You should by now have considered which type of pump and system that you will want to use with your pond, once you’ve decided which type of pond and filter system you will be using.
Pump chamber
Pump chamber is where you will fit the pumps, UV, air blower, and any other electrical appliances that support the filtration system. Regardless of which type of system you use, fibreglass filter units, or your own concrete block filters, make sure that you have a larger space for this as you may decide to fit something extra such as a sand filter or heating system.
The pumps needs to be well below the water level so that they will be full of water when they are stopped as most of them are not self priming.
The base of the pump chamber is the same level as the base for the filters, unless you are using large round filters.
You will need a pump that will be able to pass all of the pond water through the filter in 2-3 hours. So with a 6,000 gallons capacity pond, you will require a pump with a capacity of 3000 gals/hour. This is the actual pumping rate, which depend on the length of pipe runs and the design of the pipework with the minimum of sharp bends.
You will also need to take into account contact time – which is the time it takes frot he water to enter the filter till the time it exits the filter. Ideally this should be around ten to fifteen minutes.
Pumps
The pump the most important features in the system. It is important that you know which one you’re going to purchase. It is not just the cost and the pumping capacity that you have to consider but the running costs as well.
There are a few models that are available in the market. So you will need to do some research on which that would be best for your system. Look into pumps such as the Oase Aquamax which is available in various sizes and is available at 795 gals/hr for the 3500 model to 3300 gals/hr for the 15000 model. These are circulating pumps and are quite cost effective to run. There are also pumps like the Sequence if you want to pump a large amount of water with low electric consumption. While they are costly initially, they are effective and very reasonable to run.
These two pumps are used on big systems, you will need to use 2 inch diameter pipe with minimal number of bends in your setup.
