Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Sounds like your getting a handle on it. Turning your grow beds into solar heaters I what I had in mine in my other post (The black polly). I am rooting for the bari's survival.

DD - I was running one bed for a fair while as a solar collector, but there is not as much to be gained by this now that the sun is lower in the sky and the location of my beds currently means they do not get full sun for quite a lot of the day. As for insulation - I have an absolute file of 4metre long by 60cm wide polystyrene sheets (and I mean a big pile). Only problem with them is they are thin, so I need to use them in number to achieve decent insulation. On the positive side they bend around corners very easily .

Stu - the collector is this sort of stuff http://www.autumnsolar.com.au/pool-solar-heating.htm , so it is what it is. 8 tubes per strip and the most eficient way to run it I think is to take it to a point and then turn it and have it come back to an outlet at the same point (not sure I make sense here). Re: priming, when I'm just using it on the ground, I'll probably run it from an in sump pond pump (if it will push the water through) and water will fall to the lowest point when I turn off the pump (ie water will remain in the tubing but not in the pipes coming from the sump and going to the fish tank. When I place on roof (if this eventually happens) I may need to use a valve that stops the water from returning to/through the pump when the pump turns off.

will the pipes be above the level of the tank?

The collector will be lower than the tank. The pipe going into the tank would be set up (I imagine) so that they are above the high point of the tank to ensure no siphoning). The pipe in the sump will of course be connected to the pump. Does this clarify .

I'd use convection to push the water, but there is no way that's going to work

The easiest and cheapest way if you are going solar you will need a double thermostat [high low ] and a seperate pump [small submersable ]in fish tank when the outside water is 2 deg higher pump starts and changes water in solar collecter then stops

was asking because if the collector is higher than the tank and has a water seal then i'd imagine that you'd loose heat at night when the pumps off via thermo siphon. easy way to fix that would be to have the return above teh water level (ie not immersed) but this does not effect you as your collector is lower

The fish were purchased at the right time to grow them to size, but were not fed properly due to water paremeter problems.

Correct. Glad to see you are following OBO

fallen behind something shocking in the last few days

I provide this update with some trepidation:

This morning I checked the temps and they were 22 degrees in fish tank (before pump turned on for the day) and 18.5 in the sump. Sump holds about half the volume of the tank (or maybe a bit less) so at the most this would drop the system temp by 1 and a bit degrees when the pumps come on. To that, need to add some temperature loss due to cold gravel and clay balls and the bit of water sitting in the bottom of the beds below the little hole in the inner standpipe.

The 22 degrees was about 1 degree warmer than the temp at 10pm (a little under 10 hours prior). Managed this by having both my 200 watt heaters going as well as my 150 watt. You may remember I'd thrown the extra 200 watt in when I found the tank to be 16.5 degrees that morning. So I'd picked up 6 or so degrees in the day (mainly from the heaters).

So tonight I head out (10pm) and check the temps. Frack me - the tank is 26.5 degrees (or was it 26.2 - anyway you get the jist). There was friggin fog coming off the top of the water when I took the insulation off the top and shone a light in. Now one of the 200 watt heater has a bung thermostat (the one I threw in the day before) which is why I don't normally use it. For some reason the other 200 watt one was turned up to 28 degrees, so was still on. The 150 had turned off. So I've cranked the 200 watt that actually works back down to 20 degrees (which actualy turns on and off at 22 or so degrees). This means that atm just the bung one is running. Will check temps in morning.

Anyway - this is promising. With the addition of the plastic film structure over the beds, I may just get these barra through winter afterall (not that the cold has hit yet).

I'm starting to wonder whether I had the pumps going at night rather than the day for longer than the single night . But I'm sure it couldn't have been too long or I'd have noticed when potering around the system last weekend

But you were correct OBO. Mate - bit of advice, if you're falling behind, just make sure you read my threads

Loving this ,, as suspected the warm-house / glass-house is assisting nicely.
Insulation and total 550 watts of power able to get water VERY warm,.....,,

The grow beds are still a very important factor ..... maybe bury a 2 litre milk container, filled with water , in the bed ,, after a day check temps every few hours ,, you may find that they are still quite cool at 8am but still holding warmth much later in the evening.Warm rocks.
I still recon I can hold a minimum 23C in Sydney on 9 hours of heater ( 900 watt, 8 KWH). From the sounds of this, I may need less.
Smart meter at less than 7 cents per KWH= 56 cents a day.
56 cents for MAXIMUM growth of both fish and veg.

Well that's promising, good luck!

Glad to hear the extra heaters are doing the job. By the end of your next summer the Bari will be huge!

And be worth $80.00 each