Problem with water coming from filter. Possible air lock?

[UPEngineer]

Hello,
I have a pond about 850 gallons or so. I built a 55 gallon skippy type filter (Docs filter) to help with my filtration and such. It had a fountain pump so it wasnt doing to well.

I have a Beckett W1150 submersible pump. My problem is that it drains to my 2" pipe and goes back to the pond and it does well for a bit. Then it is like it stops for a second and then starts draining again. Much like when you first turn on a water hose and it runs for a second and then stops before it starts again. It does this about every 15-20 seconds.

Out of my outlet on the barrell, I have a sweeping tee (cause i read about air locks before). Goes straight down and then 90's to a horizontal pipe about 4' long. It has a slight downhill grade. Then it 90's up and sweeping 90 with a 1' horizontal back to pond.

Is this a symptom of air locking? The return to the pond is lower that the outlet. The horizontal pipes are slightly downhill and do not go up and then back down.
Should I put a sweeping tee on the outlet to the pond?

Any advice?
Thanks,

Scott

 

[ididntdoit99]

I need a blueprint.... did you just say you outlet pipe goes up at some point?

 

[UPEngineer]

No, it goes from the barrell near the top into a (I called it a sweeping tee) straight down and then into sweeping 90 horizontal (sloping down) for about 4' then up about a foot or so then horizontal into the pond.

Here is a crude drawing to help illustrated it.

 

[ididntdoit99]

Well there's your problem.... there is air into the system, and then suddenly it crashes into a 90 degree upright pipe... and that pipe has to fill completely with water, build its way up that pipe, until the level reached the next horizontal pipe and then travels horizontally again. This is gravity fed right?

 

[UPEngineer]

Well there's your problem.... there is air into the system, and then suddenly it crashes into a 90 degree upright pipe... and that pipe has to fill completely with water, build its way up that pipe, until the level reached the next horizontal pipe and then travels horizontally again. This is gravity fed right?

Figures, lol. How can I fix it?

 

[UPEngineer]

Well there's your problem.... there is air into the system, and then suddenly it crashes into a 90 degree upright pipe... and that pipe has to fill completely with water, build its way up that pipe, until the level reached the next horizontal pipe and then travels horizontally again. This is gravity fed right?

No, it is submersible pump fed into a 55 gallon plastic drum sitting on cinder blocks.

 

[ididntdoit99]

Yes, and then its gravity fed out of the barrel back to the pond... does it have to go back up? can you do some 45 degree angles and not drop it all the way to the ground? here is a pic of mine, come straight out of the garbage can, to a tee, then a 45 straight down into the pond.... obviously yours doesn't seem to be as close to the pond as mine, but you get the idea...

why does it go back up? what are you going up over?

 

[UPEngineer]

Yes, and then its gravity fed out of the barrel back to the pond... does it have to go back up? can you do some 45 degree angles and not drop it all the way to the ground? here is a pic of mine, come straight out of the garbage can, to a tee, then a 45 straight down into the pond.... obviously yours doesn't seem to be as close to the pond as mine, but you get the idea...

why does it go back up? what are you going up over?

My filter is about 5-6' from the pond. My wife thinks its ugly LOL. Semi-hidden by the dog house. So to keep pipes from being seen too much because there is really no way to hide it was I buried it about 1 foot deep. It has to come up out of the ground a foot or so to go back to pond. Actually, it is about 2 foot up. 1 foot underground and one foot above ground to go over our rocks.

What is weird, is I dry fit everything before I installed it and ran it for almost 30 minutes and it ran perfectly without a hitch. Granted I was using a water hose supplying the water instead of my pond pump. But never once did it gurgle, slow or anything. Weird.

I guess I may just have to back up 10 yards and punt.

 

[ididntdoit99]

well let me tell you, it might look a little ugly at first, but i have elephants ear planted around mine, and its halfway buried in the ground. In a month or so... .there will be so many plants around it, you wont see a thing.

 

[Waterbug]

Based on what was written it doesn't sound like an air lock. If I was betting I'd put my money on the pipe is draining, sucking in air, draining again. Like the oscillatory emptying called glug-glug (believe or not) when a bottle of water is turned upside down.

Probably can be fixed by putting a vent pipe on the horizontal part of the drain pipe, near the vertical piece by the filter. A tee is added and a vertical stand pipe to above the water line in the drum. Could actually probably be lower. That would probably fix the air lock too if you got lucky and put it in the right spot.

But I'm just guessing. Hard to figure out on site, impossible in a couple of text messages.

 

[HARO]

Sounds like the filter is air-tight, and the pump flow is less than the return rate. That way, the return (overflow) pipe has to wait for the pump to catch up.
John

 

[DrCase]

Scott
After reading your post a few times it could be the fitting you used on the outlet of the filter that is causing the air lock
Here is a pic of a tee and comb , the tee on the left wont have a air pocket at all ...The comb can trap the air when you are trying to go down and back up on the other end

 

[UPEngineer]

Scott
After reading your post a few times it could be the fitting you used on the outlet of the filter that is causing the air lock
Here is a pic of a tee and comb , the tee on the left wont have a air pocket at all ...The comb can trap the air when you are trying to go down and back up on the other end

DrCase,

I actually used those tees on the left. I got to watching inside the barrel and noticed that I think it was draining faster that it was filling.

I knew my pump should be filling faster so I got to looking and found my dog had knocked a rock into the pond and it was pressing against the pump hose and impeding it a little. After, I fixed that, it appears to have solved the problem.

Thanks for all the help everyone.

Scott

 

[addy1]

Great glad you found the problem

 

[DrCase]

Glad you got it going