Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hi Porter,

What supports do you have underneath the beds? i fear the the steel tube will bend under the load of the full growbeds. Also the sides will bulge a fair bit so i presume you will be reinforcing the sides and cladding them?

Hi Mate, much appreciated, we will absolutely be watching how it bares weight, very closely, and your right, diagonal bracing will be the first port of call. We have been watching Colum's steel frame beds very closely, and he has been of great great assistance to us as we planned and built these.



Hey Colum, speak of the devil!

Thanks for all your assistance my friend, much appreciated.
Mate, all tolled the steel layout was $300 neat. (Melbourne pricing)



HI Craig, hows things mate?
for sure, they only arrived today, we are placing a floor of 6x1.5in's across to distribute the weight across the bottom, and the sides will be internally fitted with cladding to stop any bowing from the IBC's.
I will post more detailed photos as we progress in the build.
Pop up for a coffee when your up this way again.

Things are great mate, getting stuck into my new build and the business is keeping things busy as well.

Will drop in some time soon, you will have to come down and take a look over here as well.

Good to hear the plans, i didn't think you wouldn't neglect to support and reinforce it properly, i look forward to future photos.

Very good to hear!
For sure my friend, seeing yours (and your dad's) system is definitely on my to do list, well over due.

I should get into making Aquaponic frames! I could knock that one out in an hour or two!

I've never played with the IBC's before, so I'm not quite sure how much weight they can handle. But it should be strong enough with a base to support spread the weight on the bottom, and cladding strong enough to stop it bowing out.

Are you using flood/drain for this one? I'm curous about how big you'll go with the sump, the beds look deeper than normal (not a bad thing, just need a bigger sump).

Hi Colum,

This system will be a deep water set up, a finished bed depth of 400mm and 550ltr sump.
I initially wasn't going to use a sump at all as there is no real need too, and simply return water to the bottom of the IBC (same as the little system) however, the extra 550ltrs allows some experimentation we want to do.

Should be fun.

Did you choose the frames for neatness over IBC frames?

HI Jayendra,

Whilst i want the system to present neatly as possible, i want the IBC cages for another purpose with this system.
I will be cutting them in half and wrapping them in rodent proof wire,
It will basically provide a cage that i can fit over the top of the beds to protect the seedlings and plants from vermin and possums which we are having real issues with at the moment.

Regards

There's no stopping you Porter, looking forward to this one

So, being inspired by a visit to Milne's old place a couple of years ago, and getting the opportunity to see his Greek necropolis of a greenhouse swathed in an enormous grapevine, we thought we would give it a go.

Ours is still little but now in its third year and looks good for it's first crop of grapes!
Although we are still proceeding cautiously because it is our first go, and with the rat back, who knows if we can see them through.

The photos are dated at:

2 February 2012 (inside the old greenhouse)
15 October 2013 (new place)
11 February 2014 (new place)

Grapelet's as of 14 October 2014!

I tried putting grapes into my system, and it all just died off without doing much.

Nicely done!

Hi Colum,

We haven't done anything special with this, other than made sure that the root ball stays well above the water line. Although it is thirsty, it hates wet feet.

The second of the two grapes is still growing nicely, it is 18 months behind the big one and alot smaller but again, it is much much better than last year is terms of growth. (will post a photo in the very next post in a minute).

But other than that, (i think it is about 14 days on now) the graplets (?) are growing really well with no obvious signs to worry about.

At the moment, the big one is surrounded by leaks!

The little one is at the opposite end of the same row.

So we are a bit into November, and other than the rat still making periodic and destructive appearances, things aren't traveling along to badly.
The Broccoli has come back after the first appearance of the rat but although growing strongly, it is just not producing.
The Leeks, silver beet, red and black kale, peas and celery are all pottering along nicely but the tomatoes were late this in this year unfortunately.

The new system is just waiting for the last stand to arrive, we think 5-6days, but then it arrives it should get a little crazy. We laid all the boards into the current grow bed frames and some mayhem with a circular saw should see them trimmed up nicely with a bit of luck.