Disaster in the DWC rafts...UPDATE.

OK...so it's taken me awhile to get the system back up and running. I received the ES3500 pump with some shipping damage. The unit's condensor cover was cracked along with the plastic base due to improper packing.  The FedEx delivery driver handed me the box and the pump was just bouncing around inside apparently with very little packing material. There was no obvious damage to the outside of the box, but of course the box was dropped and the pump's cover cracked when hitting the ground. Any way, I contacted the seller and was assured that a new cover would be sent out, I have yet to see one after 2 weeks, so I will follow up and see if or when it was shipped. So for now, I just epoxied the cover back together, everything else apparently works and I haven't found any other cracks in the unit.

After getting the pump in shape, I had to do a bit of re-arrangement on the plumbing for the system using 2" PVC throughout and getting rid of the 5/8" garden hose feeding the grow beds.

and as you can see, the new pump is in place. I also added downspouts to the feeder pipe with ball valves attached and have built spray nozzle which redirect water back into the fish tanks and provides extra aeration.  Of course, now I have a multitude of piping to climb over to get to the fish tanks. Of course I have also had to redesign the bell siphons to adjust to the increased water flow as the fish tanks were filling to fast and over flowing. I am still tinkering with balancing the system. I added some nursery DWC raft to the systems and so far I have had good success in sprouting new seeds.

I also added a washing machine tray on top and I have a constant flow of water traversing the tray and grow beds which then drain directly back into the fish tanks  So far I have had about a 75% sprout rate on seeds, not great but good for what I'm trying to accomplish.

That's it for now...more to follow soon.

Disaster in the DWC raft System.

OK...so a few days ago, I was working on a new set of  plant nursery rafts  in the green house when I noticed as I walked by the system that is connected to the new DWC rafts that the blower was working but no water was coming out of the grow bed fill tubes.Uh Oh!..Could there be a pump problem? So, out I went to the pump box, and after a close inspection, it appeared that the Danner Mag 9.5 pump was down. Of course it was 8 o'clock Sunday night, so I decided to take the pump out and see if the impeller was stuck or gunked up.  I reached down and turned the Union Ball valve to the closed position to cut the DWC rafts off from the rest of the system. Of course, as I removed the pump, water came gushing out of the valve...how could this be?...after feeling around inside the valve, it appears that one of the Teflon rings in the valve became partially dislodged and was no longer making a seal...so how to stop the flow...hook the pump back up of course. So now what to do...

So, I decided to run down to Lowes to pick up a new temp pump, not realizing I already had one that would have gotten me by...but hey, I had to get a new valve..right?  So, off I went, 11 miles to Lowes, and after picking out a 2000 GPH pump, and PVC pipe along with a new valve and fittings I was back home in a flash, only to find out that the pump I had purchased was only submersible and not an in-line as there were no threads on the intake port, but the output was threaded, so I assumed both were threaded, and you know what "Assumed" means..right!.

So in order to take the valve out, I had to plug up the 2" PVC pipe coming out of the raft using a 2" rubber test plug, which did the trick. After placing the plug, I disconnected the pump for further troubleshooting.


Anyway, after looking at the Danner Mag pump, and giving it a thorough cleaning, after which I did some research on the problem, it appears that the outside temp  peaked at 85 degrees that day causing a rise in the housing temperature  allowing for the thermal cutoff to kick in on the pump, shutting it down to avoid damage. So, I'm not able to use this pump type in-line, but I will be using it in the winter in the fish tank once I shut down the grow bed...no big deal.

That being said, I decided to use the Danner Mag in the Fish Tank temporarily to pump water back into the grow beds until I could find a pump better suited to in-line use.

After much research, I decided on an Evolution ES3500 in-line out of pond pump with a priming pot that I can use for both Aquaponic systems. It only uses 143 watts which is about 40 watts less than both my Danner Mag pumps together, so a little bit of savings will be realized in electric cost down the road.



I ordered it from a KOI pond dealer on-line with free shipping for $245 including the priming pot and 2"unions.  It should be hear any day now via FEDEX.



Of course, this gave me the opportunity to make some improvements to the barrel filters. I removed the home made PVC male/female bulk head fitting with a 1" standard slip bulk head fitting.on the swirl filter, and I replaced the outlet PVC male/female adapter on the Baki filter with a 2" Uniseal to prevent any leaks.






I will provide an update on the new pump installation once it arrives.