[Urbanfarmer]

I can only speak from our own experiences.

We've been growing vegetables hydroponically for 30 years. We've tried about every design you can think of, and then our own variations. Over time the winners and losers sorted themselves out. It became clear to us early on that wicking ultimately caused problems that flood and drain didn't. We settled on a design that just kept working nearly flawlessly and produced consistent results. We went commercial almost 6 years ago.

Either flood & drain or top-down irrigation keeps the rootzone perfectly balanced at all times, assuming you are using a properly formulated nutrient. Our experience with wicking always led to salt build-up and the associated imbalances.

For these reasons we always recommend either flood & drain, or top-down to folks who call us who want to build there own hydroponic systems.