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View Full Version : My Humble DIY veggie/bog/gravel Filter For My Goldfish Pond



mark622
01-22-2014, 11:00 PM
Due to the horrific winter we've had, brutal cold (-17 temps and blizzard) and a power outage my old bog/veggie/gravel filter which was nothing but a fake wooden barrel and a notch cut out off for the waterfall to come out of froze solid, when we thawed out for a few days and I got the system going again, my little filter had a crack and was leaking. For the time being I just placed the filter (pot) into the stream, but it gave me a chance to be a bit creative and improve the filter design.

Here are some pictures from this summer of how it was set up. Like I said it was just a fake wooden barrel (some kind of composite material) full of pea gravel with a notch cut out for the water to come falling out. I have a submersible pump which goes to 2 pressure filters (Lowes Smart Pond brand), off one of these pressure filters I have a little 9 watt UV, and off the UV and the other pressure filter the lines just went up and over the side of the pot down to the bottom.

Here are the pics from what I had, this set up kept my little pond gin clear, very happy with it, but with it being out of commission now I decided to go bigger and better.

SouthernStarr
01-22-2014, 11:10 PM
Very pretty little pond - and you sure have a bumper crop of impatiens! Beautiful!

mark622
01-22-2014, 11:32 PM
What I ended up getting is a 40 gallon Tuff Stuff stock tank, a 2 inch cleanout with plug, 2 3/4" tubing couplers, a piece of 2" PVC, and a tube of PL construction adhesive the premium 8x stuff.

First thing I did was make a hole for the 2 inch cleanout, I didn't have any hole saws, so with a drill and 3/4" bore hole bit and a jig saw I made my hole the best I could. At first I thought I had just flushed 40$ down the drain because my hole was so crappy, but thanks to the PL adhesive the hole is stronger than I could imagine. I pulled out my channel locks and tightened that drain plug as tight as it would possibly go, my hole didn't leak, but the dang plug leaked. I was a bit afraid the clean out wouldn't hold, but I am a big fairly strong guy and torqued that plug down as tight as I possibly could, that thing didn't even think of budging. But to my dismay that dang plug still leaked. Looked all over, was going to try a test plug, but thought what the heck, I try some Teflon tape, sure enough that did the trick. Only downside is when I clean it with the drain out I'll need to retape the threads, but I found 2 big rolls of it at Tractor Supply for like $1.57, that oughta last me a couple years lol. That was my biggest complaint with my old set up, to clean it out I had to shovel out all the rocks and rinse bucket full by bucket full. Now I just keep spraying and spraying until the water runs clean out of drain. All the water is prefiltered by the pressure filters, so there should be no big chunky stuff in there, hopefully those plans as a way to clean it out will work.

My plumbing is 1 1/4" corrugated tubing coming off the submersible pump, then is downsized to 3/4" spa tubing. From there it tees, and off the tees it goes to the 2 pressure filters. I didn't like having to run the tubing over the side of the pot, I wanted to it look better, so I made 2 inlets. All I did was get 2 3/4" couplers for my tubing. Drilled 2 3/4" holes by the drain and used the PL adhesive to glue those suckers in place. With that PL construction adhesive those couplers aint going anywhere, the adhesive is many times stronger than the stock tank itself, and as I mentioned above the 2" clean out could handle me torquing it down as hard as I possible could with out moving and still being water tight, I have no worries with the couplers coming out, they'll snap off before that adhesive gives.

Next thing for me to tackle was how the water would exit this new contraption. Before I just cut a notch out and let the water come out into my stream, it was nice, but I wanted to improve it. At the other side of the stock tank I made another 2 inch hole at the top of the stock tank, again no hole saw, so back to my drill bit, jig saw, and pocket knife lol. I then put maybe a foot and a half to 2 feet section of 2" PVC with most of it sticking out for the water to exit. I may trim some of it off, or get a coupler and make it longer, just depends on how I build the new waterfall. This time instead of just having the water exit the filter into the stream, I plan to build up a bit of rock work, use an extra piece of liner, make a pipe boot on the 2" PVC pipe exiting the filter for a nicer looking waterfall.

Here are some pics of what I have just described.

mark622
01-22-2014, 11:37 PM
I should add I water tested everything before my last step, filled it up full of water and not a single drip of leakage.

mark622
01-22-2014, 11:47 PM
Then my last step. I needed to figure out a way so that the pea gravel would not come flying out the drain or clog up my inlets. Another issue I've had is birds making a mess in my old set up and dumping loads of pea gravel into the stream. I was thinking of all kinds of ideas from PVC caps with a bunch of holes drilled into it, to little flower pots with holes drilled. I eventually settled on going with 10" pond planter baskets from Lowes. I've been using them in my pond the last 2 years, they are tough, water flows right through them, and best yet no pea gravel gets through, so tonight I picked up a couple of these to finish off the project. Due to how I placed the drain and inlets so close to the bottom I had to modify one of the baskets a bit. Again I glued these baskets in place with the PL adhesive, so I have no doubt they'll hold in place just fine.

Here are some pics of the final steps.

Sarassa
01-22-2014, 11:55 PM
Hey what a nice pond you have, and your new 40 gallon Tuff Stuff stock tank looks great!!!

I would love to see pic's of the pond after you add your new tank!!! 492805

mark622
01-23-2014, 12:09 AM
All that's left now is for spring to get here, or a good stretch of days resembling spring, fill it full of pea gravel it get her going. I think I definitely improved what I had, not to mention I now will have more surface area of rocks to filter the water, and I'll be able to grow several times more plants to suck up the nutrients of my growing sarassa herd.

At first I was a bit worried of using construction adhesive since it says not well suited for submerged use, but did some research and found folks who have used it submerged without incident, supposedly its pretty much the same as the other, just dyed black. Not to mention I have both the insides and outsides sealed of all connections with the adhesive, and only the inside will be submerged. The only adhesive that will always be fully submerged will be the baskets, but from what I've researched I should be just fine. I must admit I am still a bit shocked at the strength of this stuff, it is so strong it blows my mind.

As always, I am operating on a shoe string budget, so here is the cost break down of the project.

39.99 Stock Tank (Tractor Supply)
1.39 coupler (Tractor Supply)
1.39 coupler (Tractor Supply)
.98 2" clean out (Lowes)
.60 clean out plug (Lowes)
1.57 teflon tape (Tractor Supply)
3.99 for 3' of 2" pipe still have over a foot left (Tractor Supply)
.79 clamp for when I hook it up (Tractor Supply)
.79 clamp (Tractor Supply)
3.98 plant basket (Lowes)
3.98 plant basket (Lowes)
6.98 PL premium 8x adhesive (Lowes)
------------------------------------------
66.43 Total plus sales tax

mark622
01-23-2014, 01:06 AM
Very pretty little pond - and you sure have a bumper crop of impatiens! Beautiful!

Thanks, the impatiens went crazy this year.

mark622
01-23-2014, 01:08 AM
Hey what a nice pond you have, and your new 40 gallon Tuff Stuff stock tank looks great!!!

I would love to see pic's of the pond after you add your new tank!!! 492805

I will definitely post some pics when I get it installed, unfortunately that probably will not be until March or April, even then, it will probably be May before I get the rockwork done, unless we have some extra nice warm and dry days lol. The way this winter has gone it might not be up and going until June lol.

mark622
03-10-2014, 01:31 PM
Braved the mud and slop to get my filter hooked up. Need more pea gravel and obviously haven't done any rock work, but it's hooked up and running.

mark622
03-14-2014, 08:50 PM
Still going to try to perfect the new waterfall, but it's working great. Did the big spring clean out today.... loads and loads of string algae. Filter works great, completely clear water, can't wait to get some plants going in that sucker.

ademink
03-17-2014, 09:10 PM
Great job - it looks awesome!! Great feat of engineering :) We Hoosiers just have to sit in the deep freeze and WAIT. :eek: Warmer temps this week! :yahoo:

mark622
03-18-2014, 11:38 PM
Great job - it looks awesome!! Great feat of engineering :) We Hoosiers just have to sit in the deep freeze and WAIT. :eek: Warmer temps this week! :yahoo:

Thanks, this winter has been a doozy, and sure is looking like a cool spring is in store. Added some valves today to keep the filters from draining back down into the pond. I built in leak protection by placing the filters in the liner and the leakage fills back in the stream. My leak area had some water in it, worried my new filter was leaking, but it was a connection on one of the pressure filters I use as a prefilter before my diy filter, hopefully it just needs tightened, probably came loose when I redid the plumbing.

SouthernStarr
03-19-2014, 08:11 AM
Looks good! Can't wait to see it when you get some plants going:yahoo: This winter has been hard all over. We had 2 ice storms in SC:eek1:

mark622
03-19-2014, 03:48 PM
Good thing I installed the valves yesterday, well I kind of think the valves had a bit to do with the problem. Went out to check the pond this morning and there was a tiny bit of water dribbling down the side of the tank. Apparently installing the valves increased flow rate to the point of where the 2 inch outlet couldn't keep up. I think one of the hoses might have been a bit kinked before, and installing the valves I made one of the lines a bit longer and less angle on the turn of the hose, it must have kinked a bit, but the valve allowed me to tone down the flow on one of the inlets enough to not be a problem. Guess 3 inch outlet would have been a better choice.

Took a little video clip of it in action today. Water is perfectly clear, so clear you can see every last piece of string algae that I have been slowly taming (mentioned that above).


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zgi5eKlpWz8

mark622
03-23-2014, 05:16 PM
Snapped some pictures of the fish today, you can see just how clear this filter is keeping the water. Usually this time of year the pond has been a murky mess, it isn't this clear until the plants get established.

gray cat
03-23-2014, 06:12 PM
Mark the water looks very clear. Your fish look beautiful.

mark622
03-23-2014, 06:59 PM
Thank you very much Nancy. I mentioned earlier about having to valve down the flow, but I drilled out a bitof the excess outlet pipe. It was at a bit of an angle and shaving off the top part of the pipe inside the filter allowed the pump to go full bore without over flowing. I would estimate I am getting close to 2000 gph through the system give or take a few hundred gallons, which makes for a pretty good turn over rate for my little 300 gallon pond. Same pump as the old set up, just seems like my water flow has increased dramatically. The pump is rated at 3800gph but never came close to that with the head from my two pressure filters I have before the gravel filter.

Tula
03-23-2014, 08:03 PM
I bought a resin half whiskey barrel at Costco today. I'm interested in filling it with various water plants. I keep toying with the idea of running pond water through it, but am worried it'll be a big chore to clean the muck and gravel. I filter my pond with a pressurized filter and also have a Savio skimmer with some matala mats.

I love the pictures of your beautiful flowers in your filter!

mark622
03-23-2014, 09:21 PM
I bought a resin half whiskey barrel at Costco today. I'm interested in filling it with various water plants. I keep toying with the idea of running pond water through it, but am worried it'll be a big chore to clean the muck and gravel. I filter my pond with a pressurized filter and also have a Savio skimmer with some matala mats.

I love the pictures of your beautiful flowers in your filter!

I would add in a drain of some sorts, and make sure the water goes through a filter before going into the barrel. If you don't do a drain I would shovel out and rinse the barrel and gravel out, the first year I just cleaned it out at the end of the season in the fall, but the second year (last year) with it, it became full of crud and needed cleaned out in July or August. Biggest pain with this is digging out all the plants, removing and rinsing the gravel, then adding the gravel back in and replanting the plants. My new and improved version I made out of a stock tank I put in a 2 inch drain, the theory is I will shut down the pump, and keep filling it up with water and drain it out over and over until the water coming out the drain runs clean. The most important thing when making one of these veggie/bog/gravel filters is making sure you are running the cleanest water that you can through it, as you don't want a ton of crud in there. They do an excellent job of filtering out the fines and do an excellent job of polishing the water, but the main reason I use it is for the bio filtration with the gravel and the plants sucking out the nutrients.

mark622
03-23-2014, 09:23 PM
I should also add, last year when I had to clean it out mid season, I was running half filtered water and half unfiltered water through it, learned my lesson real quick that it is a bad idea to run unfiltered water though one of these.

mark622
05-05-2014, 12:20 AM
Filter passed its final test today. Gave it a good cleaning and worked as I had hoped. Took the drain plug out while shutting the inlet valves, drained it out, loosely put the drain back on and opened the valves until it filled with water, closed the valves and drained again. Did that until the water out the drain was clear. Took about 7 or 8 cycles until it was clear. Could make it easier by putting a 2 inch male fitting with a valve on the drain, but what I have works fine for now.