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  1. #1
    Member Rank = Tosai richrich123's Avatar
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    Question on new drum setup

    HI,

    Im planning on getting started on my new pond in the next few weeks and am just trying to get to a final decision on how it is setup before starting the build. It will be a raised sleep with 4 feet above ground and 2 feet below, 3m x 1.5m so about 8,100 litres.


    Box Weld Liner
    4" BD
    Gravity fed to a drum (actual drum TBC)
    Side skimmer

    My current pond (below ground) is a pump fed Eazypod Auto which im not planning to bring over to the new setup and hence my knowledge on all things gravity is new hence some questions.

    I am currently looking at the ProfiClear Premium Compact drum but not yet decided 100%. There are a couple of things I've yet to work out and wondered if anyone here could help.

    1. Based on my diagram here, can a mid return from the drum work on gravity alone or will it need pumping? I can see Oase offer a further pump/uv chamber

    2. Oase say the compact comes with 40 litres of Hel-X which is good for all the bio needed for up to 270g food a day and can be increased to 60 litres which is good for dealing with up to 408g food. I've read a lot of comments in forums where mention of wanting 100+ litres of media. Ideally I dont want to add another £800 cost for another 50 litres

    3. In terms of water usage, Im struggling to get a clear idea on this. I am on a meter so it is a consideration if excessive (1,000 litres of water is about £3.70 for me). The guy at my local Maidenhead Aquatics (which have them all in use on their shop setup) said each clean ejects 60 litres of water. That sounds total nonsense, If you did 15 cleans a day that would be 900 litres a day and £111 per month in water!?! Ive had a look around and cant really find anything that offers much information. I appreciate it depends how dirty the pond gets and other variable but must be some rough numbers somewhere on how many litres gets ejected per clean?

    4. Not included on the diagram but was also thinking of putting a surface skimmer into the drum as well

    Very much open to suggestions or advice from anyone as still at the point of making final decisions so welcome any suggestions for changes / improvements. Im keen to get this one right and not in 6 months be having to change things which is always harder afterwards.



    Thanks!


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  3. #2
    Senior Member Rank = Kyusai Sim's Avatar
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    Hi Rich
    I have the prem drum and don't think it could be more than a couple of ltrs a clean, what they are saying can't be right.
    Also I'm not convinced how good this is for the money.
    If I was you I would get a draco or simular and a bigger bio side.
    I'm not sure the helex will roll that well in that space, also does it have the ceramic air diffusers like mine? If so you are not far from me and the hard water and the bio film blocks them.
    I have just ripped mine out and put spindrifter diffusers in after about 6 months running, the compact hasn't the room to do this.
    Last edited by Sim; 08-09-2019 at 08:33 PM.

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  5. #3
    Senior Member Rank = Yonsai MikeMack's Avatar
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    1 - No, you’ll need a pump after the drum whichever way you choose to return the water, it’ll need a pump to circulate otherwise I’d just sit motionless in the pond and the drum.

    2 - definitely don’t pay £800 for a chamber.

    3 - my drum probably uses around 1 litre to clean, take the water from the clean side of the drum and use fresh water to top the pond back up so it’s doing water changes with each clean, either by trickle in/out or with an auto top up - both need to run through a declorinator.

    4 - yes run the skimmer to the drum, put a valve on it so you can dictate how much water is going through the drum from the skimmer, you don’t want to be pulling it all from the skimmer and hardly non from the drain.

    Personally I’d say don’t bother with the Oase drum, for the money you could buy a drum just as good if not better AND a bigger bio chamber, which you’ll more than likely need anyway. Queni Koi drums, aqua source drums, Profi drums, would rather any of them over the Oase, I use the aqua source synergy 55 myself.

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  7. #4
    Member Rank = Tosai richrich123's Avatar
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    Thanks all for the feedback / suggestions. After a chat with Tony at Dracco, I think I am going to go for a gravity fed 4"BD and side skimmer with a 3" feed going into a standalone Dracco Solum 16 and then into their standard bio unit and then pumped back into a mid return, Maybe with a T so if I wanted to split the return and send half back to the pond and half into a shower I have that option on the future.Tony suggested use 3" on the skimmer to drum so the BD feeds in more than the skimmer.

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  9. #5
    Senior Member Rank = Yonsai MikeMack's Avatar
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    I’d be careful with that, 16000 lph is all they’re capable of, 16k split between a drain a skimmer doesn’t sound good to me, I think you’d end up with settlement in the pipework.

    You’ll need valves on both lines so I wouldn’t worry about doing them in different diameters either as you can just close a valve off to restrict flow.

    If if you go down that route, definitely fit valves, you’ll need to purge the drain pipework quite often to remove settlement.

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  11. #6
    If it was me i would do the shower 1st then add a moving bed at a later date if you like , a shower will mature faster than a moving bed, also think about dwell time you want that water in the moving bed to hang about for a bit, if thats your only bio you are going to either have to push the water through faster than you really want to to turn the pond over or slow the pump down to get the dwell time and not turn the pond over as much where as a shower you can push the water over it faster

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  13. #7
    With the skimmer on 3” pipe, is consider putting a couple of valves, one on the bottom drain one on the skimmer, that way you can control the flow instead of relying on the pipe work.

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  15. #8
    Member Rank = Tosai richrich123's Avatar
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    Thanks Sephuk, I did wonder about the rate through the bio. So your suggestion would be to pump at a higher rate (Tony @ Dracco suggested a 20,000 vario pump) from the drum to a shower via 1 of the drum returns initially and then if I needed more in the future, run from the second drum return into a moving bio but with a much slower pump so the moving bed has a slower throughput and then send that back via a mid return? Makes sense, hopefully I have understood - thanks

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  17. #9
    Member Rank = Tosai richrich123's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by richrich123 View Post
    Thanks, that was actually what I suggested was to control the flow from the BD and skimmer via a ball valve although Tony suggested to just reduce the pipe to 3". May just do that anyway as I would want to be able to shut the skimmer off sometimes anyway and would want the BD with a ball valve for purging.
    Thanks, that was actually what I suggested was to control the flow from the BD and skimmer via a ball valve although Tony suggested to just reduce the pipe to 3". May just do that anyway as I would want to be able to shut the skimmer off sometimes anyway and would want the BD with a ball valve for purging.

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  19. #10
    thats how i would do it mate, of course you could return the water from the bio faster if you have a larger unit, you dont have to buy a fancy koi one, the end of the day its a watertight container with a hole on each side

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  21. #11
    Extreme Koi Member Rank = Fry CliffB08's Avatar
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    Just a slight deviation. MikeMack I am just in the process of installing the aqua source synergy 55, how did you manage to connect your pumps to the continental electrical socket?.

  22. #12
    Senior Member Rank = Yonsai MikeMack's Avatar
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    I haven't mate, the pumps are on a switch box, i used the socket on the control panel for an amalgam uv

  23. #13
    Extreme Koi Member Rank = Fry CliffB08's Avatar
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    Did you manage to get a continental plug for the uv or did it come with one or have you bypassed the socket?

  24. #14
    Extreme Koi Member Rank = Gosai RudeDogg1's Avatar
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    You can just cut the plug off and put a uk plug on. Or if you are to scared to do that lol u can get a uk plug adapter that looks like a uk plug which the euro plug lies in and you close the casing around it so then u have a uk plug

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  26. #15
    Senior Member Rank = Yonsai MikeMack's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by CliffB08 View Post
    Did you manage to get a continental plug for the uv or did it come with one or have you bypassed the socket?
    I already had a plug laying round of an old pump that I’d cut off before so I just wired it to that and plugged it in. You could just buy a UK to euro adaptor though

  27. #16
    Extreme Koi Member Rank = Gosai RudeDogg1's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by MikeMack View Post
    I already had a plug laying round of an old pump that I’d cut off before so I just wired it to that and plugged it in. You could just buy a UK to euro adaptor though
    As that does nothing but convert it into a uk plug u might as well save a quid and put a uk plug on. Unless it effects any warranty if there is one with it not being a uk product

  28. #17
    Senior Member Rank = Yonsai MikeMack's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by RudeDogg1 View Post
    As that does nothing but convert it into a uk plug u might as well save a quid and put a uk plug on. Unless it effects any warranty if there is one with it not being a uk product
    Or not, a UK plug won’t be much use to plug into a control panel that has continental sockets.

  29. #18
    Extreme Koi Member Rank = Gosai RudeDogg1's Avatar
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    Oh right I must of misread lol

  30. #19
    Quote Originally Posted by MikeMack View Post
    I haven't mate, the pumps are on a switch box, i used the socket on the control panel for an amalgam uv
    Mike..does this switch off the uv if the drum lid is opened? If not, did you modify anything in the panel?
    I gather it can be done I just don’t know how lol


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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  32. #20
    Senior Member Rank = Yonsai MikeMack's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by bigcarpchaser View Post
    Mike..does this switch off the uv if the drum lid is opened? If not, did you modify anything in the panel?
    I gather it can be done I just don’t know how lol


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
    no mate it doesn’t switch it off, there is a sensor on the lid which stops the clean cycle if the lid is off so could probably be programmed to switch off the UV as well, I just haven’t bothered looking to be honest, I fitted mine beneath the drum on the side furthest away, so if I take the lid off I can’t see the bulb directly anyway

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