I am new to the group and I recently picked up a used Omega Garden system that I am interested in trying it out. I was wondering if anyone has any experience with the system or anything like it? I did a search of the forum for Omega Gardens but did not get any hits. The company is based out of Canada which is where this unit was used. It is a hydroponic system that has the plants mounted in a drum that slowly spins, kind of like a ferris wheel except the pots don’t swivel. It takes about two hours for a full rotation and for part of the time they are basically hanging upside down. There is a tray at the bottom that holds the water / nutrients and the pots have wicks hanging out that dip into the tray as they pass by and there is a drip pan to catch the excess on the way back up. The lights are in a glass tube that runs down the center of the unit and there is a fan that blows through the tube to dissipate the heat. The unit came with sodium lights but I am planning on running some 4’ LED’s instead. I am thinking I will make a full circle of bulbs and hoping to get at least 6 bulbs in place in the 360 degrees. If I can get enough bulbs in I was thinking I could change up the color depending by which bulbs are running. Does any of this sound feasible? Any suggestions? I have the unit put away right now but will be getting it set up soon. I am curious about what herbs would be good to grow as companions. The unit holds over one hundred fifty 3 1/2" pots so we won’t be using but a fraction of that for the main grow. Obviously fruit bearing plants are out but I was thinking some basil and other herbs and maybe some lettuce, the plants only have about 18" or so of vertical space so that is a major factor. I am going to try and attach pictures here that I found online. The unit in the pictures looks exactly like the system I have but I won’t ever have that many plants in mine
Never seen one before, looks interesting.
Keen to see you set it up and get it going…
What sparked this to be a venture? Do you know anyone who’s used one before? It is very interesting and would love to watch your progress.
Drove by a place down the road from me a couple of years ago and this was for sale. I like the idea but he wanted too much for it. Have watched for a bit as they kept having yard sales and stopped the other day and made an offer of about a 1/4 of what he wanted two years ago and he said ok. We started chatting about it and he said he grew in Canada for years and used clones. He said it was basically set up and go. He had another light for the mother plant and he would take cuttings and start them in the pots. When the roots of the plants are hanging down with the wicking it was time to change the timers on the lights and start the bloom. It will be after the holidays before I get anything going and then it will be a bit before I can get a mother ready to start the clones. I will be sure to post more down the road
Working on lighting and I think this will work out. This is the glass tube that housed the original metal halide lights looks like it will handle about 16 led light bars. My thought was to have different spectrum bulbs and control the color by which lights are on and how long they run. The plants go around the light bar so they are always pointed at it. Here are 4 bulbs sitting in the tube. I will have to design and print a bracket to hold them
Made some progress, got a spacer designed and printed and it works great and will hold 16 4’ lights. Of course the other bulbs I am using are taller so I had to redesign the spacer and not 100% sure it will work. I have no idea what I am doing with this but it looks cool anyway
OK, got the brackets redesigned and printed. I have the lights split into two groups so I can have either color or both going. Still waiting for a few UV lamps to come in and will have to figure out which bulbs they should replace when I see them
What are you planning to use to control the whole system?
Looks really cool!
Thanks
Not 100% sure but was thinking smart plugs and Alexa
wheres the updates? i had a friend with one of these in '04-'05 . i think he grew a sativa dom strain that had to be pulled a cpl wks early bcuz of size and i never heard anything else about it after that. ive always wondered what you could do with a nice indica strain that stays real short and compact.
Just got it set up and I am gong to test it out with less valuable seed like some lettuce, basil etc… I will add some pictures to the post later this am as I have it set up in a 5 x 5 grow tent. Lights are one and fan is mocked up but still need to work on the water set up
Well that took a little longer than expected. I have the system set up in a 5x5 grow tent. I got the led’s in the center tube on the brackets I made just fine and I think there should be plenty of light but that glass tube was getting pretty warm so I designed and printed a cap for one end of the tube that holds a small 80mm usb powered fan. It is working well and while the tubes still get warm after a few hours you can hold you hand on them so not too warm. The original set up had two 900 watt sodium lights so it got very hot and there was a far more powerful fan to keep it cooler but I am sure this set up will be much cooler than that. Going to plant some various herbs just to see how it works on a test run. I have to set up the water system as well but that is pretty simple as there is a float valve that keeps the lower try filled. The pots will have rock wool in them and a gauze tube that will hang out of the bottom of the pots and get dipped into the water every 2 or 3 hours. The video (assuming I got it attached) has the unit spinning. Probably hard to tell since I don’t do a great job of holding still
That thing is awesome
When are you loading that mother up? Wowee
How does it water? Do the pots wick when they reach the bottom?
Going to do a test grow with herbs and greens, I figure that will be safe way to test it and make sure it all functions as planned