gosmith's system

[gosmith]

Hi all,

I'm just getting ready to break ground on my greenhouse build, hopefully tomorrow, weather permitting. The 12' x 20' GH is a gable design covered with GH film (not sure what kind yet.) I'll post pics as I go along. For now, here is the preliminary layout for the system. FT and GB's are built from lumber and lined. FT is 4' x8' x 4', filled to 3'. There are five flood/drain GB's to start with. Each is 30" x 48" and 12" deep. They will use bell siphons of some type. The sump is under the GB's and will use a low power pump in order to be able to run it from a future PV solar array. The plan is to finish the build over the winter for a start up in early spring.

I'd like to be able to raise talapia eventually, but don't know if I can maintain the required temps over the winter, so we'll probably start out with yellow perch and see how it goes. We want the system to be self-contained, so won't use grid power or fossil fuel except for an emergency generator. Space heating will come from a biochar stove that uses wood chips from the county road crews. I dry this in racks and store it in recycled dog food bags.

I also have an old propane water heater that will be converted to heat with another biochar stove. This will be connected to the FT with a heat exchanger and a low-power inline pump from a solar thermal system. I'm also planning to connect a cool water line to a heat exchanger from an existing large trout pond, which is uphill from the GH. I'm hoping to use this to maintain cooler water temps during hot summer days. All of this is experimental, of course, so we'll probably have to make lots of adaptations as we go.

Comments and advice much appreciated.

Gary

[oldSarge]

Forty-one months and some days later . . . any progress, pictures? Looked like a great start and I'm sure with the effort expended at that time you must be upnrunning now.

[Deuem]

6 year old thread and all the photos for me are gone. echo, echo, echo! I think there is an intermission.

[Jason]

6 year old thread and all the photos for me are gone. echo, echo, echo! I think there is an intermission.

I am not sure which photo's you are referring to as I do not see any that are missing.

Jason

[oldSarge]

The pics I was referring to were any new since the last post before mine. I can see all the original pictures here.

[Jason]

Ok, now I follow you. I agree it is a shame as it would be nice to know what happened since they last posted. Hopefully nothing bad.