Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Class 12 32 mm pressure pipe fits exactly inside class 9 40mm pressure pipe. It is not snug enough to hold buy itself but will hold easily with silicon. You can avoid using adapters this way.

Note... I may have my classes back to front. Try before you buy.

I've just built my first system and i want to share a few of the "learning's" i have made along the way, especially to do with prep and putting everything together...

First up, grow beds. I put mine on a table, figured it would be perfect. It wasn't. I didn't think about how much weight there would be in it once it was filled and had to strip mine down and redo it, this time with proper sole plates for the table legs and proper weight distribution. May not apply for everyone's setup, but it's definitely something to consider. All those rocks, plus umpteen litres of water can get pretty heavy and this caught me out.

Second thing. Fish tanks, especially IBC's can be death traps for animals or small kids who are always inquisitive about fish etc. They MUST have something over the top... I know most people will make sure they do this, but it needs to be part of everyone's plans and a prerequisite before adding water.

Washing your rocks / media can be a real pain and dirty water sucks. I had an old table frame laying about so i covered it with shade cloth and shoveled my rocks on to it. Then i gave them a good wash and an agitation and got heaps of dirt out... saved me a lot of time and mucking around...

The weight of water is directly proportional to the volume Marlin...

i.e a 1000L of water... will weight 1000kg....

Some media is heavier than others... and the volume displacement may vary between the media used...

But as a rough guide... you could probably assume the weight in your beds... will be at least equivalent to the volume of the beds...

On washing gravel. The real secret is....don't.

When you first unload or from the trailer or the pile out the front. Scrape a wheel barrow sized pile to the side, blast it with the hose for a while, then stick it in your wheel barrow and straight into the growbed.

I and many others have done this with no ill effects. My system cleared so I could see the bottom in three days. Complete clear water in a week.

The only thing you might need to be careful of is if your gravel have been contaminated significantly with dust from other products at the landscape supply yard. If this is the case then good luck to you.

I just filled my wheel barrow with water, then shoveled the gravel in, drained, and loaded my grow beds with the pump running to continue to clean the gravel for me. The water was clear the same day.

I dont wash media..... ever.

My media really needed it. it was about 90% rock and the rest was dirt, which meant it needed a good clean, cycled heavily and then whole tank flushed out. In most circumstances i think you could probably get away with a squirt and a few days cycling, but my case needed a bit of extra care.
Glad i did though cause my tanks are clean as and my redclaw and fish seem to be happy as...

Another option for pvc pipe cutting is to just use a copper pipe cutter as per the attached picture (looks exactly the same as the one that I have). Gives a nice straight cut without any brute force required. From memory mine cost me about $15 from Bunnings and I had no problems using it to cut PVC pipes. I even recently used it underwater to take a couple of inches off the tip of my stand pipe.

my 2c on gravel washing etc...

I had pretty clean gravel the second time around but I hit it with a hose, to get the fine dust off, shoveled into a wheelbarrow and then hosed it off again and let the water run to the lawn. I hosed it until it was clear running and not "milky"

also one HUGE help was that rather than shovel into wheelbarrow and then shovel back out, I stacked some bessa blocks next to my growbed and made a ramp with 2 2.4m hardwood sleepers so I could run the wheelbarrow up above the level or the growbed and tip it in.

Beware of the pressure drop.

I've got one of these

for cutting - I was going to get the corded version but then thought of the location it would mostly be ued (down the back yard, and went battery. Works a treat.

Also for holes in pipes, IBC's etc. I got a set of Craftright hole saws - comes in 19, 22, 29, 32, 38, 44, 54, 64, 76, 89, 102 & 127mm sizes, 2 arbors, one with centre drill and the other not and a backing plate for the larger saws


For a guy who began with almost no tools at all (what I had was for computers) I'm starting to get a decent start on needing a shed.

I have that same holesaw except i got an angle grinder to cut with

For anyone building do-it-yourself strawberry towers out of pvc pipe, here is an excerpt from my latest post regarding shaping the concave pockets:

"I was wanting to find an easier way to bend the pipes once the halfway cut is made. I'm heating them with an electric heat gun and it does the job without overcooking the pipes. (Using 3" cell-core pvc. not the solid pvc) After heating, I was using the handle of a big screwdriver to bend the hollows and hold in place until the pipe cooled enough to hold its new shape. Hand cramps! I often had to heat and hold each corner of the hollow to get the desired shape. So, I looked around for a garden trowel or something that would hold the whole concave shape I wanted. Walked through the kitchen and what was waiting to be washed? One of those fashionable little stainless steel water bottles my wife has but never uses. Was it the right diameter? Yes! Next bright idea-fill it with ice and water. Now when I use it to shape the hollow it also cools the pipe and gets me on to the next one faster."

yeah I agree... the water clears eventually anyhow and if you are really fussy you can pump it out when it has settled easy enough. Only reason to wash media that I can think of is if it may be contaminated.

Never stick a knife in the toaster