I have a spare dripper is it OK to put it in the slab?

The spacing of the dippers has a big effect on the even distribution of water and nutrients in the slab.

The flow of this water is spread evenly by the stonewool to refresh the nutrient solution around the roots. This is what we call the Cone.

The Cone starts in the cube and spreads down and sideways.

The cube will increase the width of the cone and the volume refreshed by the dripper giving more efficient water and fertilizer use.

This is vital to give good refreshment and even water content, EC control and minimizing drain.

When changing plant density or crop there can be more drippers than cubes to put them in. In this case:

• check if you can remove or block off these drippers and still have enough irrigation capacity;
• if not try and put the same number off drippers into every slab;
• make sure that you do not put the dripper above a drainage slit;
• try and put the extra dripper at the high end of the slab;
• take care when measuring with a hand meter that you do not measure too close to this dripper as the EC level will be closer to the drip EC;
• make sure that this extra dripper is not giving you “false drainage”.