Pond Boss Forums AERATION Systems questions Really neat aerator

Hello everyone,
I wanted to share a pond aerator that I came up with for my pond. I am a welder and love to build things. I welded and built several metal sculptures so I thought why not?
I used a old automotive emissions air pump that I found on Ebay for $5. I also found on Ebay a 30 inch windmill blade and hub kit. I had to open up the center on the hub to fit my air
pump, but it was not big deal. The blades move the air pump pretty easy, better than I thought it would. It starts moving at maybe about 5 mph wind. I then used 3/8 rebar and built an airplane on floats complete with a catfish pilot. The airplane has a 8 feet wing span and about 7 feet long. The cat fish is made from 1 inch metal washers welder together. The catfish took forever to make.
I added a piece of metal to the tail of the plane to work as a weathervane so the wind always turns the plane into the wind. The plane has a 20 foot chain hooked to one of the pontoons and then to cement block on the bottom of the pond.


The whole thing works pretty good, not as good as a wind aerator that is on a tall tower, but sure looks neat. The kids just love it.
We swim and pedal boat a lot on our pond and it is fun to boat up next to.
-Tony

VERY cool! Great, interesting first post as well!

Welcome!

IMHO, who cares if it pumps air...That is a piece of ART! Very cool! How much does the catfish weigh do you think?

You should bring some of your aeration art to the conference in February!!

Thanks for all the kind words. The catfish alone weighes about 8 pounds. I didn't weigh the whole plane once it was done, but I would say it is around 65 to 75 pounds total.
-Tony

I screwed up and showed my wife this post, and now she wants one. Very nice job.

mnfish,

I agree it's a cool center piece air or no air!

Heliguy very cool!! You need to patten that dude! That's a seller right there!! You could even outline the plane and fish with them LED light for night...

RC

Hey Heli, that is really cool! I use to do a lot of ornamental stuff in my earlier years, but never got into doing the stuff you are doing.

A guy down the street makes the coolest flowers.

Very creative! Do ya know the difference between a Catfish and a gal from Kentucky? One has wiskers and stinks and the other is a fish.