[Akai-San]

Quote: Originally Posted by Maurice There will be many ‘homemade’ versions of EA’s design and my own, for those doing this a couple of points: Don’t use too much media, there has to be enough spare room for the media to ‘churn’ well while cleaning. Make sure the slots or holes in the outlet pipe to the biological filtration are at least an inch above the level of the media in the static filter. Clean the static Kaldnes frequently, it’s great to achieve better mechanical filtration and pond clarity, but it’s not healthy, unless it flushed and dumped regularly!!!

Maurice,
I remember you mentioning that you actually left your pond unattended when you went on an extended vacation (as a system test). I do understand that regular cleaning is optimal for the Vortex K1 setup, and you would never recommend leaving the filtration for extended periods...but did the system hold-up when you got back from your vacation? If so, this passive system would have the capacity for minimal maintenance (ALTHOUGH NOT RECOMMENDED). Can you comment on your experiences testing the K1.

You have convinced me to go this route...I am planning to use two vortex side by side(two bottom drains so four vortex total)...each drain to have its own line...the first for heavy separation and the second as fines separation using your suggested K1 arrangement. After running through the K1 filtration process, I am planning to polish and aerate the water via bakki tower type and media. Does anyone see any possible problems with my first try at selecting a filtration setup. Thanks all.