A Community and Forum For Aquaponic Gardeners

DWC system design

I am thinking of suspending my 2' x 4' rafts off the bottom of the trough and then making it ebb and flow. I was going to break after dropping about 6 inches of the 12 inch deep trough. The purpose is to add oxygen.

I do not have enough power in my hoop-house which is at the rear of my 1 acre lot to add another air pump or a larger air pump.

Anyone done this?

Any Ideas or thoughts

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Jon Parr on November 9, 2012 at 9:40am

I already do this, it works great. You will be pleased. The only trouble is having that much more volume in surge/sump capacity. The other benefit is not having to use foam. I am using redwood boards. Glen Martinez in Hawaii has done this for quite some time, and he uses plywood panels with a water-based food safe stain, like Cabot stain.

Permalink Reply by Chris Carr on November 9, 2012 at 12:39pm

Hey Jon. Not to jack this thread but did the staggered spacing on your boards work out for alternating lettuce crop (alternating spaces with seedlings and growout) like you had hoped or have you had a chance to try it yet? From your site it looks like you are growing basil in some of them currently.

Permalink Reply by Jon Parr on November 9, 2012 at 2:14pm

Hey brother! Are you still stateside?
Yes, the staggered spacing works great for lettuce and short stuff, not really needed for basil because the height blocks the sun in the odd holes. It is great, though, for some benificial plants to just hang out in.

Permalink Reply by Chris Carr on November 9, 2012 at 2:54pm

Funny timing. I literally just stepped out of my managers office from putting in my notice. Still waiting on the lady to finish her exams and Ill be in the great white north by Christmas and then up up and away in Jan. Great the staggered layout works out in practice. Great for hobby rafts, especially for the lazy factor of never having to transplant anything after seedlings go in.

@Dan. To your topic points, I think it is a great idea. Seems others have tested this out with good success and it works well for sure. The only unknown to me in my searching is how well does it perform in a direct side by side comparison with traditional rafts + mechanical air. My guess would be that it works very well, but not as well. I believe TCLynx is doing a similar side by side test right now (air gap, no air vs air gap, w/ air stone). If there was an update since the experiment was started, I missed it.

Permalink Reply by Jon Parr on November 9, 2012 at 8:59pm

Plase copy the link for TC's side by side if you think of it

Permalink Reply by Chris Carr on November 9, 2012 at 10:15pm

Was going to dig it up eventually. It at least will show a comparison of added air vs not in a suspended root zone setup.

http://community.theaquaponicsource.com/forum/topics/floating-raft-...

Permalink Reply by Vlad Jovanovic on November 10, 2012 at 12:24am

TC being the kind and thoughtful person that she is, will probably post updates to that experiment here...http://www.aquaponiclynx.com/non-recirculating-test... as opposed to us threadjackin bastards

Chris, I sincerely wish you the adventure, freedom and growth that every one of us deserves as you set off in your new direction.

Permalink Reply by Chris Carr on November 10, 2012 at 8:54am

Yeah likely. I just left a comment on her site to see if anything interesting is going on. Today would be two weeks into the experiment. Since this experiment is non-recirculating I am curious if just the slight agitation is helping out at all, not just with oxygen. Ill admit I haven't read the non-recirc paper yet.

Thanks for the wishes. Ill keep y'all posted.

Permalink Reply by Chris Carr on November 10, 2012 at 9:05am

@Dan. Check out this video. I advanced it to the part of interest which I believe is very similar to what you are describing. http://youtu.be/HY6d1n_NfV8?t=4m59s

As Glen mentioned the small fluctuating water level allows for the drainage flow to level out some but I have also seem him mention in another video that it allows the airspace to "breath" by expelling some of the air during a flood and intake new air as it slowly drains.

Permalink Reply by Dan Ponton on December 12, 2012 at 10:44am

I am very happy with the results. The plants seem to be growing better. I am having trouble with the siphon breaking. I have read that this can be expected when large amounts of water are moving. I do not want to decrease the amount as this would cause very slow fill.

I am considering adding a water tipper to give the siphon a chance to break.

Did you have this problem? How did you solve it?

Jon Parr said:

I already do this, it works great. You will be pleased. The only trouble is having that much more volume in surge/sump capacity. The other benefit is not having to use foam. I am using redwood boards. Glen Martinez in Hawaii has done this for quite some time, and he uses plywood panels with a water-based food safe stain, like Cabot stain.

Permalink Reply by Chris Carr on December 12, 2012 at 11:01am

A member here Rob, has some cool features he has added to his bell siphon design which may help you out Dan. Here is a video explaining them.