Fri, 2010/03/26 - 4:53am
Hi,
I'm in the process of building up a parts list to make a 50 litre hydro/aero tote.
Over the past few months, in various places on the 'net, I see that water pumps
are notoriously unreliable.
What pumps are people buying these days for this kind of application?
Thanks for your time.
Fri, 2010/03/26 - 12:32pm
#2
In your design, you might want to consider how to keep roots out of the water pump intake, and make the water pump fairly easy to remove and clean while there's a mass of plant in the system. Knee-high pantyhose works fairly well as a root barrier.
Fri, 2010/03/26 - 1:12pm
#3
I think you can probably forget about cleaning the pump when it's in the system proper, remember this picture of my roots...
There would be no way to get at the pump in this instance without severe damage to the root ball, the only way to have a completely root proof, cleanable, pump would be to have it outside in another tote full of nutes. You then feed the output of the pump, via a pipe, to the misting system in the growing tote.
I used a fine micron bag to keep my roots away from the pump impeller, this has worked well.
Fri, 2010/03/26 - 3:36pm
#4
Thank you both, Peat and Gisette, I appreciate your kindness and time to reply - and especially the photo.
I shall look at the makers you suggest, Peat, and I'll be looking at plenty of designs, Gisette!
Many thanks to you both once again - I really appreciate your replies.
Kevin
Hello kevinhannan and welcome.
I've not had any problems with the make of pump I've used on my hydro/aero setup, the manufacturer is Sicce (although I'm unsure whether this is obtainable in the US?). If you get one of the main manufacturers then you'll have no problems, Maxiijet, Eheim & Rio are others.
I bought the Sicce line because they are flow adjustable, just turn the dial and you can have the flow as strong as you wish. My setup was using a 35 litre tote (lettuce and tomatoes grown) and the model I used was the Sicce Nova - this gave me a decent spray from my misters.
Good luck with your build, you'll get some impressive results using this method. Keep us posted as I'd like to see the outcome - any help we can give just ask.