My wife and I recently purchased some property with a 1.5 acre spring fed pond. Deepest area is about 15 ft deep, average is about 6-8 feet. My neighbor said he helped dig the pond almost 50 years ago! I don't know how much truth is behind that though. I'm looking to reduce the plant and algae growth as well as help out the existing fish population in the pond.

I'm looking into a vane compressor system. I'm undecided between the Gast 0523 and the 1023. I plan to install the pump in my well house and run about 250-275 of line to the edge of the water. If I go with 523 i was thinking a single diffuser and with the 1023 running 2. Am I on the right path? If I go with the dual setup i'd like to put some check valves right at the Tee. Is that a good or bad idea? As far as the line from the compressor im thinking about 5/8-3/4 I'm confused as to why the 1023 is only a 3/8 discharge, I dont think im going to get the full potential of the setup by running 350 or so feet of 3/8.

Is it worth it to spend the extra 200 bucks and a few pennies a month on the larger system?

I know the pond can use the help from just the physical appearance and just for kicks I added a little 150gph water pump i had laying around. connected it to some pvc and created a little sprayer/agitator for the surface and could instantly smell the pleasant sulfur smell. This is only near the dock at about 4-5ft. So i cant imagine whats going on in the deeper areas.

I'm hoping some of the experts can put me on the right path. There is a ton of information on this site, if i only had the time to read it all lol.

Thanks

My best advice....


Read as much as you can on this forum for the next month before you go spending any $$$!

that looks like a lot of possibly fertilized grass around the pond site which is likely contributing to the FA on the surface.

What species of fish are in the pond? What are you goals for those fish? You might find a compromise between a good looking pond, and healthy fish population (sizes) but its a balancing act that is made harder by the fact it is an old pond.

My compressor has a tiny outlet too - smaller than the weighted air hose lines that run into the pond. I use about 650 ft of 1" black plastic water line to get air to my second pond. 1" plastic pipe is not that expensive - I'd go that large for 250-275 ft just to cut the loss. Lowe's/Home Depot can get it for you in 300 ft sections.

Welcome to the club! Good first post with good starting info and questions...


If you are talking about slitted diaphragm diffusers, such as Vertex or Matala...the 0523 wants to run between 2 to 4 diffusers, not jut one. I run my 0523 with 3 - 9" heads with the deepest one at 7 foot below the surface. Running just one with that kind of air flow will likely blow it up like a balloon and shorten it's life. Not to mention, a 1.5 acre pond wants more diffusers than just one. More like 3 to 6, IMO. The 1023 will run 7-9 diffusers very efficiently given proper line sizing. Vertex diffusers are said to have check valves built in at the head...not sure about the Matala's. I use Vertex 9" single units in my pond and have only experienced one time where water got back in the line and caused a no-air-flow situation. As far as you are going with the air, take Theo's advice and go 1 inch to the pond and 5/8" for the single diffuser lines. It seems that all the Gast pumps all have a rather small fitting at the pump compared to the line sizes that we use. A small fitting creates a restriction, that is true, but the very long lengths that we tend to run our lines can create considerable more back pressure than that small outlet. I know it sounds funny, but the restriction does not effect the back pressure near as much as the frictional losses in a long run of small tubing. Bottom line is to bush the size up as quick as possible for our pond purposes. The small outlet will not be an issue.

My gut tells me that you should go for the 1023 and use 7-9 heads. This can cause a budget to get bigger than you want, so, maybe the 0523 and 4 diffusers would work...we'd have to get down to the nitty gritty to determine that.

Here are some threads that discuss system sizing and more...(keep in mind that there has been some recent talk about running the aerators 24/7 versus part time. My theories on such are just that..theories)

https://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=92494

https://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=503805

https://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=520823

https://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=520407

https://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=495180

https://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=494996

https://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=491318

There are a lot more threads to peruse here under "Aeration"...

https://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=cfrm

Post back with any questions and we'll hash them out.

Looks closer to maybe an acre, but I'm only going by the pictures. A full football field, including the end zones, is 1.32 acres, and this looks slightly smaller. But looks can be deceiving I suppose.