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10 min $10 DIY aerated compost tea ACT brewer

DARC MIND

Member
Veteran
give a dog a bone

give a dog a bone

thanks the comment!!:moon:
sometimes i swing it like louie vill lumber but still no need for name calling
thats highschool shit:tiphat:
oh shit i want to build this so badly! how does it stand up?
used a old stable metal succulent pot holder as a stand were a 1-1/2 gal jug can easily fit under to catch the finished tea with the turn of a valve.
i then dilute that jug to about 4 gals of rain water and its on
 
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Bullfrog44

Active member
Veteran
So I am building a unit like Darc Mind and I know the recommended minimum size pump is Eco Plus Commercial 1, but I was wondering what you guys thought about using an Eco Plus Commercial 5 for a 5 gal brewer? I want to make sure I can upgrade in size down the road, but don't want to have to buy two air pumps. Any info on going to big?

Darc Mind - High School Shit? Lol, just stop throwing tantrums and the dog wont bite. Peace from here on out brother.
 

jaykush

dirty black hands
ICMag Donor
Veteran
i have the eco 7 and if it goes into too little water i end up with a water explosion.
 

Microbeman

The Logical Gardener
ICMag Donor
Veteran
So I am building a unit like Darc Mind and I know the recommended minimum size pump is Eco Plus Commercial 1, but I was wondering what you guys thought about using an Eco Plus Commercial 5 for a 5 gal brewer? I want to make sure I can upgrade in size down the road, but don't want to have to buy two air pumps. Any info on going to big?

Darc Mind - High School Shit? Lol, just stop throwing tantrums and the dog wont bite. Peace from here on out brother.

you can use an eco 5 in 5 gallons, just use 1.25" pipe
 

Bullfrog44

Active member
Veteran
I bought the ecco commercial 5 today, comes in on Friday. I hope it all works out, I will take some pics if it does. Thanks for all the help everybody.
 

heady blunts

prescription blunts
Veteran
upgrade!

thanks to rip van weed for the clever idea. it really improves the flow (and hopefully circulation)!

picture.php


plus i fashioned a much better brace to keep the air lift upright.

picture.php
 

Bullfrog44

Active member
Veteran
Done! It works great people. I will try to get some pics up this weekend but I get a vortex with only 2 gal of water in the 5 gal bottle. The commercial ecco 5 is very powerful and has no problem with 1 1/4 pipe. The only problem is it is loud as a mofo, but it is so nice. Maybe one note for next build is not to cut the entire 5 gal bottom off. I think a quarter of the bottom would be more than enough for the pipe, and you will get way less over flow. I might just go and buy another bottle just for this reason. Otherwise, this only took me about an hour once I had all the parts. That includes stand, pvc and fabrication of the bottle. Like I said, pics to come later in the weekend.

Edit: without the pump this cost me 11.99 for the bottle, and $17 for the pvc fittings. The stand I had spare lumber around. Where do the people at vortex get $1,500 from? WTF?
 

jaykush

dirty black hands
ICMag Donor
Veteran
my 55 gallon conebottom brewer rumbles like a distant raging river. music to my ears. i have an eco7 and when connected to the brewer its not loud at all. just a hummmmm. the brewer rumbling is far louder lol. you can feel it when standing next to it.
 

Bullfrog44

Active member
Veteran
The hose def keeps the noice down, but the rumble of the brew is the air pump reverberating inside the water. Very cool stuff, now I just need to order a cone bottom and make my 15 gal. The 5 works perfectly.
 

heady blunts

prescription blunts
Veteran
yea my four gallon air lift in a bucket is super loud. it's a close call which is louder: the air pumps, the vibrations of the bucket, or the splashing.
 
T

tuinman

Really great thread, thank you everyone for the fantastic info.

I followed in Stankie and Scrappy4's footsteps and built this:

8l0tj.jpg


The time around was running air directly into the bottom of the bucket and letting it bubble up - but ran into problems with the ball valve getting clogged up. I tore it down and went with a 1" pipe and the airlift style instead. It's just mounted on a couple of cut down chairs that happened to be around, and use a little luggage dolly to wheel it around the yard.

Also did a video of it in action: http://tinypic.com/player.php?v=w6rwx2&s=7

Eventually the pump will be mounted on the side with the air hose curving over the top of the tank in case power is lost.
 

jaykush

dirty black hands
ICMag Donor
Veteran
tuinman be sure to keep your pump higher than the water level in your brewer. if the power were to shut off for any odd reason your pump wont get backfilled with ACT.
 
T

tuinman

This was just the test run, it's not even glued together yet. Today's errand is mounting the pump to the side of a tank and running the air hose over the top. When testing this, having the hose curving over the top of the tank prevented the ACT from backfilling the pump - it would just rise to the top of the tank level and stay.
 

bonsai

Member
Those blue 5gal water bottles contain BPA. Anyone have any thoughts on this?
Homebrewers use a higher-grade non-BPA version ... at about triple the price.

Darc Mind: Are you using a diffuser in your brewer? If so, did you try it without? I'll be using the equiv of an Eco 3 pump w/ 1" PVC, hoping to avoid needing a diffuser for simplicity of build+clean plus less parts = less $.
 
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