Thread: Alburglar's DIY fry setup and grow on pond and filter.

A ton of cheap 150mm clamps arrived from eBay. They feel very good and sturdy...

Merry Christmas to me.
£40 Aquascape digital thermometer that WIFI's to an app.
Too good to be true?
Yes and no. I sent the link below to my wife and I opened my present today. It doesn't come with a fecking plug, no wonder it was so much cheaper than everywhere else!
Does it matter? Well no, the water proof connector plugs into the 12v adapter from my recently discarded Jebao auto feeder. Perfect!
The plug you buy for it looks like an American/2 pin, it's bulky and wouldn't fit under the lid of my waterproof plug sockets even before I used an adapter. So I would have had to end up with the same solution anyway.
It's all plugged in and working on the Jebao adapter. Dead chuffed with it. It comes with a really long, weighted sensor, with a protective cage around it. So it sank nicely to the bottom of the pond.

My last cheapo wireless pool thermometer has just died. Now I don't have to leave the house to check pond temps for feeding!
https://waterfeature.shop/products/s...nd-thermometer

If I can find a cheap pH monitor that works, I'll have beaten the koi tax on a blue lab guardian...

The app gives you historical readings, so you can see how low it drops over night. Obviously it's been dropping down from 20c as it was in the house this morning.

Boring photo but shows that the temps are stable over night. Didn't drop at all, which is reassuring that the covers are doing there job. 7.6 all night then 7.7 this morning.

New Chinese PH meter is calibrated and on.

That and the thermometer look good Alburglar! I usually just get cheap ones from eBay in a pack of 4 then stick them all in to see the variations and to be fair they are nearly always extremely close in readings so either really good or all really bad I do like the idea of wireless though!

It's been tricky to clean the main window with the covers on, so I invested in a mag cleaner. This one was on eBay for £35 and had good reviews. £90 new though, ouch! It's got a stainless blade and a traditional Velcro scrubber side to choose from. It's a 'Flipper Max' and it was rated to 25mm glass. It's worked very well on the stainless blade. Haven't tried the Velcro yet. Now the fish are constantly at the glass again!

I really need some colour in the pond...

Well I definitely felt the need for some colour in the Pond.
Koi show type Patterns are not important to me, which usually means I can get some bargains, I just have to like the fish,l. I just wanted lots of good Beni.
Pictures are a bit crap, but the video on eBay suggested that this thing is absolutely beaming quality. - hopefully!
I have taken advantage of the outcasts of a Dainichi Red Tiger bloodline grow on that Prestige Koi has been thinning out. I was watching 3 on eBay for ages and this was the last one so I made a cheeky £50 offer. Jumbo Tosai, I suppose at this stage in the year. 24cm.
Then to get the use of the postage I asked him if he had anything else that fitted my brief and budget and he came up trumps. So I've got another bargain, on its way. Sakai Sanke. Which looks impressive, even in the phone photos.

I'm fed up with my old air bar/diffuser. It's a shop bought one ( which wasn't cheap!) with a rubber membrane, but it slowly clogs with algae / bio film and you have to yank it out, rub your hand up and down it and it's good to go again.
I've heard that the DIY soaker hose ones are much better. So I'd been gathering bits, and recently came across a metre length of 5mm, 316 stainless rod, that would be perfect. Albeit, I'd have preferred it a bit longer, but beggars can't be choosers. I'd already bought the cheapest 12mm I/D soaker hose I could find, which came with this end cap, and I bought a cheap 12mm to 8mm adapter on eBay.

Hopefully the rod is heavy enough to sink it, hopefully the cheap soaker hose works like the expensive Koi tax stuff. I have noticed the thickness of the rubber is much thinner than the stuff everyone uses (with the blue line in) so it's a much smaller overall O/D. If it's crap, then it's all infinitely upgradeable so I can swap bits out. But so far, I think this owes me less than a tenner, and will be a good test bed.
....when I can be bothered to take the pond cover off and swap them out.

Turned it on today. Air bar is a great success so far!
It could probably do with being a bit heavier, so I'd maybe use a 8mm bar if I made it again.

...and my new fish are coming Wednesday!

Chuffed with these.
Dainichi Kohaku is 29cm
The Sakai Sanke has a huge frame. Hopefully it will be a beast. 33cm

I also put a cheap Chinese UV in the drum 22W submersible, should keep the screen clean.

A splash of colour at the window.

I need a proper UV on the pond, so today was the day to sort out the birds nest of UVs that 'might work'...

I had two used bulbs and neither appeared to work, so I bought a new one. Still didn't work so after a short weep, I thought maybe it needs its own power supply? Because the 2 filtreau ballasts I have came with a drum and have euro plugs, that plug into the drum control box. I thought perhaps the box was too clever and needed the pump running for power to the UV or something. So I found a plug converter and still nothing for either of the ballasts with the new bulb.
Another little weep and then I realized that the bulb won't come on unless the UV is sitting in its quartz sleeve and a little bit of plastic in the collar pushes this safety switch in. I used a screwdriver and it sprung into life! .

...and the drum control box is too clever it only flicks to the UV on briefly then cuts the power...

All 3 bulbs work but only one ballast, so I came up with this, which I thought would sit inside the rodding pipe I have in the bottom drain, before the drum...

Trouble is 110mm soil pipe caps, don't fit inside a 110mm pipe!
They only fit inside the end that connects pipes together. WTF!
Anyway, I cut a slit in some pressure pipe and sleeved it over the end cap so it sits a bit safer. It's easily removable for when I purge the bottom drain. The whole thing just lifts out.
It works OK, but I think I'll do a mk2 with a 110mm straight joiner and the end cap sat inside that. All the pressure end caps appear to be domed which isn't ideal.