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Detailed Design Document 1

The document provides design details for a stacked hydroponics cultivation unit for vertical farming. The unit consists of four to five planting containers stacked vertically. Each container holds four grow plots that can support one or two plants. Nutrients are fed from the top down through a sprinkler system. The units are placed on a motorized turntable to provide even light exposure. Multiple units can be arranged in "pods" around a shared light and nutrient reservoir to increase yields within a small footprint.

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Rodel D Dosano
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106 views10 pages

Detailed Design Document 1

The document provides design details for a stacked hydroponics cultivation unit for vertical farming. The unit consists of four to five planting containers stacked vertically. Each container holds four grow plots that can support one or two plants. Nutrients are fed from the top down through a sprinkler system. The units are placed on a motorized turntable to provide even light exposure. Multiple units can be arranged in "pods" around a shared light and nutrient reservoir to increase yields within a small footprint.

Uploaded by

Rodel D Dosano
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Stacked Hydroponics Growing System for Vertical Farming

Detailed Design Document


by Rick Reynolds

Overview:
This document will provide design details for a single complete stacked hydroponics cultivation unit. A
single unit will consist of four to five planting containers stacked in vertical column fashion. The
planting units will be oriented in such a fashion as to provide four grow plots per container. Each grow
plot will support one or two individual plants depending on the plant type. The system is designed such
that a single complete unit will be capable of cultivating twenty to fifty individual plants and include a
fully implemented control and monitoring system. Each unit will be situated on a motor controlled turn
table so that it can be rotated in order to provide uniform light to all plants. The design is scalable
simply by adding additional cultivation units through duplication of the unit set forth in the design
details. Scaling of the system would be based on pods of three to five cultivation units arranged in a
circle around a single nutrient reservoir and light source, so that these resources could be shared.

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Stacked Hydroponics Growing System for Vertical Farming

Table of Contents

Section 1 | Cultivation System : Page 3


Section 1.1 | Stacked cultivator unit ....................................................................................Page 3

Section 1.2 | Nutrient solution feed system .........................................................................Page 6

Section 1.3 | Cultivator rotator system ............................................................................Page 7

Section 1.4 | Lighting system .............................................................................................Page 8

Section 1.5 | Creating a cultivation pod using multiple cultivator units ......................Page 9

..................................................................................................................................................................

Section 2 | Control and Monitoring System : Page 7


Section 2.1 | Grow area control and monitor unit .............................................................Page 7

Section 2.2 | Grow area sensing .......................................................................................Page 8

Section 2.3 | Grow area device control ...........................................................................Page 9

Section 2.4 | Central control and monitoring unit .........................................................Page 10

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Stacked Hydroponics Growing System for Vertical Farming

Section 2.5 | UI/Logging/IoT system ...............................................................................Page 11

Section 1 | Cultivation System

Section 1.1 | Stacked cultivation unit:


The cultivator unit will consist of five individual planting containers stacked on top of each other.
Alternating containers will be rotated 45o so that the corners of each container rest on the top of the
sides on the container below it. See Illustration 1.

Illustration 1: Complete Stacked Cultivator Unit

The individual planting containers are not fastened in any way to each other or the the PVC stacking
pipe. They remain in place simply through gravity. They are stabilized vertically by the stacking pipe.

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Stacked Hydroponics Growing System for Vertical Farming

Nutrient solution are fed to the top container through the Nutrient Solution Feed Tube and a sprinkler
head. This tube is inserted in the PVC Stacking Pipe and runs from the Nutrient Solution Reservoir
through, and out of the top of, the top most Planting Container. The sprinkler head is placed on top of
the feed tube and can be seen in Illustration 1. Each subsequent container is gravity fed from the
drainage of the container above it. The bottom container drains into the Nutrient Solution Reservoir
and the process starts over. This keeps the Nutrient solution constantly circulating, which also provides
a level of aeration to the solution. See Illustration 2 for a closer view of the stacked containers.

Illustration 2: Side View of Stacked Planting Containers

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Stacked Hydroponics Growing System for Vertical Farming

The Nutrient Solution Reservoir will be discussed further in Section 1.2 | Section 1.2| Nutrient
solution system Please see Illustration 3 for a detailed top view of two stacked containers. This view
shows the positioning of the PVC Stacker Pipe, Nutrient Solution Feed Tube and container drainage
holes

Illustration 3: Top View of Stacked Planting Containers

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Stacked Hydroponics Growing System for Vertical Farming

Section 1.2| Nutrient solution feed system


The Nutrient Solution Feed System will consist of a reservoir of sufficient size to maintain nutrient for
twenty to fifty plants. A submersible pump that will be used to pump the nutrient solution to the top of
the cultivator unit. A feed tube that will run from the pump to the top of the cultivator unit through the
PVC Stacker Pipe. And a custom 3D printed sprinkler head. The Nutrient Solution Feed System
assembly can be seen in Illustration 4.

Illustration 4: Nutrient Solution Feed System

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Stacked Hydroponics Growing System for Vertical Farming

Section 1.3 | Cultivator rotator system


As this system is meant to operate indoors it requires some sort of artificial lighting system. And as the
Cultivator Unit is vertically oriented it makes sense to arrange the lighting vertically as well. The
lighting system it self will be further explained in Section 1.4 | Lighting system. Since the Lighting
System will be vertically oriented and standing along side the Cultivator Unit it is necessary to
implement some method of providing light evenly to all plants. In order to do this I have designed a
Cultivator Rotator system. This will slowly rotate the cultivator, on a predetermined schedule, in order
to provide all plants the light they require. See Illustration 5 for a detailed view of the Cultivator
Rotator System.

Illustration 5: Cultivator Rotator System

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Stacked Hydroponics Growing System for Vertical Farming
The gear and turntable assembly have s center hole sufficient to allow the PVC Stacker Pipe to extend
through the assemble. This also allows a sufficient opening for nutrient solution to drain back down
into the nutrient reservoir. The entire Cultivator Unit, including the PVC Stacker Pipe, rotates. The
Nutrient Solution Feed Tube however remains stationary.

Section 1.4 | Lighting system


The lighting system is quite simple. It consist simply of an LED based grow light bar mounted in a
vertical orientation. This assembly will be free standing and will sit next to the Cultivator Unit. This
should allow the lighting assembly to be optimally positioned based on the types of plants being grown.
See Illustration 6 for a detailed view of the entire Cultivator Unit including the Lighting System
assembly.

Illustration 6: Complete Cultivator Unit with Lighting Assembly

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Stacked Hydroponics Growing System for Vertical Farming

Section 1.5 | Creating a cultivation pod using multiple cultivator units.


The ultimate goal of this design is create a fully scalable hydroponics growing system. The vertical
nature of the Cultivator Unit allows for increased yields in a relatively small footprint. The system is
suited for a single, in home, installation. Providing fresh vegetables year around for the family. It is
also scalable to commercial sized installations simply by duplicating the system set forth in the design
document. And with a couple small modifications, such as the sharing of the nutrient reservoir and
Lighting System Assembly, it can be made even more efficient. One method to achieve this is
something I call a Cultivation Pod. It consists of three to five complete Cultivator Unit and a single
modified Lighting System Assembly. The Cultivator units would be arranged in circle with the Lighting
System assembly at the center. Two to three additional light bars would be added to the system and
arranged at equal distance around the tripod stand. This would provide lighting in a 360 o arc around the
Lighting System assembly. Each Cultivator Unit would still incorporate a Cultivator Rotator System in
order to provide light to all plants in each Cultivator Unit. See Illustration 7 for an example.

Illustration 8: 3 Cultivator Unit Pod

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Stacked Hydroponics Growing System for Vertical Farming

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