This week’s selection is the Mushroom by Thingiverse contributor skylerjrandolph.
What is the “Mushroom”? It’s a modular hydroponics tower, where you can grow plants (and even food) without the need for soil.
Hydroponics involves circulating water containing nutrients to plant roots. The plants absorb water, and combine sunshine with the dissolved nutrients a method known as “photosynthesis” to grow.
It’s a very efficient (and tidy) way to grow plants, but is not often done in homes. This is usually because it’s a bit of work to identify and assemble all the required plumbing and other parts to make it work.
Here, however, is a 3D printable kit that can get you started easily.
There’s only ten part types, and you print as many as you need to assemble a hydroponics tower. Plants emerge from segments on the sides of the tower to be exposed to sunlight, while water flows down from the top to provide nutrients.
So there are a few decisions to make: how many plants do you need? Does the tower location offer sunlight on all sides? From there you can determine the number of segments required, and therefore the total number of parts to print, as per the instructions.
You’ll also need some non-printable parts, including a pail for water storage, tubing and a submersible pump. For the bio-side of this project, you’ll need some seeds of the desired plants, and rockwool cubes, which hold the seeds when they are germinating (otherwise they’d fall down the tower!
The rest is up to nature, assuming you keep the pail filled with fresh water and nutrients.
Enjoy your tomatoes!
Via Thingiverse
