What is the best vertical hydroponic system?

Vertical Hydroponic Gardening, How to Setup, 

What are Advantages 

Introduction:

            Hydroponics is a method of growing plants without soil either it is horizontally or vertically. It is basically providing nutrients and water to the roots of your plants externally without the usage of soil and It can be grown indoors if you have enough space indoors. However, if you don't have enough floor space to grow indoors, you can opt for Vertical Hydroponic Gardening as it requires very less amount of space.

What is Hydroponic vertical? 

                    It is simply setting up the Hydroponic garden in a vertical way. Vertical farming is setting up your garden and growing plants in a vertical linear fashion. In this you have multiple stack levels, each plants grow on each level. But you have to provide artificial light as it is grown indoors.

Maintaining good amount of sunlight for each and every level is very important as you have to setup different grow lights for each and every level separately to provide high yield. You have to make sure the adequate amount of nutrients and water is supplied to each and every level. You can have an efficient usage of water system with Vertical Hydroponic as the water will be reused .

Advantages:

    Space:

                    You don't need to have a lot of space to start the Vertical Hydroponic Garden. The plants are grown vertically so it does consume very less amount of space and you can also grow more number of plants in less amount of space with this type of system.

    Minimum Wastage and Maintenance:

                    Vertical Hydroponic System have a closed system, so that the water and nutrients in the pipes are reused every time minimizing the wastage of water and nutrients for the plants. These can be reused until they get diluted at any point of time.

    No Need of Soil:

                  Although all the Hydroponic system don't require the use of soil. By eliminating the soil, you can make the system lighter and improve the flow of water and nutrients to the plants. The non usage of soil also reduces the chances of fungi and pest attacks on the plants.

     Good Yields and Efficiency:

                As it is set up in a vertical fashion, you can grow more number of plants in less amount of space and that yields good results. With good amount of lighting at each level and proper nutrient supply, you can expect high growth of plants. More than the traditional horizontal farming, this type of system can yield more results as it can be grown all along the year.

Disadvantages:

       Grow Lights and Water Supply:

                To setup this system, you need to purchase more number of grow lights to setup at each level that leads to more input costs and high consume of electricity. You should take care that each and every level of the stack receives adequate amount of water and make sure the lower levels don't get drowned.

       Resources: 

                It requires more number of resources to setup the system as the input costs are more. Yes, you can grow more in less amount of space but while scaling up your garden, your resource costs also increases as it requires more number of grow lights which should be setup at each level for the plants. It also requires higher powered pumps as the water needs to flow to reach the top of layers. So, the electricity billing costs for the grow lights and the motor will be higher. But, you can always grow more if you are ready to input in this system.

                There are different types of Hydroponic System techniques which can be used to build a Vertical Hydroponic Garden such as Ebb and Flow System and Nutrient Film Technique System(NFTS). Out of these, NFTS is the easiest technique you can use to build a Hydroponic Vertical Garden.

Nutrient Film Technique System functions with a constant and thin stream of water which flows over the root system of the plants. Because it is a closed system, so the water and nutrients in the pipes are reused every time thus providing constant flow of water and nutrients to the plants. 

Different types of Hydroponic Vertical Garden:

• Vertical Hydroponic Tower System
• Zig-Zag Vertical Hydroponic System

Vertical Hydroponic Tower System:

                    In this type of enclosed system, it uses a pump to pump the water and nutrient solution in the water through a tube to the top layers and from there it automatically reaches to different levels of layers down the lane which are stacked in an vertical fashion. 

Due to vertical system approach, it uses Nutrient Film Technique System which is very efficient to use.

You can always use a single tube or multiple tubes to pump the water to different layers according to the requirement of water and nutrients to the plants and make sure that each layer is provided with required amount of nutrients and water. 

You can always use PVC pipes for this type of system. The plants are placed in Net cups and holed into the pipe so that the roots get required amount of nutrients and water. The Net cups are placed on the PVC pipe at an angle of 45 degrees.

Zig-Zag Vertical Hydroponic System:

            A Zig-Zag Hydroponic System is a type of Vertical Hydroponic System. If you have some enough floor space, it is better to go for a Zig-Zag Hydroponic System because we can grow more plants in much less space than regular vertical fashion method.

Here, PVC pipes are designed in a way that they are placed in a zig zag pattern at diagonal angles. These system also use  Nutrient Film Technique System to setup the garden i.e. water along with nutrients are pumped to the top level and are gradually provided to the lower levels. As same as above, the plants are placed in Net cups and placed on the PVC pipes but at an angle of 90 degrees. You have to make sure each and every level gets sufficient amount of light as generally, the lower levels gain less amount of light. It is best to use Vertical grow lights to cover all the layers.

Setting up a Vertical Hydroponic Tower:

If you want to build a Vertical Garden on your own DIY, you need a few items to start setting up the Vertical System.

• PVC pipe which is 72 inch or 6 feet according to an ideal home and 3 inch diameter of the pipe.
• Bucket with a lid basically a Reservoir
• Net Pots - You can buy as many Net pots can be placed according to the length of PVC pipe.
• Vinyl Tube in which the water and nutrients are setup and flown to each layer.
• Pump - to pump the water and nutrients to the top and each layer through a Vinyl Tube
• Loctite Epoxy which is used to stick to a PVC pipe for bonding.
• Grow Lights 

You need some basic tools like Hand saw, tape , drill to cut the pipe and drill holes in it and measure the distance between each Net pot.

Procedure:

                The Bucket or gallon will be the reservoir. The PVC pipe is placed in the reservoir standing tall.

Mark the PVC pipes with slots on where to place the Net cups. Drill holes on the pipe according to the mark and make sure each Net cup fits in the hole. You can use entire surface rounded to grow plants. Stick the Net cups to the side of PVC pipes at a 45 degree angle.

Use the tube and pump the water and nutrient solution with the help of motor to the top of tower which comes down gradually and automatically follows it to other layers. Make sure that flow of water and nutrients is being distributed equally to all the layers.

Place the Grow lights in a position such that each layer receives an adequate amount of light.

That's it, you have an Indoor Garden now.

You can always choose, If you want to DIY and setup the entire system or you can buy a built Vertical Hydroponic System and start growing your garden indoors.

Finally coming to the best Vertical Hydroponic system, if you want more yield for your crop and from your plants, you can always opt for Zig-Zag Hydroponic System. If you are a beginner and want to have an Indoor garden as an hobby or for fresh air or for decor in your home, you can always choose Vertical Tower system which is cost effective and easily maintainable compared to others.

Can all plants be grown Hydroponically:

Suitable Plants Grown with this System:

             The best plants suitable to grow with Vertical gardening are herbs and leafy vegetables like Lettuce, Spinach, Kale etc. 

You can also grow flowers based on which type of flowers you want.

Additionally, basic vegetables and fruits can be grown such as tomatoes, cabbage and strawberries.

Is growing plants in a hydroponic system profitable?

        Yes, it is always profitable as you need large amount of outdoor land to less amount on indoor land.  You can always grow more number of plants in less amount of space and that yields good results. More than the traditional horizontal farming, this type of system can yield more results as it can be grown all along the year.

Are PVC pipes unsafe for hydroponic gardening?

Polyvinyl chloride(PVC) is safe for hydroponic gardening as it also used for drinking water. It is possible that nutrient solution could be contaminated by plasticizer chemicals, but PVC is considered a reasonably stable compound, cost effective and durable. Yes ,it produces chemicals when heated, it will melt which will destroy your crop and plants. But this case is very minimal and you don't have to worry about it. If you want to worry, there are some plastics that are good options for gardening.

I hope I answered all your doubts which came across while going through. If any, you can post in the comments. 

Happy Gardening!..