After the first year of growing hydroponic tomatoes we decided that we were adept enough to branch out and try another growing system. We went with a NFT(Nutrient Film Technique) Lettuce setup that was a turnkey system. Putting that joker together was another story entirely!
What is NFT?
What NFT really boils down to is a system to grow plants hydroponically that involves a thin film of liquid nutrients flowing over the roots of the plant in a recirculating system. It usually involves the plants placed in troughs and set on a rack or table at such an angle that the water flows down the trough, then out into a common drain line that drains back to the reservoir. When the system is properly setup, you will have constant movement of the nutrient solution without any pooling in the trough. If the solution pooled up it would not allow for proper oxygen exchange thru the roots, causing the plant to be stressed.
How It Works
We use an automated mixing system that monitors the nutrient solution for temperature, ph level and EC(electro-conductivity), EC is just a reading of how conductive the water is with the dissolved nutrients present. The EC readings are really just a guideline that let's us know the approximate level of the nutrients dissolved in the solution, it doesn't report on each individual component, for that we had to have our water tested and have a nutrient formula worked up.
A large reservoir with a low pressure pump pushes water thru the monitoring station which reads the solution for the above listed criteria and using small pumps, pulls the proper amount of nutrient and ph adjuster into the stream and pushes it out thru the distribution piping into the troughs and over the plant roots. The solution then drains out the back of the trough and thru the common drain and back to the reservoir where the cycle continues.
Benefits of the NFT System
Using an NFT system allows you to pack a lot of plant growth into a compact space, as well as having an easily manageable system that is almost fully automated. Granted you still have to seed, plant and harvest, but other than checking your monitors there is very little day to day work that has to be done with this system. I am setting it up to be able to harvest some product every week, so one day a week I would seed the new crop and harvest the crop that is ready to sell then set the plants in the trough that were seeded the week before.
An NFT system like this is easy to expand, if I wanted to add more growing space I could add another table , add the plumbing and off we go.
I put together a quick video overview of our system so you could see what all this is all about, take a look.
So there is a quick run down of a working NFT system, you could do this at home on a smaller scale with no problem at all. If you want a quick easy way to grow some great stuff, this could be your answer.
Until Next Time, Keep growing!