First of all, Hi to the group.....

I was thinking of a filter idea that would be DIY...was thinking about doing a outside rubbermaid pond with this filter, but then I relized the issue of the fact that in winter, it would be frozen solid.....


basicly, you need this...

rubbermade container, 10 gallons or 5 gallon, something you can cut, but is tallish...

some gravel
some sand
tubing
a plasic sheet (you could use a rubbermaid top)
a water pump

what you do

you take your container , and cut the plastic sheet to seperate it into two sides, and make it water tight, with a large hole in the bottom.

you put rocks on one side, and sand on the other side, but keep the sand about 1/3 as high as the rocks.

cut hole in the sand side above the sand for the drainage, and insert tube in the hole so you can have it empty out into the pond/tank or onto a waterfall into the pond/tank...

you then saturate the sand with water...

take the water pump, and pumpt the water onto the gravel side, the water will drain down the rocks, then as it fills, the water will press though the sand and release the water onto the other side, where it drains out.

Basicly, the rocks are the biological filter, and the sand will stop most other stuff, and you should have clean water on the other side...




['''''''''{}'''''''''''']
[oooo{}'''''''''''']
[oooo{}'''''''''''']
[oooo{}'''''''''''''====
[oooo{}'''''''''''']
[oooo{}-------]
[oooo{}-------]
[ooooo---------]
_____________


the o are rocks

the {} is the plasic divider

the ---- is the sand

and the ==== is the pipe

the '''''' is air, due to the fact that the board will compress spaces...

Water is dropped onto the rocks, and exits out the pipe...

i kinda get it and kinda don't how does it get from the rock side to the sand side? just fall over? wouldn't most of the debre just wash over with it? and then if the pipe was above the sand wouldn't most of the water just stay above the sand and go out the pipe? maybe if u found a way to get the water to travel throught the rocks then have the sand under the rocks so the water goes throught sand after the rocks so it would look like this

|------------ |
|000000000|
|000000000|
|000000000|
|000000000|
|000000000|
|=======|
|=======|
|=======|
|=======|
|=======|
__________]]]]]]]]]]]]

so ----- air
000000 rocks (maybe even bio balls?
==== sand
]]]]]]]]]pipe?

maybe i am just confused good idea cause i want to put a pond in my backyard but would rather not get the filter to just go out back(may not take the weather well)

The water would go though the rocks/bioballs, then there is a hole in the divider at the bottom that would be where the water then would flow into the satuarated sand, since more water would be coming in, water would be foced though the sand, and then pool above the sand, and exit though the pipe. Of course, one could also make it (perhaps much more simpler) by using large plant pots (say, the ones they use for trees) fill the first one with rocks, then have it drain into the sand, then waterfall (airating the water) into the pond. the catch then would be lining the sand so that the sand didn't end up in the pond. I was thinking of this due to the fact that rocks/bioballs would have the bacteria to covert chemicals, and the sand is used for water treatment already to filter out the nasty stuff. The nice thing about this design is that one would just have to replace the sand once in a while, the rocks would remain untouched to keep the bacteria growing. I was thinking of a neet way to do it with the water flowing down, then being pushed up though the sand by gravity of the water behind it, but pumping it to the top then having it drain twice down into the pond would work too.

i got u now didn't see the area open at the bottem of the devider. i will try it once i get sumthing to keep it in. what would u use to keep the sand from going into the rock/bio balls area? or would it be fine with the sand going through

the key thing is the rocks bioballs for biological filteration, then it going though the sand as a means of cheep mechanical filteration by not letting anything smaller then a grain of sand though...if the sand starts to go into the rocks, thats fine, as long as there is enough sand for it to go though.

You could substitute filter wool or a filter pad for the sand. Q. How come you have divided it? Wouldn't it work just as well if the layers of filter material were on top of each other?

yea thats what i was thinking i will try both i suppose probably won't be much money to construct.

I think the sand as a substrate would tend to clog up too much. Unless of course, a massive amount of surface area were provided. The idea is great but I too think that filter floss bought in bulk is a much more feasable aspect.

You guys are most likely right....

Just had a cool idea, then you figure out that There a lot simpler ways of doing it