Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Steve
Bum, sound expensive and no thnks for the steer but I think I'll do that later.

VB
I got my head around autosiphions the other day (sort of) reading through grenado's thread and it points to else where. Some where there was mentioned that the grow beds need to be progressively smaller in order for autosiphons to work. Will need to study them some more to understand why this is so.

However, I'd been thinking I'd steer away from autosiphons because I thought it was a good idea to have the GBs quickly fill and then slowly drain. Not possible if running the autosiphons in series. If they were run in parralel then we have the same problem as before. Now that I think about it. Why do we want the GBs to fill quickly and then drain slowly. Why do we care? Is there anything wrong with them filling and draining slowly?

Did I mention I'm going fishing tomorrow. Why am I still up?

Lots of whys.

Stuart

My GBs fill more slowly than they drain. Fill is about 8 minutes and drain in 4, if I recall correctly. My pump runs all the time.

Greenedo is stepping the size of his GBs to make sure the water volume in the previous bed is enough to kick on the autosiphon in the next.

As i'm sure you have read, there is such a WIDE variety of members fill/drain time that i think we have come to the conclusion that it doesn't matter too much!

Sorry Steeve,

I really meant to say thanks for the steer (or is that stear).

Honest.

I am always grateful for any heifer, I mean help, that I can get.

Stuart

Hey SPC:

Your first diagram reminded me of Travis Hughey's newer barrelponics float valve thingo, which apparently uses something like the action of a needle valve from a carburetor to initiate/terminate the flow. I haven't seen pictures of this design yet, but maybe it is something like what you are describing.

Stuart - I may have said something about progressively smaller beds (or water levels) because this is what somebody said to me when I first mooted the thought of autosiphoning from 1 bed to the next.

Now I have been running an autosipnon of my own though - I know that this is not necessary. I'll explain later - am off work to study today and to get delivery of my rainwater tank - so better do some work

Thought I'd better confess some embarrasingly nuub mistakes I have allready made. The system I'm currently desinging is not my first in fact its my thrid. Thats not to say that the first two worked though.

Oh and another emabarrasing point. Don't use black poly for cweeture hides as it floats

yeah ... tryin' to hide under sumpthing as it floats away just kinda makes you look silly..... LOL

I've been thinking about this lots. Previous valve control mechanism will work but will probably stop working really quickly as flow rates out of weight bottles change due to partial clogging by stuff (bacteria, algae, stray leaf etc.)

Please bare in mind that in the following where ever I say "this will" or similar emphactic statements what I mean is that my current idea is..... until I get a better one.

Current plan is to have one fish tank that spans the entire width of the green house. A deck, removable in sections will be placed over the thank and NFT will be suspened over most of the deck leaving room for access to the tank and the NFT gutters. Main idea is to conserve space and maximise area available for growing plants. Fish don't mind the shade and algae dosn't get much of a chance to grow in the fish tank.

Below is a schematic of the components.

On the schematic vertical height represents position in the flow of water through the system. Ie GB pair 1 is directly below the grow bed resivior and directly above GB pair 2.

A new design for the control mechanism invlolves 2 pumps. Meaning that the system will have three pumps

This will mean:

1 I will have the system with the most water pumps
2 I will have the system with the most water pumps
3 I will......

The two extra pumps will be the smallest reliable AQ pumps I can find. Their job will be to pump a small number of liters from a seperate resivoir into weight bottles that will open valves that will fill grow beds. One pump will be on a 30min cycle the other on a 60 min cycle. Control pump water is completely seperate from system water and the whole setup will be in a box so there will be no algae/bacterial growth or solid contamination to muck up the filling and emptying of the weight bottles.

The reason for that setup is so that GB pair 1 will fill every 30 mins and then empty over 29 mins and 59 seconds (hopefully) and GB pair 2 will fill every 60mins and then empty every 59mins and 59 seconds.

Since GB pair 1 is plumbed to GB pair 3 GB pair 3 can be operated as a F&F with a rate of flow equal to that of GB pair 1. Since GB pair 2 is plumbed to GB pair 4 GB pair 4 can be operated as a F&F with a rate equal to GB pair 4.

In addition the Grow bed resivoir would be a floating raft GB.

Once cycled the system wold be planted with a variety of plants in strips running the length of the green house. ie lettuce planted in the first 1m of grow bed resivoir and grow beds 1 through 8, basil planted in the second 1m of grow beds 1 through 8, etc.

Whole point would be to test growth rates at different F&D rates and different F&F rates.

So am I silly?

Anyway time to go and build my house,

Stuart

PS how do you get your signature to stick? Tried three times held my tongue in various positions etc still not there.

SPC, have you gone to Edit Signature, rather than the box for the signature? try that.

Stuart, I'm not sure if I'm understanding what you're trying to achieve, but I have thought that it would be nice to have a way to sequence the F&D of a series of tanks -- ie if it were possible to pump water exclusively to GB1 until it is full and it's autosiphon kicks over -- and then pump exclusively to GB2... It would be possible to have a very small pump that ran all the time -- and a fairly constant flow of water back to the fish tank -- and a fairly constant level in the fish tank too.

I noticed on the siphon.com website that they can sequence up to 32 siphons in a tank with a simple air valve for each siphon. So I've thought about a dosage tank with multiple siphons... And about solenoid valves and levers that actuate levers based on how much water is in a container on either end.... And I've come to the conclusion that it might just be simpler to have a huge tank and a huge sump and timed pump.....

I worried about all our beds and the big tank, but the depth was fine and all the beds fill at the same time.

Hi Ems,

Yeah I almost came to the same conclusion. It would certainly be simpler and wouldn't cause any where near as much head pressure. Although the big sump/timed pump option has its challenges as well.

I didn't get far into researching siphons before I began to think that I didn't want my GB to fill in just one cycle. Hence the control mechanism. With a small AQ pump and an electric timer I can open a valve on any cylce I want. I imagine that a timer, AQ pump and a few bits and pieces is going to be cheaper than solenoid vales and control boxes etc.

Two things that I'm trying to achieve other than produce tasty food:

1. Have control
2. Experiment

I think I said this ages ago in one of my philosphy waffling posts but even though AP has been around for quite sometime it is still an unexplored frontier.

The discussion of F&D vs F&F has intrigued me and I'm hoping to run this system as an experiment comparing 2 F&D rates with 2 comparable F&F rates and a third variable but higher F&F rate in the resivoir tanks floating raft.

In various disscussions many people have put forward their ideas and theories with some supporting research. Not to denigrate peoples opinions and ancedotal evidence but I think almost everyone would agree that more research would be a good idea. Actually anecdotal evidence is often the sign post that guides people on what to investigate next and therefore is a crucial part of the whole process.