Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hi Guys,

Short introduction I'm Matt, I live in the northern suburbs of Perth and am about to dive into my first aquaponics system! I've been researching and lurking for about a year now and planning (procrastinating) my own system.

My plan has grown too a CHIFT PIST, X2 fish tanks @ 900l, X4 300l grow beds and X4 sumps with 400l capacity each. I'll have a total of 3400l of water moving around my system. I hope to grow SP in one tank then barra/trout in the other seasonally.

I currently have X3 IBCs that I picked up a few months ago out of the gumtree. All X3 had been used once to store coke syrup (they still smell like coke!) My first question for the forum is I have access to X3 more IBCs at no cost, again they've been used once, though to store new diesel engine oil (mineral oil) I've read over the MSDS for this product and believe that with a good thorough clean they should be ok use. If anyone would like to take a look at the msds here http://www.caltex.com.au/sites/Marine/MSDS/DELO%20400%20MULTIGRADE%20SAE%2015W-40.pdf IF these IBCs aren't suitable for aquaponics please let this newbie know

Any feedback on my system plan is also welcome

be good to see drawing of your setup cargs and how you plan to do it.

yes sounds like a bit of a situation with the IBC, oil seaps into coontainer very well and i would not llke to go through the process of setting them up just to find out that they are contaminating your water. But i have not been down this path before, i have only used food grade ones. so some advice from someone who has used them would be good for you.

let us know how you go but.

I would scrub with bleach, rinse thoroughly, repeat a couple of times and let sit in the sun for a week. Then I would fill with water temporarily and put in a couple of cheap goldfish or something for a week or two just to make sure.

The fish tanks in my system were used to transport engine oil originally. I gave them a good clean with detergent and pressure washed them and have had no problems.

Ive attached a pic of system design, artist impression on top, schematic down the bottom!

So SLOs from both fish tanks meet at a common manifold distributing water to the grow beds. Each grow bed siphons to its own sump below, all sumps are connected with a pump in the last sump to move water back to the fish tanks. I like the idea of having a few sumps as I plan to keep yabbies in them and I'm told they'll kill each other if too crowded. I also like that I don't need to build stands for the grow beds as they are designed to stack on each other.

Boy can draw!!!!

Regarding the system design, might pay to put some thought into how various failures would affect it. Rather than having the SLO daisy chain into the other tank, why not have them feed two GBs each. That way if the second tank's SLO becomes blocked you'll have a bit more time to act to avoid it overflowing.

Same for the linked sumps - why not put the pump in one of the middle tanks, reducing the effect of a blocked transfer pipe?

Aside from that, looks great.

Hi Cargs,

I have a system with a very similar layout to yours.. mine however only has 1 x fish tank full IBC and 3 x grow beds with 3 x sumps underneath like you are planning to do... It works really well because you dont need stand for your grow beds like you said.
In my design I placed my pumps (I use 2 since I also have 10 strawberry towers and 3 NFT tubes on the walls) in the sump closest to the fish tank.. why run plumbing for pump all the way from the end when you can have it right next to the fish tank.
Also like Curly pointed out if your linked sump piping gets block it can cause a problem... I have very little space in my greenhouse so I couldn't use the IBC taps to plumb my sumps together and instead connected them on the sides.. originally I used 25 mm pipe but there was too much flow and the pipe wasnt keeping the water height equal... I then added a second 25mm pipe (anything larger in HDPE was too expensive since I wasnt using PVC for the sump piping) and that has evened out the flow and also given me a backup in case one gets blocked.
If are not plumping together with the IBC taps I would recommend a minimum of 40 mm piping for joining the sumps.
Also I would add an overflow from the fish tank direct to your sump just in case you SLO gets blocked (even partially blocked can cause an overflow) but perhaps you are already planning that I just didnt see it in your diagram. My SLO is 40mm from fish tank to grow bed and then down to 25 around grow bed edge.. the 40mm only just keeps up with a bit more than the flow of changing the fish tank 1 per hour.. if I had my time agin I would step up to 50mm just to be on the safe side... bit more expensive though and not as easy to find fitting as for 40mm.. or I would raise my fish tank another 10-15cm which would give the water more drop and perhaps increase flow..
Should be a great system!

Yeah - definitely go big on the piping from your SLO. You'll be surprised at how little flows when it's not under pressure.

We used 40mm piping in this system viewtopic.php?f=18&t=6074 and should have gone bigger.

This is why I joined, thanks guys some very logical ideas pointed out there, will incorporate the x1 slo per x2 grow beds idea and definitely put the pump closest to the fish tank for path of least resistance and save me some $$$ on plumbing. I'm also joining the sumps through the sides for space requirements (the extra 200mm saved per ibc makes a big difference when multiplied by x6.

Can't wait to get started! Will post photos as I go..

Looks nice and gave me an instant idea for mine... Have to read up a little bit more on SLO and on artificial lighting...

Man I wish I could draw a picture like that on a computer good job! I downloaded google sketch and ya did not go well lol. But I like the system set up but would not connect the fish tanks like the other members have said. Would anyone else know where to put a swirl filter in this kind of set up?

SW only good immediately on exit from FT.

Hi Nicky Wayne, I didn't use sketchup, just took the KISS approach and used good old MS paint. The 'artist impression' was just some cutting and pasting with a little bit of photoshopping from google images.

I was originally going to use a 200l barrel as a swirl filter, I need to research it a little more though as a lot of people aren't running them and just allowing worms to break it all down in the grow beds.