Hydroponics - Where to start?

as daft as it sounds, there's some real good clips on youtube for making your own kit, try looking there

Pot, compost, seed, water. Little bit of bottom heat if sowing in winter.

Why hydroponic?

I will still be using more traditional methods as you mention. I will then be able to compare both methods and results. I just want to try a very basic set up just as an experiment.

For my sins I have, in the past grown Tomatoes commercially in Guernsey and other places.
Hydroponically grown tomatoes were produced very successfully for a number of years, especially good if you have poor soil.
Basically, you have a flowing trough of shallow water, which the roots sit in. The plants are placed into a block of rock-wool, which will not breakdown in the flowing water. The water must flow to keep oxygen in the water.

OK now the important part, the nutrient levels were measured electronically virtually all the time and acid added to keep the PH levels correct.
If this system failed, then you could kill the whole greenhouse of plants, if it was not noticed for a few days.
If you added nutrients by hand, which you would do on a non-commercial system, then you would need a basic kit to measure all the levels, i.e. PH, potash, nitrogen and calcium. Don't ask what they should be, it was too long ago, and we had an advisory service with 15 staff to advise the whole industry.
However, I am sure that you will find plenty of advice on the net if you want to do a trial. There are still some vast glasshouses around the world that use this system and it was very popular in places with virtually no soil or peat to use.
It would be very interesting to see how you get on and if done right, you will have a the perfect growing conditions and a great crop, but remember you will have a smaller margin for error.
Good luck.
This link shows a simple versionHow To Set Up An Hydroponic Garden (Lifestyle & Home: Small Space Gardening)
Mr TK

The hippes and tree-huggers might not like it, but hydroponics, when done right is vastly more productive than soil growing.

It is complex to set up, but in some cases, once everything's set up, you can leave the system running right up until harvest time without any intervention (no need to water or fertilise because it's all done automatically). So you could argue that it takes less effort.

Having said all that, I prefer growing in soil, it's a lot more forgiving of mistakes, and I'm prone to making them!

I think the more scientific hippies realised it was vastly more productive (with less disease) for growing dope. The problem is the same with veg- in that you end up with a plastic imitation product- Admittedly free from blemishes and perfect for commerce; but ultimately soulless.

I guess if your livelyhood depends on a constant supply and you must have a totally controlled environment (for whatever reason) then you must make a considerable investment in equipment, chemicals and fuel. On a fiddling about scale ?..its possible, but I'm with TS...Why?

I'd suggest stick the rockwool in the attic instead and spending your time, energy and money on improving your soil...then give 'em a load of wood ash when they flower....Fanny's your Aunt ...Tastier Toms.