Looking for some advice from the experienced

[dsrtlzrd32]

Hello,

I am building my first system out of 3 275 gallon IBC's pretty much following the youtube tutorial for an ibc system. I am going to plumb the three ibc's together and use one pump to fill the three grow beds sitting on each of the fish tanks. I will have a larger pump (thinking of 2000 gph) feeding through a 2" pvc pipe in each bed. My grow beds are about 8" deep (although after reading through oliver's aquaponics 101 guide I wish i would have made them deeper). I will have a 2" pvc standpipe in the growbeds to drain them but have a constant flow system.

I was thinking of doing a 4" pipe to plumb the FTs together so the water would have plenty of flow to keep all the tanks equal depth since I have the GBs drain at 2". This would also allow fish to go in between tanks. Is this thinking rational or should I go to a 2" or maybe two 2" pipes between the FTs?

I plan to insulate the FTs by burying half of them and insulating the top half with roofing insulation. I deal with 120 average summer temps from may to oct and keeping the water cool is going to be a challenge (The reason for 3 ibc system instead of just one to start) I will have a mesh shade over the top to allow some sun through but not full sun. I am hoping I can keep a system alive in this climate (desert, little humidity, high temps). Anyone have any advice on that?

Thanks for your help.

[urbanfarmer]

I think I understand what you're saying about plumbing the FTs together. One thing that confuses me, a 4" pipe is equal to FOUR 2" pipes as far as the area of their cross section. Generally, that means that TWO 2" pipes would be 1/2 the flow of ONE 4" pipe. I hope I understood this correctly??

Whereabouts do you live? I want to look at the historic climate data regarding suggestions for the temperature issue. What are the night temps, seasonal weather patterns, etc?

[thcoolest]

I'm not sure if you will have a separate sump or not, but if you are going to put your pump in a fishtank I would suggest you use the 4" pipe to connect the fish tanks together to help equalize flow between them. The less holes you have to make the better. Less holes, less chances for leaks. Uniseals are great for the connections too. I have a couple of sumps connected via a 4" drain line underground and fish swim back and forth through it. Adventurous :)
I can tell you from experience that keeping your water cool is going to be a problem unless your night temps are in the 60-70s, with your day temps in the 120s. Burying half of the tank will help slow the temperature increase, as will the insulation, but the temps will certainly rise as the summer progresses. I would also recommend full shade for the tanks. You have an advantage with the low humidity to possibly do some kind of evaporative water chiller to reduce the temps of the water. I'm in Galveston, TX and this past summer my water temps got into the low 90's, with a shaded 3000 gallon ferro-cement fish tank that is halfway buried and 10,000 gallons of total water. Granted, our night temps don't differ much from our day temps being that we are close to the ocean ( around 10 degree difference ) and the humidity remains high enough so that evaporative cooling just doesn't work that well either. Curious, what plants do you plan on growing in 120 degree heat?

-Tyler

[keith_r]

your growbeds will act as a heat transfer unit and get your water temps up quickly..i'm not sure how a system would handle that kind of heat.. and at 8", those gb's will heat up fast.. not sure what you could grow in those temps, or what would happen to the bacteria..
have you had a look at the free "IBC's of Aquaponics" ebook? there's a web page and downloadable pdf here;
http://ibcofaquaponics.com/

[dsrtlzrd32]

Urbanfarmer:

I live in Needles CA. We set the world record rainfall temp at 115F last year (http://newswatch.nationalgeographic.com ... on-record/ (http://newswatch.nationalgeographic.com/2012/08/21/hottest-rain-on-record/)). The nights are usually around 105F in the summer so water cooling will definitely be an issue. Also glad you pointed out the flow issue of 2" vs 4" because I was thinking just two 2" would be the same.

The coolest:

I think I will do the 4" and glad you pointed out the uniseals. I was thinking of how to make a make shift seal because I did not know a better solution. I like the idea of the fish being able to move freely :lol: I just wanted to make sure they didnt get stuck. Yes, the water temp seems to be my most glaring challenge. I plan to start with just goldfish to test for a year to see the flux in the water temps and play around with solutions. I read on another post on this forum someone suggested a cooling system of a secondary pump pumping water through a cooler in a chest freezer filled with water jugs and rv antifreeze. Maybe that will work.

keith_r:

Yep, that is the manual I am using and also watching that youtube video. That is where I decided on the 8" growbed as the lady says the growbed size really doesn't matter as long as it is between 20 - 30 cm. Then I read Oliver's advice of 12" and regretted making my cuts already, oh well, live and learn. :oops: Maybe with the 8" the water wont sit as long in the Gbed and get back down to the FT sooner. As far as plants go, I am not exactly sure yet. I was hoping to be able to do most the same plants as others. We have hybrid tomato plants out here that like full sun. I wanted lettuce and spinich too but I figure a lot of my stuff is going to be trial and error. I wanted to maybe try and keep documentation on what works and what doesnt in this climate as I have not found much about doing it in this heat. I do know there was an elderly gentleman here that was growing a lot in his back yard including an orchard. He had it covered with the sun shade and said the plants do fine in the heat, it was just keeping them watered enough that was the problem. Water is not cheap out here. I thought perhaps this AP system might be the solution to that. We shall see.

One other quick question: In Oliver's AP101 he talked about testing DO (dillutted oxygen) in the water. Would I find a test kit for that the same place I get a PH test kit or do I have to find a special kind of store?

[keith_r]

a DO (dissolved oxygen) tester is pretty expensive...
even if your water is always flowing, i'd add an airpump a airstones

[urbanfarmer]

You can try the pet store. They sometimes have cheap $5-10 DO test kits. They are not accurate enough for something like scientific research, but it will tell you what you want to know.

[davidstcldfl]

Hi, Here's a couple random thoughts...

If you haven't bought any shade cloth yet, check out alumi-net. It's supposed to be cooler underneath, then regular shade cloth. Seeing as how, your air temps are so high already, every little bit might help.

A 2000 gph pump is pretty big, in my opinion. You could go to 1/2 of that or even slightly less. You would need to drop your size of your stand pipes. Less $ to buy it and less $ to run them.. :)
Have you read anything about 'affnan bell siphon' ? Affnan has designed bell siphons that can start with less water flow ( less electric costs) And they don't have breather tubes that need cleaned.

Danner brand water pumps are pretty good, see the link below, they carry them.

A few web sites you might like...

http://www.aquaticeco.com/
It's fun looking at all their stuff. They have sales pretty often.
They have uniseals, also check out... 'economy bulkheads'. They are only a dollar or 2 more then the uniseals.

Search for US plastics (in Ohio ?), they also have uniseals and bulkheads, and if I remember, they are a little less costly.

http://www.jehmco.com/html/heaters.html
Go to the bottom of this page, you'll see stainless steel tube. It might work for the heat exchanger line in your DIY cooler.
I think I remeber someone here, getting a SS coil at a beer making web site. They used it on their DIY cooler, in the fish water.

[dsrtlzrd32]

Thanks David,

I will definitely check it out, you are right, any little help cooling will help. Also thanks for the links to some of the tools I cant find or did not know about. I am thankful for this forum since it sure helps to hear ideas from people already doing this.