Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hello everybody. I joined this forum to learn and that I have even thought I am still dumb. I wanted more AP information for a system I had just started up when I learned on here that veggies as well as flowers will grown in gravel. I also found out that many different types of gravel work well as a growing medium. So I said Good Bye to hand watering my coir/rice hull grown beds three times a day and fighting with a million ants and got to work on the system I plan to complete very soon.

On this forum under Aquaponics Systems Locations I have a thread titled: I have AP setup in Thailand. This thread tell about my old system, a good one but not for everyone.

On this forum under General System Discussions I have two threads titled: SLO and solids removal. The second thread is "How many Time per hour with larger pond". These two threads and a few other short threads is where I learned most of what I am now going to try. If it does not work - oh well - I am a dummy - not the teachers fault. In fact everyone on this forum has been very helpfull and I appreciate it. Thank you.

Now for the new system: Same inground cement pond, 8 foot X 20 foot X 39 inches deep. 11 GB's are higher than the pond and will be filled with gravel. Each GB is approximately 120 cm by 120 cm by approximately 70 - 80 cm deep. These are the same GB's I had before except I added GB6 so as to tie them all together so as to have the flow of water all run to the waterfall for return to the pond. In the diagrams that follow this is plain to see.

Tonight I am uploading, I hope, the Drainage plan, and the Incoming Water Plan. Please look them over and tell me all of the things that I am doing wrong. Do I have enough drainage or do I need to increase pipe size?

Help: Can a MOD remove the post without the attachments. I don't know how and I don't think I am authorized to do so. Thank you, John

Any pics of the progress?
Does the wife have her new camera yet?

New camera, maybe in Feb. She is sitting on the money right now. I think that she thinks it will hatch more - LOL. Photos are in the plan for this week if it stops raining. Can you understand my wonderful blue prints??

Yes I understand the sketch, but then I drew the Sketchup model its based on

Careful the wife doesn't take the camera money to the "hatchery" - aka "Thai Lottery".
I don't know your wife, but I know all Issan girls will definitely "Win the lottery" this week.
And when they don't, they will talk for 2 weeks about how they nearly won

LOL She has never smoked a cig, taken drugs, went to a movie, got drunk, cursed, etc, etc. I tried to ask her about the Lottery. I was curious if it was like the Lottery where I came from. She couldn't tell me anything about it. Not sure she even knew what it was. After we were married for awhile I explained to her what these people that sell lottery numbers were selling. She was a christian about 15 years before she met me through the church. Old fashion lady and I love it.

No photos today. Had to stay in town on business all day and dark when we returned home. Plan on photos again tomorrow. I have some questions about pumps. With a system like mine would I be better off having two pumps or one larger pump? Also which works best - a pump in the pond or outside of the pond?

From what I have seen, the bigger pumps get, the more efficient they are (or at least claim to be)
One of the problems in TL is that 99% of the pumps you can buy are cheap Chinese models.
In my experience you are very unlikely to get more than 24 hours warranty even at the big hardware stores, Home Pro etc.
I ended up with a Walrus PWA-100 with a 2 year warranty, was nearly 4000 Baht IIRC, 5000LPH and the claimed 100Watts turned out to be 250 Watts at 1M head.

Ao found what looked to be a nice pump in his thread here:
http://www.backyardaquaponics.com/forum ... =1&t=11312

As for in pond/out of pond, I have no idea which is better...

I just re-read what I posted above and it seems contradictory.
I said you won't get a warranty, but I got a 2 year warranty.
That was after visiting about 20 shops.
ประกัน (Bpra Gan) is Thai for warranty.
It also occurs to me that you need to pump a lot of water, 12kL+ per/hour.
If it was me, I'd look for 2 x 10k pumps, at least if 1 fails the other will run while you get a replacement.

Warranties in Asia - LOL. I have lived in Korea, Japan, Philippines, and now Thailand. The only warranty I know is to be sure before you buy because, you buy it you own it and it is your problem now baby.

Searching for information on pumps I tried the search function and got 6000 plus results. Too much to search and sort. I then went to "Systems Discussions" and started searching through the 51 pages there. There should be a discussion somewhere on pumps and all of the pros and cons. Wished I had time to read all of those posts. Seems like some good information in there.

I like your two pump idea, it makes sense since I live sort of way out in the sticks.

As i said before, the problem here is most of the pumps being sold are cheap Chinese ones.
Even if you found a thread on this forum about a good pump, chances are you couldn't buy in in TL, unless you are willing to pay the delivery charges and take your chances with the import authorities...

Korat is a big place, you might be lucky and find a shop that sells high quality European or Japanese pumps (or maybe American, lol)
Another option is to take the wife to a local fish farm, I am sure there are many, and ask her to talk to the boss about pumps.
They'll know... Aquaculture in TL has such low profit margins, they can't afford to replace their pumps every year.

Tonight I will upload some photos. They really, at least to me, show nothing except that I have torn apart part of what beds I had and removed the sidewalk so it could rain for four days and turn the place into mud. And, oh yes, They show the nice holes you get when you use a Thai drill (hammer) for making pipe holes. But it sure is faster than a drill. Hopefully future photos will be better and show more progress.

Keep the pics coming
You know I still look at my old threads when I am trying to remember exactly what I did or when I did it.
It's good to have a log of what you've done.

The three, 3 inch pipes sticking out will be where all of the water from the GB's drains back to the pond. I plan a pool of sorts there and a waterfall. I would like to include this filter, next photo, into the waterfall too, hidden somehow. I am still trying to design the pool and waterfall and need all of the help I can get. Please provide any ideas you have. The next two photos after this will be my new security guards since fish ponds get hit often in Thailand.