Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

This is my System.




The basic IBC setup is taken from Fayes Video

The System is connected together with PVC Pipe about 400mm up from the bottom of the tanks to prevent all the tanks emptying if one tank develops a leak.

Nicely done.. can get a good amount of variety with that many tanks..

Are they connected with 50mm DWV pipe and fittings?

I am using a 550Watt Clean Water Pump. It is set to come on 15 minutes every hour.



The output of the pump is to strong for the growbeds. I have installed a tap inline to recirculate excess water back into the tank.



Each bed is supplied from a tee from the mainline. The beds all seem to get roughly the same amount of water.

Hi Amph, Yes the fittings are 50mm. With hindsight, I would use larger fittings to get more water flow. But the 50s do the job.

The Air Pump continuously supplies air to all five tanks.

I have used 20mm blue metal from Magic Garden Supplies. The guy at Magic suggested I used blue metal as he believed it was the most stable. I was originally going to use pea gravel. Apparently, pea gravel gives off Iron.

This is quite similar to what I'd like to do....very, very cool.

We currently have;

FT 1 - 9 250-300mm Rainbow Trout.

FT 2 - 3 Silver Perch Fingerlings.(Originally had 22, but I over fed the trout and managed to knock off most of them.)

FT 3 - 10 200-250mm Rainbow Trout.

FT 4 - 10 Yabbies.

FT 5 - 1 Water Pump. Probably won't Stock fish in this Tank.

I have recently wrapped all the tanks in Aircell. I was getting temperature fluctuations between day and night. The Aircell has helped keep the temps more stable. I am looking for some sheets of styrofoam or similar that I can float on top of the water to help insulate better.
I have found that the fish eat more when the temps are more consistant.

This is the 1st Trout we pulled out of the System a couple of weeks Ago. It was delicious!
We plan to have another on for dinner tomorrow night. I'll take more photos of that tomorrow.

We have been feeding the fish Floating Pellets from BYAP. I started on the 3mm and have just started feeding the Trout on 7mm.
The Yabbies are being fed peas and carrots. And anything else that flows into their Tank.

As you can see in the corner of the Photo, my Jack Russells are pretty keen for the pellets too.

Thought I'd take a video of the Trout Feeding this afternoon as the were particularly active. Video is from my phone, so the quality isn't so good.

Nice system. One Issue if you have a Look at your photo's.. When the Pump is running does the tank with the pump in Go Dry...?

- I would take a Guess that you are running Flood and Drain on the Tank.. I can't see you running constant flow @ 550w you are doing over 12kwh per day and I'm not sure what your power cost is But at say 25c/kwh that's a heap of power for just the 1 day.. $3.00 per day for water flow..

Plus the air pump's say another $1 per day.. so at a guess.. $4/day.. x 90 = $360 just to run the system...Full time.. so with 15/45 you are costing yourself $90.00 per month..

- Me with your system Run a smaller pump...
- Put the Pump in the Middle Tank so the water flows from the Ends to the Middle..
- You have no Ability to siphon the crude off the bottom.. [Add a "T" to the interlink pipe. 1 end going to the bottom.. The Other end open/screened so it does not siphon the tank out]

Sorry just found the spec's on your Pump.. 15000lt/hr... Sorry are you Kidding me.. Nice Pump but WAY WAY over powered for what you have.. you could get away with 2-3000lt/hr.. to do what you need..

It is a Nice system.. over all.. But I could not keep my hand's off it to give it a few tweak's..


Juergen

Hi Juergen,

I'm not sure how to work out the power consumption. Can you please explain how you worked it out? I had a go using your figures and got about $25/month for the water pump.

Cheers,
Jarrad