Page 1 of 4 123 ... LastLast
Results 1 to 10 of 34
  1. #1
    Members Bioritize's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jul 2011
    Location
    Paonia, CO
    Posts
    139

    Basement System Design

    Hey Guys,

    I am back again with my third system in my new place in CO. This system needs to be modular so that if we have to move I can move this thing. I have decided to get 5-6 IBC totes from a source in Denver. My questions are about the plumbing and possible creation or placement of a sump tank or filter system that I could get solids out of the system with.

    I plan to have two pumps one in each set of three, using danner 700 magdrive pumpshttp://www.kmart.com/shc/s/p_10151_1...3V004248983000. Should I combine all the tanks at the bottom? What do you think of setting the grow beds directly on top of the fish tanks?

    I will make a bell siphon for each grow bed, yea a slight pain but more 02.



    Any feed back appreciated.

  2. #2
    Members Bioritize's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jul 2011
    Location
    Paonia, CO
    Posts
    139

    Re: Basement System Design

    What do you guys do about moisture build up in the basements? Has anyone used this type of configuration with these IBC's?

  3. #3
    Moderator davidstcldfl's Avatar
    Join Date
    Nov 2009
    Location
    Saint Cloud FL USA
    Posts
    2,029

    Re: Basement System Design

    Hi Bioritize, I don't know 'if' you already did your building...? Looks like it might be hard to get to the fish when it's time to eat some.

    Do a search for a free PDF called IBC's of Aquaponics. It has about 20 some different set ups, other folks have done, using IBCs. Lots of good info and ideas...

    As far as the humidity....I remember how dry the air was in the winter, where it snows. A dehumidifier uses a good bit of electric...too bad you couldn't exhaust it 'upstairs' somehow....?
    "Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same." - President Ronald Reagan

  4. #4
    Aquaponics 101 Oliver's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2009
    Location
    Show Low, AZ USA
    Posts
    251

    Re: Basement System Design

    This is not in answer to your question, but in looking at your design the first question that comes to mind is; how are you going to get the fish out of the tanks?

    My first design was a similar grow beds over fish tanks with more room between the two than it appears you have there. Netting the fish could only be accomplished by draining the fish tank of most of its water. My later designs moved the beds off center from the tanks in order to have better access to and light for the fish.

    As you probably know, I am an advocate of leaving in the fish solids and mineralizing them to provide the plants with extra nutrients.

    What is the purpose of the blue barrels you have in the drawing?

    I do like the idea of the interconnects between the fish tank bottoms in order to keep them in balance. You will need some strainers in the fish tanks to keep the babies from swimming through the pipes into adjacent tanks.

    You might want to bus together the water pumps using a check valve on each pump in order to have total system pump redundancy. That way you can turn off some of the pumps or rotate their timing and thereby reduce the amount of electricity used while still having ample pressure by using larger pumps. This will allow you to pump from each fish tank and help keep the solids in motion but not have to run every fish tank water pump continuously. This will also cause the water to flow in different directions through the bottom interconnects and help clean the strainers.

    I'm not sure what the cycle should be as you don't want to leave any individual pump off too long and allow solids to accumulate in that tank, yet cycling the pumps too often is not that good for the pumps either. Maybe turn each pump off for a couple of hours, turning off one pump and another on as you rotate through the them. Always have at least two pumps running so as not to have all pumps off during the rotation.

    Use the extra pumping power to jet back some water into the fish tanks. This is helpful in aerating and circulating the water and is an aeration backup in case one of your air pumps goes out for a particular fish tank.

    Use separate air pumps in each fish tank. If it is located below the water level of the fish tank, you should also use check valves to keep water from back flowing into an air pump if it gets turned off due to a power failure etc. Not to do so will end the pumps life next time it gets turned on. Unfortunately, I have experience in this as I lost a one hour old rather expensive air pump when I forgot to put in a check valve. I turned it off for a few minutes, saw that the line had water in it and thought I would blow it out by turning on the pump. The pump had filled with water and it burned out as soon as I plugged it in. You can also bus together your air pumps for the same kind of redundancy as the water pumps, as long as you use check valves on every air pump.

    Considering your low grow bed to fish tank volume ratio, I assume you are making this a low density system when it comes to the fish to gallons ratio. I find myself leaning that way more and more.

    What program did you use to create the drawing, as it looks nice?

    What kind of grow lights are you planning on using?

    I'll stop typing now.

    Oliver
    To measure is to know

  5. #5
    Members Bioritize's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jul 2011
    Location
    Paonia, CO
    Posts
    139

    Re: Basement System Design

    Thanks David, I will read that pdf it looks awesome.

    Oliver,

    I planned to use the blue barrels as a swirl filter to get solids in which I would sell and use on my other plants as fertilizer.

    I used Google sketchup to create the design, it is a free download and fairly easy to learn.

    I have a 1000 watt MH I was going to use over the 4 tanks and I plan to get a 400 watt flourescent light for the other area.

    I intended to add more growbeds in the future, I am going to try and build a couple plywood tanks, either lined with pond liner or fiberglass or even roll on rubber (if it is not toxic).

    The whole thing has to fit through a 32" door so I am forced to cut the IBC's in this way. I may change this design after reading the pdf.

    I like idea of putting the pumps together using a header I will try that. This current drawing has two returns one to each of the fish tanks. I am not sure if this would be necessary.

    Getting the fish out would be a problem. I may rethink this a bit.

  6. #6
    Members foodchain's Avatar
    Join Date
    Oct 2011
    Location
    Dallas/Ft. Worth, TX
    Posts
    611

    Re: Basement System Design

    Depends a lot on what you want to grow. I grow strawberries in gutters. Some swear it's too shallow a container for the media. But it seems to work for me, only drawback I see is high evaporation. But I am in TX...what doesn't evap quickly?

    Consider running gutters or something down the walls, you can cut these to lengths that will clear the doorway, and still get you your access to the fish for netting. Draining water out of tank always makes eaiser to net.
    OR use the traditional 1/2 blue barrel as the growbed. Cut lengthwise and frame to the back of the IBC against the wall. This allows room for fish access, and deeper beds.

    IF you terrace your IBC's, you can run it as a cascade system. This will have gravity doing some of the work of your pump. Then you simply have to have one pump to move water to the highest point, and let it trickle down through the different systems. This is how many fish stores, fish farms etc do their indoor stuff. And how I started playing in polycultures.

    Different tanks on same system will allow you to run different species within the same water....nice applications here. Escpecially if you can keep it warm down there.
    Nylon window screen works fine as screening between tanks, or use the craft mesh from Joann's, hobby lobby, etc.

    I am rebuilding my operation, and am designing something similar but bigger. And not in a basement. I don't want the bill for the lighting...one of the many reasons I got out of reefing.

    Best advice I have, go up first then out...use gravity to do your pumping as much as possible. I agree that leaving the solids in, is better for your system balance in long run, so long as you have a lot of growbeds, and therefore bacteria.
    At first I left this blank...but now I believe: "It's better to keep your mouth closed, and have the world think your a fool, than open it and confirm it."

  7. #7
    Members
    Join Date
    Jun 2010
    Location
    Fairport Harbor, Ohio
    Posts
    1,073

    Re: Basement System Design

    you'll be hard pressed to reach the back of the growbeds along that wall to the left as well..
    i've got my ibc's in place in my basement.. they're bigger than you think..
    with all those IBC's, i'd set a couple up as ft's that overflow into the gb's, that drain into a couple more "cut down" ibcs linked as a sump
    my basement has a pretty low ceiling, just over 6' clearance where my gb's are going, so i'm overflowing my ft (an 8' kiddie pool) into a cut down IBC sump, where i'll pump up to my gb's which drain back to the ft - i'm going out the side of the IBC gb to keep the drain high enough to flow back into the ft
    you could throw a few crayfish into the sump for extra cleanup duty

  8. #8
    Members foodchain's Avatar
    Join Date
    Oct 2011
    Location
    Dallas/Ft. Worth, TX
    Posts
    611

    Re: Basement System Design

    All of your return lines are connected with no ball valves/gait valves. What keeps the water from filling up the first IBC, and not the rest?
    At first I left this blank...but now I believe: "It's better to keep your mouth closed, and have the world think your a fool, than open it and confirm it."

  9. #9
    Moderator davidstcldfl's Avatar
    Join Date
    Nov 2009
    Location
    Saint Cloud FL USA
    Posts
    2,029

    Re: Basement System Design

    Bioritize, I've looked at the sketch again and re-read what you have written ....I'm not trying to bad mouth you or your drawing...I wish I could do sketches that well (or at all)... But I'm seeing some differance between the two....and it may be confusing me (us).

    The pipes in the upper 1/2 of the sketch makes it look like 'each tank' has a pump tied to a common header feeding a group of 3 tanks.
    Sounds like Oliver 'may have been' thinking that too.
    But you wrote you were using 2 danners, one in each set of 3 FT's

    and Foodchain 'may be' thinking the 'same pipes' are your returns.
    I saw you wrote, that you will be using bell siphons....we wouldn' see the drain pipes going into the FT's, but we 'should' see the tops of the bells in the beds.

    The pipe in the lower part of the sketch, has all 6 Ft's tied together by their drains. But you wrote, that they would be tied together in set's of 3.


    I'm not sure if the IBC's cage would 'safely' support the weight of the grow bed above...?
    Speaking of support...PLEASE, don't stack your concrete blocks like shown in the sketch. I've seen lots of photos of folks doing that, and I cringe every time. The block loses a lot of it's ability to support a load, when place on it's side and even more so, when stood upon an end...

    I liked foodchain's idea of cascading the fish tanks....that would add some 'free' DO.

    Looking forward to hearing how, your actually going to do your set up and see some pictures
    "Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same." - President Ronald Reagan

  10. #10
    Members Bioritize's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jul 2011
    Location
    Paonia, CO
    Posts
    139

    Re: Basement System Design

    Hey David,

    Glad you are paying attention.

    On the above design, I had used a couple templates and they had these guys piped together as you see above. In my mind one would be the supply and the other two would be returns to each tank. I was not sure if two returns would be a good idea or not. I will likely go with just one return back into the fish tank.

    Thanks for the tips on the blocks.

    I can't say how much I appreciate you guys and this forum. You have saved me hours of swear words and extra parts.

    Here is the updated design. I will only be able to get my hands on four of these IBC's. I plan to build more grow beds in the future out of wood and various liners. I may even put the additional grow beds outside.

    I was thinking of using bottom lifting overflow lines to help remove solids from the bottoms of the tanks.






    I took the Tristana's design from the "IBC of aquaponics.pdf" and made a few modifications.

    The change I made was to use the pump to supply the grow beds and then to have the extra pressure shoot in the far tank. I then tie the two fish tanks together and at the same time try and suck solids from the bottom of the tanks. This would then flow into the sump tank. Does this make sense or is it better to overflow into the grow beds and only pump into the fish tanks?

    As far as the tanks and steel go I plan to cut one or two tanks steal vertically to allow more support for the grow beds, this is another idea from the "IBC of Aquaponics" thanks David

    Question: What size bell siphons should I use here? 1" or 3/4"? Have any of you tried combined siphons?
    Would there be an advantage to tying the two fish tanks together at the bottom, in the new design?

    Much love,

Similar Threads

  1. My new basement system!
    By Prometheus7504 in forum Back Yard Systems
    Replies: 3
    Last Post: 12-17-2014, 04:08 PM
  2. Keith's basement winter system
    By keith_r in forum Back Yard Systems
    Replies: 62
    Last Post: 10-01-2012, 07:02 AM
  3. AP System Design
    By jmalone68 in forum Back Yard Systems
    Replies: 21
    Last Post: 11-17-2011, 12:10 PM
  4. My 700 gallon basement system
    By badflash in forum Good, Better & Best
    Replies: 41
    Last Post: 08-02-2010, 06:20 PM
  5. System design help
    By REEFBUG in forum Aquaponics Knowhow
    Replies: 9
    Last Post: 04-30-2010, 02:37 PM

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •