pond filter continued

We are officially in summer and with the warm weather, the perennial problem of pond filtration has once again come to the fore.  Last year I posted a piece on my blog about a prototype I was working on to clear the pea soup pond in my garden to a gin clear beauty.  Following what I learn't last year, I have once again been working on a prototype to solve the problem, so far with limited results.   As I have said before, good things take time, but I wish everything would happen faster.  I guess the older you get the less patience you have and when it comes to having a clear pond my patience is waining but I'm not giving up yet.  More to follow.

product design ideas - pond filter

I have a small pond that is currently the colour of pea soup and i'd like it to be clear.  I have a UV Light on the pump outlet, but it doesn't seem to be reducing the green (yes I've checked the bulb).  So, this weekend, I decided to go all Heath Robinson on it.  I have a load of stainless steel mesh, left over from other projects (originally my kettle design).  I've used it before to filter bits out of wine, so I thought I'd make a set up to try and take some of the sediment out of the water.  The rig I built works really well for a while, tiny bits ofsediment build up as they hit the mesh and are pushed to the sides by the pressure of the water, but aftter about an hour or so, the build up gets too great and rather than go through the mesh, the water spills over the sides.  So, I've been thinking of improving the design to incorporate a water wheel, driven by the fall of the water to brush the sediment that builds up into a collection area.  This is only the first stage, this is the product design process in action.  I have identified the problem, almost have a working solution, but it still needs the design process to make it into a realistic object.