Thanks for the compliment giovani
Great points Veipa! I'll answer your questions as best as I can:
*for your bio filter and your chemical why not have containers with holes or like mesh canisters / boxes that sit in the water path so you could change the media easier?
-The problem with this would be actually finding/ making canisters to sit in the box I made that will force water through them for chemical filtration without running the risk of anything clogging. I mean yeah i could put something right in front of the exit to make it smaller, but then it was have a smaller surface area, and again, run the risk of clogging and flooding my house, haha! If you have design/product ideas that would work well, could you draw/link me to them?
* It looks like you made a custom filter to hold your carbon, which will exaust in a few days to a few weeks... you'll be opening that and replacing the carbon often.
-There is a top center screw that comes off, and I can unscrew that, and pour it out and I have a funnel and I can just pour fresh carbon right back in! Already tested and it works pretty easily, again, if you know of an even faster way that will safely work, please let me know!!
*Also bio balls don't have that much surface area. You're much better off using spun glass / ceramic bio media (rings or nuggets) for your bio surface area.
-http://www.aquariumguys.com/ehfimech1.html how do those look? about how heavy are they? can these be completely submerged and still work properly? If i switch to these I'd like to just put them in the same place as the bio balls inside that PVC tube, it's 2 feet long, 2 inches in diameter.
*Bio Balls work best in a wet/dry trickle filter.
-Well the water comes around in that PVC and there's actually a decent amount of splashing created inside of that tube from the speed that it's going through and having to make that 90 degree turn, so doesn't this accomplish the wet/dry effect by having the water splash over the bio balls? Yes they are also half submerged, however the tops are getting the splash effect. I've thought about putting a mister in there to really accomplish the wet/dry effect in that pipe, would that work for the bio balls?
*The vast majority of your filtration system should be biological filtration.
-I've never heard of this, do you have a reference that I can look at to get a better idea of how much bio filtration I need?
*Do you only have bio media in that small length of PVC pipe?
-Yes
*What is that white stuff where the hose is connected? Why not just drill and use a bulkhead?
-The white stuff is Silicone II as a preventative measure for leaks. That is a bulkhead, but there was an extremely slow leak still and so I just went ahead and added Silicone II all around it, inside and outside for precautionary reasons.
*Looks like a great start... could you post a few pics of the pump and the plumbing?
-Thanks! I will get you a picture this evening of the pump, you could search on amazon for 1200 GPH Pondmaster Model 12 if you just wanted to see the pump itself, but if you want to see it's positioning I'll get that this evening. There's not really much to the plumbing, I've got that garden hose and it just loops around, I plan on cutting it down to size within the week so I don't trip over it. The way I have it setup currently, there is actually a current in there, it's basically a slow "whirl pool," the exit pushes the water around and the pump pulls it, not really strong, but still a nice little one.
*Also, the Jimmy Johns sign. Excellent IDEA. I assume you are using that to make the nitrifying bacteria hungry and get them to eat more
-Of course! hahaha!
