Hi - has anyone had any experience with the following apparatus on koi ponds.






Apparently this has been designed in Australia for use before sand filters on swimming pools. The claims are that it removes a massive amount of solids before the filters therefore saving the backwashing time.

If it works on sand filters it will work on any koi pond filter.

Also - and this is just speculation - it may be able to replace discharge boxes and settlement tanks. And it may - I repeat may - be able to replace the mechanical chamber or sand filter on a koi pond.

Chris

Hi Chris

Some info I found on various internet sites>

Multi Cyclone Centrifugal Water Filter
The MultiCyclone is a filtration device that is capable of saving water and reducing filter maintenance. The MultiCyclone works on the basis of centrifugal water filtration. There are no moving parts to wear and tear and no filter media to clean or replace.
How does it work?
Incoming water is guided by a diverter plate so that it enters multiple hydro cyclones tangentially, generating a strong centrifugal effect. This spins the sediment out to the hydro cyclone's wall and then spirals it down to the sediment sump, while the cleansed water spirals upwards. The accumulation of sediment can be visibly monitored through the MultiCyclone's clear sediment pump. It is cleared by simply opening the purge valve. Only 15 litres of water is discharged to clean the unit of sediment.
The MultiCyclone is ideal as a pre-filter to extend the life of your excisting filter. The filtration efficiency of the MultiCyclone was tested by feeding 5 to 80 micron dust particles through the MultiCyclone and analyzing the percentage of dust particles trapped in the sediment bowl. The laboratory test revealed that the Multi Cyclone was effective in filtering particles sized 40 to 80 microns.
DE powder was fed to the MultiCyclone and amount of captured DE powder was measured at various flow rates. The graph illustrates that the MultiCyclone is capable of capturing 60% of DE powder at 40 litres per minute and up to 80% at 350 litres per minute
The unit works together with a sand, cartridge, bead or DE filter to polish the water. It allows the installation of finer filtration systems, such as cartridge filters with finer cartridges and the sand filters with finer filter media. The water ends up clearer with less up keep.
The unit is supplied with both 2"/63mm quick connect unions making this unit ideal for new installations and retrofit market. Minimum flow is 3m3/h, max. flow is 30m3/h. Max. pressure is 4 bar. The MultiCyclone must be installed after the pump.
Minimum flow rate 13GPM - Maximum flow rate 132GPM - Maximum Pressure 58PSI
Some comment:
I'm just about to fit one for a customer in the next few days as they want to remove as many fines as possible, they work on a very simple process of spinning water through " multiple cyclones" separating the waste down to the bottom of the settlement chamber.

I was given a demo at waterco place a few weeks ago where they threw in a handful of zeolite dust into a vortex which was plumbed into a pump with a cyclone on top of the pump then returning to the vortex, when the dust was added you couldn't see the bottom of the vortex but within 5mins the vortex was clear and the cyclone was full of rubbish.

to clean the cyclone out you simply have to open the waste valve and let it run to waste ( less than 15ltrs/3galls) of water and dirt gone, which means less rubbish going into your final filtration great bits of kit.
The only concern I have is whether they can handle the larger solids, leaves and blanket weed. If it does block then it is a awful lot of allen key nuts to undo to get it open

Cost price in UK 250 pounds. Roughly R 3750

Warm Regards
Marius

Hi Marius,

Thanks Marius that was interesting.

Where was this demo you saw?

A few are available in South Africa. They were flow in and are more expensive than that. Cost will come down if they are shipped in.

Ernst in Cape Town has one running on his pond and is giving it a very good report. Says his water has never been this clear.

I am going to look at one this week end and am considering trying it on my pond. I am always open to new good ideas. Especially the simple ones.

If it can remove the soilds without reducing the flow rate much then it could be a winner. I see the max flow rate is about 35,000 litres per hour - thats a little more than a good 1.1Kw pump.

If it works so well why don't you fit one to your pond instead of a sand filter? This would act at the mechanical filter that your systems does not really have a this stage. It would hardly take up any space and you do no thave to build another chamber. Also these units are under pressure so they can be placed anywhere - after the pump.

Let us know how the fitting goes and how it works.

Regards,
Chris

Hi,

Pet Masters in Boksburg have one on one of their ponds.
They are going to sell this product, and it is imported by Tony Pitham.
The price was R 4500, at the 2008 Baby Show held at Pet Masters.

Hi Chris

Yes, that might just be the unit I need. No, sorry it was not me who tested it, that was part of the info I found on the internet. Was some UK guy and he went to a demo somewhere in the south of England. The price was for the UK and I x it by 15 to end up with the Rand value. Importin excluded.
I am sure that will solve my problem. I have plenty space to upgrade my Biomedia but the mechanical part is what I am missing. Back in Bloem next week and will tackle the problem. Hopefully I will sort things out and soon I can start buying proper Koi and get rid of most of my made in the Freestate specials.

Regards
Marius

Hi Pieter,

Thanks for the info - Yes thats where I am going to look at one. Adrian says they are expensive because he flew them in. If he ships them out then they will be cheaper.

I am keen on trying it with and without sand filters.

The build up of organics is a major problem with our ponds. This is especially so in South Africa with large amounts of sun and really good algal growth. Algae can reproduce its self very fast. This gets trapped in the filters and bio-degrades resulting toxins being pumped back into the pond water.

Regards,
Chris

Hi Marius,

Just had a flush of oxygen to the brain.

You could move your biological filtration above your filter chambers and use the present filter chambers as mechanical filters.

Chris

Hi Chris.

Sorry for late response (travelling). So what do you have in mind??

Regards from FS
Marius

Hi,
Bought a cyclone on the weekend. Will post the fitting progress and how well it works.

Unpacked the box - all layed out. A stand comes with it.

Workmanship looks good. Quality of materials looks good.

Now lets see - water goes in at the bottom and comes out at the top - that seems simple enough for me ....

Hi,

This is a very interesting piece of equipment.

Phoned Martin at Koi Fanatics to fit it - Martin does excellent work, watched him service my sand filters a few weeks ago, has a really good idea of what is going on with pumps and piping and hates 90 degree bends like I do - Martin said the fittings are far superior to anything available in this country -



The pump house - the cyclone is being fitted to the smaller pump running the surface skimmer - The larger 1,1kW pump uses 75mm piping to the bioconverter at the top of the garden / water fall -



Setting up is always important before glueing -



Fitting -



Finished -



From a Distance - not happy that you can see the blue piping through the foliage - so on the weekend out with the green paint for the piping, some plants will be re-located - and some shade cloth netting will be placed over the cyclone. Two reasons for this - the cyclone is already in the shade but I want to keep the sun off the cyclone as much as possible to stop the wear and tear over the years and to stop the chance of any algae growing inside the transparant part of this system.

Pool pumps in the sun get algae growing inside their lids but in my pump house where the pumps are cut off from the sun - no algae



Waterfall to pond - I need any pumps or piping to be hidden and blend in with the garden



As an experiment I have placed the two sand filters on the surface skimmer on by-pass. I want to see if the cyclone on its own will take solids out of the pond water and how much it will take out. In a few weeks time I will flush the sand filters and use the cyclone through them as a test - (unless they explode in the middle of the night with the hydrogen sulphide from the anaerobic bacteria - ka-boom - don't worry dear, just another sand filter exploding - go back to sleep).

Chris

At R4500 there is quite a bit more that you could do in our humble opinion. For around R3k for a typical 3 bag sand filter you can covert it into a bubble bead filter with the following advantages.

a. Mechanical filtration as good as any sand filter...
b. a backwash that uses less than a tenth of the water...
c. a closed backwash - no more open backwashes and stirring of the sand with your own hands - a stinky messy affair because no-one ever does as much maintenance on a sand filter as they really need!...
d. You never open the filter again. No replacement of the beads, ever...
e. your hands stay completely dry throughout...
f. you get good bio filtration taking place because there are no areas for anaerobes to grow thanks to the super efficient backwash that removes all of the buildup, not just some of it (as in a sand filter)...
g. a lower pressure drop = no more 1.1 kW pumps needed!

On that note - who uses these pumps anymore? Good grief Chris - time to chuck that dinosaur and switch to an efficient pump - not to punt anything but our Pedrollo .75 kW pushes 48kl an hour. You do the math on that. Our .37 kW pumps pushes 18kl/hr. Just not through high pressure high head loss systems - but the day and age of high pressure sand filters and pressurised bio filters is over - they are massively expensive to run. In fact, with some thought in your design you can run an entire pond on an air pump - our 12 kl preformed fibreglass Koi pond (which doesn't leak!) circulates water through the filters using an 80W air pump and ONLY and 80W air pump... and it costs less to build!

Innovation is a good thing - don't get me wrong. But it would be a stretch to justify this kind of price on something that shouldn't really be needed in the first place. :-)

Hi William,

1) Dinosaurs were around for a few hundred million years - a lot longer than us humans.

2) The "Pedrollo .75 kW pushes 48kl an hour" - what is the loss at a 2 meter head and running through 20 meters of piping? What is the claimed life running 24/7?

3) "with some thought in your design you can run an entire pond on an air pump - our 12 kl preformed fibreglass Koi pond (which doesn't leak!) circulates water through the filters using an 80W air pump and ONLY and 80W air pump" - 12 kl too small for me - and how do I get the water to the water fall?

4) Just replaced the original pump that runs the surface skimmer. 8 years running 24 hours a day out of a Speck magic 8 pump. Quite happy with that.

5) Sand filters are adapted from swimming pool applications - whether used with gravel, zeolite, beads, balls or anything else. It comes back to the same thing. The back wash is not efficient in any application or with any media. This needs to be re-designed one day.

6) The build up of sludge and slime - biofilms - occurs in all filters and becomes a problem after a time.

7) The build up of organics and solids is of major concern in all ponds. The biocoversion is the easy part.

A lower pressure drop indicates less resistance. This in turn indicates less efficiency at removing solids.

9) I witnessed a 2,000,000 litre pond with a filter system driven by air go bad and all 380 fish died. The air ran the bioconverter water flow but the sand filters used to remove the solids were driven by "normal dinosaur pumps". The media was not sand or gravel but a high tec ceramic and plastic media of different densities. This resulted in the media settling into different layers after back washing.

10) I use a Jacuzzi air blower to clean the sand filters. Very clean and very efficient. I would install an air blower system under the stone bed - gulp that is really from the Jurassic Period - to ad that extra agitation than when flushing.

Kind regards,
Chris

Well William,

I am a dinosaur!
I am using sand filters and 1,1kW pumps, and yes, a sand filter is not for the lazy Koi keeper!
Sand filters need to be cleaned regularly, but so any other filters only at longer intervals.

What I read about the Cyclone filter, it should be the best and easiest maintaining filter on the market, you only need to open a value every morning for two minutes! The ideal filter for that lazy Koi Keeper!

I am waiting for Chris to do the testing, if it complies with the standards set out by the manufacture, and it works on Koi ponds I will buy it!

PS. With sand filters I can see my bottom drains in the moon light!
and a 3 Bag Koi Sand filters should not cost more then R 1800!!!!!

Hi,

Picture of solids building up at the beginning of the second day.



What is fascinating is that the you can see the particles (of different sizes) floating downwards and settling at the bottom. There appears to be no swirling or agitation. They just float downwards to the bottom of the catchment area. as per the pic.

The cyclone was designed for swimming pool use and it was designed to trap the fine solids before the pool filter. The blab goes that this saves on water and the frequency of back washing.

If it works like this it could be used as an add-on before sand filters or bead filters etc. But it certainly works.

And don't not forget this is operating on an already clear pond and only on the surface skimmer. The main pump moves most of the water volume through the chamber at the top.

Once this cyclone has run some time in this way I will back wash the sand filters - with nose plugs - and then run it as an add on whilst the sand filters are set on filter (as they are normally). It should trap a lot of solids before the sand filter beds. The ease of flushing and seeing what you are flushing be a bonus to lazy koi keepers. Then perhaps the gravel beds will be even more efficient at removing fines and have a much longer time between back flushing. There could be a further benefit. Less solids in the gravel beds mean less compaction of the top layer and therefore less effort to backwash.

Sand filters at the moment are about R2,800 for a P18 or two bag filter and about R4,000 for a three bag filter - the P24. The P30 comes in at about R5,500. These are the Collins filters.

Pieter what are you doing at the edge of the pond watching the bottom drains in the moon light? (just wondering ..... )

Chris

Hi,

I received the following quotation on sand filters from a respectable Koi dealer not two days ago:
2 bag Speck Koi Sand filter R 1 595-00
3 bag Speck Koi Sand filter R 1 756-00

The cyclone is doing its work, great! I do have a feeling that this is a winner!

Chris, watching the bottom drains in the moon light is not what you are thinking; I was bragging with my crystal clear pond water, we could even see the shadows of the Koi on the bottom.

Chris, please keep us upto date with its performance. I have also been looking at this item for the last 3-4 months but what i am concerened about it wether the filter is going to get clogged with time.

I did some reading about this filter and according to what i have read it has small holes in the top of the see through section that creates small vortxes...i am worried that these holes are going to get clogged with time.

If it workes perfectly in the next 2-3 months then i will also buy one as i can see it saving me water.

Just getting back to william and the dinosaur pump issue. Can someone please tell me if you get a self priming low wattage pump? This is one of the main reasons why i am still using high wattage swimming pool pumps, i need it to be self priming. My setup is so that i cannot have my pumps below water level...so is there a power saving option for me? or am i stuck with the self priming dinosaurs?

Hi,
Some more feedback on the multi cyclone -

It works really well. A cannot get a decent photograph of the pond because of the reflection but my water was always clear and now it is definitely clearer. The sand filters do not block up so quickly and the crust that forms on the top is definitely less. (Not that I use my hands in the sand filters but rather air bump them with a Jacuzzi air blower)

The Multi Cyclone appears to be removing a lot of solids before the sand filters therefore the sand filters are taking more of the fines out of the water.

I think the Multi Cyclone would work really well on bead filters as well.

Here are some pictures of the Multicyclone used in Aquaculture applications.

Regards,
Chris

It's official -

We were sitting at the edge of the pond yesterday evening. My wife says my pond is much clearer now. The water has an extra sparkle. If my wife says the pond is clearer then it is, so it's official now.

The Multi Cyclone is not clogging up in any way and is certainly doing its job. There is a maintenance tip - flush it regularly. The majority of the water that enters the bottom clear chamber remains there as the solids and organics settle to the bottom. This water is only removed / replaced when you flush the Multi Cyclone.

Stagnant water + organics = not a good idea.

The same applies to all filters. When you trap organics they must be eliminated from the system regularly. As they degrade they negatively affect the water quality in your system because they are still in contact with the passing water.

Also place a valve on the other side of the Multicyclone so that you can close it every now and again when flushing as this will give the bottom chamber a really good blast of water to clean it.

My wife also mentioned that my pond was much cleaner and much clearer than our near-by swimming pool.

Oh well - you can't win them all ...

Regards,
Chris

Chris yor email made me laugh, thanks for that.

Will you say that the multi cyclone can replace the need for a swimming sand filter?

Hi Wayne,

I tried running the cyclone for a few days without the sand filter and it worked. Then I ran it before the sand filters and it worked better. Remember I have sand filters on my surface skimmer only.

In the above pictures you can see they have used Multicyclones without sand filter in aquaculture applications. However, the standards of clear water are much higher in koi keeping so the original concept of using this with sand filters is probably they way to go.

This is the way I figure it -

The cyclone was designed to be operated with a sand filter. It was designed to trap solids before the sand filter and reduce the solid load.

On a koi pond it traps a lot of the solids, that would go through to the sand filter, in a place where you can see them and they are very easy to discharge to waste.

This reduction in solids load enhances the sand filters performance. The sand filter then has an increased capacity to remove finer solids and the water becomes clearer.

Because of the design the Multicyclone can be fitted before any filter on a koi pond. This could be a bead filter the answer filter, the old green boxes with sponges etc.

It is far more efficient than a vortex settling tank as it removes more solids in less space and with less water to clean it. As it is pressurised it can be placed anywhere and does not necessarily have to be on ground level and gravity fed.

It seems to extend the time between back-flushing sand filters and I am sure it will extend the time in between cleaning other types of filters.

I emailed the designers with queries and they were extremely helpful and honest. They mentioned that some new larger Multicyclones will be coming on the market for industrial use. They did not say when.

In the mean time this is working very well.

Regards,
Chris

Hi Chris

if my calculations are correct 2 months has gone by now since our last discussion of the multi-cyclone.

You still happy with it? Anything new you have noticed regarding the unit.

Wayne

Wow, I don't know how I missed this post.

Please let us know, because I will be very keen on buying on.

Latest pricing and the supplier names too please ?

i'm waiting in anticipation over here.

They are quite expensive. At the Gauteng show they went for about R 4500.00. Supplier unknown.

I found it online here for 225 Pounds

http://www.absolute-koi.co.uk/subcat1294.html