Finally DONE

I finished the last few steps in about 2 hours this morning... and then had problems.

The pipe up from the sump tank leaked a little, as did the drain pipe.  And the pump wasn't pushing enough volume to overcome the drain holes in the stand pipe, so the growbed wasn't filling.  I looked at the pump and decided it just wasn't big enough for the job.  It's supposed to push enough water to cycle the entire system each hour, but it clearly wasn't up to the job and didn't have a volume control.

So I drove 30 minutes to the nearest open aquarium store, bought a 375 GPH pump with 6' head and a volume control, took a different route back to avoid some ugly traffic I'd seen on my way out, and decided on the way to ditch the sump-to-fishtank piping and go with tubing instead.  I stopped at Home Depot and bought some kink-proof hose in the fountain section, and a half-circle bracket to fasten the end to the upper lip of the fishtank.

This pump is a HELL of a lot stronger.  So strong, in fact, that it was exceeding my overflow pipe drain holes.

So I drilled twice as many. 

It's still flowing out the end pretty hard.  I may put in even more holes next weekend.  Yes, I could turn down the pump.  But that's the right amount of water volume for the system.  It's my job to make that work.  And it's working fine, it's just flowing out hard enough to splash and push pellets around, and that's less than ideal.

I also glued the drain pipe, but it's still got a bit of a leak.  I think I'll replace it (can't redo it since it's glued) and use some teflon tape this time.

Now that the pump is pushing enough water, I realized that my clay pellets only came up to the waterline.  It's vital that they be above the high water mark so they don't grow algae.  Luckily, I still had another 100 pounds of pellets I hadn't put into the growbed.  So I dumped those in and it's perfect.

As soon as I recover from it all (and catch up on the housework I intended to finish today and the dinner I planned to cook on Saturday) I'll get the plants in there.  

It's DONE!!!

SO close to done!

So far this weekend, I've gotten the rain-barrel connector pipe glued in, the standpipe glued in, the growbed full of 400 pounds of clay pellets, the overflow pipe drilled and installed, the fish tank drained about 3/4 of the way and jacked up so I could put 2x4s under the back corners to level it, refilled it, tested the overflow, and done most of the pipe work for the sump pump back to the fishtank (it might work the way it is, but it's not as neat a job as I'd like - I'll fix that today).  I would have gotten the drain pipe done but I'd bought the wrong adapter and the stores were closed for the day.  I'll buy the right one today and *hopefully* get the very last of the system completed!

Growbed full of pellets:

Overflow from fishtank:

Overflow pipe drilled full of holes:

Overflow pipe installed :

Video of overflow (tank filled by hose for this test):



Rain-barrels in place:

Sump pump from rain-barrel to fishtank:

Pump sitting in barrel:

Hole drilled in top of barrel for pipe:

Piping from barrel to fishtank:

Broke down and hired a handyman

I just couldn't seem to find time to finish the construction, nor did I have the right tools for the job, and I can't keep asking friends to bring their tools and work on it with me.  So I hired a handyman to come do the construction.  I've still got more work to do, but at least it's down to just plumbing work, and I can handle that.  Heck, I'm getting pretty comfortable with it after all this.

So I had the Handyman come and build the center support, and replace the plywood end with a thicker piece.  He did a fantastic job.

I've cancelled my Christmas weekend plans, and haven't made New Years weekend plans, so I WILL get the whole thing done for the new year.

In other news, I bought an algae eater.  He's about 6" long.  He wasn't cheap, but he and everyone else should be very happy for a while.

The Tilapia are doing well as far as I can tell.  If there are any dead ones, they aren't floating where I've seen them.  And the live ones are eating with great vigor.

Got a lot done! (Updated with pictures)

Everything is definitely taking longer than I expected, but then I guess that's one of the things I should expect. I have an overly full calendar already and neither the tools nor the physical strength to do some of the things myself. Nor the know-how to completely plan things out. Some a lot of stuff is being done, and adjusted, on the fly instead of being completely planned in advance the way I'd prefer.

Last weekend the water tested too high in nitrites, and my growbed was clearly not going to be finished in the next day or two, so I purchased a 300 gph aquarium filter and hooked that up. Hopefully that'll keep the tilapia healthy enough until I finish everything. I've also cut down on food, though that's hard to do since they swarm to the surface when I'm there and gobble up the pellets when I feed.

This weekend I (with the help of a coworker/friend and her circular saw) finally got the legs onto the growbed. It required a lot more cross-bracing than I'd expected during my initial planning, and I wasn't going to skimp on that once I realized how wobbly it was, but that's taken care of and it feels very sturdy now. (I'll post pics later this week.) The bed is nearly perfectly level. It actually slants just slightly away from the incoming water and toward the drain.

I've once again pulled the fixtures out of the rain barrels and tried yet another method of silicone and attaching them. I'm giving them 48 hours to cure per manufacturer's directions, and then I'll pressure test again... except I just realized while typing this that it rained last night, and I left the barrels outside because it NEVER rains here! Oops. Sigh...

I've already purchased the hydroton, and it's waiting next to the greenhouse. On the bright side, the rain probably washed away some of the clay dust from them.

If the rain barrels pass the pressure test, I just need to decide what type of drain system I want to use, make/install it, and finish plumbing the overflow out of the tank into the growbed (I've already got the pipe from the bottom of the FT to the overflow hole). Everything else is done... I think... until I realize something else I've missed.

So the final decision to be made... what kind of drainage will I do? The GB has a huge hole already in it, with gaskets and stand pipe. But I don't need a drain hole that big. (Off the top of my head I think it's 3" diameter.)

• I could drill a small hole near the bottom of the stand pipe and use a timer for quick fill and slow drain.
• I could build a bell siphon, but with an outlet that large I don't even know what the specs would be for all the parts. I could figure it out, or maybe ask around. But bell siphons just seem so finicky to me.
• I could do an internal or external U-siphon. I'd still need a reducer, I think. And it has to be on the downflow of the pipe or it won't work. But I think that's probably the most fool proof.
• I could use a tube for a loop-siphon. Those also seem a little finicky and harder to keep clean. And I'd still need to reduce a ton before the tubing.

I still want to build a cover for the fishtank.  And I really should drain it down, jack it up, and shim it - it's pretty far from level and slanting in precisely the wrong direction.  But those aren't urgently necessary for it to function... I think.  It's possible that in order to overflow I'll have to get the water level too high in the rear (lower side) of the fishtank.  If it's too high it'll either overflow out the back (that would be terrible) or the water will be too high and the fish might jump out (that would also be terrible).  One solution would be to level the tank right away.  Another would be a cover which I'll need to do anyway to control algae.  So, yeah, something will need to be done.  But I'm hoping to postpone those until Paul is here in a little over a week and can help.  :)

It's all taking shape now!

The fully braced leg:

The side view with both legs:

 Side brackets attaching the growbed to the fishtank:



Well THAT isn't going to work...

Progress report:

I'm still fighting with the rainbarrels.  This time I invited a friend over to help me, and we removed the fittings, put rubber gaskets in on *both* sides of the rainbarrel wall so it was sandwiched in, reinstalled the fittings, and one of them *still* leaks.  The other one sealed fine on the fitting, but it leaks around the actual PVC pipe.  Sigh.  So I'm going to pull them apart and put silicone into the sandwich on both sides, and some PVC glue, and if that doesn't work I'll just scream.

I also purchased the 4x4 posts to make table legs for the growbed.  But without cross bracing they wobble way too much.  So I'm working on cross bracing (and meanwhile the growbed is still safely propped on cinderblock).  I should mention that this little project necessitated the purchase of a jigsaw.  The mitersaw was a piece of junk, a miterbox wouldn't have the angles I needed, and I'll be damned if I'll saw everything by hand anyway.  I really want a table saw, of course.  ;-)  But this will do for now.

Oh, and the fish... I nearly killed 'em.  I tested the water Saturday morning and it was bad.  Scary bad.  Everything would be fine if the growbed was set up so the water was being filtered.  Weeks ago like I'd intended.  Meanwhile, the fish are happily eating and pooping and the water isn't being filtered.  So I rushed out to my local pet store and purchased a 300 gph aquarium filter.  Of course it won't fit on the side of MY fishtank, like it would over a skinny little aquarium.  But it actually sits quite nicely on top of the fishtank wall.  It's very stable there.  I also hooked up a long hose to the uptake tube, and fitted a screen on the other end (purchased from my local hydroponics store) so the filter is pulling from the bottom as it should.  After running it for 24 hours I removed the slimy, greenish-black filter pad and hosed it off so it was pristine and white again.  I'll probably do that again after work tonight.  My poor fish!

And while I was at the hydroponics store purchasing the tubing and filter, I discussed Hydroton with them.  They'll sell it to me for the same price as everywhere else offers it, plus they'll deliver it to me (for free, I believe - if not, they're close enough to home that I can make 3 trips without wasting the whole day).  So if I ever get the growbed properly braced, I'll have the Hydroton ready to fill it.

Oh, and on that note, I'm having issues with the draining of the growbed.  It's got a HUGE pipe fitted through the bottom right now.  I think it's like a 2" or maybe even 3" (I'm going from memory here).  There's no way I'm going to try to build a bell siphon with that as the upstand.  I considered just drilling a drain hole near the base of it and doing a timer-based fill with a slow drain, but the fittings come up too high.  So the next step is to see if I can unscrew it.  If so, perhaps I could put in a reducer immediately at the floor of the GB and do a U-bend siphon off of that.  The U-bend would be my preferred method anyway.  If I can't do the U-bend up into the GB itself, I can run it off to the side and U-bend externally, leaving the gaping hole (properly screened from media, of course) on the bottom as is.  That would probably be the least hassle at this point.

Plants have sprouted nicely and will probably want to be planted in the next few weeks.  My fiance will be here on vacation in 2.5 weeks, so if all else fails he and I will just spend our vacation blasting through this and getting it done.  I hate to admit it, but that actually sounds like a good vacation to me.  Getting this project complete would make me very happy!

Summary:
Rainbarrels: fail
GB legs: fail
GB drain: fail
Fish health: fail
Stress management for me: fail

LOL.  At least no one is dead yet.  Not me, and not the fish.  And where there's life, there's hope!

Greenhouse complete!

I got the sides on myself, with a crochet hook and a lot of swearing.

Then Pam, my friend from work, came over to pick up the old greenhouse, and while she was here she helped me put the ends on.

Greenhouse done!

I also re-siliconed the rainbarrels.  I'll pressure test them this week.

Progress once again

So the new rainbarrels are drilled and plumbed, though I'm still trying to get a water tight seal on the plumbing.  I'll work on that some more today

One of my poker buddies came over and helped me raise the growbeds up another block-worth.  And he, and another poker buddy/neighbor helped me get the new greenhouse partially assembled.

 I've started some seeds, and they're already popping up.

Today I will once again silicone the rain barrel fittings, using the 2nd tube of silicone which did such a great job on the fittings I'd already used it on.  The first tube, of a different brand, has consistently failed at every application.  I also am hoping to get to the home center to purchase some brackets and 4x4 posts to use as table legs in place of the cinderblocks.  Though the blocks are functional, they aren't as stable as I'd like.  I'm also considering putting the legs onto furniture coasters to aid in any future moving around, since the posts are more likely to splay and crack.

I did a pH test on the 3/4" gravel offered locally, and it's just not going to work.  So Paul and I have decided to use the expanded clay instead.  It also has the advantage of being lighter weight than gravel.  It will be more expensive, and is not as easy to maintain, but it will be easier on my fingers.  I won't be doing that today, though; I'm fairly sure most of the hydroponics stores are closed for Sunday and I'm not really ready to plant anything anyway.  So that can wait.

Paul and I also discussed cover designs for the fishtank.  The overflow hole is rather higher than I'd like, and if I fill the tank that high it's going to bring the fish up awfully close to the top of the tank.  Also, the fish prefer to be under cover so they feel safe.  I have the greenhouse providing shade, but it doesn't provide that feeling of hiding.  We've tentatively agreed on a 3-piece lid.  The back portion of the tank will be covered by one piece which will remain stationary.  The front half will be two pieces, each hinged to the stationary piece, so that the fish can be fed by opening a small portion of the lid, or cleaning and capturing can be done by opening both hinged pieces creating a large opening.  I'll be building that soon... I hope.  I plan to use fence slats with some spacing between them for good air circulation.