Pond Boss Forums AERATION Systems questions Ecoplus 7???

What is the maximum distance this can be placed from diffuser?

Distance wise you be ok for several hundred yards , my pump struggles alil when my depths hit 12 ft plus.

Not really sure on Max distance Jokar? I have one and it's about 80 feet from mine, but as Cody says you can go quite a ways with them. Remember running air through a line really doesn't take much toll on a pump. It's pushing the air upwards from at a certain depth in the water is where your pump comes into play.

These Eco 7 pumps are good for about 10 foot like Cody says above around that 12 foot mark it will start to struggle some.

RC

Ok how about this. My house to the pond is about 400 ft. But the elevation from house to pond is about 50 ft( pond sits lower). Will this have an effect on the push of the ecoplus 7? The depth at which the diffuser will sit is at 10 foot. Just trying to figure out a aeration solution. Thanks everyone.

I recently learned something about the Eco7 pumps. An air flow guage was hooked up to an Eco 7. At open air flow, no back pressure resistance, the pump did great, even excellent producing 5-6cfm which is a very good impressive amount of air flow. Then the air flow was restricted to simulate water depth, as the resistance approached 2psi (4ft depth)the air flow volume dropped way down to 1-2 cfm. As more restriction toward 4 to 5psi was applied and the air flow dropped noticably below 1cfm. A call to the manufacturer and they said they do not have a flow rate chart for the various depths because they make this pump only for aquarium - aquaponics applications where depths are usually 12" to 16" and rarely exceed 2 ft. Greater depths put excessive resistance to the pump's mechanics/hardware. If one would see the size of the boil from an Eco7 and a pump with adequate pressure at 8 to 16 ft deep there is a dramatic difference in the size of the boil and amount of water moved resulting from the upwelling water and surface boil.

Thanks for posting this Bill.

That is exactly what I figured. To make something that cheap it can't be that effective. Personally, I don't see the value in those pumps for aerating anything except maybe a very small ornamental pond. Even the manufacturer says it is for aquarium and aquaponics use not pond aeration.

So then why does it work like a champ on my 1 acre pond??? 8 to 9 foot deep? I got 3 / 9 inch fine bubble fusers pushing bubbles like crazy! Heck it even pushes my 14 foot flat bottom boat away I can't even stay next to it while oaring??

Here is a pic you cant tell me this isn't working? Not trying to start anyting here but this picture don't lie.

I with RC you can try to hate the pump all ya want, at the end of the day it's still a great pump. My pump runs 24/7 all year long got flooded twice and still runs like a champ.

I stated only what I witnessed. I have no vested interest in this contoversy. There may be more than one model of the Eco7 compressor available on the internet and possibly cheap knock offs could be available. Several possibilities. The Eco7 that I saw tested looked like the "standard" pictures of the Eco7 pump. For the one I saw tested, there is no way it could produce the type of bubbles in your picture at 8ft deep. Buyer beware. Another possiblity is the Eco7 that I saw tested was brand new and new models may be different than models 1-2-3 years old. It always depends. They are made in China so as I know it, manufacturing standards or specs in China can change without official notice to consumers.

I don't know if this would be a helpful approach, but if water depth is going to reduce pump performance by too much then you might think about an "air lift" pump rather than just a diffuser alone. Injecting air at reasonable depth into a vertical pipe would allow you to place an "intake" deeper in the pond and only have to pump air down a few feet. I haven't seen a discussion of that method on PB and I've only seen it in a tanks system, so I'd be curious if anybody has any experience/opinions around as it applies to a pond setting.

Here are two diagrams. One is open ended and the other draws water through a gravel-filter intake.
http://www.ca.uky.edu/wkrec/AirliftPumps.pdf
http://toddecological.com/PDFs/100623.casestudy.fourseasons.pdf

Hey Bill like you I too have no vested interest here with this pump. It just was one I picked out and ran the numbers best I could and it seems to work well for me and others as well. Maybe the next one I buy won't be worth a thing?? You never know. And of course with anything your buying being aware of what your getting is just good practice.

RC

Phytomike -thanks for that airlift information. It will be helpful to others. The basic concept was used back in the 1970's for hypolimnetic aeration where only the deep stratified colder water was moved and aerated. Big difference was addition of a vent pipe to the surface to discharge the air from the bubbles.

I just recently bought an Eco 7 and after a couple of days I must say I am with Bill on this one. It certainly is pumping nothing like RC51's video.
I have it attached to two 9" diffusers which at first were placed so that one was at about 4 feet and the other at 6. I would estimate that 90% of the bubbles were coming from the shallower one. I'm going to do a little more experimenting but at this point kind of disappointed in the Eco7.

Bullhead just FYI I only have 1 main line running to my 2 fusers in that video. Not sure if your branching off with a valve or something to run both of yours but that could be your problem? All / most of your air is going to first fuser maybe?

RC

There are a lot of variables.
I have 25' of 5/8" plastic tubing that goes from the pump to about 30' of 5/8" weight hose. The weight hose meets a 3/4" PVC "T". The 90% part of that diffuser goes to one diffuser. The straight through end of the T connects to about 4' of PVC pipe then hits an elbow on which the other diffuser is connected. To make things even more interesting, one diffuser has been used a year while the other is new.
We're getting some much needed rain today, but as soon as conditions allow I'm going to go do some more experimenting to see what's going on.

If the tubing going to the diffusers is a different length, different diameter, or if the diffusers are placed at different depths in the pond, each diffuser has to have an air regulating device attached to it's line (like a ball valve). That's the only way to ensure the air is distributed evenly between them.

There is a permanent gremlin called a pressure drop, then temp, density of the air, atmospheric pressure, elevation...

Well all this talk about the ecoplus 7 make me nervous but I just can't afford the other options. I can't locate a dealer that will ship to Canada so I'm ordering one next week and having it shipped to UPS in new York state then I will drive over and pick it up.

Hooking it up to 2 nine inch diffusers. Power right near the water so the air line will only be 30 feet out. Small 1/3 acre pond and it will only be 5 feet deep.

Fingers crossed!

EcoPlus7 Commercial should work okay in a 5 ft deep pond. Those pumps can be rebuilt with a new homemade diaphragm (Youtube). There are other similar priced options but you do not have a lot invested in this one so give it a try and keep up informed as to how it is performing over the next 3-5yrs. Thanks.

The electromagnetic principle they use in these, like many other types of devices of this nature should last quite a few years. Someone on here had one that died. He ripped it apart and found a lead wire that had come loose. He soldered it back on, and it's making bubbles. I would think it was a vibration issue. I've used a lot of these types on bowl feeders and such.

Over time, the motor materials for these will degrade and get weaker, but that's a long, long time!

You'll run into more physical and mechanical issues as Bill has stated, but that would be about the same for any of these types of devices.

RC51 has had two. One lasted for 4 years, the 2nd, not so long. Don't know what caused them to croak tho.

Jay you will be very suprised at how well that pump will work in 5 feet of water! I had my first pump in 8 feet of water with 3 nine inch fusers for 4 years. That pump just got tired and it would not produce very good air anymore at 8 feet. At 6 feet it was fine. My second pump I got was a test subject from Ted Lea (God Rest His Soul) he gave it to me and wanted me to test it with my fusers. It ran fine also about the 7 foot mark but did not push as hard as my first pump did. Course I was not using Vertex fusers either and that's what Ted was testing with. I was using 9 inch fine bubble fusers from diffuser express.

Keep in mind Vertex fusers are great, but there one downfall in combination with a Eco 7 pump is they have a LOT more slits in them versus the diffuser express fusers so in turn it's harder for the Eco 7 pump to push enough air through all those extra slits at a certain depth. I still keep my Eco 7 I got from Ted as a backup, but I have sence moved on to a GAST 1/3 hp 0523 that Mr. Cody helped me get setup. I have to admit the GAST is a awesome pump! But what you can afford is what your can afford.

I get it that you can't afford it. That's why I got the Eco 7 myself at first. I now have tooooo many fish and tooo much invested in my pond so I wanted to make sure I was pushing enough water in my pond for my fish. On your 1/3 acre pond it's a great starter pump though and in 5 feet of water I would say it will run like a champ! I ran my one for 10 hours a day for 4 years ( except in winter here November through Feb.) and at the price of those pumps you can afford to have an extra one on the shelf if need be. Hey good luck and let us know how it works once you have it setup I am sure you will be happy.

RC

Thanks everyone I will get some pictures once I get set up.

J

Hey Jay,

If you're on a tight budget, I could send you two Vertex diffusers I bought from esshup. Sue shipped them to me. I have 4, but will keep two.

I kinda jumped the gun for my application without solidifying the egg head stuff with the appropriate engineers. My bad!

Anyway, the diffusers are way to large, and the bubbles are way to fine to make it work properly. Yeah, we don't need to go into that tho.

PM me your specifics, and I should be able to get them shipped out next week some time.

Free!

Pm'd you! Man this place rocks!

Well the pump came today! No thanks to UPS!!!!
Purchase price 120
Shipping 40
Converted to Canadian dollars 180
UPS blood sucker idiots 62.67 brokerage?!?!? What the heck is that about???

So a 120 pump costs me 260?

Anyway, can't wait to get this system hooked up water is getting pretty warm in the pond.