Here are som pics of the sytem I coppied off RC51 for my 3/4 acre pond. I used Eco 7 Air Pump, three 9 inch diffuser from diffuser express, 50' of bottom line hose, 15 feet of auto zone heater hose, a few bread racks from a buddy, some stainless cabel, a 2 duck decoys, and moddified contico locking out door tool box. The tool box is also going to be storage dock box for the radio and life jackets, things like that.
Pump=115$
diffusers=62$
bottom line=80$
heater hose=10$
contico box=64$
box vents=11$
PVC fittings=10$
hose clamps=4$
stainless wire=15$
Total=356$

diffusers
http://www.diffuserexpress.com/fine_bubble_disc.htm
pump
http://www.aquariumspecialty.com/catalog...ac6a4ac1fada291
bottom line hose
http://www.cleanponds.com

More pics

Pictures of the Dock/air pump box being modified, Going to add 6 more to the other side and 6 smaller vents on the back. to much air flow is better ten not enough!

Just a few considerations, Secure the schedule 80 tubing with more than zip ties (as is) the discs will float up on you at some point.I would also 90 degree down the hose barb for the weighted tubing and tie it off a foot or so down the rack,so it then can sweep to the bottom. I believe it will in time snap your fitting off, probably when you lower it in place, you dont want that heavy weighted tubing hanging "out" as the pic shows.Also try to get the unit on the pond bottom as level as possible as those diffusers will tend to put more air to the high side (less down pressure)Look'n good keep the pics coming !!

Ted, good call on the barb. Never even though of that. i will snip that barb off and 90 it down to the bottom of the rack. This way the 50' section of bottom line will be just sitting on the bottom of the pond from the dock to the middle.

Joker looking good bud! I want to see those bubbles coming up out of the water at 15 feet!! I hope it works at that depth for ya! It should be close! You may have to pull it to 12 feet?? Not sure. Keep us posted!!

Hey RC51 thanks. the ponds getting there, it was about 50% dethawed this morning when i left. I cant wait to get the aluminum boat in the pond and drop this thing to the bottom and get it ooked up. I got some pics im gona try to up-load tonight. I built another diffuser prtion and have valves in my compressor box this way one will be sitting in 5 foot of water and the other set will be in the deep 15 foot water and all i have to do is open and shut the valves instead of moving my diffusers. I talked to diffuser express and they told me the diffusers with there check valves can remain under water with no air going to them indefinatly and i do not have to worry about water running back into my line and that cleaning of the diifusers is recomended once a year with a soft bristled scub brush but not required.

RC51 i forgot to put I found the specs on the ECO 5 pump and it said maximum deoth of 15 feet. so i would imagine the eco 7 would be at least that or better? will seee

THIS WAS SUPPOSE TO BE IN YOUR DOCK THREAD EVERYONE IGNORE THIS POST

RJ,
Picked up my barrels yesterday, Its amazing the price difference between Menards and Home Depot almost $250 cheaper at Menards. Those deck boards are where they get you..

my barrels were filled with vanilla flavoring, and the others where filled with a coagulant aluminum something, I sprayed them off and the water turned to gel on top. I gotta get them cleaned pretty good and sealed up real tight. The vanilla smells good though lol

Hey Joker that's good to know! I could never really find any for sure info on the pump like you did. So your right if the Eco 5 will go 15 feet the 7 should be no problem. COOL!! And you are right about the internal check valves on the diffusers. That's what makes these diffusers so cool! Pretty much maintenance free!! Good idea about having a station deep and one shallow. That will sure make it easier for ya! Talk to you later,

RC51 just got the other 3 diffusers and got the 2nd station built. we had weather in the 70's on friday and imk sitting here tonight at work watching the snow pile up!whats up with that! as soon as the pond is totally opened and the dock is shoved in i will get pics of this system working! thanks again for all the help. The diifuser worked good in my fish tank lol.

Awesome! And glad I could help! I have been on this forum for a little over a year now now and I am glad I could help some folks out! I posted my pictures when I did just for showing what I did never really thought about someone else using the same style system! It really is a good system for a 1 acre pond or smaller and fairly easy on the pocket book too! Be looking forward to seeing your system in the pond and working. Have a good one Joker!

Thanks for the info.

Well dock is in so I figured might as well get the aerator out of the cabin and into the lake to free up some space. RC51 the system worked great in 15 fo0t of water but i have it off the bottom about 3 feet so im only in 12 foot of water. here are some pics

Lots of good info here. Thanks for taking the time to post up.

RoadWarrior your welcome. I am glad RC51 shared the nice set up. I was very happy with the way it turned out and performed. I am curious to see if it will run 6 diffuser. i am going to run another station with 3 diffuser that will hang below the dock at 5 feet on a cable. it will be run in the winter full time to keep the dock un-thawed. I am curious to see if I can run both stations off the eco 7 in the summer time. I will find out shortly planning on putting the dock station in this weekend.

NO problem infinty. Thanks again to RC51 and all the members. But most important Thank you Pond Boss for this valuable tool where all of us can share are knowledge and experiances!

Joker that's AWESOME!!! Glad it worked for ya!! For the price of the setup you just can't beat it!!! I am happy for ya!

Just out of curosity, if you were to purchase a complete system like this out of a box, how much would it run?

Hey RW,

Out of the box is hard to determine. You can get out of the box systems that range from 1000 bucks to 3000 bucks or more. This system I put together will cost you right around 300 to 350 give to take. I only used 75 feet of weighted tubing so my system was a little less. Weighted tubing is expensive but man it's awesome and makes life easy when it comes to this type of setup! Keep in mindy if you bought this system out of the box from a retailer if would be about 600 bucks I bet as you know as well as I do they are going to make their profit as well. Here is a quick breakdown of what I spent. I also think Joker posted his cost too earlier in this post.

Eco 7 pump = 105 bucks
75 feet weighted tubing. 117 bucks.
3 , 9 inch round diffusers fine bubble. 50 bucks.
PVC pipe for air system about 15 bucks.
Cat kennel to house air pump. 20 bucks.

Hope this helps.

Just a footnote. If you are in a potential flood area on your dock; either build compressor with quick disconnects or put box up as high as possible. Experience talking here (not smarts).

Sniper excelent sugestion. If the water makes it over my box I am in a world of hurt because that means the cabins under water to. Thats when i give stae farm a call lol.

My pond is a dammed up part of a "crick". Water varies by 5-7 feet in a toad strangler. I was down on the dock chucking water out of the compressor box last spring. Not fun by twice.

When do we get to see some photos of these triple 9" diffusers bubbling from the bottom. I'm anxious to see the size of boil you get!

Hey Rick I posted some before but here are a couple of pics of mine working. It will make about a 18 inch round bubble area give or take.

That's impressive. How high above the surface does it boil?

and how deep is it?

farmerrick my sytem rolls the water at the top BOUT 2 TO 3 inches and is at about 12 feet depth. it is in 15 fott of water but i brought it of the bottom so it wouldnt stir up mud

wow, that is great!

Yeah I would say thats about right mine rolls about 2 inches. I can tell you this. I have a hard time getting close to it and staying there with the boat as it keeps pushing me away!! Mine is about 8 feet deep.

sounds strong. RC are you going to ad a pump for the additional set of diffusers or split air from the one pump?

Rick your probally talkin about my setup

I have the air line split 2 ways in the compressor box with valves to each station. I havent tried running both stations with 1 pump but i plan on trying when I get the second station hung under the dock. i did this so i dindt have to move my deep water station in the winter. the guys on here have said to run your diffuser at your deepest poin in the summer and you winter diffuser at 1/3 of the deepedst point. my second station will be suspended via stainless cable under the dock at 5 feet to keep it free of ice in the winter

Hey Rick,

Not sure what you mean by additional set of diffusers. I have 3 out there now. If your talking about a shallow and deep setup I don't need a shallow setup as here in Arknansas it doens't get cold long enough to warrant running a shallow air system. So I just shut mine off around mid to end of October and turn it back on right around now. Hope that answers your question.

Sorry, got confused about whose system was getting additional diffusers. Both your systems sound awesome. I had a fish kill last year from turning on my system too late w/o breaking in. This year I have already started up to save that experience. I run 10 hrs a day now and when hot will got to dusk to dawn to cool the water.

Thats is what my setup will run. i have a dawn to dusk timer that the pump plugs into, and in the winter it will run 24-7. Nice system with out breaking the bank.

Thats it. Mine is setup the same way. And will be kicking it on, on Saturday. I will problably go 2 hours a day for the first week. Then move it up. As I can't be there all week to slowly bring it up each day.

Do either of you have check valves on your systems? Or do the diffusers act as a check valve?

Hey Bullhead no I dont' have a check valve the diffusers have them built in to them so we don't need one. Although it wouldn't be a bad safety net to have one in the line by the pump but it's not needed.

You are probably far enough south that this wouldn't be a problem, but my fear would be that if it were to shut off during the winter, water would back feed up the tube to the water line, then freeze at that point, possibly bursting the hose or blocking it up until the spring thaw.
Of course that's a worst case scenario.

Yeah it doesn't get real cold here for very long. It will get down in the teens once in a while but it don't last for a few days then back up above freezing most of the time.

Im thinkin the Air 7 along with 3 fine bubble disc difussers Should I be looking at 7"9"or 12"standard or high capacity.Looking at around 100 feet of hose and it will be running off a 5000wgenerator not continuesly.do I need a check valve or anything else you might think of?

Usually the membrane fine bubble diffusers have built-in check valves. Ask before buying. Keep in mind that as you split or divide the air volume each diffuser will receive less air and produce fewer bubbles which often means a smaller sized diffuser can be used for smaller air volumes. There becomes a point where the diffuser is too large for the amount of air it receives and it does not operate efficiently. No use buying a large diffuser if it will receive only a small amount of air. Just because the diffuser is large does not mean it will produce a large boil.

I'm looking to build a similar aeration system for my lake channel. What size bottom line hose did you use? I see the specs on the EcoPlus Commercial Air Pump 7 has 3/8" ID output. But concerned that that 3/8 bottom line hose will restrict CFM.