New Air Pump

My old air pump finally gave up. Have been using it since the start in Siam Lake View so must be 4-5 years old. The rubber in the pumping mechanism has perished. At 130 Baht for the pump its done well. But today as a replacement I bough a better one. Has 4 outlets and can do up to 30 litres per minute. So two outlets into top tank and two below. Doubt it does 30 litres per minute under the pressure of being in the bottom of my tank but it does give far better air then previously.  WIll monitor progress.

December Update

Well for me this has been a very exciting month.

Got my own home system working much better. Today I tested the water. Fantastic results. Ph of 7.5 and NO2 and NO3 almost negligible.We had been having a lot of heavy loads from the tank clogging the filters and the pump. So much so that is was beginning to go terribly wrong. Even the large flood and drain bed was accumulating algae. First off was to redo the syphons. We made them a little shorter to ensure the water never came up above top of gravel.  I know easy enough but when we did the beds we ran out of energy to put in more gravel.. So being lazy finally came home to roost as it were but thats now sorted. Second big job was to remove some of the small fish we had. I thought we have added a lot but when you buy a kilo of cat fish they take up a lot of space. I reckon I removed about 150 small fish. We sorted them out. Kept 7 big Tilapia and the rest went into our main farm pond. Hopefully to grow and finally arrive on on plates in due course...

Next up for December was meeting with James Racoky of UVI fame who is the world renowned expert on Aquaponics.  He has retired and lives in Pattaya.  Owen and I met him for a quick coffee. 2 and a half hours later we left. Very interesting and exciting stuff. Go me more pumped up about the whole thing.

 

The four pictures above are of the 1000 litre system.  We are going to have a very similar construction to this one.

Above is Wanna reviewing the large UVI system construction. I think she is hooked as well.

Following on from such a meeting was then catching up with Robert Bob" White at Chat Takarn. Bob has been instrumental in establishing the Association of  to see a small system he had installed in a local Wat, and see his other new UVI type system in its construction stage. Really got me all fired up to get started. The small system is a 1000 liter fish tank feeding about 10 meters of flow beds. The big system is 4 fish tanks of 7000 litres each. Big and very interesting. Ive added a few random photos of the systems and as youve guessed Ive got a load more to help me understand what is going on. Ready for me to start on mine...

To keep me going through January I have bought a small system off Bob.  He is due to deliver in first week of January. Thats the 1000 litre system.  It should produce all the greens to fed the whole family and more... We should have it up and running with in days of Bob making his deliveries. Getting excited about this. Bit like waiting on a Christmas present.

Then our big project. We are going to build one similar to the UVI system on our land. I mentioned before we met with James Racoky of UVI.  He was really helpful to support us in this idea. Already got the spot in mind. We have flat raised land, power and water. Also already have a lot of ancillary stuff. Office, store room, pumps, plastic pipes and lights etc. Just need the fish tanks which well make out of concrete and the various filter beds and grow beds.So now need to finalise costing and make sure it pays of itself. Then February/March we start the big system.

The last photo is form our tank. Modest but a success.

Happy New year for 2013.

Air Lift Pump Aka Als Lift Pump

Done it.

Make me a lift pump.  I followed You tube Video Air Lift Pump.  Did myself a sort of ISO sketch and a take off for parts needed. See below.

ISO for 2" airlift pump

After that it was a simple trip to Global and buy the bits. Got them all in Rayong except for the check valve.  Had to wait till Khon Kaen for that.  Everywhere sold out.  So conclusion is there are a lot of persons out there doing air lift pump tests....all at this time.....

Anyway got it sorted and then had my friends Steve and Phil assist with the testing.

I have two air pumps. One is a 30 litre/minute  low pressure on and the other is similar but I am guessing more in region of 100 litres plus per minute.  (label missing ! Other difference is the small one is about 30 watts and one is about 200 watts.

2" flap valve and 1/2 " riser

Bits

And more bits

And some more Bits......

Results were interesting. Not well recorded but good enough as we were covered in water !!! However conclusion is it seems pump output volume is main factor in water movement.  And smaller vertical pipe gave a bit better lift height. Not we only used the piping we had and did not go into a lot of extra cutting and splicing etc. Needless to say it worked. So whilst I expected it to work I was still very pleased with the results and need to thank Steve and Phil for this assistance.  Wait I did thank them.. We had a beer together.... :)

So I plan to stick with 2" check valve and have 2 smaller ones for sale !

Ive added a video.  poor quality as Ive having trouble getting my Sony camera to talk with my software. Will get it sorted eventually. its a bit long but shows you the fun we had... Not at all scientific but so what.....