Ryan's 150g Marineland Deep Dimension!

[Ryan S]

Here is my temp swing over the past 7 days. No fan or chiller on the tank (yet). 4 hours/day MH:

[Ryan S]

Ok, I may have to add a chiller. Before I spend the money on a chiller, I am going to try a fan and see if that can do the trick first. Adam hooked me up with a clip-on fan, but I'm having a hard time finding a good place to clip it. I may be able to use it down the road in the sump, but not at the moment (too much crap down there!)

 

I found this vornado-type fan on amazon, for $20 shipped:

 

It can be wall-mounted, so the plan is to mount in on the wall behind the tank and have it blowing across the tank, which should blow the hot air into the living room (great for winter), and away from the tank. Right now the tank is hovering at 81-83, and at 83 I have the Apex turn the MH off. So Wednesday night it was scheduled to run from 4-9pm, but shut off at 8pm b/c the tank hit 83 degrees. Thursday night it shut off at 5pm b/c the tank his 83 degrees (obviously this is not going to work). So we'll see if the fan can drop the temperature at least 1 or 2 degrees, and keep the tank running in the 80-82 range.

 

Here is a photo of the tank to get an idea of where the fan will go. (Note the current fan in the picture is just temporary. I wanted to test this fan before installing the new one on the wall).

[Ryan S]

Check out this 36" Sfilgoi light fixture. Probably the most beautiful light fixture I've ever seen. Dang.

http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2227468

[epleeds]

Oh yea. I love my sfiligoi.

[Ryan S]

On the chiller front. If I find a nice chiller... I have limited room in my sump to add a dedicated pump (though it might be do-able). The easiest solution would be to swap out my mag 9.5 return pump for a mag 18 (or mag 24?) and make a manifold. The manifold could replace all of my maxi jet 1200s, and feed 1) The DT, 2) the UV, 3) the carbon MR5 reactor, 4) the GFO MR5 reactor, 5) the chaeto box, 6) the chiller. (Would a mag 18 be enough flow for all of that? Would a mag 24 be better?) The alternative would be to find a small utility pump, and make room for it in my sump, and just run that to/from the chiller. That would be the easiest and fastest solution, assuming I can make space for it in the sump. I may need to take the carbon and GFO reactors offline to accomodate the pump though. Thoughts?

 

What are good (and small!) utility pumps? Add a mag 7 pump? MJ3000 (775gph) Utility Pump?

[Der ABT]

Ok this is where i would say go away from the mag pump unless you make it external.

 

External pump will help take heat out of the water (technically the tank is cooling the pump right now) so that would be one way to shed some heat...

 

otherwise look at waterblasters, very efficient and from what ive hear pretty powerful

[MBVette]

get a waterblaster and get rid of the mag. There is very little heat transferred into the tank from the waterblaster.

[Ryan S]

Ok this is where i would say go away from the mag pump unless you make it external.

 

External pump will help take heat out of the water (technically the tank is cooling the pump right now) so that would be one way to shed some heat...

 

otherwise look at waterblasters, very efficient and from what ive hear pretty powerful

I will check out the waterblasters. If I add a chiller, the pump being internal or external won't matter. Some day I will have an external again like my last tank. This tank was designed with an internal in mind unfortunately.

 

get a waterblaster and get rid of the mag. There is very little heat transferred into the tank from the waterblaster.

I wish I could fix my heat problem by just swapping out my return pump, but I'm pretty sure the heat problem is from the 400w MH above the tank Afterall, I was running the mag 9.5 for 9 months w/ the radions and the tank never got above 80 degrees.

Edited October 26, 2012 by Ryan S

[Der ABT]

Just because the chiller takes care of the heat...your still payign for that double in electricity as youll be making the chiller work harder/more often.

 

regardless i bet the fan helps alot, maybe even add one in the sump too.

[Ryan S]

Just because the chiller takes care of the heat...your still payign for that double in electricity as youll be making the chiller work harder/more often.

 

regardless i bet the fan helps alot, maybe even add one in the sump too.

True. And I hope it works too. A lot easier to mount the fan on the wall and call it a day. I just hope it's enough to keep the temperature down. If not, chiller it is.

[John]

I mounted a similar fan under the cabinet that points down onto the sump...out of sight...may be something to consider...

[trockafella]

I would start with cleaning up your current mess. Having 4, 5, or 6 pumps in your sump alone can add heat, especially when 1 is a MAg. I think you should go back to the drawing board and clean up that aea all together. Do you really need all of those things, can it be minimized.? A manifold could work good, but I dont know that you have the space for the either. Maybe you should just go to T5s instead.

[Incredible Corals]

LEDs would be much cooler

[Ryan S]

I would start with cleaning up your current mess. Having 4, 5, or 6 pumps in your sump alone can add heat, especially when 1 is a MAg. I think you should go back to the drawing board and clean up that aea all together. Do you really need all of those things, can it be minimized.? A manifold could work good, but I dont know that you have the space for the either. Maybe you should just go to T5s instead.

It is a mess. No doubt. When I move next July and take the tank down, I want to fix the mess when I set it back up. I was thinking about hiring Rob to do that for me. A large external pump and a manifold would likely help clean everything up.

 

In the mean time, it looks like I have found a 1/3 HP chiller that I'll be installing with a dedicated pump in the sump. The crammed mess of pumps in the tiny 20g sump isn't ideal, but this solution should work for the near future and keep temps in check. I love T5s. If I didn't need 12-16 bulbs over this tank for complete coverage (and the associated $240-$320 annual replacement bulb costs, I would totally try them out.)

[Jim]

When I added a mag 5 to my system it raised the average operating temp about 2 degrees in a ~140 gallon system.

[Ryan S]

Okay. A chiller is being added to the system. A 1/3 HP JBJ Artica will be added to the system next week. I'll be swapping out my mag 9.5 for a mag 18 and running the chiller in-line. This should fix the heating problem once and for all. This seems like the best solution for the health of the tank.

[BowieReefer84]

When you are down under that sump changing out the pump clean up the rats nest.

[Ryan S]

When you are down under that sump changing out the pump clean up the rats nest.

lol. whatever.

[trockafella]

When you are down under that sump changing out the pump clean up the rats nest.

 

 

Thats what I said. So much unneeded crap in there. Seriously just spend an afternoon taking it all apart and then put it back nice and neat. It will be sooooooo worth it.

I think you should consider another pump, not the mags. They are heat monsters in there own. Seriously check out the WB pumps. Sean uses them out at his shop if you wanna check one out. Definitely when I go bigger I will use one.

[Ryan S]

Travis, the thing is, I NEED everything down there. It's not like I have extra crap. I need a fish room like Bill (OldReefer). I could put everything down there and have the space for it. Shannon has mentioned moving to a townhouse next year in the Falls Church area... Do they come with basements?

[MBVette]

Ryan. Seriously look at waterblaster pumps they run significantly cooler than the mag pumps.

[DaveS]

Omg, I can't believe I spent my first night off in 2 weeks getting caught up on this thread... That was an hour I should have spent sleeping.

[Ryan S]

Omg, I can't believe I spent my first night off in 2 weeks getting caught up on this thread... That was an hour I should have spent sleeping.

I should probably buy some frags off you at the next WAMAS meeting to help make up for that lost hour huh?

 

Seriously though, I very much appreciate your time invested, as well as everyone else's who keeps up on my thread.

[zygote2k]

After looking at more detailed pictures of your sump and subsequent rat's nest, I think that if you had a properly designed main sump, you could eliminate most of the cords and hoses. Why don't you get Adam to build one for you?

[Ryan S]

After looking at more detailed pictures of your sump and subsequent rat's nest, I think that if you had a properly designed main sump, you could eliminate most of the cords and hoses. Why don't you get Adam to build one for you?

We talked about a while ago. The main problem would be that the ideal-sized sump would have to go into the stand from above (top-down). It wouldn't fit into the tank from the sides, and there is no way I am going to empty the tank right now to do that. (However - it's totally an option next July when I move - and something I should probably reconsider). The other problem is that, I currently have all of my other equipment in the stand (IE the rats nest), which includes: 1g calc jug; 1g alk jug; davy jones skimmate locker; mr5 carbon reactor; mr5 gfo reactor; UV; 1g jug of vinegar; and 3 brs dosing pumps. If I added the new, bigger sump, I wouldn't have room for any of those items in the stand anymore. So, even though it's a mess, I think it's pretty good that I have managed to fit ALL of that equipment plus a sump and a fuge in a very limited space.