??? --- Parts Per Million --- ???

PPM


If you have a million units of a mixture, how do you describe its contents ?

Create a table of the components based on the units and create a "short hand" notation for the relationship.

 
 

PPM = Parts Per Million.

How many parts of the million are there?

We could choose the number of atoms as our units of reference, but that would require us to keep writing a lot of zeros and to do more math than is actually needed.

The "practical" lab based system, that has been in use since the early 1900's, uses the notation of grams of an element in grams of water.

There are 1000 grams of water in a liter at 39° F. or 4° C.. So if we have a thousand liters of water, (about 264.17 gallons; – 1 gal. = 3.7853 l.) there would be a million grams (1,000,000 g.).

If then, we have one gram of an element, such as nitrogen, disolved within the total million grams of solution, we would have a solution with 1 ppm of N ( One part of Nitrogen within a million parts of solution. )

 
 
 
In hydroculture, we are accounting for more than 30 different atoms, in our water solution. A good growing solution, will have a concentration of atoms, in a range extending from about 0.005 PPM to 200 PPM. for each element. The atoms we are interested in, either are building blocks for the plantary Life Cycle, or are antagnostic, to the growth process.

Each atom, needs to be present, within a special range for each life type and the general rule, Twice Optimum is Toxic, applies in almost all cases.


Tommy's Plant Food Spread Sheet

  30.58 Gal FoodCon.      Quanity to make in gallons -->   520
                          Total Salt Concentration  --->   585.63 ppm
10.44 Dollars per Order.                                        
Atom     Total  PPM     Mineral Salts             Grams   Cost/Lb
----------------------------------------------------------------
N   180.3606848 PPM   Ammonia Nitrate                  0    1.35
P   76.21176709 PPM   Urea                           150    0.60
K   156.3388923 PPM   Potassiun Nitrate              500    1.10
Ca  89.46245300 PPM   Potassium Chloride              75    0.80
S   25.22345290 PPM   Potassium Phosphate Dibasic      0    2.70
Mg  18.80525353 PPM   Tricalicum Phosphate             0
Cl  18.17768671 PPM   Calcium Nitrate                800    0.54
Fe  19.56102022 PPM   Calcium Chloride                 0
Mn  0.495376486 PPM   Magnesium Sulphate             375    0.40
Cu  0.129305964 PPM   Magnesium Nitrate                0
Zn  0.115537038 PPM   Magnesium Biphosphate            0
B   0.489025505 PPM   Ferric Ammonium Citrate Brown  220   12.50
Mo  0.040290620 PPM   Ferric Citrophosphate            0
Co  0.044047861 PPM   Potassium Permanganate           0    3.47
Ni  0.029722589 PPM   Manganese Sulphate               3
I   0.038842597 PPM   Copper Sulphate                  1    2.51
Na  0.019317142 PPM   Zinc Sulphate                    1    2.73
Cr  0.001796565 PPM   Zinc Nitrate                     0
Ba  0.001428208 PPM   Boric Acid                     5.5
V   0.001300680 PPM   Molybdic Acid                    0
Se  0.031104562 PPM   Sodium Molybdate               0.2
Sn  0.001336246 PPM   Cobalt Chloride               0.35
F             0 PPM   Cobalt Sulphate                  0
Li  0.050858652 PPM   Nickel Ammonium Sulphate         1
O   531.1151803 PPM   Potassium Iodide               0.1   93.70
C   15.41845340 PPM   Sodium Chloride                  0    0.11
H   15.32486789 PPM   Potassium Dichromate          0.01    4.35
H20  303.801646 Gm.   Barium Chloride              0.005    2.90
                      Vanadyl Sulphate              0.01  213.38
                      Selenious Acid                 0.1  181.60
                      Stannous Chloride            0.005   15.43
                      Lithium Citrate                  1   45.06
                      15% N - 30% P - 15% K          500    1.25

I developed this spreed sheet, to help me do the math, for the more than 22 different salts, that are needed to make the water of life. It is not a complete product, nor does it cover all possibilities.

Here is a test plugin for your Web Browser, created by Office 2000, that will sum the mineral components, adjust solution concentrations, estimate cost, etc.
I have not have a chance to fully test it.
It is based on a 123 spreadsheet (above) that I wrote a decade ago.


If you are a serious grower, or researcher ...
you should find this program or spread sheet useful in your work.

Download a Hydroculture Spread Sheet Program & Spread Sheet.
455K self extracting package — for 8088+ IBM machines

Download Only the Spread Sheet
Works well with Excel


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