koiguy1969
GIGGETY-GIGGETY!!
its easy enough to remove and replace , both setups come with the screw holes...why one had screws and one has a snap in..i dont know!!
koiguys 55 gallon bio filter (skippy style)
- Thread starter koiguy1969
- Start date
Thanks for posting all of these details koiguy. I just finished building a 200 gal pond in my garage to overwinter a few of the small koi that I recently bought. Your previous posts have inspired me to do it. I love the idea of maintaining the beneficial bacteria colony throughout the winter so that the spring start-up is faster.
The frame, liner and insulation are complete and I filled it with water last night. I just have to build a mini version of your filter. I'll probably scale down the PVC to 1 inch and the container to 20 or 30 gallons. Maybe this weekend...
The frame, liner and insulation are complete and I filled it with water last night. I just have to build a mini version of your filter. I'll probably scale down the PVC to 1 inch and the container to 20 or 30 gallons. Maybe this weekend...
koiguy1969
GIGGETY-GIGGETY!!
your welcome pebcpa...thats why werre here. to help eachother. out in the garage, you gonna be heating the pond?
The garage is detached and has a hard wired electric heater so I have kept the temp in there in in the 50's all winter except on the coldest days when the garage temp dips into the 40's. I've thinking about heating the pond but I'm not sure what kind of heater to get. I've seen some in-line aquarium heaters that I may be able to use but I'm not sure if they will be powerful enough for 200 gallons.
Any thoughts?
Any thoughts?
koiguy1969
GIGGETY-GIGGETY!!
i wonder if an old water bed heater might do ?
I know the one I had could be easily wrapped around the inside of a 55 gallon drum.
I ended up building a skippy very similar to this. I had to trouble shoot a leak in my pond which I thought was in my waterfall. I couldn't tear apart my waterfall without taking my filter offline so opted to build a skippy I could place into the pond while I figured out it was indeed my waterfall or a leaky liner(yikes).
I used much of your design koiguy with a few small modifications. on my pvc feed pipe I ran 1 1/2 inch pipe into the barrel then used a 1 1/2 inch to 3" fitting adapter then approximately 1 1/2 foot of three inch pvc then to another adapter back to 1 1/2 inch pipe then a tee for my outflow pipes with 45 degree fittings to create the same venuri/settling chamber.
The reason I choose to do this is I wanted to use floor buffer pads for my filter medium instead of scrubbies. the 3" pipe is a perfect fit for the inner hole on a buffer pad. The barrel I used was 17" in diameter so I went with 17" buffer pads and have a perfect fit. I can fit up to 8 pads with this design ranging from coarse to fine. They will serve for both mechanical and biological filtration and cleaning will be much much easier than scrubbies. I figure I can rotate the pads and not have to clean all at once.
I then cut off the lip of the lid ( it was the type that fit into the barrel ) and sanded it down so it was a tight fit and would slide down into the barrel stopping at the barrels first ridge. I then used a hole saw on the lid and made multiple 3/4" holes everywhere and of course a 1 1/2 inch hole to slip my feed pipe threw. This served to both hold the floor buffer pads in place and give me a place to set my bio-balls which had been in my waterfall spillway. The reason I opted for this was due to the fact my bio-balls already had beneficial bacteria and I could not afford to start with a virgin filter. I also placed the filter pads from my water fall in between the buffer pads for the same reason ( I acually think this is were the majority of the beneficial bacteria is).
I then drill holes on the outside of the barrel all around the perimeter. I did this to increase aeration to the pond while my waterfall was out of commision. Long story short it works better than I could have ever imagined and I did it all without a spike in my ammonia levels which stayed at 0. I also, much to my relief, confirmed my suspicions that my waterloss was the fault of the waterfall and not a leak in my liner.
I hope to build two more of these with different modifications and incorporate them as planters for some water lotus next year, but I don't know how to prevent the roots from growing into the pads...........
I used much of your design koiguy with a few small modifications. on my pvc feed pipe I ran 1 1/2 inch pipe into the barrel then used a 1 1/2 inch to 3" fitting adapter then approximately 1 1/2 foot of three inch pvc then to another adapter back to 1 1/2 inch pipe then a tee for my outflow pipes with 45 degree fittings to create the same venuri/settling chamber.
The reason I choose to do this is I wanted to use floor buffer pads for my filter medium instead of scrubbies. the 3" pipe is a perfect fit for the inner hole on a buffer pad. The barrel I used was 17" in diameter so I went with 17" buffer pads and have a perfect fit. I can fit up to 8 pads with this design ranging from coarse to fine. They will serve for both mechanical and biological filtration and cleaning will be much much easier than scrubbies. I figure I can rotate the pads and not have to clean all at once.
I then cut off the lip of the lid ( it was the type that fit into the barrel ) and sanded it down so it was a tight fit and would slide down into the barrel stopping at the barrels first ridge. I then used a hole saw on the lid and made multiple 3/4" holes everywhere and of course a 1 1/2 inch hole to slip my feed pipe threw. This served to both hold the floor buffer pads in place and give me a place to set my bio-balls which had been in my waterfall spillway. The reason I opted for this was due to the fact my bio-balls already had beneficial bacteria and I could not afford to start with a virgin filter. I also placed the filter pads from my water fall in between the buffer pads for the same reason ( I acually think this is were the majority of the beneficial bacteria is).
I then drill holes on the outside of the barrel all around the perimeter. I did this to increase aeration to the pond while my waterfall was out of commision. Long story short it works better than I could have ever imagined and I did it all without a spike in my ammonia levels which stayed at 0. I also, much to my relief, confirmed my suspicions that my waterloss was the fault of the waterfall and not a leak in my liner.
I hope to build two more of these with different modifications and incorporate them as planters for some water lotus next year, but I don't know how to prevent the roots from growing into the pads...........
koiguy1969
GIGGETY-GIGGETY!!
first of all the design of these filters eliminates theneed for cleaning the pads the only thing on the media is beneficial bacteria...2 years of use and my media has been in inside, and outside filters never cleaned never even looked like any thing like they needed cleaning...cleaning just removes or kills the bacterial colony that the filter had built up...so why would you you clean it? do filter flushes only!!!!
koiguy1969
GIGGETY-GIGGETY!!
o.k...i thought you were talking about pulling it out and cleaning it... but my scrubbys have performed flawlessly since day one, even before building the larger filters.. in my tetra pond filter, replacing the biospheres that came with it. i combine my scrubbies with the blue plastic cut to fit furnace filters for a corser media..25"x30"x1" $5.00 at home depot
I would suspect overtime though the scrubbies will need either cleaning or replacing. Eventually as they become clogged, water will tend to flow more around them then through them. The length of time this will take will of course very greatly depending on how dirty the water that is being filtered, and may very well take a few years to have this happen. With the buffer pads I plan on pulling the pad first in the chain and rinsing it with pond water as needed. This is not a criticism at all, as all filters eventually suffer the same fate, and the ability to backflush would extend this time greatly.
koiguy1969
GIGGETY-GIGGETY!!
i already did share...home depot carries them so does lowes the ones at lowes are 20"x25"x1" about $4.50 each ... you cant miss them ..i dont remember the brand name. but the reason i use 1&1/2" pipe instead of 1"or smaller is to slow the flow of water out of the bottom pipes, its slow enough with 1200gph to have minimal suspension of debris,MOST settle in the sump area before getting near the media.
koiguy1969
GIGGETY-GIGGETY!!
no its like floor matala pads, scrubber pads or scrubbies...same open flow design..