pond leak - does this make sense?

[gng]

I have a 2500 gallon pond, cement with liner, and woke up the other morning
to find that half the water was gone! I found a small hairline crack along
the smaller waterfall - perhaps a foot long. The water flows over the
crack; the crack is not submerged. I patched it and everything seems fine.
Does this make sense that this was the problem? 1200 gallons down in 12
hours? It was raining hard that night so I could not tell if it was wet in
one area or another. I had this problem before but I would lose maybe 2
inches a day, not a foot and a half of water in a night.

Also, now that I am paranoid, I had this idea for how to stop the pump if
the water drops. I have a 1/5" intake tube that goes to the bottom of the
pond. If I put a T coupling on it a couple of feet from the bottom, if the
pond ever dropped lower than that would I not lose prime and suction -
hence, causing the pump to stop pumping the pond dry?

Gary

[John Bachman]

On Mon, 17 Jan 2005 09:23:23 -0800, "gng" >
wrote:

>I have a 2500 gallon pond, cement with liner, and woke up the other morning
>to find that half the water was gone! I found a small hairline crack along
>the smaller waterfall - perhaps a foot long. The water flows over the
>crack; the crack is not submerged. I patched it and everything seems fine.
>Does this make sense that this was the problem? 1200 gallons down in 12
>hours? It was raining hard that night so I could not tell if it was wet in
>one area or another. I had this problem before but I would lose maybe 2
>inches a day, not a foot and a half of water in a night.
>
>Also, now that I am paranoid, I had this idea for how to stop the pump if
>the water drops. I have a 1/5" intake tube that goes to the bottom of the
>pond. If I put a T coupling on it a couple of feet from the bottom, if the
>pond ever dropped lower than that would I not lose prime and suction -
>hence, causing the pump to stop pumping the pond dry?


1200 gallons in 12 hours = 100 gallons/hr = 1.67 gallons/minute = a
leak noticable even in a rain storm. Especially since the "heavy
rainstorm" added water to the pond which means that the leak was
greater than 1.67 gallons/minute.

Yet, the patch solved it. Are you sure that your fish are not
spitting water out when you are not looking just to mess with you?

John

[~ jan JJsPond.us]

Gary wrote:
>I have a 2500 gallon pond, cement with liner, and woke up the other morning
>to find that half the water was gone! I found a small hairline crack along
>the smaller waterfall - perhaps a foot long. The water flows over the
>crack; the crack is not submerged. I patched it and everything seems fine.
>Does this make sense that this was the problem? 1200 gallons down in 12
>hours?

Amazingly it is possible. Small holes can cause drops in inches, whereas
your hole was a foot long.

>Also, now that I am paranoid, I had this idea for how to stop the pump if
>the water drops. I have a 1/5" intake tube that goes to the bottom of the
>pond. If I put a T coupling on it a couple of feet from the bottom, if the
>pond ever dropped lower than that would I not lose prime and suction -
>hence, causing the pump to stop pumping the pond dry?

It would, and you'd burn out your pump. Better to get an automatic shut
off. www.aquaticeco.com type in *mercury float switch* if the URL below
doesn't get you there:
http://www.aquaticeco.com/index.cfm/fuseaction/product.detail/iid/11432/cid/2965

~ jan


See my ponds and filter design:
http://users.owt.com/jjspond/

~Keep 'em Wet!~
Tri-Cities WA Zone 7a
To e-mail see website

[gng]

Thanks - Jan, which device should I buy? I looked at the website and there
are lots of options. I have a Sequence 7100 pump. How does it work? Do I
plug the pump into this gizmo?

Gary
"~ jan JJsPond.us" > wrote in message
...
> Gary wrote:
> >I have a 2500 gallon pond, cement with liner, and woke up the other
morning
> >to find that half the water was gone! I found a small hairline crack
along
> >the smaller waterfall - perhaps a foot long. The water flows over the
> >crack; the crack is not submerged. I patched it and everything seems
fine.
> >Does this make sense that this was the problem? 1200 gallons down in 12
> >hours?
>
> Amazingly it is possible. Small holes can cause drops in inches, whereas
> your hole was a foot long.
>
> >Also, now that I am paranoid, I had this idea for how to stop the pump if
> >the water drops. I have a 1/5" intake tube that goes to the bottom of
the
> >pond. If I put a T coupling on it a couple of feet from the bottom, if
the
> >pond ever dropped lower than that would I not lose prime and suction -
> >hence, causing the pump to stop pumping the pond dry?
>
> It would, and you'd burn out your pump. Better to get an automatic shut
> off. www.aquaticeco.com type in *mercury float switch* if the URL below
> doesn't get you there:
>
http://www.aquaticeco.com/index.cfm/fuseaction/product.detail/iid/11432/cid/2965
>
> ~ jan
>
>
> See my ponds and filter design:
> http://users.owt.com/jjspond/
>
> ~Keep 'em Wet!~
> Tri-Cities WA Zone 7a
> To e-mail see website

[~ jan JJsPond.us]

>>*mercury float switch*
>>http://www.aquaticeco.com/index.cfm/fuseaction/product.detail/iid/11432/cid/2965
>> ~ jan

>Thanks - Jan, which device should I buy? I looked at the website and there
>are lots of options. I have a Sequence 7100 pump. How does it work? Do I
>plug the pump into this gizmo? >Gary

It plugs into the outlet and you plug your pump in behind its plug. The
float switch needs to be in the water. I use the one that when the water
level drops so far it cuts the power to the pump. In your case, with a pump
that is out-of-the-water, you may have to use an extension cord depending
on where your pump is in relation to pond and plug-in. ~ jan


~Power to the Porg, Flow On!~

[Pam]

For the first few months after we built our pond it lost water every time
it rained. Sometimes it lost more than half its volume. It turned out
that the outlet from the kiddy pool veggie filter back into the pond was too
small. It could keep up with the pump (external ), but it couldn't keep
up with both pump and rain. If it rained long enough the veggie filter
would continue to overflow until the water level in the pond dropped low
enough to stop the pump. We put a much larger outlet in the veggie filter,
and will double the size of the veggie filter this summer.

Good luck

[Hal]

On Sat, 22 Jan 2005 12:32:21 -0600, "Pam" > wrote:

>For the first few months after we built our pond it lost water every time
>it rained. Sometimes it lost more than half its volume. It turned out
>that the outlet from the kiddy pool veggie filter back into the pond was too
>small. It could keep up with the pump (external ), but it couldn't keep
>up with both pump and rain. If it rained long enough the veggie filter
>would continue to overflow until the water level in the pond dropped low
>enough to stop the pump. We put a much larger outlet in the veggie filter,
>and will double the size of the veggie filter this summer.

I'm having a bit of trouble with adding more water causes one to lose
water. If the return pipe is adequate for pump flow that should
remain constant rain or shine.

Do you have a waterfall?

Regards,

Hal

[Pam]

No waterfall. Water goes out of the veggie filter through a pipe back into
the pond.

As long as the veggie filter does not overflow everything is fine, but
once it starts overflowing I guess the water follows the path of least
resistance.



"Hal" > wrote in message
...
> On Sat, 22 Jan 2005 12:32:21 -0600, "Pam" > wrote:
>
>>For the first few months after we built our pond it lost water every time
>>it rained. Sometimes it lost more than half its volume. It turned out
>>that the outlet from the kiddy pool veggie filter back into the pond was
>>too
>>small. It could keep up with the pump (external ), but it couldn't keep
>>up with both pump and rain. If it rained long enough the veggie filter
>>would continue to overflow until the water level in the pond dropped low
>>enough to stop the pump. We put a much larger outlet in the veggie
>>filter,
>>and will double the size of the veggie filter this summer.
>
> I'm having a bit of trouble with adding more water causes one to lose
> water. If the return pipe is adequate for pump flow that should
> remain constant rain or shine.
>
> Do you have a waterfall?
>
> Regards,
>
> Hal

[Stephen Henning]

Hal > wrote:

> On Sat, 22 Jan 2005 12:32:21 -0600, "Pam" > wrote:
>
> >For the first few months after we built our pond it lost water every time
> >it rained. Sometimes it lost more than half its volume. It turned out
> >that the outlet from the kiddy pool veggie filter back into the pond was too
> >small. It could keep up with the pump (external ), but it couldn't keep
> >up with both pump and rain. If it rained long enough the veggie filter
> >would continue to overflow until the water level in the pond dropped low
> >enough to stop the pump. We put a much larger outlet in the veggie filter,
> >and will double the size of the veggie filter this summer.
>
> I'm having a bit of trouble with adding more water causes one to lose
> water. If the return pipe is adequate for pump flow that should
> remain constant rain or shine.

I agree. You may have found the problem, but it was a problem before it
started raining. When the veggie filter pool gets full, it has more
pressure at the outlet and more water flows out into the pond unless
there is an obstruction. In other words, you had an obstruction out of
the veggie filter that caused less water to flow into the pond.

Otherwise the pond would have more water because it would have at least
the same amount flowing into it, plus it has the rain water coming into
it plus it has additional flow from the veggie filter pool due to the
increase height of the water in the veggie filter pool.

This all assumes that the pump flow was constant. It may have changed
for some reason.

--
Pardon my spam deterrent; send email to
Cheers, Steve Henning in Reading, PA USA
http://home.earthlink.net/~rhodyman

[Hal]

On Sun, 23 Jan 2005 10:09:32 -0600, "Pam" > wrote:

>No waterfall. Water goes out of the veggie filter through a pipe back into
>the pond.
>
> As long as the veggie filter does not overflow everything is fine, but
>once it starts overflowing I guess the water follows the path of least
>resistance.

I suspect Stephen may be right about the obstruction. I don't see
the pump output changing drastically. When it rains could the rain
beat down foliage in the veggie filter that would block or partially
block the return pipe?

Regards,

Hal