24 gal. aquapod to hot

[wawruck]

our aquapod is getting to hot, is a chiller going to be the best way to keep the water cool? and if so can anyone tell me a good chiller to use on it.

thanks

 

[Nano Nana]

How hot is hot? Mine gets and stays around 80

 

[kiknchikn]

Chillers are a pretty expensive piece of equipment for just a 24 gal tank. I'd try to avoid that if you can. Perhaps you should try moving it to a cooler part of the house? A basement perhaps?

 

[wawruck]

we live in military housing, so no basement. When we got home last night it was at 84. With the lights being off all night the temp went down, and today we have been able to keep it at 78 by leaving the lid propped up a bit. Was hoping that someone else with this type of tank would have a inexpensive solution, cause yes chillers are a bit expensive.

 

[kiknchikn]

Well, normal things that would keep your house cooler will help. I assume you either don't have A/C or you don't want to spend a fortune cooling the house just to keep your tank cold, so instead maybe you can try things such as closing the blinds during the day, or any number of the things on this site:

http://www.energy.gov/news/1652.htm

As for the tank itself cool, this article might be useful to you:

http://www.aquariumpros.com/articles%20PDF/chillernotes.pdf#search=%22tips%20to%20keep%20your%20aquarium%20cool%22

You'll need adobe acrobat to read it, as it is a PDF file. Its free on download.com if you don't have it.

 

[Illuminati]

If you need a quick and dirty way of dropping the water temp you can float a little frozen bottle in the back chamber, or use RO/DI Ice cubes. Propping the top and aiming a fan at the tank will also help in letting out some of that heat.

 

[bluewatr24]

All you need to do is have the feeding lid proped open and it will stay cool. im running 1 1200rio and 2 90rios so they can make some heat so try the lid before spending the $

 

[wawruck]

ha, never thought of putting a little frozen bottle in the back, thanks. Also thanks kiknchikn for the article, we do have AC but I am a warm person and get cold very fast (we did turn on the AC, and now I am in a sweatshirt and bundled up)

 

[kiknchikn]

Well, at least you save a lot of energy during the summer, right? I hate to see your heating bill during the winter though =P

The problem with the frozen bottle is that it can create rapid fluctuations in temperature in small tanks like you have. I'd start by only freezing a little bit of water at a time, and slowly fill it more each time until you get hit the sweet spot. The other problem with using this method is that it gets very tedious. Luckily winter is coming right? So its more of a problem next summer...

 

[DocApoc]

I hear rumors that the stock pump in an aquapod is very inefficient. Most people replace them with a maxijet for added flow, but MJs are also very efficient in GPH/watt. So replacing the pump could really help.

I'm actually going to hook my watt meter up to the stock pump in my aquapod 24 tonight. I'll let you know what I find.

 

[wawruck]

yeah let me know. We haven't had an problems with the stock one yet, but then again as this is our first SW tank I wouldn't know what problem I was looking for
I have noticed that everyone seems to switch out the pump from it though, and we are looking at picking one up and seeing if it makes a difference

 

[DocApoc]

Stock pump uses 26 watts, and the maxi-jet 900 uses 14. The maxi-jet seems to pump much more water as well. If you don't need more flow, you may get the same performance of the stock pump with a MJ600, which will presumably use even less power.

I'm a bit peeved that the MJ uses so much, it claims on the label to use 8.5 watts, which is a figure I have seem bandied about the net quite a bit.

For the record, these test were done in a 10g bare tank i use to mix salt water. The water was cold (60 F) and was not saltwater. I have no idea if any of this affects the numbers.

But as to your problem, i would think that trimming 12 watts would proably save you quite a bit of heat. It might make a 2 degree difference or so, I'm not really sure. How much would a 12 watt heater that's alwasy on raise the tank temperature? Enough that you'd want to unplug it if you could, I'm sure.

 

[ALittleSalty]

I have found that with pod, It stays around 82 during the day, but that is with nothing around the sides of the tank. With the airflow in the house it keeps it cool. I am still running the stock pump and a 10 hour light cycle. I ran mine for two days with the lights off, when i moved it in august and the temp rose to 80, then i turned on the lights and it jumped to 82.8 degrees. I dip to 79 at night, and never go above 82 now. I have a heater installed, but its not plugged in right now, might have to for the upcoming winter months though. Jon

 

[wawruck]

well since turning on my AC and propping the feeding lid open during the day when the lights are on the temp has stayed down. At night we are closing the lid but the lights are off so it doesn't seem to get to hot. We stayed at 78 - 79 in the tank today. Tomorrow I might keep it closed and see how it works out with just the AC on in the house.

Thanks again to everyone that has given ideas and advise on this.

 

[kiknchikn]

A daily swing of 3º+ probably isn't very healthy for your tank's inhabitants in the long term. I'd try to keep that swing to less than 1.5º if you can. Hopefully you have really hardy critters in there though.