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My growtronix turns that pump on every day for 30 seconds and dumps some of my resevior out. then the system is connected to a water supply so it autmaticlly refills what was dumped out with fresh water. then i come allong and add nutrient manually once a week or depending on whats fruiting at the time.
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The way I understand it, is that he has one reservoir with nutrient solution in it (I don't know how many gallons). The pump is running 24/7 supplying this nutrient solution to the plants via the open ended drip hose with the single stream of nutrient solution coming out pointed at the main root ball.
The growtronix system is connected to a valve that opens automatically each day for 30 seconds dumping one gallon of this nutrient solution out and into the sewer system (septic tank I think actually). Now that the water level is low in the reservoir, I assume there is a float valve that allows fresh water to take the place of the nutrient solution that was dumped out. This dilutes the nutrient solution, but then once a week he adds some
nutrients to the nutrient solution because of the fresh plain water that is added each day. Basically he is taking 7 gallons of used nutrient solution out, and adding 7 gallons of new nutrient solution back each week to the reservoir.
This is an interesting concept and I know that a lot of nutrients get wasted by dumping out the reservoir regular. I do know that some people don't dump them at all but just add new nutrients to the reservoir. Though that is something that takes a watchful eye to know how the plants are responding. As I said somewhere in this forum before, observation is the key to learning.
Perhaps instead of dumping the whole reservoir, maybe only dump half then replace the half with fresh nutrient solution. Or maybe only replacing 75% of the reservoir to start with, then see how the plants respond. If OK, then replace only 50% the next time. If OK, then maybe try replacing only 25% the next, but observation is the key. Also size of the reservoir will play a part, I don't think it would be as much of a problem in larger reservoirs (like 50 gallons and up) but smaller ones (like 5 or 15 gallons) will be affected more. And if there's anything wrong with the nutrient solution or root diseases, then I would certainly change the whole thing.
I would still want to clean the pump and reservoir out. You can always put the nutrients in another container while you do this. Smaller reservoirs also might have a problem with stable pH levels because of the stabilizers in the old nutrients being older. By the time my nutrients start getting to the 2 week stage the pH level starts to need fixing almost daily, on a 8-10 gallon reservoir. You you may want to use a little stronger solution when only replacing a portion of the nutrients also. Only hands on observation can tell you how your plants are responding.