Matala is too expensive.

And looking up the floor polishing pads on ebay that go on those big floor polishing machines, I can't figure out which color to buy. Don't need too fine of a filtration or it'll clog up with my dirty brown pond water.

If I used the washable AC filters, which brand have you guys used for years and KNOW that there is nothing in them that would kill the fish?

Was reading how one contained a fungicide that wiped out the fish..

I tend to think that if the AC filter material is treated with any anti-whatever stuff, it should mention that fact on the packaging. There again, maybe not.

I used to use a floor polisher pad in my sump barrel, it was green and fairly fine material.
(You could Google and find out about the different material coarseness/coloured pads).
I don't think I would want to have such a fine material as that pad to use as a pre-filter for the pump or even more risky, use quilt batting, that as you have witnessed plugs up very quickly. (I'm assuming, because I don't know exactly what your filter set up is, that you are using the quilt batting at present as a pre-filter material???)
Please excuse me if I jumped the gun on that.

Having too fine a pre-filter material, that plugs up very quickly, could starve the pump of the proper flow of water it requires to function as it is intended to do.

It is okay to cut down or slow the water flow on the output side of a pump but not on the intake side,with either valving or filtering. Nothing should ever impede the flow of water to the intake port of the pump.

Can you give us a description of what kind of filtration system you are employing at present and maybe some one can help you with that dirty brown water problem.

Fine material is usually used as the last filer mat that the water goes through before returning to the pond.
"Horton"

First, the skippy is old, but I just rehabbed it. After years of neglect it was chock full of stuff. The old media was quilt batting in bags, and I had plants on top, but it was basically just mud.

Pre filter - none. Got bottom drains that were retro'd in, even though they were put in when the pond was built, because I was scared to cut the liner so I put the 4" water lines and bottom drains inside the pond on top of the liner. This goes to a priming pot / leaf basket, then to the pump. The pump pushes water up to a 300 gallon skippy, which has a vortex at the bottom, a grate, polyethylene baling twine (the only thing I could find that I thought would work like strapping material) and bird netting, then another grate and the water pushes out of the top of the skippy into a 4" line that leads to the top of the waterfall.

My original pond design also employed 2 55 gallon drums - one as a vortex and one filled with quilt batting. It didn't work, and though I knew how to fix it, after building the pond 4 years ago I was tired and didn't want to reinvent my wheel! I pretty much left the pond going with only a skippy, and since then have gotten a divorce and all kinds of things that meant 0 attention to the pond.

Oddly enough, me cleaning the pond has made the water browner than ever. Guess I'm stirring up stuff. Cleaned out the top pond, which is maybe 6' by 4' by 4'. Top to bottom. Cleaned out the skippy top to bottom. The bottom pond is another issue because the fish are all there. It's around 18' by 18' by 4-5' deep. And I'm sure the bottom is full of all kinds of crud that my DIY retro bottom drains are not quite good enough to get.

I've been changing out the water pretty frequently and using this pond water to water my plants. Probably going way above and beyond the 10% per week. Willing to bet it's more like 40%. But I'm using well water and the fish aren't struggling. The brown water isn't getting any better. Woulda thought eventually it would dilute into something a little clearer?

One suggestion that comes to mind is that you try pumping out the bottom of that pond by lowering a solids handling pump on a rope, down into the sludge and moving it across the bottom of the pond in stages, to pump out the build up.

I would not filter the pumped out water/gunk, just get rid of it onto the lawn or garden and do a top up when you see that only clean water is being pumped out.

Another suggestion is to drain the pond completely, dig out the gunk and fix the bottom drain, if that is possible?

The Skippy that the water is pumped into from your pump, is as you already know, your first line of defense and should contain mechanical filtration material first, going up to the finest last.
I figure if you get rid of the build up in the pond, then on a regular basis, drain the bottom of your Skippy, via a 2" drain valve, to remove accumulated gunky water, you will see an end to the dirty water problem.
"Horton"

How would you suggest I fix the bottom drains? What I have now is 4" pipe down there that Ts and there are 2 90s coming up with black plastic covers on top. I think I probably need to take the 90s off and figure out a way to attach the caps closer to the ground. Those 90s put my actual bottom drains probably 10" or a foot above the liner.
The pond does get deeper where the drains are though.

I've been thinking of putting mechanical filtration in the Skippy, but as quickly as it'll get clogged with my water the way it is now, it would be something I would need to clean every day or 2 for a little while. What would happen if I put the mechanical filtration on the top so that I can reach in and clean it easily with a forceful waterhose, then when the water is clearer it can go on the bottom under the bio media? I know it's not ideal, but will it work temporarily?

I have a pond pump and filter at my disposal. Was thinking of rigging up some kind of vacuume to the pump to get some of these solids out. Does anyone have a link with instructions on how to rig it cheaply?

Thanks,
Carrie

Alas, however in your case, from what you said in your post, your bottom drain plumbing having been retro fitted in the pond, the inlet ports are sitting over the bottom, but not sufficiently close enough to suck in too much debris, if any at all?

That situation would have to be remedied or you will always have the sludge building up on the bottom of your pond. The inlets of the bottom drain are not close enough to the sludge to do any good. It maybe just a case of extending the piping to the inlets, down closer to the bottom.
That of course means emptying your pond. And at which time the sludge can be dunged out.

As to your question about using a pool pump ( but not the pool filter, as it will plug up before you know it) to suck the debris from the bottom of your pond.
Why not, if you have pool pump handy, it will do a great job of sucking out the sludge.

See link below.
You just need your pool pump and a couple of hoses. You don't need all the rest of the set up shown in the article, other than you may wish to build one like it for future use.
This set up has lots of pulling power for sure.
I made one up this spring and it certainly sucks the sludge and small pebbles out of the pond.

I would definitely focus on the cleaning out of that big pond first, the re-vamp of the bottom drain inlets and then the filtration part can be evaluated and re-vamped if require.

Let's know what you think.
Horton"

Wondering, with that pond vaccum, the hose they've added looks really flexible. I was thinking of making a stiffer end. Maybe PVC? Like a normal vacuum. To give the user more control. What do you think? I would attach the pvc to the flexible hose, again, just like a normal vacuum.

Did you use the swimming pool hose and the swimming pool vacuum head? Those are pricy.

Inverted salad bowl - got that! Only instead of 2" above the floor it's much more! Maybe I should pull them out and put buckets or big flower pots on top instead of the big inverted salad bowls? I've been trying to think of ways for me to redesign the bottom drains, but so far I'm hitting a blank.

I accidentally pulled out the bottom drains earlier this year. Wondering if I should do that again. Don't really want to turn the pump off though with our temps about to hit 100. Worried that lack of oxygen would become a big deal really quickly.

As for the pool vac.
I bought some cheap PVC swimming pool hose, as I wanted to find out just how good a job that pool pump would do, before I invested in the more expensive hose.
I experimented with it this spring and I was very impressed with the way it sucked up the gunk and small pebbles from the bottom of my pond.
The hose I bought was white and had a slightly thicker corrugated walled, I believe, than the black corrugated hose you would use on a sump pump. I think the white PVC hose came on the market, along with those small above ground swimming pools, that the big box stores sell.

I found, however, that you have to be careful with it, if you suck up something up that plugs the end, the hose will collapse into it's self.

I used a half length (5 feet) of 1 " PVC conduit as a wand and it worked quite well.

I intend to find some secondhand pool hose and a proper pole (vac wand) so I don't have the problem with the PVC hose collapsing. I'm in no hurry, so I'll just keep looking until I find some one who has given up on their swimming pool, or if I can find one at a yard sale.
"Horton"

Was wondering if replacing the sand in the filter with anthracite (we use it here on drinking water) would make a good every once and a while filter? I like the idea since the pool filter comes with a backwash function- which no DIY filter I could make can be backwashed with enough force!

Of course I wouldn't even attempt any such filter until the crud is out of the bottom..

I've got to do some research on bottom drains that are retro'd in... Gotta be a way to attach something to the 4" pipe that would allow it to pull that close to the liner.