First pond......kind of done...couple questions?

[charleyd]

Well, Through lots of help from people on here and lots of searching of this forum my pond is done except for all kinds of cosmetic work yet. 32" deep about 3000 gallons. Docs filter gravity fed into a biofalls and a Aqua scape skimmer. I am not real impressed with the amount of water coming from my falls. Does it look like enough flow to oxygenate the water? My water is also from a well and is very very hard, wll over 1000ppm. Do i need to worry about the hardness? I have a soft water spigot in my garage that I could do a partial water change with. Any other suggestions or comments are welcome. Thanks again for all the help.

 

[addy1]

that looks like a nice flow, it will add o2 to the water.
We are opposite very very soft and acidic well water.

very nice rock work btw, love the waterfall.

 

[taherrmann4]

Nice looking pond. How many gph is your pump?

 

[charleyd]

It is a Beckett pump and I think it is 3600 gph. I am guessing my pond is around 3000 gal. I guess I was just expecting more water.

 

[taherrmann4]

I agree I would have expected much more with 3600 gph. What size pvc did you use?

 

[j.w]

Looks very nice and if you do want more flow than you will have to get a bigger pump unless something is restricting the flow like tmann suggested in the piping size. Do you have any kind of screen or protective cover over the intake of your pump (if submersible pump) that could be clogging it up? Can too many or too sharp of angle's in a pvc pipe cause restriction to the falls?

 

[addy1]

The flow from my deck pond looks stronger than that, it is a 650 gph pump with over 40 feet of head pressure. Bet you have some restriction somewhere, mine is fed with 2 inch pipe

 

[sissy]

love that stacked stone

 

[taherrmann4]

If you used flex pipe you may have a kink in it somewhere.

 

[sissy]

how long is the hose remember that the longer the hose the less water you will get .When they do the gph it is how much water comes out of the pump directly and if you calculate the length of the hose it goes down for every foot of hose you have .

 

[addy1]

at 3600 gph you should have more flow, let us know your set up. bet there is a kink or something.

 

[charleyd]

I have 1 1/2 pvc coming off the pump. I have 3 45's and a 90 in the pvc. I ran about 35-40 feet of pvc total but it is run pretty level until it gets to the docs bio. Once it gets to the Docs It necks down to 1" pvc which is 1/4 bigger than the instuctions on DrDaves website. I have 2" pvc connecting the Docs to the biofalls. I have a 1" ball valve in the docs that I have to somewhat closed or my Docs over flows. I have my pump in the skimmer which has a 2" white filter media over it along with a 1" green mat. In the docs I have the plastic poultry net in it that The instructions said to use. In the bio falls I have 3 - 2" white filter media mats. Any suggestions?

 

[addy1]

I don't use filters, that sounds like it should work fine, but I am sure someone that uses them will be able to see how you have yours set up and maybe find a problem.

 

[taherrmann4]

I am not familiar with the docs set up but two things popped out. If you are closing the 1" ball valve some to keep it from overflowing this could be something to look at and you have 3" worth of pads that the filter has to suck through, maybe try removing them and see if that doesn't increase your flow. You can always put them back in.

 

[HARO]

Do you have a by-pass around the filter or is the waterfall being fed by the filter only? John