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    Thread: 5000 gallon pond build

    1. #1
      WYOKoi is offline Junior Member
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      5000 gallon pond build

      I am building a new pond, or will be as soon as the ground thaws. I have been looking around the cite a lot and it gave me a lot of good ideas. I still have a lot of questions thought, so here's what I was planning and hopefully I can get some advice.

      It is going to be a wet stack cinder block construction with 2ish feet above ground and 4ish feet below. It will be about 12 feet long, about 9 feet wide, and 6 feet deep. That is my ideas for construction. I will line it with EPDM. If there is anything wrong with this I would love to know now before I build it.

      Most of my questions are about pluming and filtration. My thoughts were to put in a four inch aerated BD. From there it would gravity flow into a 275 gallon tote SC. From there it would go into a 275 gallon tote bio-filter, then to a SG filter, then a pump and then up to a waterfall.

      I was thinking I would need some TPR's but I wasn't sure. Also I was wondering if I needed a skimmer.

      Any advice would be much appreciated
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    2. #2
      SteveE is offline Senior Member
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      That's about the same size as my pond, mine is 4' underground 2' above ground with a liner. I used pressure treated lumber for my frame secured with heavy duty galvanized lag bolts countersunk.

      I would most certainly use a skimmer, I have one at the opposite end of my pond to the waterfall and it collects uneaten food and dust / debris that collects on the surface of the pond. I turn off the aerated bottom drain on regular intervals to allow the skimmer to operate fully. Some types of food leave a residue on the surface of the water and the skimmer removes this, along with other surface debris.

      I use one 4" aerated bottom drain in the dead center of the pond and after a year of operation the bottom of my pond is completely free of any debris. We have the pond covered with 3 sections of pond netting on 1" PVC pipe to keep out predators etc... and when I remove any of them and turn off the aerated bottom drain and waterfall, you can see a staple on the bottom of the pond that must of fallen off when we were stapling the liner to the wooden frame. That is pretty clear water at 6' deep.

    3. #3
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      I don't think you can gravity feed a S&G filter like that. I always see it after a pump. If you add a skimmer (and you should) on a separate skimmer, you can have skimmer > bead/something mechanical > S&G filter > waterfall. Have your BD circuit return to TPRs placed around the BD.



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    4. #4
      icu2's Avatar
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      Welcome and thank you for joining WYOKoi!

      I'd agree with Steve E, and wouldn't build an outdoor pond without atleast one skimmer... and I also would include tpr's. It helps bring debris out of corners
      and the fish love them! They seem to really enjoy underwater currents... the more the better. So I wouldn't build a pond without them.

      I think you're on the right track with the filters, but with a pond that large, I'd split the flow up a little.
      I'd instead arrange the filters to be something like BD > Settling Chamber > Bio Chamber > Pump > TPR's...
      Then I'd make a second circuit of a Skimmer > Pump > UV (if used) > S/G filter > Waterfall

      But whatever way you arrange things, the S/G filter needs to be pump fed in most situations.

      I hope you'll create another thread with your building project.... it's one of the great parts of this forum is watching others
      create their dream pond, start to finish!

      Enjoy!
      --Steve



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    5. #5
      birdman's Avatar
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      For a pond your size two pumps would be nice. The BD/Bio pump should feed the TPRs, The skimmer pump should feed the UV and a pair of S/G filters in parallel feeding the waterfall.
      Also your pond would be a good candidate for a custom made drop in liner. Just think, no folds.

    6. #6
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      Quote Originally Posted by birdman View Post
      For a pond your size two pumps would be nice. The BD/Bio pump should feed the TPRs, The skimmer pump should feed the UV and a pair of S/G filters in parallel feeding the waterfall.
      Also your pond would be a good candidate for a custom made drop in liner. Just think, no folds.
      Steve this build is just like mine... do you recall my setup theat we discussed with one pump? I know most of it but I'm still a bit confused as to how the skimmer ties in. Maybe if you remember you could post to give both of us help.

      Mine has a shower instead of a second tote for bio.

    7. #7
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      Look at my pond build. Almost identical aside from the size. Mine is 10x20x6.5.

      I build mine as a linear flow. Every thing enters on one end and exits on the other. Bottom drains and skimmers are at one end, tpr's at the other.

      Mine is 10' wide and I have two skimmers and two bottom drains. Drains go to two totes for settlement. Skimmers go to pump, then to s/g filters.

      The top of the totes need to be at water level, that make your wall between the pond and the pit a "common" wall and will take a little extra reinforcement. That is a lot of water to hold back. I tied the end wall in with the sides with rebar. Each cell has both vertical and horizontal rebar. Holding up like a champ after 3(?) years.

      If I had to do it again, I might spend the extra on a preformed liner. The folds on mine were a ***** and I never did get them perfect.
      Jerry

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    8. #8
      WYOKoi is offline Junior Member
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      Thanks for all the help. All these new ideas made it so I have a few more questions.

      What size pumps should I use?

      Any advice on a good skimmer?

      What size UV filter should I use?

    9. #9
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      Just my opinions.

      Contact Birdman, he can hook you up.

      I would use an 5500 gph on the skimmer circuit and run to 2 s/g filters.

      8500 for the bottom drain circuit.

      I like the Evolution Aqua UV's. For your pond, I would probably go with an EVO 55
      Jerry

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    10. #10
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      Quote Originally Posted by Sp00ks View Post
      Just my opinions.

      Contact Birdman, he can hook you up.
      I 2nd that...

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    11. #11
      WYOKoi is offline Junior Member
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      From what everyone has said this is what I was thinking.

      Name:  pond plumming.png
Views: 2016
Size:  69.1 KB

      Does that look right??
      Last edited by WYOKoi; 03-23-2014 at 06:29 PM.

    12. #12
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      Looks good to me but I think there's a way you can efficiently run this system on one esm 8500. I'm asking Steve now what he came up for me.

    13. #13
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      Well, you could run it on one pump, but redundancy is quite an important part of a good filtration system. What happens if the pump shuts down for any reason? Your whole system is down, not just that one circuit.

      Also, I think you'd do better with another ESM 5500 on the bottom drain circuit as well. The necessary "dwell time' for settling out waste in a 275gal tote maxes out, for efficiency, at around 4500-5000gph. Also, with the two tanks in series, you will have drawdown issues. Besides, you're only feeding two tprs in this design and 2000gph each is quite sufficient. I would place these roughly 12" off the bottom of the pond as well.

      Also, you might want to think about using 2 skimmers, one in each corner so the aerated bottom drain doesn't block the surface flow. You'd probably get about 4000gph from this circuit, so 2000gph for each skimmer should work quite well, depending on the size of the skimmers being used.
      Mike

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    14. #14
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      I am going to bring up a thought about your weather. The last I heard, it gets cold (slight understatement) in your area. The part of the pond above ground will radiate heat much faster than the the portion underground. Having the skimmer/s on a circuit with the UV and the waterfall, allows the draining of that circuit so freezing pipes won't be a problem, but if ice builds up very much on top, it can start pushing on the walls. Draining the pond to ground level, reduces the depth of the pond so fish may not be as protected.

      You really need to look into a proper cover and potentially heat to protect the pond, fish. plumbing, or you need to have a winter home for the fish in a garage or basement. I would look to make the depth below ground deeper, and maybe limit the above ground part to 15 or 18 inches.
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    15. #15
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      The way I plan on doing my skimmer is to build up earth 2' in the skimmer area to insulate the skimmer and skimmer line....

      Also wouldn't your skimmer have a valve to shut off if neccessary. I understand redundancy is a fail safe but if your main pump (esm8500) shuts down for any reason you lose your biological circuit anyways. So I understand that in a two cricut systems you would still have your tprs, but with an aerated BD you have a fail safe at least as far as your fish and oxygen levels are concerned. I mean let's be honest if your pump fails it won't go/shouldn't go unnoticed longer than say 12 hrs. and as long as your aerating your fish will be fine for that amount of time...

      I dunno; if redundancy is the main reason for two circuits, I'd rather power the whole thing off of the Esm8500... Seems like pulling the BD and Skimmer, then T'ing to your bios and uv, two parrell SG filters that each feed a separate tpr is the way to go.

      Can somebody please explain drawdown in a bit more detail?
      Last edited by Redman8102; 03-23-2014 at 09:35 PM.

    16. #16
      icu2's Avatar
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      Quote Originally Posted by Redman8102 View Post
      Can somebody please explain drawdown in a bit more detail?
      As they say, a picture is worth a thousand words... this is one of the better ones done by Ryan (boggen).
      The draw down will depend on the head between barrels, including pipe size, media, etc.

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    17. #17
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      Quote Originally Posted by koiman1950 View Post
      Also, I think you'd do better with another ESM 5500 on the bottom drain circuit as well. The necessary "dwell time' for settling out waste in a 275gal tote maxes out, for efficiency, at around 4500-5000gph.
      If you were to do a one circuit system pulling both the skimmer line and the bottom drainline wouldn't that give you the proper dwell time inside the SC? The skimmer would T in after the SC and the pumps priming pot could be upgraded to the 3' pot to aid the skimmer as well.

    18. #18
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      I like the idea of running off of one pump. If it's possible it seems a more efficient to do it that way.

      I was also thinking about pipes freezing and wasn't sure what to do about that. I was hoping to overwinter fish in this pond.

    19. #19
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      I would go with two pumps. Things are still running while your either flushing s/g filters or s/c.

      I agree with Mike, run two skimmers in opposite corners. I would use long neck waterway skimmers. (pool skimmers) Your tpr's creating current will push debris to the corners. Also do an aerated bottom drain, it will push debris to the sides as well. You could put a check valve on the air line and put a remote switch on it to turn it off while feeding or viewing.

      I would also build a bypass for your waterfall. I don't know what you planned to use for a water fall but if it's a weir, those are hard to gravity feed. I had a midwater pickup installed to handle my weir on it's own pump. I purchased a remote switch so I can turn it on with a remote. Besides, I didn't want it running all the time.

      I am running an ES8500 on my bottom drain circuits but my settlement chambers have prefilters and I'm pumping to a shower so when factoring in head, it's not 8500 gph.

      My last bit of advice, listen to these guys. they have done this many times and know what works and what doesn't. It's worth the extra time and expense up front to do it right. Trust me. I learned my lesson.
      Jerry

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    20. #20
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      Quote Originally Posted by WYOKoi View Post
      I like the idea of running off of one pump. If it's possible it seems a more efficient to do it that way.

      I was also thinking about pipes freezing and wasn't sure what to do about that. I was hoping to overwinter fish in this pond.
      You could insulate open air pipes, and bury in ground pipes below the frost line... You could also insulate your filter pit and heat that area in the winter... Just a thought

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