Comment

Comment by Dan Ponton on May 4, 2012 at 6:38am

I just bought the Tetra 1900 gph pump. It seems to loose about 100-150 GPH per foot,  0 GPH at 16.5 ft. It has a 1" outlet, so I made my supply 1.5" to minimize any lose.

Comment by Kenyon James Hopkins on May 3, 2012 at 8:47pm

My 600GPH pump is maxed at 8’ but I’m only pumping up 3’. A pump expert I am not but I would think that a 1900 GPH pump with at least a 15' max height would do the trick if all you have is the 1 IBC. 2 at best. How many gallons in your fish tank/growbed? Is it just the 1 IBC or you adding a bunch? Have you decided on your recirc rate? If you plan on expanding much, you may want to consider either a shallower sump or a direct drive pump. But again, you'd have to pay close attention to the amps being pulled because of your wiring situation. @ 200 feet I wouldn't want to pull more than 8-10 amps on a 20 amp circuit. You can look up what's recommended or ask an electrician. Sometimes the tag on the extension cord tells you.

I did some research and depending on how big you are going to make your system this pump type might work nicely for you: Pumps 

1900GPH with a max lift of 18’. That put the flow at 15’ about 300GPH. The next pump bigger would be a 3100GPH pump with a max lift of 29’. That would put your flow between 1000-2000GPH at 15’. More than plenty for future growth I would think and fill up your grow bed in no time! The price isn’t horrible either considering the obstacles you have to overcome. There is one even bigger (4900GPH) if those 2 weren’t big enough. I hope this helps or my gross negligence causes someone to jump in and save you. Maybe it just points you in the right direction for you to solve it on your own. Good luck!

Comment by Tony Gilliam on May 3, 2012 at 7:13pm

Kenyon, Do you know about how much lift you get out of your 600 gph pump? I would need about 13 feet of lift with just the grow beds. A little more for strawberry towers.

TCLynx, Great advice. I will check out the MSDS.

Comment by TCLynx on May 3, 2012 at 4:40pm

Bleach is used to disinfect but it won't neutralize acid.  I doubt acid requires disinfection.

Now most acids are fairly safe once well diluted but do a little research on the particular acid and it's MSDS sheets since there are a few that are very toxic even in minute quantities and you would not want your food coming from containers that have ever even herd of them.  So find out what the particular acid you are talking about is and look it up.  Yes, baking soda or lye are what you would use to neutralize a strong acid but as Sheri says, wear appropriate protective gear if there is enough acid left to need neutralizing.

And as Parker and Sheri note, check the totes for damage and be sure to support them well.

Comment by Kenyon James Hopkins on May 3, 2012 at 2:58pm

Not that you’d need one this big, but a Tetra 1900 GPH submersible mag drive pond pump only draws 2 amps. You could run that sucker forever and not overload  the circuit going over 200 feet. I have a 700 gallon system on a 1 amp 600GPH Tetra mag pump ($45) and the cord runs halfway around the house. I’ve also been running a pool filter pump on the same plug in addition to the pond pump for nearly a week dealing with an algae bloom and have not heated or overloaded the circuit. So long as you are using the proper gauged extension cord you would be all set. Just a thought.

 

Comment by Tony Gilliam on May 3, 2012 at 2:41pm

My greenhouse is rather far away from a 110 power source. I think if i had a pump running 24/7 it would be such a draw on the line that it would heat up and pop the 20 amp that i can give it. I would need atleast 200 feet of subsoil wire. That is a bunch of $$$$$$$$ with no gaurantee that the breaker would hold. Oil floats on water. give me some time and i will work out a water bath that the air can flow through and the oil will float up and can be drained off. This may take me some time to figure out.

Comment by Kenyon James Hopkins on May 3, 2012 at 2:03pm

 

Possibly but cleaning it out of the tank would suck. My experience with using vegetable oil as lubricant is that it works initially but then turns to gunk fast. The compressor generates heat with the piston action too which would cause the oil to break down or catch fire rather quickly as well.

 

Couldn't you just place a single efficient magdrive water pump in your sump well and pump it directly to your grow beds? What is the benefit to using air besides you wanting it to assist in gassing and the breakdown of the solids? If you have media in your grow bed, "treating" your solids is unnecessary unless you are stacking the fish on top of each other in the tank. I'm only 2 months into my first build so I'm no expert. Just trying to learn new things.

Comment by Tony Gilliam on May 3, 2012 at 1:44pm

Just a thought, a standard compressor could work if you changed the oil in the air pump, and used a vegetable oil instead. You would want a rather thick oil i would think. Or maybe fish oil would work. I think i would try it on an old compressor VS a new one.

Comment by Tony Gilliam on May 3, 2012 at 1:40pm

I have a 300 gallon compressor that will go up to 160 pounds, It is use for my small screen printing shop so it is in use 24/7 anyway. It has plenty of water traps and a chiller so it is totally clean air. It is my intention to keep the air compressor in the shop and run a line out to the greenhouse, where i will have an air tank of about 100 gallons so i get the volume of air needed to raise the water to the growbeds.

Comment by Kenyon James Hopkins on May 3, 2012 at 1:21pm

 

Oh I like it! A compressor could use less electricity over a 24 hour pump and if you had no power back up you could always adapt a manual (or wind?) pump to charge your tank to get you by a few hours at a time depending on the storage capacity and usage.

What type of compressor will you be using? Standard air compressors leak oil into the air supply by design to keep everything lubed properly. You'd have to have something like a SCUBA compressor that doesn't contaminate the compressed air with oil I would think.

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