Anyone have any links, books or suggestions on different ways to set up a clarifier barrel?
I have the book Small Scale Aquaculture, but don't think that I can set mine up like they do. The main problem is that since I am using a stock tank with only about 18 inches of water in it, which is sitting on the ground, the water level in the commonly used 55 gallon barrel would be too low to do much good.

If you've got enough floor space, use 2 turned on their side, cut in half. Run the water into one, then to the next one and then back out.

That sounds just crazy enough to work!
How do I plumb it though? Do I still siphon in and pump out or can I pump in and gravity flow out? How are the two tanks connected, at the bottom through the bung holes? Do I still use the netting?

Raise your stock tank with concrete blocks and your problem is solved. My tank depths are similar to yours.

After my last post I think that I figured out the answers to my own questions.
I would guess that the bung holes should be kept plugged and used as clean outs. The two tanks should be connected with a pipe close to the top so that water transfers from one to the other high above the sediments. Netting should be used to reduce turbulence from water movement. I think that I would want to pump in and gravity flow it out. If I tried to siphon in and the electricity went out it would drain the tank and overflow the filter.
Am I getting warmer?

Generally, one would not want to run raw effluent thru a pump in a situation like this. The pump would macerate (break it down) quite a bit into finer particles, which are harder to remove. TSS and TDS would increase quite dramatically, and your filter, unless it was absolute rated, would not help much. Plus, the pump would require more frequent cleaning.

What happened to your previous sketch?

It would be easier to raise the tank as Cecil mentioned to even things out with a barrel.

If you want to do a center drain, as in the modified sketch. A simple 2" PVC shower drain will work quite well, for most purposes such as this. You can even modify them a bit so they suck stuff off the bottom -vs- just a down flow. That's patented tho! I may just grant the "right to use" said patent

You saved me a lot of typing!

Are you attempting to do the same as the book small scale aquaculture or something different? If the same I would cut out the top of barrel bung holes and all.

If your pump is set on top of your filter material there will be minimal effluent as it will be trapped in the filter material. If your power goes out it simply stops sending water back to the biofilter.

Draw us a picture of your thoughts.

JKB,

I'll do it on Sunday. My wife has the scanner. I need to draw up another footprint drawing anyway. I am setting up my second high school RAS. This one will be a high school next door.

Cool Cecil.

I was not directing the draw it up to you.

Talk to esshup. I sent him an SD card a while back with some "stuff" on it.

BTW: I got my new electric 3 phase motors in for my pumps. Still waiting on another.

They are not super fancy or extremely, highly efficient!

Main thing for now is not to fry them with the drive, and that should be OK, but I need to program in upper and lower thresholds.

These motors, even though not the really fancy ones, should prove to be, to save about 60% in electric costs.

What!!! No Cartoons??? It's Monday morning now!

I wasted my weekend reading manuals and playing with some new software for a project. I gotta get a life!

Here's a Monday morning cartoon.



Water is pumped from bottom of fish tank into a 3 or 4 inch PVC secured to inside of barrel which helps to slow it down. Sediments collects at bottom and in netting while clean water rises to the top and flows via gravity to the bio filter and then back to tank.
Barrel is sitting on blocks to allow sediment to be drained out of bottom.

In that cartoon, I'd either have enough reserve capacity in the fish tank to hold the water from the other tanks in case of a power outage (water would siphon back into the tank unitl the water levels in all tanks were the same) or put a one way valve in the line between the pump and the clarifier tank.

Bullhead,

You're reinventing the wheel (making it more complicated than it has to be) but in your case you're creating a problem where a problem doesn't need to exist. Why add valves etc. when you don't need them in the first place if you keep it simple?

There's a reason the set up is the way it is in the book Small Scale Aquaculture. It's a tried and true system and a KISS system.

Sorry I'm not trying to be a know it all. I've been there done that and tried different things and made all the mistakes. Additionally once you start adding too many gadgets to a small scale system it becomes an expensive hobby.

You are obviously free to do what you want and I'm just trying to help...

You'll have to clean your pump all the time.

What kind of pump do you have?

The only valve I'm using is to drain sediment from the clarifier.

The reason I can't build it like in the book is because for several reasons I can't raise the tank.

Why not?