Blank slate; planning for potential upgrade

[crvz]

Hey folks,

Some of you may be familiar with my 150 gallon setup, which was planned under some pretty tight restrictions (particularly space and sound). Now, a couple years later, my wife and I are thinking about building a new house. The leading candidate has an attached tandem garage, and the back of the tandem has a shared wall with the breakfast area of the kitchen. I'm thinking that this may be a great spot for creating a built-in tank, but before we proceed with making any decisions I thought I'd get input. We're still negotiating everything on the house, and we havent even decided to move, but the market is primed for getting a great deal on the move that we know we'll want in the next 5 years or so.

A quick google sketch-up shows the basic lay-out of what I'm thinking right now. The gray floor simply shows the garage floor space with an optional third front bay (lower part of the image). The tandem part of the garage runs ~42'x12', and I was thinking of walling off the back 12' to have a 12'x12' room for the tank and all support equipment.

The orange wall is the shared wall with the breakfast area, the framed wall is one I would add after the home is built, and the other two walls are outside walls (one of which isnt shown).

Right now I'm looking for info on what would be the best solution for heating/cooling. Since we're building, I could tie it into the central HVAC setup of the house, but I don't think that would be the best solution, especially for humidity control (and probably very expensive). I was thinking the easiest choice is to add a window AC unit that would vent into the garage, as it's only 150 square feet and that would be inexpensive to run.

To give a bit more info on size and other thoughts I've had, I'm looking to get a display in the 7'x3'x2' range (so relatively shallow with large footprint), glass tank, I'd put a utility sink in the room, and I'd probably have a couple other tanks for qt and frags that would be independent of the display. It's credible to have about 500-600 gallons of water total in the room, and I live in Houston so heat and humidity do need to be considered.

The first big request is for input on temperature/humidity control in the room, and then anything you think I'd want to do while building that I couldnt do as easily after we close on the house (as I'm sure I could do it cheaper, so anything I do on my own is preferable). So what do you know?!?

- Chris

 

[melev]

Chris, I would install a vent fan in the ceiling to draw out air from the fishroom. It needs to blow outsides, not into the attic. This is very important.

The window unit is best, because they are cheaper than a chiller and you as well as your tank can be comfortable. The one in your picture is over the door, so if you don't mind installing it that high and deal with any drips landing on your head, it's fine. My HVAC installers told me I should build a chute from the exhaust section of the window a/c unit that goes right up into the attic, so the heat goes out the roof vents instead of heating up my garage. That is the only thing I've not done yet, but it is on my list of things to do this summer. When the garage is closed and that unit runs all day, it gets very hot in there, and the a/c pulls more electricity. As soon as I open the garage to let the heat out, the wattage drops because the unit isn't working so hard.

Don't tie your central into the fishroom because you don't want the moist salty air flowing through the ductwork nor into your furnace system. Mold and corrosion are what you want to avoid. Negative pressure can blow that air back through the central ductwork, so the window a/c is a much better solution.

I've never needed to heat my fishroom, ever. I doubt you'll have to in Houston either.

I do open and close the door to the garage during the cooler times of year, as well as all winter. You'll have to learn what works best, but there are days the door will be wide open, and other days you'll only open it about 2 - 3". In the cold winter nights, the door is closed, but during the day time when the lights are on, the door is open to let some cool air in and the hot air out. Because this is a completely manual method, watching tank temperature is pretty important, but heaters will help protect against it getting too cold in case you forget.

Having front access to your tank is very important. Everyone that has only access from the back says the same thing.

 

[Hop]

if I could redo my set up I would install a couple windows in the wetroom. This could save me a ton of hassle, but I just didn't implement it when I started mine. A floor drain would be my second item I would add to the wish list. With that set up, the options would be endless. fresh air in-fresh air out. Personally I wouldn't even tie the wetroom into the rest of the houses heating and cooling. I'm not sure how things are in Texas, but here getting the humidity into the heating system just put humid saltwater in every room of the house and a heat exchanger was just outside what I wanted to spend.

 

[crvz]

Alright, some great thoughts so far.

the placement of that window unit is completely arbitrary right now, so I'll probably move it to the left side of the door. It is a two story home, so there are bedrooms immediately above the back part of the tandem garage, but I could run the chute over to the front part of the garage and into the attic (it's attic storage above that portion), or I could run it to the wall next to the left and vent it immediately outside. I could also do this with a drip line for the condensate, running a hose down the wall and then drill a hole to allow it to drip outside.

Or maybe a better solution overall is to move towards a portable AC unit that utilizes a vent hose? While the up-front cost may be about twice that of a conventional window AC unit, it would be a simpler installation (just cut a hole in the exterior wall for the vent hose). I would be ok with the initial costs as long as it's as efficient, does anyone have experience with these?

 

[melev]

Weatherson uses the portable a/c unit, but he lives in California so I don't know that he has to run it nearly as much as we do in Texas. The portable units are between $500 and $600 when I was looking at them, where in the past five years, I've had to buy two window a/c units. The first was $144 (Sams), and the second one $160 (Home Depot. Plus it doesn't take up any space in my room, which no matter how much you plan, it never feels big enough.

 

[crvz]

I was looking at that, too (space they take up). Apparently they're not quite as effective (and probably as efficient) as the straight forward window units. I need to do more research...