7 days from scratch to finish and filled with water, WOW!!!

Everything went well during the night but I have noticed that the one drain in filter chamber is leaking. I was worried about it since I made the holes for pipes after I have built the pond. Very difficult to seal it against floor but someone will come and fix it today. Will leave the water in the pond and only drain the chamber to fix

They have to finish the waterfall as well

What did you seal the inside of the pond with?

well, from what I've read he believes in waterblok, so I suspect it's that.......I also did mine with waterblok and looks exactly the same......altho I'm sure all black bitumen's look the same

Cam I have mixed a bit of salt into the plaster. Before the plaster dried out I have used salt and cement to paint over the plaster. It dried out fast and the cement blocks also suck up water. Painted it with Waterblok. It will be dry in about 2 hours and you can add water to pond 72hours later but I did not wait that long. I have used a fan in chamber to dry paint and few hours later I filled pond up

Looks great Marius, cant believe how quick you managed to put it all together.

I hope we gonna see some pics of the lucky fish that are going to call this pond home.

Again Job well done, congrats on the addition.

Cheers
Lee

Waterblok isn't as sticky and annoying as bitumin is it?

How many coats do you need to apply? And do you need to mix it with water or does it come in a tin/drum?

Hey Cam...it comes in a tin and is a liquid....for the first coat you dilute 1/1 with water...then on the final coat you just coat with it undiluted

Have a look here : [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Not sure what area you in but ferreiras in honeydew stocks it.

Cheers
Lee

The paint is a bit sticky the first day after painting but when you add water it will ‘cool down’ and no further problems.

The water in pond and 2other chambers is stable for 2 days now. Very thankful it is not leaking. Sealed the pipe in filter chamber and repainted the bottom again and hopefully I won’t have any more problems.

With the current setup I will have a problem when the water level is below the skimmer. This will mean that I won’t have any water flow towards the motor in last chamber since the water will be unable to flow upwards from drain pipes to partition that I use as a pre-filter. Will make a drawing tomorrow and would appreciate some comments as how I can modify the setup. Should be back ‘home’ tomorrow afternoon then I will give a detailed drawing. I am a bit blond at times, so help will be useful, thanks.

Will post photos of fish in near future. Must still get some 'test pilots'. pH 0.1 higher than main pond, but will test again when filling up the chamber.(Filter media in main pond now, next to pump and hopefully the media will still be active when I place whem back in filter

I need some advice please. In the drawing (if you can call it a drawing lol) you will notice that my partition (marked 1), brick wall (marked as 2) and skimmer are all at the same level. The water flow is perfect but I will run into serious problems when the water drops below the skimmer. I won’t have any water flowing through the filters and the motors will run dry.

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Do you think it will be a good idea to lower partition (1) and wall (2)? The drawing is not to scale. The skimmer is about 1.1m from bottom of pond and Matala sheets only 500mm high, so I still have room to play. By lowering it with about 200mm I should have good water flow from skimmer and drains and the motors won’t run dry. Settlement should still be good.

All inputs will be appreciated, thanks

Hi Marius
I reason that your pump will run dry as soon as the water level drops to below the top level of the higher of either 1 or 2. Of cause I might be wrong.
In my pond, where I use an airlift system, the water level is important to allow circulation. My approach was to fit a ball valve to maintain a constant water level.

Thanks Jan. Maybe you can add a photo or 2 of your airlift system. I wanted to play around with such a system but time was very limited.

The leaking filter chamber is fixed now and no more leaks. Was a bit of a hassle to get into chamber (+-1.4m high x 480mm long and 600mm wide)

Still waiting to see how the waterfall return will look but my biggest concern to me is the way I have built the inlet part of the filter system. I am sure I will have too much water flow from skimmer and very little from bottom drains with the current setup. Hopefully by lowering the 2 walls I will get a better flow rate. In my big pond it is perfect since the suction pipe is more or less the same height as the drain and I get a good flow from both skimmer and drain. In small pond the setup is reversed.

I can even raise the drain pipes a bit if I don’t get the suction as wanted. Only time will tell and hopefully it won’t be a major modification I need to perform.

Marius another solution would to add a top up system to the last chamber.
Using the operating system from a toilet cistern?

what you have there is pretty much a sump arrangement, albeit on a vertical plane. I have the same problem, guess what i am doing on the public holiday. LOL

My ball valve is actually the cistern type that David describe plus a stop cock. My concern is that a water leak will go un-notice as water will automatically be replenished. So I close the water supply ocasionally and observe.

Hi Marius

Just thinking out aloud here but about shortening the plastic partition 1, who at all be possible to move it to the left to make the partition wide as possible you can then lower it a fair amount. doing it this way you will have more surface area available for the mechanical filtration ?

Reason behind doing so is being like it is pictured i would be worried the surface get blocked by floating debris that the skimmer brings in and that will effect you flow-rate too.

Cheers
Lee

Lee

Thanks, that is a brilliant idea. I can add a black Sheet (put into 4 pieces) to make it double as wide as now. I am sure the system will perform better when I lower the plastic with about 20cm, as well as the wall going to the pumps. By doing it this way, the sheets will still be +- 25cm above floor level for settlement and plenty room for water movement. Now the 2 drain pipes will be closer to the inlet of the mechanical filtration and better suction should be obtained. The water level in pond can drop a lot before the pumps will run dry.

Checked the water level in pond this morning and still at same level, so I think the leak is history. This pond is not the best looking at all, but very happy about the easy access to filters and fish. Still need to move the Log cabin back by a meter or so before I can decide where to put the glass window. Work never seems to stop when you have a pond.

New toy to be mounted on the side of QT pond waterfall wall.
Great job by Eugen Sr once again


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Windgat

Eugen en sy pa mag maar....regtige mooi stukkie werk.

As ek mooi onthou is Louise net jou Cherry....beter haar gou trou voordat jy die kuns werk moet laat verander.

Sal maar niks se nie,wonder maar net wat sal die duurste wees

Eugen kan daardie CMT??? masjien van jou stainless steel letters sny?

Wayne, ja ek sal maar mooi na haar moet kyk, sal nie mooi lyk om naam met jigsaw af te sny nie , en wie gaan so mooi na Koi kyk as ek weg is, so ek beweeg op dun ys?

Jammer Maar Nee Miskien Aluminium.

Ek het so paar jaar gelede antennas gebou en elemente op 'boom' vas gesit (lyk soos TV antenna maar net 40 keer groter) Die plate wat teen 'boom' gepas het was uit SS gesny. Daar is plekke wat tot 80mm SSteel sny met laser. Dit help om 'plan' te gee in CAD formaat. Dit is oog om te sien want masjien sny so iets soos 'n meter staal per sekonde. 'Horror movie' op sy beste. Weet nie wat die prys was nie want dit vriend van my gewees en hy my so bietjie gehelp. Dink dit was omdat hy nie bonus gekry het nie