Mick's Twin IBC System in Brisbane

BackyardPermaculture

After a fair bit of reading on here and elsewhere, I decided to have a go at a fairly simple system - I've gone with a pair of IBC's sitting side-by-side as sump and fish tank, with the top sections of the IBC's functioning as grow beds.

The flow will be:
- Water pumped from sump tank up to grow beds on a timer cycle of 15 mins on, 45 minutes off.
- Drains from grow beds into fish tank.
- Overflows (via SLO) from fish tank back to sump tank.

The stand pipes are 40mm pressure pipe mounted through uniseals, with a pair of 6mm holes just above the uniseal:

The stand pipes guarded by 90mm pipe with many holes:

The electrics in a waterproof box mounted on the back of the sump tank:

I stupidly mounted the first overflow too high - the new one is lower and bigger (50mm) and flows well:

RupertofOZ

Hi Mick, and welcome...

Have I got this right... both grow beds drain back directly into the IBC below them (respectively)... and one IBC overflows (via an SLO) into the othe IBC which pumps to both grow beds...

BackyardPermaculture

Hi Rupert,

Almost - except both grow beds drain into the right-hand IBC (the fish tank), which overflows via SLO across to the sump which has the pump in it.

BackyardPermaculture

I've filled the grow beds with 10mm drainage gravel, stuck some seaweed concentrate in the water, and planted it out a bit:

It was clearly not quite level - should've sorted that BEFORE filling with gravel! I've since jacked up the grow bed and leveled it with some treated pine fence palings - may still have to reduce the height of the stand pipes to keep the flood level well below the surface.

Jackied

Just beware that a lot of the mechanical timers cannot do 15min increments, more like 25mins.

Yes get that water down under the media for sure.

But looks good.

BackyardPermaculture

Cheers Jackied - I wondered about that; it felt like longer than 15 minutes but I hadn't checked it against the clock. I can always extend the drain time out a bit I guess.

Zman

You will need to cover the outside of the tanks too but looking good.

BackyardPermaculture

Thanks Zman, I was thinking of using wooden fence palings around the outside - will that work?

Zman

Yep that would look alot better than the shade cloth i have on mine hehe

bonsaibelly

Hey , love the setup. You can pain them too - its just that IBC's are not UV protected so will demolish over time....wooden fence pailings sound good, but you will still need paint if they dont block out the sun...!

:thumbright:

BackyardPermaculture

Thanks BB, your setup looks good. I'll try the fence palings and then take things from there.

BackyardPermaculture

I put in 3 egg whites last night - cleared the water up overnight, although the surface is now a bit bubbly. Amazing how quickly it worked!

mantis

Those blocks holding up the back of the growbeds dont look very stable. I would be doing something there
But apart from that its looking really good

BackyardPermaculture

Good point Richard - I might try stacking more of the big pavers instead.

chainsaw

Jackied wrote:

Just beware that a lot of the mechanical timers cannot do 15min increments, more like 25mins.

Too many people get tied into this 15/45 with timers, what the hell if it went 25/60. The point is to get the system to flood then drain. It is just a balancing act between whats good for the fish and the plants, and not very scientific at that, people just try to over complicate things. Kiss. My systems operate all over the place, what happens when you turn a system off overnight and it all drains? or leave your GBs flooded during the heat of the day?

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