Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

just an update.....

woke up this morning to the pump sucking air..... went out at 6am to find the ST empty....

looked around and found the problem.. the upper pond develeoped a crack about 6 inches below the rim..... so.... I lost 150 gallons of cycled water..... but ponds had plenty of water and the GB's were almost full since the water level never got high enough to kick in the overflow siphons....

oh well.. will get it fixed today and see where I stand as far as water quality goes....

the joys of AP

jT

I like those black tubs. What are the specs, where'd you get 'em, how much, and are those uniseals?

hey

are you talking about the GB's or the FT's?

the FT's were free

the GB's were from lowes... a heavy duty tote - 27 gallons.....they were on sale for 10.99 each...

uniseals vary.... I get mine from here

http://www.aussieglobe.com/uniseal3.htm

JT

I meant the GBs, thanks.

took a ph reading tonight on the outdoor system....

8.8 WOW..... I know the well water was high, but not that high....

this is a fishless system, so I can bring down the ph as fast as necessary....

tried some vinegar, which brought it down to 8, but now its back up to 8.2.. it was
ticking along at 7.6 before the water loss... and replenish

so.... what can I use to bring this PH down .....

my outdoor system went up to 8.0 after adding well water... no more well water....

jT

Hi did you resolve the ph issue and how does it all look now?

I found that bringing down the pH in my well water can only go so far with acid. I managed to get it down to 7.6 by using several doses of pool acid before cycling up my new 300 gallon system that didn't get any shells. I actually used the acid to bring the pH down to 7.2 but it bounced back up to 7.6 so I left it and started fishless cycling from there which did bring the pH down as they system cycled.

So, my answer would be....... pee in it.

You mention taking down the GH system, why, to rebuld of just don't like it anymore?

Mark

JT, hopefully you'll see this even though it's an older thread. I have a question regarding the water input to the growbeds in this system. I noticed only two inlets from the tank to the growbeds. How are you distributing the water to the other growbeds? Which do you like better, these containers or the larger beds that you used in your greenhouse system?

Hey

I keep an eye out for any posts...

actually the two pipes you see coming out of the top of a couple grow beds is actually overflow siphons....

the beds are filled from the bottom up.. and all GB's are connected through a bottom pvc pipe ....

I like both systems... the overflow siphons on the outdoor system have worked perfectly from day one....

the affnan siphons in the GH system have also worked perfectly since day one...

I use the overflow siphons on my smaller systems to save space

jT

Thanks JT. So the two overflow siphons pull enough that none of the beds overflow?

I have a bypass pipe between the ST and FT's and its directed back to the ST... this way I can adjust the amount of water going into the GB's as the roots build up, I can adjust the flow down a little

jT

Makes sense now. Thanks for your help. I hope to be making a small system in a 6 X 8 Harbor Freight greenhouse that uses some of these totes and below bed tanks similar to your greenhouse system. I'll post some pics in a new thread when I get going.

Time for a picture-laden update of this system, JT!