“What do you want to achieve?”
A great place to begin, next comes the question, “is it really possible to achieve what you want?” And finally, “how in the world do you achieve what you want?”
Plants, roots and beneficial microbes – the synergistic dual aerobic eco-systems contained within DWC, RDWC life support systems.
Keeping all the aerobes alive and especially healthy in a hydroponic life support system is always the total responsibility of the “Boss-Man” of The Grow. I believe the point of this medical oxygen machine is about a cheap source of providing 95% oxygen continuously 24/7, the most vital elemental in any DWC, RDWC life support system. For hobby growing requirements, it makes little difference of the Brand of the machine or the patients family selling the machine. On the other hand. a commercial farm has O2 delivery requirements and specific machine specifications.
Where the gaseous element O2 comes from, the type of equipment that delivers the oxygen gas (O2 tank or electric machine that produces the gas), the brand of the equipment producing or delivering the elemental gas nor the people that sell this gas or sell equipment that make this gas is the issue here… the gas is the big deal so say the real horticulture experts that teach and publish the white papers in the scientific horticulture journals.
Without a constant supply of enough O2 gas within a range of safe concentrations, safe volume and continuous minute by minute supply, aerobes suffocate and all the home brews, nutrients, fungicides, chemicals and even serious praying for root recovery will not reverse roots that have suffocated because the damage is done, Period.
The professional hydroponic horticulturist growing plants for a living claim that root suffocation is the # 1 killer of roots in all hydroponic growing systems, then the fungi eat the stinking, decaying root mess in the tub.
When the hobby grower fails and cannabis roots die and decay, then the “race for the cure” is on and we try all sorts of concoctions always hoping to kill what we perceive and our enemy that caused the roots to die. Our mission in life is to kill the Pythium and all its fungal cousins that are colonizing and thriving on our rotting roots and decaying Benny microbes that all suffocated in our DWC, RDWC life support systems. Hobby growers often blame pathogenic fungi for killing their cannabis roots in DWC’s when that is far from the truth as to what really happened that killed all those roots.
So, how does root suffocation happen and happen so quickly? Disrupt or cut off the O2 supply and see how quick distress and death comes. A good example the everyone understands, when the O2 is intentionally cut off on a ventilator on a terminally ill or injured child in an Intensive Care Unit that’s on life support, how quickly the skin turns dark blue and heart quivers and then flat-lines and it’s over.
Suffocation is a common method of terminating life in ICU in all hospitals for patients on breathing life support systems. For all aerobes you can bet your last 2-bits that O2 gas is absolutely the most vital element required for health and survival and count on winning that bet before you throw your money on the table. Actually, all hydroponic systems are also functional life support systems, all the aerobes (Plant and microbial) are totally dependent on the grower’s knowledge, ability and choice of equipment to provide and insure all life sustaining nutrients are constantly available in safe concentrations required to keep the all the aerobic organisms healthy and alive for months.
Fodder for fun - If you used a medical O2 machine that delivers near 95% O2 bubbling into the water @ 5 LPM, wonder just how much that 95% O2 would increase the DO concentration and DO Saturation in water regardless of the water temperature? The point being to use the O2 machine (95% O2) to increase the DO compared to using a high volume air compressor pumping air (21% Oxygen / 79% Nitrogen) through the same bubbler and basically increasing the dissolved nitrogen in the water to extremely high concentrations? Supersaturating the water with nitrogen gas high enough to cause gas bubble (the bends) disease in fish.
Discussions like this are just fodder to play with because no one has nor uses a DO meter to actually test or verify what the real DO would be using 5 LPM of 95% O2 nor compare the test results to air pumped with an air compressor. All most growers have seen the internet DO Charts, a simple DO prediction that is based on ambient air (21% Oxygen exposure), water temp, salinity and barometric pressure. But, the fodder is different and something to explore when there’s nothing to do. Techy stuff, that’s all.
More fodder just for fun. Try thinking real techy for a moment, think “out of the box” if you will - Fast forward from the internet DO Chart prediction with ambient air as source gas in a clean reservoir containing NO plants, No roots and totally void of all aerobic microbes — to a real time grow DO using 95% oxygen source gas using a medical O2 machine … What do you think (a wild guess is good if you don’t have a clue) the actual tested DO difference would be in reservoir water containing 15 lbs. of cannabis roots, 40 lbs. of vegetation and 4lbs. of Benny’s or 1/2 gallon of microbes in reservoir water @ 70F, 75F, 80F and 87F water with dissolved ambient air and dissolving 95% O2 really be and root suffocation and aftermath would be totally prevented and never give that low O2 problem another thought or worry?
Of course all of this fodder is meaningless and a total waste of time even looking at if you are a dirt farmer or a DWC, RDWC cannabis grower that never has any problems or even concerns with root suffocation, root rot or Pythium fungal outbreaks.
Finally - “What do you want to achieve?” The root cause of all this stress, aggravation and problems are caused by low oxygen concentrations in reservoir water and preventable and not necessary – some DWC, RDWC cannabis growers do have real problems, issues and do experience high stress worrying about those low oxygen problems, root suffocation, root rot and the predictable Pythium fungal outbreaks that come last.
If more plants and microbes need more O2 gas to be healthy, then why not simply give then more O2 with a machine that generates O2 which is exactly what doctors are doing when they prescribe these O2 machines for patients that are suffering / dying from low O2.
Now we are back to those medical O2 machines that deliver 95% oxygen gas, the magic gas, not ambient air like an electric fan, or an air compressor pumping tons of air through bubblers making trillions of mostly Nitrogen gas bubbles.