Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

I thought I would share on here my new system design so I could get some feed back! So far if bought my grow beds which I got on CL. They are old boat lift air lifters. Just needed some cleaning. I cut them in half to fit in truck they were 37ft long. You can see in pics I cut agin to open them up. I just bought some fiberglass to make new end walls, paint for outside and four 55 GAL barrels for my filters.

I plan on lining the fiberglass with pond armor, Anyone try that stuff out???

~ It will have two tanks, 210GAL. Possibly more, What u think?

~ Grow beds are 3ft wide buy 14inches tall and 17ft long, I'm starting with 2 but have 4.

~ three filters (swirl) (bio) and (screen solids remover)

~ the swirl will be hooked up to a bio-digester tank. Plan on using it to grow flood and drain tomatoes in big
PVC pipes cut in half filled with media. Note: not in plans drawn in PICs

I plan on growing lettuce and small plants in a raft system in the grow beds. And after I get running for awhile I will hook up the bio- digester to flood and drain PVC pipes.

> see pictures for design and the build start to finish!

More to come.

Plzzz comment if you think my system is flawed in anyway. thanks

Few more pics!

Are you going to leave those tanks on the ground, or build stands for them so you won't have to bend over to tend the plants?

what type of fish and what stocking density are you planning?

Better drawings of system

The filters and grow beds are all gravity fed. Them pumped from grow beds to fish tanks.

I kno it's hard to read the drawings...... But the bio filter has a small line from the pump to ster up the bio balls and to use the Venturi effect to pump in air.


And I'm still trying to figure out how to tie the bio digester to some DWC flood and drain large PVC pipes for tomatoes.......

Why use bio-filters?... If you use gravel filled GB's they will not only give you the required bio-filtration, but also more growing space, possibly for alternative crops such as Tomatoes, Capsicums etc... possibly making your "commercial" system more viable!

I plan on putting tilapia in the fish tanks. I'm not sure what stocking density yet. I'm not sure how efficient my filters will be. Nothing crazy at first. What do you think, I'll only have two of those grow beds at first.

I'm building supports weds or this weekend . They will be in a cradle system made out of wood.

I don't want gravel in these. I'll will be growing lettuces and such. Such big gravel beds a not efficient in my opinion. So much wasted space!! I will be constructing long PVC to act like row crops to grow tomatoes and such using flood and drain. Probably 20"30" PVC. Easy to clean, take up no space and drain fast!!!


Take in consideration these are a small scale test of a commercial farm. I have access the 16 of these grow beds. Not just to grow diffract kinds of stuff in my back yard. If I was doing that I would definitely fill them with gravel and have a sweet grow bed.

I don't think you understood what I was getting at... If you still used the fibre glass beds for a floating raft set-up, but replaced the bio-filter drums with gravel filled GB's they would do the same job, but give you somewhere to grow your tomatoes... freeing up space and reducing costs... because you wouldn't need the PVC pipe set-ups for tomatoes, which I think you will find in the long run to be a major PITA.

Oooo I got you. I'm not sure if that will be enogh surface area to support the system. A well design bio filter will be very productive and break down the solids. It will also act as a degassing tank.

I might change the last filter (screen) to a media/gravel with worms in it.

Why do you think the PVC will be a pita? I plan on having over 100 tomato plants eventually, when I go full size. So the barrels with gravel will add a lot to the total cost.

So stocking is going to be about 1lb of fish to every 7gals of water.

My flow rate will be just over one fish tank size a hour.
Found a tank CL that's 450 gallons and my pump will be 500gals a hour.

Had a question. My return lines will be 2" should I make my gravity lines 2" as well or 2-1/2"??