Anyone using hot water closed loop to heat?

[Otiss]

I have a 75QT with a 40 gallon sump in my basement and will be putting in a 180DT on my first floor and putting a 100 gallon sump in the basement.

My basement is not finished and stays between 60 and 70 degrees. Im trying not to waste a ton of money just heating the tank.

Is anyone using a closed loop from their water heater to heat their tank?

 

[mcgyvr]

Yes.. There is a fairly large post I think in the DIY section here about people doing it..

Just don't think its "free" heat.. Its not.. Your water heater still needs to heat that water when the heat is lost to the colder body..

 

[Otiss]

I agree, But it is a form of cheaper heat-At least in my area. I have seen some threads on it but they are at least 5 years old. I wanted to see if anyone has been using one for quite some time with success.

 

[mcgyvr]

Some newer stuff here.. 2014-2016
http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2460126&page=2

 

[Otiss]

Thanks. That has a lot of good information!!

 

[ca1ore]

I agree, But it is a form of cheaper heat

Sorry, why is it cheaper? Gas/oil versus electric? BTUs are BTU's.

I thought about adding a zone to my current home furnace, but frankly the cost of oil isn't much less than electricity and I wasn't willing to take the risk of a stuck solenoid boiling my tank.

 

[Otiss]

Sorry, why is it cheaper? Gas/oil versus electric? BTUs are BTU's.

I thought about adding a zone to my current home furnace, but frankly the cost of oil isn't much less than electricity and I wasn't willing to take the risk of a stuck solenoid boiling my tank.

Water sitting in my hot water heater is already being heated to be used in my home, By using it to heat the reef tank there is a dual purpose. Water returning from the coil in the sump will still be 80-90 degrees minimum meaning itll take less energy to heat back to what my water heater is set at. There are different fail switches that can be added to this system in order to avoid cooking your tank, just like there are with traditional electric tank heater. In this case you just need a solenoid set to a temperature probe as a secondary fail switch after using an aquarium controller if the temp probe were to fail or the pump somehow failed as well.


And to add, it is much more efficient, it costs significantly more to cool my home in the summer than it does to heat it in the winter. It gets roughly 90-100 here in the summer and can be less than 0 a majority of the winter depending on the year. Obviously things factor in such as how efficient ones furnace and AC units are. Others have stated what a money saver this type of system can be.

 

[ca1ore]

I think your logic is flawed. Your tank requires a certain number of BTU's to keep it at temperature, regardless of where those BTU's come from. Maybe a home hot water heater is more efficient at turning electricity into BTUs than the aquarium stick heaters - dunno, Or if a home hot water heater is run on gas/oil, which is less expensive than electricity. Otherwise I don't see where the savings come from. Not trying to be difficult, just 'testing' my own assumptions about this.

Not sure what point you are trying to make about cooling versus heating.

Lots of people do lots of things they think save money, that actually don't.

 

[Breadman03]

I bet you would get a far better return on your investment by insulating your sump, QT, and plumbing. I can see how it may be difficult to heat a truly large tank but you won't have any issue with tossing in a couple moderate sized heaters for redundancy.

I have a 150 upstairs with a roughly 120 gallon sump in my unfinished basement. My basement used to get into the 30's and I had almost 2000 watts of heaters in my sump to keep it warm. After rebuilding my front porch and keeping a sheet of foam insulation in front of the exterior steps, it stays around 60. I have three heaters in: a 100 watt that is on almost all winter, a 250 watt that cycles about 6-8 times daily, and a 250 watt that almost never comes on. It's there just in case one of the other ones fail or it gets really cold.