Sounds like you got him headed in the right direction.
Argh!!!! My brain hurts.... it hurts really, really bad! Who knew so much knowledge could be crammed into my tiny brain.
I had originally planned on hanging out with Steve ("Birdman") for an afternoon, and then heading home. Well, long story short, at 2:30am the next morning we were still at it discussing my pond design/construction. He and his charming wife asked me to stay overnight so we could continue working the next day. We were up again at 6:30am (4 hours of sleep!) and went back to work until 5:00pm when I "finally" left.
I know many of you on Koiphen have benefitted from Steve's knowledge of Koi ponds, DIY projects, and all other facets of ponding. I know I sure have been impressed with what I have read on his many posts here. However, to actually meet him in person and get hands on experience and one-to-one discussions with this fine fellow is a mind blowing experience. I am in awe of this man's knowledge - but it is more than just that. If any of you have the pleasure of meeting Steve in person, you'll very quickly see that this man is addicted to this hobby, he loves to share his knowledge with others, and his enthusiasm is infectious. Oh, and he loves to talk, and talk, and talk, and talk..........
Anyway, that's my opinion of Birdman, and I'm sticking to it.
PS - Steve did not pay me to post this message (honest!).
It's pretty easy to have a captive audience when you have him chained in place so he can't get away!
looks like a good build, can't wait for pics.
Birdman wanted me to do a soil survey of my pond site. He said: "Dig a five foot hole and tell me what's down there!" So here is my contractor, John, just getting started.
Hey, one hour later, he's making some progress. The first two feet were solid as concrete!
Now he's really getting down there! One more foot to go and he's done.
John needed a beer break. Fortunately, there was someone far prettier than John to take his place.
Alright! Finally down to five feet after nearly four hours of digging.
Here is what the native soil at the very bottom looks like. Very smooth with no rocks or even pebbles in the soil. There was a thin layer in the native soil that was composed of little bits of charcoal. This was evidence of the field burning that the native people used to do 200 years ago.
Here is the data Birdman was looking for.
This is the bottom section of the soil profile.
I sent the last two images to Birdman and he said my pond site is nearly perfect for my needs. The top two feet are darn near ideal.
Fred wants a rounded natural looking pond, not straight or formal, so we pretty much ruled out block walls. I wanted him to see if the soil would be self supporting with out fear of wall collapse or if we needed to do something such as a plywood ring. From what he showed me the soil looks to be plenty stable and solid enough to just go with a collar then excavate out from that. Slight self supporting slope to the side walls like this.
I wish I had that kind of soil in our yard, here there are only rocks and more rocks.
There was not much going on with my pond build this weekend so I decided to play around with the filtration room design. My 23,000 gallon pond will have two bottom drains, four TPR's, and 2-4 skimmers. The space in my backyard for this room is very limited, so it was a challenge to cram as much of the goodies into as small a space as possible. I think it turned out pretty well.
Here it is with everything labeled:
Another nice view:
This shows some of the detail of the filtration room:
This is a side view with some walls removed:
Here is a view looking down from above:
Any critiques, comments, or questions are welcome.
For those interested in flows,
Two 4" Koi Toilet 1 BDs, each feeding a Cetus Sieve, the two BDs/Sieves will feed an Evolution ESS 9600 pump which will feed the shower with feather rock. This shower will then feed the waterfall. We are running the shower to the waterfall so the waterfall basin will also be a foam collection point as showers work so well as foam fractionators.
We haven't decided on Skimmers yet, either one lg Savio or 4 small waterways. But they will be feeding one Cetus Sieve, which will feed one Evolution ESS pump, ( probably a 7800). This pump will feed 4 sand/gravel filters. Each S/G filter will have a Savio UV adapter so a max of four 50 watt Savio UVs could be used if needed. Each S/G filter will feed one TPR for a total of 4.
The filter house will be built along the back wall of the garage, and while the pond will not be heated, the filter house will be.
So when does the building begin?
Not exactly sure, but I suppose some time during the last week in July. Birdman and I are still hacking out the details of the pond build, and he has other client obligations until then. Meanwhile, I'm spending my time absorbing as much knowledge as possible and selling my body organs to raise the cash I'll need.
This will be a good example of elegant design. The filtration house will run alongside the back of my garage. Above the garage is an attic space which is nice and warm even in the dead of Winter. So... you take a section of conduit and run it from the top of the attic space on down to the bottom of the filter house and install a small fan inside the conduit. This seems a very simple and inexpensive way to heat one's filter room. I was also thinking of adding a thermostat to the fan?
steve, the 'foam interceptor' might be a good application for this system. assuming you'll use 4" pipe from shower to waterfall basin, all you need to do is put an inverted tee in between and the 'foam interceptor' made of plastic cut out from maybe an ice cream bucket. this is based on the fact that foam is lighter than water hence you can skim it from the water flow. in that case you no longer need to scoop out the foam from the waterfall basin, foam will be skimmed as it passes thru the interceptor.
do you glue the foam interceptor to the inside of the tee?Meaning how does it stay? Good idea...
Watch your thoughts; they become words.
Watch your words; they become actions.
Watch your actions; they become habits.
Watch your habits; they become character.
Watch your character; it becomes your destiny.
Dustin