Fun thread, thanks for everyone who participated! You know, I was goofing around Central Phoenix yesterday anyway (Art Museum, Biltmore Fashion Park (can't pass up a Brooks Brothers sale) etc) so I pulled over when I drove past Grotown Horticultural Supplies (1945 E Indian School Rd) just to check it out. It was really interesting and fun. SO MANY interesting supplies there. Everything from "hand picked" bat guano to Superthrive to all sort of pots, mats, materials and rooting supplies. Some of the prices were awesome, so I did stock up on pots, some new rooting media, and trace element solutions. I had stopped for perlite or pumice, but the only perlite they had was in Grant-sized bags and the particles were larger than packing peanuts so not quite what I wanted, but they had tons of other stuff. All in all a fun visit and I'll definitely head back. I don't grow cannabis, nor do I use any indoor grow lighting, so I'm not their target customer in general, but they had tons of fun stuff so I'll definitely head back next time I'm down there. Take care and happy gardening, whatever you grow!

http://www.jasons-indoor-guide-to-organic-and-hydroponics-gardening.com/index.html This is a great place to get started. I am trying this myself for the first time. I learned quite a bit about lighting as well as other things from this site. Enjoy. p.s. i spent several hours reading on this site, so grab a beer, some cocoa whatever and get ready for and good read.

The fish tank water is excellent for plants. But I wouldn't pay attention to its ppm. Although it does contain npk, it's not the same as bottled hydro nutrients. There are aquaponics setups to grow lettuce from fish waste, which is think is something like 5 -.1 -.1 NPK, but it works more because of the beneficial bacteria in the system than the NPK levels. When you have a lot of good bacteria going, you can get by with less NPK, because the bacteria allow the plant to uptake the nutrients more efficiently. Those bacteria love fish tank water, even if you are still adding chemical nutes. I would not put the pump on a timer. The roots will follow the flow of the water and continue to grow. The more flow you have, the higher the oxygen content of the water. The bell pepper is a flowering/fruiting plant, and it will want more phosphorous than the other plants you have going. You might want to consider maintaining two separate systems, one for peppers and tomatoes. Otherwise you end up wasting nutes, because the lettuce and green plants can't use the higher levels of phosphorous.

There's a guy around here that goes by Hydroponica that's got what he calls an encyclopedia with a bunch of stuff, but it's incomplete and he doesn't seem to do much work on it. If you Google "encyclopedia hydroponica" it'll come up. There's a couple other people around here with good sites too, but I forgot who. Mostly I recommend the articles on Advanced Nutrient's website (they make hydroponic nutrients but they've got a lot of good general information stuff). Here is a link that might be useful: Advanced Nutrients Articles