Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hi all,
I'm very new to this and really excited about getting my first system up and running soon.
I am planning on running a 1000l fish tank to maybe six 100l grow beds made from 200l drums cut in half and using the Flood and Drain method. Can anyone see any major issues?

Which way were you planning to cut the barrels?
Cutting them the long way can give some people trouble trying to get siphons to work and then you need good stands to support them or they bow and buckle. Cutting them around the middle and having slightly taller round grow beds has been very effective for some people as you just need a surface to set them on and no worry about additional support. Also balancing he flood and drain with barrels cut round the middle is easier as the volume of a given cross section is pretty similar near the top as near the bottom.
Here is a thread where the barrels are cut around the middle showing how simple the stands for the grow beds can be.
http://backyardaquaponics.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=111534#p111534

I would also suggest that you may well want more grow beds (like 400 liters more which would give you a 1:1 ratio) if you are likely to want lots of or if your water quality doesn't stay good. Equal amount of grow bed to fish tank is a good recommended minimum amount of grow beds since you generally want to circulate the volume of your fish tank each hour and that can get harder if you don't have enough grow bed.

With 600 liters of grow bed, you should probably stock less than 30 fish to start out (that is me figuring you would get fingerlings to start and would harvest them before they get much over 500 grams.) Future seasons you might be able to stock more heavily but the first season cycling up and learning to care for fish you shouldn't push it.

Anyway, welcome to the addiction
For newbies I usually recommend reading the Basic Infohttp://backyardaquaponics.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=12 and Useful Infohttp://backyardaquaponics.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=11 sections completely as they are not too terribly long and should give a good foundation to start with. Then pick a couple of the bigger member system threads to read through completely to hopefully save you from some of the more common mistakes.
I think I'll link to OBO's thread again for you as a good one to read through
http://backyardaquaponics.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=2218&st=0&sk=t&sd=a
If you have any additional comments about the design of your system it might help us recommend other member system threads that might be most helpful to you.

Again, welcome

Thanks TCLynx for the info. I see what your saying about the drain down. Would you recomend
flat based/ even sided tubs for grow beds?(makes more sense).
I've just scored a 3500 lph 60w pump on the cheap, will this do the job?

It depends on how you plan to set up the system. If you will run the pump constantly and drain the grow beds by siphons or some other means, then it should be more than enough flow to cover you.

Some notes about pumps. Just because it says it can pump 3500 liters per hour, that does not mean you will get that much from it once you make it pump up some height and through pipes. There are usually charts or curves for pumps that will tell you how much flow it will give at different heights. You also want to be sure it is a "fish safe" pump. Some people have gotten cheap pumps only to have them fail a short time later from corrosion due to metal parts in contact with fish water or in other cases the pumps can have some sort of oil lubricant behind a seal that could fail and cause oil to leak into the water and kill fish at a later date. Pumps meant for fish ponds and aquariums are generally quite safe.

Anyway, if you want to run the pump on a timer, you will probably need to run it for at least 20 minutes each hour in order to turn over the 1000 liter fish tank each hour. This could be done by running it for 15 minutes twice each hour or running 30 minutes on/30 minutes off which would let you use an even less costly timer to operate it.

Hey Willods - welcome to the forum.

Your system plan sounds fine, except for the number of growbeds, as TCL indicated earlier. You want a minimum 1:1 ratio, preferably 2:1 unless you integrate in some sort of biofilter.

And remember - we all love photos of people's systems !

hi i am just around the corner in green fields and have been going for 9 months if you like too phone i may be able to help with what little i have learnt i also have used plastic 200 litre drums and as mentioned there is a
problem more so in summer when drums get hot
darryl 95812578

Thanks again for feedback. I'm sure you'll hear from me soon darryl.

Photos comin soon

Hello,

I am in North Yunderup and am also very green. My system is just one week old.
Have you put fish in yet?
I have put Barramundi in and I think they are doing OK but they are pretty quiet and don't seem to be eating much.

Linda

I agree with TCL, etc, that it is far better to have more growbed than less for improved water quality, but a higher ratio of growbed to fish tank means you will need a sump. I have had a system with a flood/drain cycle time of 15 minutes, roughly, and one of the tomato plants I pulled at the end of season weighed about 50kg (100lbs), even with all the pruning back during the growing season. Probably harvested at least that many lbs of tomatoes from it as well over the summer. So, one can filter a pretty good system with less than optimum growbed....if everything works perfectly.

Nope... they'll work just fine...

Cheers Rupertofoz for the reassuring photo's.
I've been distracted by some major car issues but will get me head down and finish the construction now i've seen those pics.
Was wondering why have you looped the poly drain pipes to the header?

Simple "loop siphons"... to drain the growbeds... water rises in the growbed (and inside the loop tubes)... until it expels the air from within the loop tube... (thus setting the maximum height of the flood in the growbed).... initiating a fast siphon drain....

When the siphon has drained the growbed down... air re-enters the tube... breaking the siphon, and allowing the growbed to refill... etc etc...

Uses a continuous pump regime...

Been working near flawlessly, with virtually no maintenance, for several years...

Check out these threads...

viewtopic.php?f=8&t=4154

viewtopic.php?f=8&t=470

Hi Willods, welcome to the madness just on your pump as TC has mentioned you won't get 3500lph out of it this here http://www.rockaroundtheblock.com.au/pd.html?Model= is an excellent guide, pick a pump and put in head height and pipe length and you will see the result, for example the Jebao 3500 at a 1 mt head height and 3mts of pipe in 19mm pipe drops to 1800lph, in the setup you are building I would suggest you will get around 1500lph so you need around 45 minutes of run time to turn the water over in an hour, I have 6000lt of water pumping at about 10000lph so at the moment I am 1 hour on and 1 hour off and thats the cycle I would suggest for you with that pump, it works out less than 15c a day to run with that wattage pump, a digital timer with 20 on/off settings are available from places like Bunnings, Coles etc for around $15.
As Hydrophillia has mentioned, if you have 600lt of Grow bed to me that will be fine or if adding more you will run out of water when pumping so a sump or another tank connected will be needed, there is a lot of talk about 1:1 ratio, I am well under that and have no problems at all, I have 6000lts of water and around 2000lt of GB, admittedly I only run around 50 fish and 150 yabbies in that but is sufficient for me, so you can manage things around what you have

I'm up and running at last but still ironing out a few bugs namely electric timer. Can anyone recommend a reliable timer as mine has a mind of it's own.
A big thanks to Darryl for helping me out