Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

ok now to begin with punctuation is evil and i will try to use as little as possible in my posts

after nearly 2 years of procrastinating a month ago i finally decided to cut up my ibc's and make a small system get my feet wet so to speak. the only problem was we recently hired a bobcat to clear an area for a shed to be built on as the block we have is sloping and as we had some trees that had been cut down previously i made the suggestion to use the trees as a retaining wall and level off an area with the dirt from the shed pad with absolutely no intention of anything going on the new leveled area for the time being
unfortunately my father caught the AP bug and now this humble little ibc system is turning into a monster!!!! we are now building a 6m x 11m greenhouse to house 2 x 1500ltr fish tanks and 6+ grow beds and 2 x ibc systems everyday this little project seems to build up in momentum and it is such a fun ride to be on i am enjoying it very much

so i have decided to document everything we do here and welcome any input anyone has as this is such a big learning curve the questions will be flying thick and fast

a few pics of the ibc system set up and running and us getting the posts in for the greenhouse

.... AP systems just seem to grow and spread... a bit like a cancer....

If that black thing in the poly pipe is a filter that has a mesh in it, i think it's upside down so the crud settles to the bottom.

My systems growing in my head, just need to put it into something constructive.

Lyndon

the filter is a 1 inch irrigation line disc filter bought from bunnings for cheap i added it to the system to pull out any plastic or unwanted particles that were added to the systems by accident after tinkering ( i just cant help myself /sigh ) it works great and was the cheapest option i could find for filtering the system while still in setup stages i will remove it in the next few days

Ha ha you've got it bad SF, lol. Look forward to seeing ut evolve.

Good to see mate. Ill be watching with interest.

Do you know we have members names "something fishy" and a "somethin' fishy", I was a little confused for a bit.

It says it all in my signature.....

i wonder how similar their system is to mine? long lost brother/sister perhaps lol

have a few more pics to post







nothing major yet just finishing off the frame but am going to need some advice on covering to use for greenhouse for the intended purpose but will search forums information if probably already here =)

few pics of my German engineered siphon made to exacting precision and standards!!!!!





i can get my hands on some 3000ltr slimline water tanks for CHEAP (pictured below) they mearsure 3m x 2m x 700mm deep splitting them down the centre would give me two grow beds with an effective volume of 3000ltr minus some for the lip, there are 2 issues i can see 1. my pipework on top of grow beds would have to be a bit more extensive to make sure i have no dead zones 2. access to the centre part of the grow beds might be a bit hard as they are so big
anyone heard of or had experience using this type of growbed or any other issues you can foresee in using these

Am I allowed to ask where / how you can get these cheap?? I'm after 1 or 2 for rainwater collection.

The other problem you may have is i'm not sure how strong / rigid they will be after you cut them in half. I suspect a lot of the structural strength comes from the overall shape. Also need to work out just how you will cut them. A lot of those inner joins look like they could be hard to get to cleanly.

unfortunately they would be no good for water storage as the seam down the middle ( where i would be cutting them) was not welded properly when they were manufactured. attempts have been made by more skilled people ( in plastic welding ) than myself and they are still leaking so for water storage they would be no good hence the cheap price ($300 each tank) but as grow beds they might just work
regarding the structural strength the join is quite a bit thicker than the rest of the tank as this is where they are welded together i am hoping this will be enough extra support and if it is not i can jam a piece of timber between the inner slots to take up some flex and was thinking of running a piece of patio railing wire around the whole thing on a tensioner just below the top lip. but after taking a real good look at these tanks they are not cheaply made tanks and have rather thick walls on them much thicker than say a blue barrel when i pushed on the sides of the tank there was no flex at all and i am a spritely 100kg so i put a bit of force into trying to flex it
i have a modified dremmel bit that will cut through these tanks in the hard to reach places

i would be happy to tell you where to get them once i have cut one up and see if it works he only has a limited number and as i wont be getting one til thursday i would hate to post details and rock up thursday to find them all gone hope you understand

i will at least give one a try and see how it works for 150 bucks per grow bed for around 1400ltr capacity this could be a very cheap option even if i have to spend a few bucks modifying them to suit and if it doesnt work i figure on using them to place under a false floor and have vertical grow beds drain into it

ok after extensive late night meetings with the minister of finance we have been forced to change direction a little bit instead of buying poly fish tanks we have been forced to use......



managed to buy one of those slimline tanks to use as a growbed



needs a bit more modification but instead of cutting it down to the middle for two growbeds i have left alot of one side intact for support still works out a very cheap growbed for me maybe around 1300ltr capacity and approx 5m2 of grow area i was thinking two ibc's to run a growbed this size???

tested water today and this is results tank is around a month old with 50 silvers and a few goldfish in it
salt: 2ppt

Interesting growbed! Hope you don't struggle too much to seal up the inspection hatch thing.

Hi BF,
i was going to use some marine ply and sikaflex but have found a local guy that does poly welding if the cost isnt too high i will get him to seal it for me.

You posted this question in another thread and no one answered so I thought I would give it a bash. I did a bit of research into shade cloth and discovered that the garden/organic/permaculture experts favour max 50% shade cloth for vegie gardens in Australia and recommend the white colour (not the cream but actual white which is a little harder to get).

Apparently the white shade cloth is the only one that does not filter out any of the coloured wave lengths of light from the visible light spectrum that the plants need to grow and be healthy, and 50% used only during summer will still povide your plants with enough light to grow well while minimising the energy being put into transpirtion. I would hang the shade cloth from the inside of the green house in such a way that you can easily roll it up out of the way when summer ends.

Hope this helps.

Hi Something Fishy, are you still around? I am in Mt Helena, just started my AP set up after YEARS of talking about it.

Any new pics for your thread?

I am starting my own thread, will post the link here shortly.