Hi all.
I built my first pond this year as above and now have the bug.
I rushed this first build (as nice as it is) but should have put a bottom drain in rather than using a pump and box Oase filter.
Currently it's 3.2m long, about 1.5m wide and max 0.9m deep as although it's raised, it is dug down in the middle. (About 4500 litres)
Next year I'm going to extend the pond to the left by 2m long and dig it a bit deeper to 1.2m and fit a bottom drain running a pipe behind the fence and then put a 3 barrel DIY filter system, UV and dry pump in the shed 5m away which will pump the water back to the pond. This will make the pond about 9200 - 9700 litres.
My questions are:
1) Should I fit a 3 inch or 4 inch bottom drain.
For info there will be 2ft of water below the shed floor and 2ft water level above the shed floor.
2) Is it worth installing an aeriated bottom drain so I've no unsightly wires in the pond with a air stone.
3) Is it worth putting a skimmer in the new wall that I'm going to build to the left and can I run this into the bottom drain rather than later putting in a floating skimmer with (again) unsightly wires.
4) What size pump and UV will I need?
5) Am I missing anything else?
Thank you.
For a BD size you really need to determine how large is the floor area and what flow rate do you
need to flow from it to the filtration. If you use the 3 barrel type system most of them max flow
rate is in the neighborhood of 2500 gph. If you decide to add a skimmer, will it also feed the 3 barrels,
reducing the flow rate needed from the BD?
I think if it were my pond I'd live and enjoy it for now while taking note of things like if, and if so, how it would
be better with a skimmer. If I added it, what direction do I see the wind blow and debris collect on the surface that a skimmer
might be the most beneficial?
If your BD would be a retro type drain, air lines can be cable tied to the pipe feeding the drain making it very hard
to even notice. The extra air really helps keep debris from settling on the floor if you can work it into your plans
and are able to live with the extra lines.
The pump needs to match what the filtration needs and what what your egress points from the pond can supply.
Enjoy your new pond and I hope you'll share them when you get started on the next phase!
Thank you Steve. From reading various forums on here, although I could feed a skimmer into the bottom drain with some ball valves to adjust flow it's probably better to have a separate pipe all together to the filter barrels or just have a skimmer powered separately by a pump.
I'm going to take the liner out and dig it deeper so might as well concrete in a bottom drain rather than retro fit one.
The pond will only be 4ft deep in an area of about 1m wide x 3m long, the rest of the pond will remain 2ft deep. The pond walls were built onto an existing concrete base garage floor and I used a jack hammer to dig through it to make it deeper.
I'm thinking a 3" bottom drain will be more than big enough as it's not a massive pond.
I like your thinking re wind direction as the waterfall could be reversed to the opposite side.
Any other considerations? Thank you.