In over my head, building a huge waterfall. Need pointers.

[Tjsherrill]

FOR 30 BUCKS YOU CAN BUY A FLOAT SWITCH that will kill the power to the pump its the reverse of a fill valve as the water drops the float drops killing the power

Thats cool. I didn't know about that.

 

[Tjsherrill]

Ooooh it sounds so nice!! You'll be tinkering for a while, don't panic to get it perfect. Man that's a lot of rocks!

Thanks. 60tons

 

[Tjsherrill]

Quick update: I know I'll be tweaking the edges and the "finish" work for a long time, so I continue to do that. But we continue to lose about 1" per day, which totals out to ~150-200 gallons. That doesn't feel sustainable, as I think it would roughly triple our monthly water bill. So we are watching it daily and keeping notes. Hopefully, we can find the leak and sort it out soon.

If anyone has any ideas on tracking down the leak let me know.

Thanks all for all of your continued support.

 

[GBBUDD]

With your set up you dont have the ability to shut down areas to see where your leak is. but that is where to start shut the pumps off see what drops or doesn't . check even where water pools and watch to see if it drains. then you need a pump and hose to run the water only so high up the hill like ten feet or less see if the water drops as quick after a few days then extend the hose up the hill further etc etc 150 gallons loss a day sounds like a leak or excessive splashing

The other possibility is folds and wicking water upward as much as 2 or 3 inches without a pump from simple folds in the liner which can be a lot of folds ob a build like yours

 

[Tjsherrill]

With your set up you dont have the ability to shut down areas to see where your leak is. but that is where to start shut the pumps off see what drops or doesn't . check even where water pools and watch to see if it drains. then you need a pump and hose to run the water only so high up the hill like ten feet or less see if the water drops as quick after a few days then extend the hose up the hill further etc etc 150 gallons loss a day sounds like a leak or excessive splashing

The other possibility is folds and wicking water upward as much as 2 or 3 inches without a pump from simple folds in the liner which can be a lot of folds ob a build like yours

The loss is entirely in the pond. So We are just tracking it on a daily basis, and see how things go.

 

[Lisak1]

How big is your pond?

 

[GBBUDD]

just let it drop until it stops or drastically reduces that is the level in which you puncture tear or rip will be

 

[Tjsherrill]

How big is your pond?

About 2400 gallons

 

[Lisak1]

Surface area?

I know that my 14x17 foot pond (about 230 sq ft of surface area) would lose around 140 gallons of water if I drop an inch. Believe me - I've had these discussions with my water bill paying husband and have done the math countless times. (It's just over 1/2 gallon per square foot of surface area at one inch of depth.)

140 gallons a day is 4000 gallons a month, and is certainly nothing to ignore. But it's always good to put things in perspective. If you take out what's "expected" - because you will lose water daily due to splashing, evaporation, plant uptake, etc - the actual "loss" that you can hope to locate and correct is far less.

 

[Tjsherrill]

Surface area?

I know that my 14x17 foot pond (about 230 sq ft of surface area) would lose around 140 gallons of water if I drop an inch. Believe me - I've had these discussions with my water bill paying husband and have done the math countless times. (It's just over 1/2 gallon per square foot of surface area at one inch of depth.)

140 gallons a day is 4000 gallons a month, and is certainly nothing to ignore. But it's always good to put things in perspective. If you take out what's "expected" - because you will lose water daily due to splashing, evaporation, plant uptake, etc - the actual "loss" that you can hope to locate and correct is far less.

My surface area is maybe 8'-15' (120 sq/ft) and about 32" deep. The hard part at the moment is that the water level drops daily by an inch without the system running. If I was losing 1/8 or even 1/4 it would feel like maybe that was evaporation. We also have no plants yet.

I 100% hear you that if there was plants, the system was running (there are a few splash points) and we had plants and all that, we could lose more, but it feels like a leak, not a tweak. I really appreciate everyone thinking about this with me.

 

[GBBUDD]

but it depends so much where you are located if your in Arizona id expect serious evaporation due to sun temp and lack of moisture in the air. so there is no im this size pond on east coast zone 5 i loose this, your west cost zone 10 you loose that

 

[Pablo]

Sorry I dont know all the details of your build, sounds amazing. Can I just throw out there that maybe there is a leak from your pipes or connections? If you are not seeing anything for a liner leak and dont think evaporation is the cause maybe there is a leak somewhere with your fittings. Guess it is one of those frustrating things of trying to narrow down all possible causes.

 

[GBBUDD]

I'D LOVE TO SEE A PICTURE AT THE SAME ANGLE AS THE ORIGINAL POST PICTURE HERE.

 

[Tjsherrill]

Sorry I dont know all the details of your build, sounds amazing. Can I just throw out there that maybe there is a leak from your pipes or connections? If you are not seeing anything for a liner leak and dont think evaporation is the cause maybe there is a leak somewhere with your fittings. Guess it is one of those frustrating things of trying to narrow down all possible causes.

Thanks for the notes. Thankfully the fittings situation is very simple. The pump is connected to a screwed in fitting that then goes up out of the pump vault. Then it turns about 45' and connects to 3" flexi PVC which runs up under the left side of the system to the spill way. All the connections are tight and there is no dripping or anything else leaking. I knock on wood that its a single piece of pipe doing all the work.

 

[Tjsherrill]

I'D LOVE TO SEE A PICTURE AT THE SAME ANGLE AS THE ORIGINAL POST PICTURE HERE.

@GBBUDD You mean the first picture in the original post? I'll take one and upload. You and the rest of the people on this forum have been a huge help in getting me this far.