Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Did se a plumber, after making a small mistake and not having a spare T to cut the drain pipe flush with that T,
saw trough the piece of pipe inside T with a hacksaw blade and prised it out with a knife.
Have tried it myself at home but have used a small wood chisel to do the cutting and prising.
Quite easy.

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Not my idea but either saw, heard or read it.

To brew your own liquid fertilizer, fill a big plant pot or similar container with holes in it for drainage with weeds
from the garden, well pressed, put it in a rubbish bin or open B/Barrel, weight it down with bricks or similar and fill
with water.
In a month or two the weed and the water will go black and the weed will stink rotten when pulled out.
Buffalo or coach grass will not stink, not much but “juicy” weeds will ferment and produce a very strong brew.
Use a plant pot or container big enough to fit snugly into the big bin to prevent it tipping over inside the bin.
Also tie a rope to it, leaving it hanging outside so you don’t have to reach inside to pull the weeds out.
Use it diluted to a weak tea color.

When making weed tea, place the can or bin in an out of the way place since it can stink quite badly.

Comfrey leaves can make a very strong fertilizer tea.

There are lots of tea type concoctions that can be made, diluted and sprayed around the dirt garden. Cornmeal is good for increasing bacterial activity in soil, if too much wood mulch has promoted an overabundance of fungal growth, the cornmeal can bring that back into balance.

Compost tea and worm tea are also ways to improve the microbe activity of your soil.

Most teas can simply be made by placing the ingredient in the water and letting it soak for some amount of time. Then strain, dilute and use. Improvements can be made by adding aeration and perhaps a sugar source (sugar or molasses). Most aerated teas only need two or three days to brew or they will run out of sugar and die back off.

You can reuse pvc fittings that are glued by heating with a heatgun, softens the glue, and pry out the pipe end.

If at first you don't succeed, read some more posts. If it still doesn't work, ask for help or try a different approach. The beauty of AP, there's more than one way to do just about everything. And, this group is amazing in terms of the volume of knowledge and the willingness to help.

Also, on plumbing... measure, cut, put it together to make sure it works. Then go back and glue everything that doesn't come in contact with a grow bed, sump or fish tank. Those parts in will likely need cleaned periodically. The rest will either leak, or worse yet, come apart shooting water everywhere when you least expect if not properly sealed.

These are pricey but very handy when you have limited space, or don't want to dig up lengths to repair a break. http://www.perthirrigation.com.au/listP ... C/SLIP+FIX

A $30 PVC welder (a type of heat gun) and the correct type of plastic welding rods cam save a bundle in pvc fittings. Its not hard to learn.

Or my favorite method of doing this, Slather the pvc glue to the inside of the bit you want removed and light it up pry it out when soft.

If you have big fish in your tank, together with a pump, make sure that the hose can't come loose!

If you line a growbed or pond, NEVER CUT AND GLUE THE EDGES, just fold them away.

*When making cutting for new plants, cover them up with a thin clear plastic (such as drop cloth for painting) or 2 liter bottle with the bottom cut off, to help the plants retain moisture. I'm not totally sure but you may need to vent them once a day to help bring in fresh air.

*The bulkhead style fitting on sun tea jars work perfect for draining the grow beds if you are using a continuous drain or flood and drain system. Just take out the rubber valve and put the valve on the inside of the grow bed, then attach a 5/8(?) hose on the outside.

*To get a better air/water mixture when making an airlift pump use a plastic funnel turned upside down. Drill a hole in the side of funnel for the air tube to go inside the funnel, then attach the airstone to the end of the air tube. Then drill a bunch of holes around the bottom for water to be pulled through, the more holes the better. Dont make the holes big enough that the fish could get sucked in. Mess with different lift tube sizes, I ended up using 5/8" rubber tubing for mine.

Have you tried the air lift without the air stone? It might work just as well with big bubbles?

I just tried out aplanting idea and it worked beautifully.
It may have been aready tried before but I couldn't find it documented anywhere.

Planting seedlings in a crowded GB has always caused me to damage to the roots of nearby plants as well as just about destroying the roots of the seedling going into the bed.

Every time you dig out some scoria, more drops into the hole.

My Solution,
I got a piece of 90mm PVC tube about 100mm long, pressed it about 60mm into the media Bit like a cookie cutter, and thenvdug out the stuff inside the tube with an old set of tongs.

I placed the seedling into the bottom of the Hole/tube,
and then lifted the tube up from around the seedling.
The scoria just fell back in around the roots causing no damage.

Knew that would happen, Reworded the search, and got 1/2 Dozen hits rangeing back years ago

Been using similar technique, a plant tube with bottom cut off.

While not really AP related, I get fed up with the amount of portable power tools dumped because the batteries wont charge (well now that I have quite a few ).
Please note if you are unconfident about this don't try it, if the battery is a Lithium ion dont do it, its dangerous. (enough of the warnings).
This is for Ni CD (nickel cadmium) and nickel metal hydride batteries ONLY.
You need a voltmeter, two pieces of wire, a small 6v SLA battery and something (screwdriver to take the battery pack apart).
Lets say its a 12v battery pack, this means you will have 10 cells of nominal 1.2v(individual batteries) joined in series ie positive to negative to positive etc.
The hard bit is getting the pack open (manufacturers don't like you doing this) do it slowly and carefully. LEAVE ALL THE CONNECTIONS ON THE PACK JOINED
Once apart measure the voltage of each cell, stick the positive probe of your voltmeter on the button and the negative on the flat bottom (got to be above 1.2v and usually 1.3 something volts). The most common failing is that one cells has a dead short (no voltage) or has dropped below 1.1v.
Once you have identified the bad cell(s) you have to apply a high voltage ie 6v across this cell, using your small SLA and the wires apply this for a few seconds MAKE SURE YOU ARE CONNECTING POSITIVE TO POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE TO NEGATIVE. Check the voltage of the cell, if it hasnt pulled up to about 1.3v do it again. Wait a few moments and measure the voltage again. If its holding above 1.2v,( preferably higher) put the pack back together again.

An interesting way for those with micro systems and fluro's to adjust the height of the fluros.
Normally fluro's are suspended from chains, and you move them up by adjusting the chain length, this is fairly fiddly.

If you have two parallel surfaces going up on either side of the gb, attach metal plates to them. Get a piece of wood which just fits between them add a small block of wood on either end. Get eight cupboard magnetic door catches (can usually get them from salvage) and attach four at each end, two on the top two on the bottom (if its a very big fluro more) attach your fluro/s to the wood.

The wood should now be between the metal plates and held there by the magnets, you just move it up or down by grasping each end and sliding it.

These catches will exert usually a 4kg pull but thats only on the face, not laterally which is how they are now taking weight.