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jackalope
01-17-2010, 09:10 PM
This tank will be the foundation for my AP system for this spring/summer. I've built a box, 4' wide, 8'long and 2' high - which translates into about 475 gallons of water. I'll put up pics soon, but first I've got a few questions for anyone who has ever used PVC pond liner. How long should I have the water in the pond liner before I put in the fish? I've got some Mossies that need a new home .... a much bigger home. I've got the biofilter already cycled, heater and air pumps are all ready, the water will be charged up with about 70 gallons of used fish water plus about 400 gallons of fresh water, I should have the pond liner in place tomorrow morning and then I'll start filling the tank ..... the only thing I have to determine is how long it takes to season the liner so the fumes of the liner won't affect the fish! Any Ideas?

davidstcldfl
01-19-2010, 07:48 AM
Hi Jackalope, Cool to hear that you've got a good size FT comming along... :D

I remeber reading somewhere about conditioning a new liner. I'm in info overload....sorry.... :( ....????

I think I remeber them saying, to soak it in a fresh body of water for a few days....of course, that's out for you , even if you did have access to water....which is now frozen.

Don't hold me to this....all two brain cells are shrugging... :lol: BUT...I thought, I remember 'something' about washing it with salt water, then rinsing it ...????

I've tried to find where I read this......???.....sorry Jackalope, at least I was thinking of you ... :)

jackalope
01-25-2010, 04:40 PM
I went on a couple of pond forums and I got the impression that the liner doesn't need to be conditioned, just as long as the water and the bio filter have cycled, everything should be OK ...... I'll give it a try with the few Mossies that have survived the winter .... I think I have about 20 or so left :( :(

davidstcldfl
03-05-2010, 03:16 PM
I'll put up pics soon, but first I've got a few questions...


:lol: 46 days and holding... :roll: .. :P ......any many more questions... :P ...?...... :? :lol: :lol: :lol:

jackalope
03-06-2010, 08:05 PM
I'll put up pics soon, but first I've got a few questions...


:lol: 46 days and holding... :roll: .. :P ......any many more questions... :P ...?...... :? :lol: :lol: :lol:

I bin gon ...... is that enuff excuse?

Actually, the tank has been on hold becuz I had to work on my son's motorhome so I could drive it to Oregon, when I got there, I had to tear the rear-end apart to put rear brakes and cylinders on the pickup he was trading me, then we had to slaughter 5 goats and a sheep, then I had to bone all the meat and grind it for hamburger and freeze it, then I had to go up to the Seattle area and see a niece I haven't seen in about 18 years, then I broke down in E-burg on the way home and had to fix the truck some more, then I got home and had to put in a hot water tank, then I had to take the wife to Billings for our once-monthly shopping trip to the big city, tomorrow I have to clean the biofilter pump hose, replace a light switch in the house, scout for some more firewood for the rest of the winter, Monday I've got to go to Lewistown for some more spring water - now that I've got a pickup, I can get 60 gallons instead of 30 ;) then I've got to put the kowboy kaddilack up for sale (I converted my wife's 4 dr Sedan de Ville into a pickup), plus, now that the weather is better, I've got to go under the mobile and fix all the freeze-cracks in the plumbing so we can stop living in water-bucket heaven .......... I guess I'm out of excuses now, so I guess I better get busy on the tank one of these days ......

davidstcldfl
03-07-2010, 05:03 AM
Good Lord...... :cry: ...now I feel bad for poking you in the ribs.... ;)

I guess we can wait a little longer for some pics......

Hang in there.... :D

jackalope
03-11-2010, 04:36 PM
Well, when I went in to the saloon to clean the biofilter hose, I found that the biofilter had gone TU and was anerobic .... it killed 8 of my biggest Mossies ..... so it took me most of the day to clean it up and set it back up again ....... I did find some firewood, so we're sitting pretty for another month or so ..... it snowed yesterday, so I only got a few little honey-do's done ...... got a filter and a headliner for my pick-m-up today, so I've got some more stuff to put off the FT ....... can't win!!

davidstcldfl
03-11-2010, 05:41 PM
Sorry to hear that, Jackalope... :(

badflash
03-11-2010, 08:10 PM
I feel your pain brother. Do you have an air stone in each tank? That will buy you time when things get clogged up. The down side of aquaponics is it needs constant attention. Nothing about it is automatic. We are the major part of the feedback mechanism. One day without the farmer's shadow spells disaster.

jackalope
03-11-2010, 10:03 PM
I feel your pain brother. Do you have an air stone in each tank? That will buy you time when things get clogged up. The down side of aquaponics is it needs constant attention. Nothing about it is automatic. We are the major part of the feedback mechanism. One day without the farmer's shadow spells disaster.

I had one of those large shell-shaped airstones, plus a power filter, but when the biofilter goes anerobic, it turns to sewage, so nothing can help the tank then ....... I had just got back from a two week trip and didn't take readings right away like I should have ...... I also didn't pay close enuff attention to the filamentous algae in the biofilter fill hose, which was so clogged, that it was just dribbling, not really running ..... I still have about 10 Mossies left to put into the big tank, should I ever get the time to finish it :!: :evil: :evil:

Yeah, I wasn't minding the store close enuff ;) When the biofilter went down, the ammonia went thru the roof ...... my fault completely!

jackalope
04-28-2010, 09:48 PM
OK. I finally got time to get back to the big FT ..... I put the liner in it today (now I gotta take some more pics), I'm going to buy a 3000GPH sump pump to run the water .... it will change the water at about 950GPH because of the 3/4" discharge adapter that it comes with ...... when I figure out how I want to connect both the large tank and the small pool, that will be about 750 Gal, so then I'll increase the GPH by going to the 1 1/4" discharge and then it will be closer to 4 water changes per hour.
I've got the small swimming pool ready to go for the Mossies except that it gets too warm, 100F, I don't have the Do-re-me for a thermal controller, so I'm going to try to keep the temps more constant with a timer ..... it got up to a little over 100F with that bucket heater, so I'm going to try 6 hours on, and six hours off, then I'll taper off or add to from there. It's a 250 Gallon pool, and a 1000 watt heater ...... if anyone has any advice on a better hours on/hours off cycle, please don't hesitate to let me know ..... this is going to be a practice shot for my big tank which will have my Blues in it.

davidstcldfl
04-29-2010, 02:53 AM
I don't know what type of timer you have......?
Seems like it would be better to have the heater cycle more often. Maybe an hour on, then off for an hour....repeat for the next 9 1/2 months of winter.... :P

dwaller
04-29-2010, 06:47 AM
Is there no better way to heat the FT? With a guesstimated price of $.12/kWh, that heater (if run 12 hours per day all year) is costing you $525/year.

I wonder if a solar collector with a hot water storage tank would be a better route to keep the tank warm.

jackalope
04-29-2010, 09:33 AM
Is there no better way to heat the FT? With a guesstimated price of $.12/kWh, that heater (if run 12 hours per day all year) is costing you $525/year.

I wonder if a solar collector with a hot water storage tank would be a better route to keep the tank warm.

We're still in winter here ..... we might get a summer of two or three months, but solar is only good for the hot days .... right now it's freezing (32F) wind is blowing, snowing out, and a wind chill of 22F ...... I gotta get outta here :!:

badflash
04-29-2010, 09:36 AM
Check my post Sun Grabber (http://www.diyaquaponics.com/forum/showthread.php?143-Sun-Grabber)

If properly protected and covered with glass this has real possibilities, it is just a lot of up front costs.

jackalope
04-29-2010, 09:42 AM
Check my post Sun Grabber (http://www.diyaquaponics.com/forum/showthread.php?143-Sun-Grabber)

If properly protected and covered with glass this has real possibilities, it is just a lot of up front costs.

I've got some old thermal patio sliders that i could put over them, but even then, they would be worthless with the weather we've been getting :( :(

jackalope
04-30-2010, 08:55 AM
Well, after a few days (almost a week now), I'm really not impressed with the swimming pools that Wally World sells .... the side walls aren't holding that well, so the edges sag and the side walls tend to curl under at the bottom. On a fairly level concrete floor, i've got one edge that is dangerously close to leaking over the edge because the bottom of the sidewall has curled under about an inch or so. I'm not sure that I want to put fish in it ..... I think when they made these sidewalls out of tin, that would have worked much better, so it looks like my only option will be to try to get some flashing and wrap it around the pool and hold it there with tie-down straps ... which will make these pools more expensive than I originally intended them to be :oops: :oops: ...... I guess you learn as you go ....... :(

Of course, I could just pump all the water out of the pool into the large tank, (2x4x8), roll up the pond after drying it out and give it away to some deserving family ;) , and build another large tank so I have two of them side-by-side (that was the original plan) :roll: , and count the pool as a loss :cry: ...... my problem with that is that I hate to take losses if I can figure out a way to avoid them :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

davidstcldfl
04-30-2010, 03:53 PM
Jackalope, I don't know how rigid the sides are...(?)
I was thinking ....How about taking some PVC, maybe 1/2 inch, form a 'circle' out of it, to what ever diameter would fit 'snugly' inside the top edge of the pool. That size pvc bends pretty easy...doesn't cost a lot. A coupling or two and some pipe.....It 'mght' keep the sides up.
Not sure how you could hold it in place...? Maybe drill a few small holes near the top edge and use wire or tie wraps....?

jackalope
04-30-2010, 05:41 PM
Jackalope, I don't know how rigid the sides are...(?)
I was thinking ....How about taking some PVC, maybe 1/2 inch, form a 'circle' out of it, to what ever diameter would fit 'snugly' inside the top edge of the pool. That size pvc bends pretty easy...doesn't cost a lot. A coupling or two and some pipe.....It 'mght' keep the sides up.
Not sure how you could hold it in place...? Maybe drill a few small holes near the top edge and use wire or tie wraps....?

Actually, the top isn't as bad as the bottom ..... as the bottom sidewall curls under/expands, the top gets lower, causing the top of the water to get closer to the top edge of the pool sidewall. I'm thinking that if I can put something around the outside to pull the bottom back in to where it's supposed to be, that it might make the grade for a year or so ;)

jackalope
05-22-2010, 10:26 AM
Well, we sold our Mossies, small pool, heater, and all - lock, stock, and cookie cutter! .... I gave away all but 4 of the feeder Guppies, gave away the remaining Marmorkreb, now I've gotta start over :o :o .

My son wants us to go to Tennessee with him for a month to help him get things set up for his in-laws and his family (If we have time, we may put a mobile on there for my family too!). It was going to be impossible to take care of the Mossies for that month, so we decided to sell out until we find out whether or not we are going to be moving down to Tennessee permanently or not. He seems to think he has enough money to put in a mobile for his in-laws and one for us as well on his 20 acres, so it won't matter if we sell the place here right away or not. He wants to take care of us in our old age ..... I keep telling him that I'm not getting old, it's my wife that's getting old, but he doesn't believe me :roll: :roll:

davidstcldfl
05-22-2010, 11:30 AM
[quote="Jackalope"]I keep telling him that I'm not getting old, it's my wife that's getting old, but he doesn't believe me

If your wife reads this forum.....you may not have to worry about getting any older..... :lol:

jackalope
05-23-2010, 04:55 PM
She's not a fish person, so she don't read this forum .... I don't tell her that it's about plants and veggies too ;)