A Great Way to ruin a perfect wall; My 400 Gallon Project

[bulldogfish]

I am going to have my chiller in the same room as my tank. And have an AC unit like ryan. But the exhaust from the ciller is going to be ducted outside. Ryan, this may be an option you might want to look into.

 

[ReeferMonkey]

Ryan/Servo has got it set up so that their is a ventilation fan right behind the chiller, sucking the output out as quickly as it's produced.

His garage hits about 110-120 during the heat of the day, so having a chiller there would be pretty worthless. Once you hit the mid-90s chiller performance makes a big nose dive.

It's what he's doing.

 

[SERVO]

I am curious, how thick it the glass and is it tempered? Do you have holes dirlled in the tank for a closed loop, or are you going to run it from the overflows?

Cathy8424, Yes it is tempered and I have a closed loop ready to go. I wouldn't recommend running a closed loop from the overflows. I am also going to run Tunze streams.


I have a little problem with my plumming parts (I was shipped too small of size) I need to fix that and get this going!!!!


Bulldogfish; Nathan has been over to see the set up in progress. I may not even need my chiller. That room stays very cool. I would hate to add something that will unneccesarily add heat if I don't need to.


Joe; If I could have plummed my chiller outside I would have. THat by far is the best way. THe closest "outside" acessable portion of my house is the front of the house and I DO NOT want the chiller in the front of the house to 1) become an eyesore that I'll have to cover up and 2) It can easily walk away out in the open.

AcroSteve: Thanks for the info. I have a gmail account, but I'm not sure how I would get the IMG link?

Nathan; I have a big project I need to talk to you about.:mixed:

 

[asnatlas]

Nathan; I have a big project I need to talk to you about.:mixed:

Spill the beans, what is this big project ??

Shawn

 

[cduran02]

SERVO: Great project you have going there. I have also have a wall that I want to ruin, but no garage on the other side. Im toying with the idea of building a green house, to get natural sun and moon light.

 

[SERVO]

cduran; a greenhouse would surely give you a lot of options. Depending on the humidity, I would set up an evaporative cooling system. This works best in arid climates, but there is a fellow hobbiest here who has a greenhouse set up to grow orchids. The humidity ranges here to about 70-80%. The system doesn't do much when humidity is close to 100%. This is called geo-thermal air-conditioning with water mist heat exchanger and works like a charm. This is a cheap and effective way to cool your system. I would set up a big chiller 1.5 HP as a back up. It would be great, you could plumb it outside.

Sounds like a fantastic potential set up!!!!

As it stands, the tank will be plummed on Monday!!!! Looks like I may be adding water and some rock soon!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


:eek1: :eek1: :eek1:

 

[cduran02]

For cooling Im going to go with well water. Weather I build a green house or not, my sump and fuge are going to be outdoor. What Im going to do is have a fresh water jacket around both the sump and fuge, and cover it all (minus the top) with styrofoam. The fresh water jacket will be supplied by a well. If I go with the green house idea, Ill also cover the back of the tank with styrofoam.

 

[SERVO]

Cduran,

Your idea about using well water around your sump may be a good one, however It doesn't give you very good options for temperature control. Surly, you intend on using the styro to mitigate the temperature exchange, but I would think that the conduction of the temperature from the well into the sump wouldn't make any significant difference. I would ask a physics expert. Surely, the speed of turnover of the sump will have an impact on temperature exchange, not to mention the size of the sump walls in addition to the temperature variation between the two bodies of water. It is too complicated of a system because of all of the intrinsic variables, but if you can get it to work, more power to you. I remember doing equations similar to this in physics class in college, but the only thing that hangs around in my brain now is V=IR, p=mv and other simple equations. I wouldn't know where to begin to try to determine the amount of temperature variation.

 

[cduran02]

I know it will work from experience, we've controlled the temperature of chemical reaction chambers this way, not to mention in nuclear reactors.

As for asking physics expert...already did. There are plenty of hydrologist where I work. The trick is to keep the water jacket circulating with fresh water coming in, that coupled with the fact that the well has almost an infinite amount of water compared to the aquarium and that water is kept at a constant temperature due to geothermal cooling.

 

[SERVO]

Kewl!

Well when you get that up and running, I definetely want to read your thread!!!!


I just bought a bunch of 1/2 foam for under my sump, pumps and frag tank. I also bought some thin acryllic sheets to put on the bottom of the stand to protect the wood against tiny spills and drips.

"biting nails".............

Rock?
Water?

.....Livestock?.......

 

[AcroSteve]

The trick is to keep the water jacket circulating with fresh water coming in, that coupled with the fact that the well has almost an infinite amount of water compared to the aquarium and that water is kept at a constant temperature due to geothermal cooling.

Feel guilty about wasting all that water?

Don't forget to figure the operational cost of the well pump in there. I am not sure how effecient they are.

 

[cduran02]

There is no waste, its well water, I will simply pump it back into the well and when its time to water the lawn just run the water to the sprinkler system.

I dont think the operational cost will be more than using a chiller unit. At the very best it would be equal. I just have to make sure everything is well insulated. And if I want to get cost really low Ill just get a solar well pump, they operate on solar energy when the sun is out and AC power otherwise, these pumps run around $1.5K

http://www.partsonsale.com/solarpumps1.html

 

[SERVO]

Well I just spent the last 3 hours cutting acryllic sheets to place on the bottom of the stand in addition to cutting pink insulation foam to put under the sump and pumps.

I was going to have Trigger systems custom build me an acryllic drip tray. This could be placed under the sump and skimmer to catch any unwanted misfortunes of salt water. Because of the dimensions of the stand, I couldn't get the sump length that I really wanted (see above sump fiasco related posts). To compensate, I am adding on an addition refugium to the existing sump. The addition will be off set by 2 inches to allow space for the closed loop pump. (I'll post pictures once it is set up and installed). This set up would have made the drip tray next to impossible to fabricate off site. So I went to Lowes and bought thin plexi to put on the bottom of the stand. This way, all I have to do is wipe off any salt water spills. This prevents the water from seeping into the wood of the stand. I don't want to bore anyone with pictures so I wont post what it currently looks like. I wanted to share the idea incase people wanted an alternative to protecting their wood with paint products. This was a lot easier than buying epoxy water proof paint and painting the bottom.


One step closer!

 

[melev]

Did you make a perimeter border to contain the water so you remove it, or can it pour off the surface and down into the stand? I've observed water wick under acrylic and stay between it and the wood for long periods of time.

 

[extinguishfire]

Ryan, I used some pond liner to line the inside of my stand about 6 inches high. I had a fiasco the other day where the filter sock I use got to full of junk and started overflowing the top and consequently spilled over the side of the sump a bit. Well I ended up coming home after getting tubes inserted in my sons ears to find about 6 or 7 gallons inside my stand perfectly held by the pond liner and therefore no mess on the floor around the tank for my wife to complain about. I am on shift at the fire dept. now but will try to get a pic of what I did tomorrow.

 

[AcroSteve]

I've observed water wick under acrylic and stay between it and the wood for long periods of time.

Same with the insulation. Water can get under there and stay almost forever. You could run a bead of silicone around it to seal it up.

 

[asnatlas]

I don't want to bore anyone with pictures so I wont post what it currently looks like. I wanted to share the idea incase people wanted an alternative to protecting their wood with paint products. This was a lot easier than buying epoxy water proof paint and painting the bottom.

One step closer!

Pics are not boring Post what you have... I am sure people will forgive you

Shawn

 

[chriscobb]

Yeah post the pics!!!!!!

 

[LittleBlueGT]

Here is the return pump; a sequence Hammerhead. I put one of my sandles next to it (Size 12) for perspective on this monster

<img src="http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a12/ryanreeves/hammerhead.jpg" alt="Image hosted by Photobucket.com">

How old is your Hammerhead pump? Mine is almost a year old and it has fins on the motor, it is not smooth. The exterior is solid aluminum.

 

[LittleBlueGT]

This is how mine looks.