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Cleaning Your Gravel Right In Your IBC Growbed

I wrote this in the beginners forum and realized it should be here as well. Now understand that my gbs are at a nice working height and not on top of an ibc. Having said that this is how I wash my sometimes very nasty gravel.

Merely hosing down the gravel would never have cut it with the river sand or rather gravel that I had to wash. I start by filling the ibc gb with water and lots of flow. I dump the gravel into the water at one side and then move the clean gravel on top over to the other side. Meanwhile the bell siphon is doing it's thing and all the silt and sand is being carried off out the back door of the gh and down hill so the flow is at a max. and I get to see the bottom every cycle of the siphon. (My siphons rock) I keep piling the clean gravel high until the whole gb full is taking up about 2/3 of the gb. and keep running the water and siphon hard until no silt and sand are left all the time stiring things up and then I move all the gravel the other way to make sure nothing has settled under the pile. Great part is I DON'T HAVE TO MOVE IT AGAIN I just level it out and plant.

It is always work but the end result is very gratifying. I hate to think anyone has ever had gravel worse than I had. Also keep in mind the gravel weighs a lot less and is easier to move around under water. I suggest gloves but I have yet to use them. I started out washing it in barrels but this method beats all that heavy lifting by a long shot. The granite gravel I used last time was a piece of cake compared to the 2 tons of river sandstone I used the first time around.

Here are some pics I took during washing

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Jim Fisk on September 23, 2012 at 5:41pm

Sorry, still getting used to how things work on here. Here are the pics that never showed up above.

Permalink Reply by Bradly on September 24, 2012 at 6:54am

I'm glad you posted this...it's an alternate way to clean the rock. I won't have to deal with it for some time as my system is new, but I was planning on shoveling all my riverrock into a cement mixer for cleaning and then back into the GBeds. I think I'll try this first when the time gets here :-)