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Comment by Ted Titus on February 3, 2015 at 11:09am

I am new to all this.  I have a question about salt.  We live outside of town so have our own well. We also have a water softner.  I've grown tropical fish: the plants and fish didn't seem to have a problem, but what effect may salt have on the bacteria?  We can't taste it in our drinking water but there must be some there.  If anyone has experience or knowledge about salt it would be appreciatied.

 

Thanks

Comment by Michael Osman on February 3, 2015 at 7:21am

I've got it stopping. Thank you. It was the horizontal peace after the 1st 90. I pushed down on the top of it to get it level, and now it works great. UhIt's taking about 12 minutes to fill, 4 minutes to drain, & 30 seconds for the siphon to break.

Comment by Jim Fisk on February 2, 2015 at 9:40am

Hey Michael, There are so many ways that folks build siphons that without a good picture of yours it is almost impossible to give you advice. I have made and shipped over 600 siphons now to aquapons all over the world and the trickiest are our tiny bell siphons for say 3" media for a kitchen window herb garden. The larger ones are far easier to tune and rarely even need tuning due to the fact that surface tension does not come into play the way it does with the tiny ones.

So, having said that the most common fail to "break" reason is a trap for water under the GB or no air vents after the 90's which results in interference from the common drain, etc. That trap can be as simple as the below bed horizontal pipe running up hill inadvertantly or running 2 one inch siphons to a one inch T as one customer did recently. Of course that is disaster and all the tuning in the world will not fix it. It must be replumbed correctly. Each siphon MUST be kept independent or isolated from the other siphons and the common drain. Plumbing 101.

So if you are still having them hang then get us a picture or vid and I (we) can be of greater assistance. As in all things AP: KISS. Our motto around here. I have found that a simple system makes for low maintenance and as much as we love our AP GH we do have so many other interests and things to get built and all around homesteading that our time is limited. Our 2500g system might look pretty complicated to the newbie but it really is quite simple and for the most part takes care of itself and our five 1" siphons have been running flawlessly for over 3 years.

Comment by Robert Rowe on February 2, 2015 at 7:56am

My most successful/effective method of keeping the temperature to a safe minimum is using 2" foam insulation (not styrene) I made plugs for my FT's and Sump tanks. The plugs sit on the water and stop evaporation as well as insulating. A small amount of air will still escape around the edges. My next most effective method is using 300 watt aquarium heaters with the temperature set at the lowest level usually 65-68 degrees. I build a 2" PVC manifold with 6 vertical tubes which have perforated sides and place the heaters, as needed in the vertical tubes.  The manifold sits on the bottom of my 700 gallon FT. I have a bulb aquastat in the tank which allows the low temperature to be set from zero to 100 degrees. I plan to set the minimum to 55 degrees F and this will control a relay which will control the heaters. This is a current unfinished project.  

Comment by Robert Rowe on February 2, 2015 at 7:39am

@Michael Osman The secret to a hard shut-off of your siphon is simple.looking at your drain pipe follow the water path downward and insure you have 2 elbows at the bottom and be sure there is a sneak path for air flow back up the pipe as the flow slows. Picture the air flow following pack up the pipe and be sure the air pocket through the elbows isn't blocked. As the return air flows up the pipe and through the elbows be sure the top edge of the horizontal portion of the elbows is always descending. if the lower elbow is twisted in the wrong direction you can get an air pocket which intterupts the shut off. Another possible problem is if your drain pipe feeds into an air tight manifold. If the manifold is filled with water from another bed you wont have a return air supply. You can correct this problem by drilling a small hole in the top edge of the 2nd elbow to which I added a 1/4" snorkel up the side of the grow bed. I haven' tried but I suspect you can get by without the tube as the outgoing flow should be minimized by the velocity of the discharge.

Comment by Leo White Bear on February 2, 2015 at 12:30am

Michael-

Bell siphons can be a bit tricky at times.  Dickering around with the flow rates is probably the best answer you'll get, but I found with my indoor system, when a low pressure system comes through the bell siphons have trouble stopping.  To correct this, I enlarged the snorkel tube from 3/8" to 1/2" and haven't had a problem since and that has been 3-weeks now.

Comment by Michael Osman on February 1, 2015 at 9:29pm

My systems getting much closer to done now. The siphon starts quickly, runs strong, but doesn't quite want to stop. I've played with the flow rates a bit with no luck yet. any pointers, or do I just keep adjusting it till I get er figured out?

Comment by Keith Rowan on December 21, 2014 at 9:15am

if you want good growth of your yellow perch, you'll need more than goldfish flakes.. get a good quality, higher protein feed

Comment by David L. Eisenbrandt on December 20, 2014 at 10:38pm

Mine seem to like goldfish flakes. Thanks to you for  answer.

Comment by Leo White Bear on December 20, 2014 at 9:36pm

All my YELLOW Perch Would just ignore my duckweed.  They are carnivorous fish and wanted protein instead of veggies.Meat with no potatoes, you know what I mean.

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