrient solutions.

The plants roots can either be dipped on the top of the water, or planted deep inside it, depending on the plant you’re growing and personal preferences.

A pump and an air stone work together for oxygenizing the contents of the reservoir, the oxygen bubbles being in turn, sucked in by the plants’ roots.

Water Culture Hydroponics System – Components

You can purchase some of the components from your local store (Home Depot, Walmart, etc) or order them online from a recommended hydroponics store.

  • 1 External Pump is required to get fresh oxygen into the nutrition tank
  • An Air Stone
  • A water proof reservoir (this can be a fish tank, a bin, or even a reservoir that you built yourself)
  • Grow media
  • An Air Tube to connect the water pump to the air stone (you could have more air tubes attached to several air stones if you have the right kind of pump and if the system needs it)
  • StyroFoam
  • In addition to these, get a pair of scissors, some dark color paint and your happy face on, because you’ll be building a cradle for life in the next few minutes (or hours, depending on your skill level ;).

Water Culture Hydroponics System – How to Build It

If you find the process of building your own system too difficult, consider buying one of our recommended hydroponic systems.

Water Culture Hydroponics System – How to Build It
Water Culture Hydroponics System – How to Build It

Pick up the container and check if it’s water proof and light proof. The reason it needs to be light proof is to stop the growth of algae inside the reservoir, since algae and several microscopic bacteria that will be harmful to your plants bloom in light. If you’re using a fish tank to build your own hydroponics system, paint it (or at least the sides that get exposed to a lot of light) with a dark color.

Once this is done, you’ll need to apply the StyroFoam on top of the tank. To do so, measure the exact dimensions of the top of the container and cut the StyroFoam a few inches narrower, so you can adjust water levels if needed, or introduce/take out stuff from the tank.

The next step you need to attend to when you build your own hydroponics system is to cut holes in the StyroFoam where you will place your plants later on. If you’re using mesh pots of the same size to hold the plants, it’s easier to cut the holes proportionally. One last use of the cutter/knife is to carve a small opening in one of the StyroFoam’s sides, to fit the air line in the reservoir.

Next, it’s time to set the water pump. Take note that not all pumps work the same and not all are suited for all containers. If your container is large, you’ll also need a powerful water pump to keep the water oxygenized.

If you’re unsure of the type of water pump you need, you can ask the retailer for help, telling him the exact dimensions of your container (there’s no reason to get a pump that is more powerful than needed, it’s a waste of money). Place the pump on a fixture, or wherever you find it fit and connect it to the air pipe, then insert the air pipe through the space you carved in the StyroFoam.

Attach the air stone to the other end of the pipe and voila! You’ve almost built your own hydroponics system! Now all you need to do is place your plants in the holes you carved in the StyroFoam beforehand and start feeding them nutrients.

Water Culture Hydroponics System – Building Difficulty

Water culture systems, next to ebb and flows are considered amongst the easiest to make, even if you’re not very skilled in DIYs. Anyone can handle some StyroFoam cutting and setting up an airstone to a pump.

Even if you don’t get it perfectly right at first, don’t worry. It takes a steady hand and some experience to craft a quality homemade hydroponics system and chances are you won’t get there until you’ve built a couple of them.

How to Build a Hydroponics Water Culture System Using a 5 Gallon Bucket

If you’re looking for a simple solution to grow plants inside your own home, a hydroponics water culture system using a 5 Gallon bucket and a few other components might be your cheapest and easiest-to-build choice. Find out how to get one running here.

Growing plants using a hydroponics system is a growing hobby, with more and more people starting up on it each year.

But a professional hydroponics system is usually so expensive that many of these fresh new gardeners will either quit, or try to work around the problem by creating their very own, homemade hydroponics systems. In order to do this and keep costs at a minimum, they turn to the cheapest materials that can get them through the storm and one of the objects that came to be known as a trademark of homemade systems is the 5 gallon bucket.

Quite possibly the easiest system you can make by yourself is the water culture. This does not require any suspended plant trays, complex nutrient pumps or flood and drain systems. It’s just a big pool of water and nutrients that you suspend plants on top of, having their roots drowned in the container, hence the name of water culture.

Obviously, one of the best household items you could use in order to build a hydroponics water culture system is the 5 gallon bucket. Five gallons is not much in terms of hydroponics, but it can get you started and the container itself is just right. It’s small enough to be portable and it’s large enough to be well used as a décor object.

If you find the process of building your own system too difficult, consider buying one of our recommended hydroponic systems.

How to Build a Hydroponics Water Culture System Using a 5 Gallon Bucket
How to Build a Hydroponics Water Culture System Using a 5 Gallon Bucket

Start building your hydroponics water culture system using a 5 gallon bucket filled with nutrient solutions and water. You will also want this water to be oxygenized for your plants, so you should also get an air pump and an air stone to put inside the bucket.

Now, it’s time to suspend the plants, and you can use Styrofoam. Simply cut the Styrofoam around the same shape as the bucket’s lid, but slight smaller, because you’ll want to have some room to refill the bucket through and also a short carved space inside the Styrofoam for the air tube between the pump and the airstone.

You will also want to carve out spaces for plants inside the Styrofoam. It doesn’t really matter how many plants go in there at first, but do try to be administrative with your space. The more plants you get in there, the more fruit/vegetables you will produce and the better your homemade hydroponics system will look.

In conclusion, all you really need to make a homemade hydroponics water culture system is a 5 gallon bucket, some Styrofoam, an air pump, air tubes and an air stone. It’s really not that difficult to make and it’s not expensive either.

5 Gallon buckets are pretty much the standard nowadays, so you should find them at any shop that sells gardening supplies and not only.

The air pump, air tubes and air stone can be purchased from your local pet shop and they probably won’t be very expensive either. And I guess the Styrofoam really shouldn’t be a problem getting, since every hardware and home improvement store will have some lying around the place.

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