Modular Hydroponic Tower Garden - HydraTower

HydraTower | Fully Modular Hydroponic Tower Garden

I have wanted to build my own hydroponic tower for quite a while, but every time I looked at existing designs there were things I wanted to do differently. Eventually I decided the only way I was going to get the tower I wanted was to design it myself.

So I did.

HydraTower is the result of a lot of time in Tinkercad, a lot of printing, a lot of changes, and probably more thought about hydroponic towers than any reasonable person should put into one.

The biggest thing I wanted was true modularity . I didn't just want a tower where you could stack another plastic section on top. I wanted the actual system to expand when you added a section.

Each HydraTower growing section has three plant sites and its own printed-in-place section of the internal water riser . There is no separate pipe inside the tower and no long piece of tubing that has to be fed up through all the sections.

The riser is already there when the part comes off the printer.

When you stack another growing section onto the tower, the internal risers connect using 5/8" x 3/4" O-rings to create the seal.

So adding one section gives you:

3 more plant sites A taller tower An extended internal water supply

All at the same time.

That is probably the part of HydraTower I am most proud of.

Three plants per section, on purpose

I know I could have squeezed more planting pockets into each level. I chose not to.

I wanted the plants to have some room once they actually started growing. Putting a huge number of plants into a tower looks impressive when they are seedlings, but those seedlings hopefully aren't going to stay small for very long.

Each section has three planting sites, but the connection between sections has six possible positions . That lets you rotate one level relative to another and stagger the plants instead of being stuck with the same three positions all the way up the tower.

You can also make HydraTower as tall or as short as makes sense for you. Print another growing section and add three more sites.

The water system is built into the tower

Water is pumped from the reservoir through the internal riser to the top of HydraTower.

At the top I use inexpensive micro spray nozzles to spread the water across the inside of the tower. The water reaches the roots and then makes its way back down into the reservoir to be recirculated.

I could have tried to design and print the spray nozzles too, but sometimes the better solution is a cheap part that already works. The nozzles I use are readily available and inexpensive.

For the pump, I recommend at least 210 GPH . I prefer something closer to 480 GPH , which gives the system a little more to work with as the tower gets taller.

I will include information on the hardware I use so you don't have to go hunting for parts that fit.

HydraCup

Once I got this far, putting a generic net cup into the tower didn't feel right either.

So I designed one.

The HydraCup has a square top that fits firmly into the angled planting pockets and a deeper body with plenty of openings for water and root growth.

I also wanted to be able to start plants in the tower rather than germinating them somewhere else and transplanting them later, so I designed a humidity dome that fits over the HydraCup.

Put your seed and growing media in the cup, put the dome on, and let it germinate. Once the seedling is growing and no longer needs the extra humidity, remove the dome.

The idea is simple:

Start with a seed. End with a plant. Keep it in the same cup.

I have also designed a Rockwool insert for the HydraCup. I have some other ideas for inserts that would allow the same cup to work better with different growing media, so there will probably be more coming.

The HydraDeck connection

The base of HydraTower may look familiar if you've seen my HydraDeck design here on MakerWorld.

HydraDeck was originally designed as a platform that sits over a 5-gallon bucket for watering plants. I liked that design enough that I used it as the starting point for HydraTower's reservoir base.

This version has been modified specifically for HydraTower and incorporates the tower's locking system.

It still keeps one of the things I like about the original HydraDeck. It simply sits securely on top of a standard 5-gallon bucket. There is no need to screw it to the bucket or permanently modify the reservoir.

If I need into the bucket, I want to be able to get into the bucket.

Simple.

Sensor access