Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Recently added a 12volt backup system

Thanks Charlie it keeps an old bloke off the streets, I'll upgrade the sign a little when I get a chance and give BYAP a plug.

How's that move going mate? I'm looking forward to seeing your new system progress.

You're bit closer to the real world over this side of the country, and a few years of the good air over here will do your lungs the world of good

Nice work!

Dam, makes me feel ashamed of my electrical box

Is that epsom salts at the bottom right? If so, do you use much in your system?

Thanks Matty.

That is Epsom Salts, Dr. Damage put me onto using Epsom Salts for my magnesium deficiency and it works a treat.

I use it as a foliar spray once a fortnight, that's probably over doing it but while things are going OK I'll keep applying it at that rate.

I cant add anymore growbeds without increasing the size of my sump so to use up the little spot left at the end of my half barrels I put in a small wicking bed using what materials I had laying around.

The 50mm pipe were old pieces of SLO and fittings left over from other jobs, the blue baskets came from the $2 shop.

The conduit was use to give it a bit of strength.

The metal frame came from and old fence that was across the backyard when we bought the house.

Sand in the bottom and then the liner with shade cloth over the top to protect the liner.

I used anything I could find to throw in and make a reservoir in the bottom, ice cream containers strainers it's in there.

It was then all covered over with Scoria and more shade cloth.

Soil on top of the shade cloth and it's ready for planting.

A few plants to kick it off.

The plants are doing quite well over a short period of time, we haven't had any heavy rain as yet, that might not do it any good.

I would imagine it would not have a lot of drainage for the water to get away and could become very wet, so I'll face that hurdle when I come too it.

I've had to bite the bullet and look into filtration. Having a dual SLO that works far better than I thought it would, there's nothing stays on the bottom of the fish tank, any uneaten fish food is straight up into the GB's.

I can feed the fish and walk to the GB and see it arrive, so a filter will stop any pellets entering the GB's.

Even though turning the pump off while feeding helps, the problem is that half the pellets sink and the other half float, it's the floating pellets that settle overnight then finish up in the GB the following morning.

I plan to put a Radial Flow Filter- Bio Filter combination on both fish tank outlets, currently I've built one pair and will try them on one of the outlets and then build a second pair of filters exactly the same if the first pair perform OK.

The grill on the RFF will stop any pellets entering into the Bio Filter section and they can be removed along with any fish solids through the tap on the bottom of the blue barrel.

The blue barrels are 65 litres - 17.1712 gallons, the larger PVC pipe is 150mm = 529⁄32", the smaller pipe is 50mm = 2" and the filter media in the second barrel will be K1 Bio Filter tumbled with a 127mm = 5" air stone.

I'll probably pass the waste through a sieve and decant the good stuff back into the GB's as DasBoot does.

Good sized blue barrel - where did you get those from? Been looking for something smaller than the standard 200L jobs for a while now.

Will the vent cowl slits be enough to handle the flow rate?

Yea they are perfect. Nice work mate.

What media are you going to use in the biofilter?

Matt they came from this guy.
http://www.paramountchemicals.com.au/contact-us.html

I tried the flow through the slits and there's no restriction whatsoever, and the idea is to stop the fish pellets from leaving the RFF. They'll enter through the vertical tube and the slits on the top outlet will stop them floating out through the top and when they sink I can drain them from the bottom tap.

If I do find they restrict any flow I'll drill holes.





Thanks Charlie, I think they should do the job.





Tom I bought enough K1 Bio Media secondhand off a forum member to do 2 x barrels.