Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

the length of pipe at the bottom will increase flow. Its got to do with the atmospheric pressure difference between the water height and the siphon outlet height (this is why they work at all). The greater the height diff, the greater the "push" and it only holds true while the siphon is "flooded"

Hope this makes sence. Some one posted a diagram with A B and C lengths, that diagram makes it easy to visualise and understand

Steve

I'm chasing you Les

Hey Ell:
I was thinking about them again the other night while drifting off to sleep - it would be nice to add some curves inside to smooth out the flow and close up the air gap asap, maybe with some silicone?

I have another design idea that I will sketch up in the auto siphon thread sometime soon.

Another way to think about the downpipe is that water is accelerating due to gravity, and the accelerating "particles" pull on the ones higher in the pipe. Without some length to the downpipe you wouldn't get this pull happening to keep the water flowing.

J, got too much of a head start on ya

Dave, doing the writeup on it got me thinking of a better way:

1) have no cut outs on the stand pipe at all
2) cut the siphon pipe (the one that fits over the stand pipe) to a length so that it clears the top of the stand pipe when flush with the bottom of the GB floor by an amount so that there is sufficient gap between lid and top of standp pipe
3) cut out pieces on the bottom of the siphon pipe so that water can flow up between the 2 and down the stand pipe - much like MF has done

In other words, put the crenellations on the bottom of the siphon pipe, this takes away the accuracy in depth cut needed previously, will put in the Siphons for AP's and explain more fully - damn why didn't I think of that originally

"J, got too much of a head start on ya"

yep, three days

This is the limit of 10 little goldies, had good growth on lettuces, herbs and beans with nitrates heading towards 40 - put in a chinese cabbage and it kinda took over, growth on everything else slowwed down as it grew larger and nitrates down below 10.

Beans have flowered and producing fruit, lettuces look a bit down trodden and herbs hiding in there somewhere.

Had thoughts of removing the monster but decided to let it run, the system works, I have gained a lot of knowledge and have had fun in doing it - now for the real thing

Eat it, eat it!

Ell- looks a bit different than when I saw the system!

that's a monster, can you pluck off a few outside leaves and leave the plant in there?

lol all - needs to form a head yet, have some planted in dirt.

Plan to just have herbs and small veggies in the future in these GB's and use the tank as an isolation/quarantine area so pushing the system to its limits - imagine 100 perch in 200l (not for very long eh!)

Update:
Added 20-ish silver perch to the 10 comets, needed to do something, nitrates were almost zero - being sucked out by the chinese cabbage.

2 of the comets are all black and now its difficult to tell them from the SP, but they seem to be settling in okay - better start adding more veggies (and work on the new system)

Will be easy to tell the difference soon mate. The perch will be the big ones.

I know, they can also swim faster - quite humorous to see SP leisurely swimming along and goldfish madly flapping tails to keep up

Oh well - "BIG" SP and small comets don't mix - rescued the comets today and extended my fish tank size to about 300litres, system might struggle for a day or 2 - intended using the goldies to cycle my new system when I got to that stage but they are a bit worse for wear at the moment.

New extension to the system, this is how to connect 2 tanks without cutting holes in sides, 10mm piping looped over each tank (2 pipes)

Aaaahhh! - just did a nitrate test, 40+ in a week, put in a punnet of lettuce to help, beans have got new life (and little beanies).

The extra fish have really kicked the little system along, got to keep an eye on the nitrates now

Doesn't DD say - when in doubt, add more fish.....