a few questions on pond building

Hi CYRUS,

I am a owner of a 1300gallon pond in my Bed room. I'm 23 years old i live in Columbus, Ohio, My sugesstion would be is to use concrete foam from my experince in home construction. I met this home owner who use CONCRETE FOAM for a small house he built for his mother. I was in the basement few times, I can tell you that, the temapeture out side of the house was about 95 degrees over 100degrees Humidaty (That which is very hot) but the tempeture inside the basement was frezzing as hell!

The house it was still still in the process of being built. there was no air conditioning at all nor electricity the owner's plan was to use the basement air ventalation to cool the house upstairs (How clever of him). The concrete is made of concrete in the middle and at least two-3 inches of foam a foot wide CONCRETE FOAM BLOCK. I did stucco and stone on the walls, i put 1 and half inche nails and didn't even touch the concrete. The matrial is kinda new it's been out only a couple years only. You should be able to get it. When you getting to that stuff i is kinda pricey. I've seen alot of other fresh built houses an their basement settings before from million dollar homes to 100 thousand dollar houses, this one is the only one i seen that had no water problem ever due to the foam insulation, which i think is unique.

If you decide to go with i suggest of covering up the foam with lining so you don't damage the foam. I hope this help you out a bit.

Redtail_Watcher.

CYRUS said:

im not sure if im posting this on the right pond forum but i think its some what an indoor pond what im trying to build here. well the plan was the pond would be built inside a green house kinda thing to regulate the temperature. the actual Green house would then be connected to the house so the actual abient temp would be regualted by the house themo but portable heater can always be rolled into the green house if needed. in a way im building an extention of my house but in glass something like how an indoor pool would be that has sky lights or glass roofing. water heating would be a total different story. as of now the plan is using a pool heater which hopfully would keep them water temp constant. the size of the pond would be L-40ft x W-15ft x D-3ft. by the way its an in ground pond.

here are my questions:

-what do you guys think would be the best material to use in such a massive pond? rubber liner or concrete? by the way i live in Richmond BC so we're somewhat even with the sea level at times but then again some houses here in Richmond do have swimming pool so i dont think its does matter
-if i do use rubber liner, how do you do the insulation to prevent heat loss under ground? do you put styros between the earth and the rubber liner?
-is there any other more efficent and cost friendly way to heat the pond up aside from what i was thinking of using (pool heater)
-is it true when you have plants in the pond you dont have to do water change as often?
-i was thinking of filling the bottom part with river rocks to hide my floor filters would that not be a good idea if im using rubber liner?
-i was thining of using sand filters as well, how do you clean the filter on these things? or do you even clean these things out or do you just change the sand every so often? i heard about bead filters too, does that work better than sand filter?
-would one UV60 http://www.aquaticeco.com/index.cfm/fuseaction/product.detail/iid/8998/cid/2204 be enough for this pond?

any other suggestions or comments would really help me out.

Click to expand...

For heating and plumbing electricty cost i think you shoud use a solar panel and a deep cycle battery. Some Solar panels are available a hardware stores.

Redtail_Watcher.

CYRUS said:

im not sure if im posting this on the right pond forum but i think its some what an indoor pond what im trying to build here. well the plan was the pond would be built inside a green house kinda thing to regulate the temperature. the actual Green house would then be connected to the house so the actual abient temp would be regualted by the house themo but portable heater can always be rolled into the green house if needed. in a way im building an extention of my house but in glass something like how an indoor pool would be that has sky lights or glass roofing. water heating would be a total different story. as of now the plan is using a pool heater which hopfully would keep them water temp constant. the size of the pond would be L-40ft x W-15ft x D-3ft. by the way its an in ground pond.

here are my questions:

-what do you guys think would be the best material to use in such a massive pond? rubber liner or concrete? by the way i live in Richmond BC so we're somewhat even with the sea level at times but then again some houses here in Richmond do have swimming pool so i dont think its does matter
-if i do use rubber liner, how do you do the insulation to prevent heat loss under ground? do you put styros between the earth and the rubber liner?
-is there any other more efficent and cost friendly way to heat the pond up aside from what i was thinking of using (pool heater)
-is it true when you have plants in the pond you dont have to do water change as often?
-i was thinking of filling the bottom part with river rocks to hide my floor filters would that not be a good idea if im using rubber liner?
-i was thining of using sand filters as well, how do you clean the filter on these things? or do you even clean these things out or do you just change the sand every so often? i heard about bead filters too, does that work better than sand filter?
-would one UV60 http://www.aquaticeco.com/index.cfm/fuseaction/product.detail/iid/8998/cid/2204 be enough for this pond?

any other suggestions or comments would really help me out.

Click to expand...

hi cyrus iam in langley and think your pond idea is a great idea what are you going to put in it? one thing you could try is make the pond out of concrete then put carpet underlay down to help with heat then put a pond lyner ontop

Don't know what your budget is, but it sounds large enough...

Is 3ft enough to be below the frost line?

Look into spray foam insulation. If you dig your hole. Spray on the foam insulation 6in - 8in thick, then place the liner in, that should give you a descent thermal factor and no frost rising or cracking.

Your going to have a large thermal and water lost with such a big surface area, but maybe you could cover part of the pond with a thermal pool cover and alot of plants.

Plants will help with nutrient removal, to limit algae growth. Water hyacinths, water lettuce, and lillies.

Sand filters are backwashed to blow out all the garbage, it's done with a multi-port valve on the filter.

Passive solar heating is a viable method for you, but check around locally to find someone who has already done it for a swimming pool.

Using big (or alot of) river rock will give you a large thermal mass to help regulate the water temp.

If you use a sand filter, bypass part of the return water to the UV-60 as it's a lower flow rate than your filter. Remember there is maintenance on the UV's (lamp replacement 6-8mo's).

Hi Cyrus,

Where abouts in BC are you?

Five foot depth will help stabiize temp, & you you could either put large plants in floating trays or pedestals.

You could also slope the bottom or tier it from 5t up to 2ft for shallow for smaller fish or breeding (the fish).

What kind of edge did you want on the pond?
!) You could burm the edge with the dirt from the pond and extend the liner over the top.
2) Compact the edge and put up a one or two block tall wall (or landscape timbers / railroad ties), but don't raise water that high, wall is only for looks unless you reinforce it.
3) Leave it level with ground and edge with ? (rock / timbers etc) to hold liner edge down.
Then just spray the foam directly on the dirt. This foam is used for home insulation and is sprayed between the studs and trimmed / shaved even with studs so wall board can be installed. Foam can be sprayed relatively flat so you shouldn't need to trim it. Just let it cure completely before putting in liner. Foam is firm but you'll have to lay something down to walk on it.

Pool covers are also like bubble wrap and float on the water. they're usually blue in color. You could cut them into strips or large circles to make them more asthetic and take them off when company comes (like slip covers ).

You could get large lily pads (victorian lily?) about 3ft - ft accross !

The liners are usually 40-45mils thick so as long as the rocks are not sharp shouldn't be a problem, Hand lay the flattest ones on the bottom.For solar start with the interent and get educated...then talk to several dealers to find out what they are capable of doing. get referrals from dealers / installers and talk to them. There are some bad people out there that can screw things up bad. And your fish are counting on you.

Solar could also be used to heat the shelter or atleast help.

Sand filters by design filter very well first time thru so they need to be backwashed (cleaned) more often. Bead filters are designed to filter by multiple passes, each pass picks out more trash. they are backwashed like sand filters.

None of this is cast in stone (no pun intended), if you've got ideas or questions don't hesitate to bring them up.

After all it is kinda your pond too.

Glad to help and keep us posted ( WITH PICS )

We all love to watch other people work .

Dr Joe

What about concrete affecting the pH of the water?