Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

This is the second design with larger bells. Now they are at one inch stand-pipe and bulkhead. Two inch bell, four inch media gaurd. Thanks to Joeblow for all the tips and pics. It made building these simple. I had to cut down the endcaps in order to make the media gaurds spin better for cleaning roots, as well as lower the drained water level in the beds. They get top caps as well. Some issues will be dealt with later, such as the very cool idea of the prybar holes in the top of the media gaurds. I need to get media in these and start some plants. BTW, if you didn't catch it, these bunk bed style GBs are 37 Cu meters. Not a lot as noted. Which is why I'll be building a RAS style MBBF using K2 (Kaldnes) media.

A couple more pics

This bell siphon worked on the first try; dumped when it was supposed to, and broke when it was suposed to. Yay!

Two more beds to plumb for outflow. The bottom one by the sump is a challenge to reach, but I'll get it. Oh BTW. my new tape measure, the one with both metric and 'Merican is at the bottom of the FT

"Oh BTW. my new tape measure, the one with both metric and 'Merican is at the bottom of the FT"

- time to get that diving mask and flippers!!

thjakits

All looking good Brian

You might need a few more holes in the media guard to speed up the the GB draining process.

+1

If you've got a drop saw, it makes quick work to put a few slits in place. Way quicker than with the drill.

Good advice, I spent about 20 minutes drilling holes in each of my 3 media guards. Not sure how many holes, but hundreds.. A table saw does the job in 1 few minutes.

Nice! I keep a long handled grabber tool in the RAS and 1 in the GH. I hope momma was happy with your house cleaning job, and you're not relegated to the couch.

She was super happy to get out. I got lucky I had that working for me.
Always think of this scene whenever I'm vacuuming:


Yes, it finally dawned on me I could use the new telescoping pool net to scoop it up, aw, missed my chance to swim

I read about the slots for the media guards, but seemed like the consensus was use vertical slots and it didn't come to my brain how to do vertical slots with the cut-off saw I've been using to cut pipe. So I just put the minimal holes for now. Figure this weekend I'd pop a few more holes in after y'all told me how many more it needed. One more set of drains, this weekend and it's time to start putting bags and bags of lava rock in so we can plant this sucker up real good.

Brian - you mentioned that your bell siphons work like clockwork, right?

HOW far below the growbeds do the down-pipes extend?

[ON my planned effort, I will need siphons that can work with minimum down-travel, I need to "rescue" as much height as possible.

So if your's (by chance...), don't have too many cm/inches down-pipe.....I would really like to know and maybe you could get some pics (IF you can get to them!


Thanks!

Won't be long anymore and you're cycling!!

thjakits

Some folks have Fish Tanks, Brian got a Tape Tank.
What do you feed that sucker ?

"So if your's (by chance...), don't have too many cm/inches down-pipe.....I would really like to know and maybe you could get some pics (IF you can get to them!" I too don't have a lot of room, as you suggest. It's three or so inches, added to the stand pipe length I assumed is what creates the draw. I'm certain there is maths involved

I've been reading here for almost a year now, couldn't say I understand all I read or think I learned, but for me the the flow stuff makes sense.
I've studied Rocket Stove Mass Heaters (although never built one (I have built rocket stoves)) they use heat rise and resultant vacuum to keep air moving through long stretches of horizontal pipe. My bio-diesel processor required a ton of research which pushed my brain to its limits about chemistry, but with enough smart people willing to help with experience and knowledge it can't help but work.
Sorry I digress, but it is so important to success to have a great group like this. The attitude here is inspirational to say the least.

One more note on this bell siphon, the only thing I am certain of is; It ain't over until the fat lady sings. All I said is the first two bell siphons worked well enough to move on to the next phase; add media. That is where the rules that count will be. Water is going to move differently through rock,as all rock percolate (let water move through) differently. I've got two sacks of expanded clay. I still hadn't asked the group if mixing or layering clay with river rock, red scoria or keeping them separate is the way to go. Hehe or did I just?

Don't forget the slight up-turn at the end of the horizontal pipe under the GB. I assume that upturn helps keep the vacuum right up until the siphon breaks.

here is a picture of the slight up-turn in the bell siphon outflow

Each of the four outflow plumbing is slightly different as I used bigger and bigger drain pipe as I learned more here