Questions from new member talking2u

[Murray]

talking2U is new to the internet, so she asked me to make a thread for her. Murray.

talking2u asks,

I am not to savy on the internet/web pages. Can't figure things out/or find....It has taken me three months to get this far! (Praise God I have not Given UP!!! Not sure where to go to ask a question or find the question?

1 Questions I have:*Does the bed have to fully drain or can it have a little bit of standing water(1/2 inch)

2 How Long can the Grow Bed go "between floodings"? in case of power outage ....my tank is not over stocked with fish. but I don't want to lose my plants either.

3 I have read about the relay--- back up batteries. I do will not have a sump, my pond is in the ground and my grow bed will drain directly to it. thanks
talking2u

[fishfood]

talking2U is new to the internet, so she asked me to make a thread for her. Murray.

talking2u asks,

I am not to savy on the internet/web pages. Can't figure things out/or find....It has taken me three months to get this far! (Praise God I have not Given UP!!! Not sure where to go to ask a question or find the question?

1 Questions I have:*Does the bed have to fully drain or can it have a little bit of standing water(1/2 inch)

2 How Long can the Grow Bed go "between floodings"? in case of power outage ....my tank is not over stocked with fish. but I don't want to lose my plants either.

3 I have read about the relay--- back up batteries. I do will not have a sump, my pond is in the ground and my grow bed will drain directly to it. thanks
talking2u
Hi I to run direct drain
My system has been running 12 months Now the cooler weather is here it goes 15 hrs without running [over night] in the summer max 4 hrs and every 2 hrs is plenty during the day
There is always 1 inch water in the grow beds that does not drain no problem so far

As for the battery backup murry is the boy for that

[GaryD]

Hi,


1 Questions I have:*Does the bed have to fully drain or can it have a little bit of standing water(1/2 inch)
I've got a small flood and drain gravel/expanded clay grow bed that always has 50mm of water in the bottom. It's been running for at least six months without any apparent issue.


2 How Long can the Grow Bed go "between floodings"? in case of power outage ....my tank is not over stocked with fish. but I don't want to lose my plants either.
My small grow bed runs on a 15 minutes ON/45 minutes OFF pumping cycle. This regime is fairly common.

By my experience, a grow bed could survive, in the event of a power or equipment failure, without water all day in cool weather but will be in serious trouble after about half a day in hot weather. The amount of damage will also be determined by the maturity of the plants - fully grown plants will cope much better than young plants - probably because of their deeper roots.

The biggest risk that you face in the event of a prolonged blackout is dead fish due to lack of dissolved oxygen.


3 I have read about the relay--- back up batteries. I do will not have a sump, my pond is in the ground and my grow bed will drain directly to it. thanks talking2u
Murray will explain how the backup relay system works.

Gary

[talking2u]

Thanks FishFood

[talking2u]

Hi,


Thanks Gary D

[talking2u]

what is a autosyphons?

[talking2u]

I have a neat idea I wonder what you all might think.
I want my pump to be running cont. so I am going to hook it up to a sprinkler system. the timer will tell it when to switch to the grow beds. then the timer will tell it when to switch back to the pond. this will also allow me to have a NFT system as well.

[GaryD]

Hi Talking2U,

An autosyphon (as the name suggests) is a device that automatically drains a grow bed when it has filled. In so doing, it controls the pumping cycle for the system.....rather than a float switch or a timer. The principal benefit of an autosyphon is that you can run a pump continuously rather than have it cycling on an off.

While I currently use timers and float switches, I would prefer to have my pump run continously (it's better for the pump and it provides for better aeration) so I'll eventually get into autosyphons.

I'm a bit unclear as to what you're attempting to do with the sprinklers etc. Can you provide more detail?

Gary

[daniel]

I am not sure about this, but wouldn't you loose a fair bit of water by using sprinklers. Especially on windy days?

[talking2u]

is an auto "sypon" a pump?

I know what a sypon is....water from a higher level stick in a hose. Suck hard. water will drain to a lower level.

[talking2u]

sprinker system. I am sorry. I did not mean I was going to use a sprinker. But rather I was going to use the "system" that is the timer will hook up to a device that will send the water to zone one (grow bed) then 10 minutes later it will switch it to zone 2 (fish pond). I also could switch it to zone 3 and 4 when I get more grow beds.

[talking2u]

I don't know how to work this site to well...but just incase someone has the same question. I appreciate Murry's explanation. It turly made it clear to me.....


Hi Talking2U,

I set up a temporary auto syphon just to show how simple they can be.
A piece of pipe is connected to the bottom or near bottom of the tank or grow bed you wish to syphon the water from in an automatic manner. It is then looped up toward the top of the tank with the top of the loop being at the maximum level you wish the water to rise to in the grow bed or tank.
It is important to have a good length of "tail" hanging below the bottom of the tank.
As the water fills the grow bed or tank the water in the tube slowly rises to the top of the loop until it eventually starts to drain over the loop and downward.
When sufficient flow is established as to exclude any air from being drawn into the pipe a syphon is established.
The water will be evacuated out of the tank until the water level reaches the level of the bottom outlet of the syphon pipe and air is sucked into the pipe from the grow bed or tank. The syphon will then be broken and the tank or grow bed will begin to fill again.
And so the process continues automatically.

One photo shows the water almost at the top of the clear tube. The next photo shows the syphon well established and water being removed from the tank to the fish tank below.

This simple system allows for the flood and drain process to be operated in a simple system with the use of one pump only to raise the water from the fish tank to the grow bed/s. The water is removed from the grow beds by the auto syphon, thus allowing the grow bed to flood and drain.

Some people have used this system very successfully in medium to large systems with multiple grow beds.

It is particularly suitable for people setting up a system where they have a sloping location. The fish tank at the bottom of the slope and the grow beds up the slope a suitable distance.

There are other variations to this theme that can be discussed later.

Muzza.
Attached Thumbnails

[talking2u]

I had all sorts of trouble finding out the size of gravel. In the good old US of A we do every thing in Inches.

the best I could find is this info form the Wikipedia, encyclopedia.

8-16mm = 0.31-0.63 inches which is medium gravel aka pebbles. which is called around here 1/2 gravel

16-32mm = .63 - 1.26 inches coarse gravel aka pebble which is found around here as 7/8 inch gravel

apparentely our draiage gravel is 1"

I went with the 1/2 inch gravel.

[Murray]

Hi Talking2u,
1/2" gravel will do the job nicely. The 7/8" would also have been just fine. Pebbles (round ones) are nice and easy on the fingers when planting seedlings into the gravel. The stuff I use has very sharp edges.

I am old enough to remember measuring everything in inches

Keep us informed of your progress. Some pix would be interesting.

Muzza

[Aquatic Oasis]

Hello,
An irrigation controller will in theory work. You will need to check the number of on and of times per zone. Your average controller will only allow 2-4 cycles per day. This may not be enough frequency for your grow system.