Heating Cost for Large Tank?

S

Sundog101

New member
I'm considering setting up a large predator tank around 500 gallons. My favorite heaters are jager and I would need two 300 watt. I know theres other costs, but I'm just focused on heating right now. I've never had a tank that size and Im just trying to determine how much the heaters would be on and how much that would cost. The tank would be in my basement that stays pretty cool around 65 degrees even in the summer. Do you think the heaters would be on about 50% or more? All info would be appreciated!
 
probably at least that much I think its something like 3.4 btu's per watt and it takes 1 btu to raise 1 pound of water 1 degree . so you need about a 10 degree rise minimal . 500 gallons x 8.5 = 4200 btu's now 2 300 watt heaters put out about 2040 btu's by my numbers you need at least 4 300 watt heaters that will run roughly 50% of the time.
 
I would say yes, I just got out of a relationship with 375gallons of tank and 270gallons of sump in a similar condition in my basement where the ambient temp is in the low 60s, and yeah it made that electric dial spin like crazy. Now you could isolate the tank by building a room around it and insulate the walls, then as the ambient temp in the room increases so will the decrease in heating necessary.

Also don't neglect evaporation, I know you said heating was all you're worried about but evaporation is a cooling process that takes heat out of the tank whether you want it to or not.
 
I was just researching heat pumps for swimming pools. Has anyone ever tried this and do they make smaller versions? Seems like it would be a reverse chiller. I don't know if this would be practical though.
 
I run a 400 G tank with around 800 g total system volume with sump and couple of frag tanks and a cube in basement. Gets to low 60s and I had 6 300 heaters work. On stop for days to barely reach 76-78 degrees Celsius. The year I added 2 600 w titanium heaters and they clearly performed better than 4 300 w heaters .
Next year I will work on isolating room better and also isolating tubes that pass in garage before going up to tank. Also considering heating the tank via a coil...
 
I set up a 210 with a open top last year, 2 x 300watt heaters. My house gets down to about 60 at night, low 70s during the day. My power bill went up substantially, I figured about $25/mo went to heating the tank.
 
I use hot water PEX loops for heating my tanks.
I've had them running for almost 3 years with no problems at all.
Here are pictures of one of the loops, the hot water recirculation pump I got from Home Depot and a picture of the water connections at the hot water tank. The red coloured PEX is hot water going to the recirc pump and the white PEX return line from the recirc pump is plumbed into the cold water supply line for the hot water tank.
I used to use electric heaters, but both the failure rate and cost of running them was high.

<img src="https://c7.staticflickr.com/8/7377/27377302222_a015186fba_z.jpg" width="448" height="600" alt="user193_pic6227_1375656078"></a>
 
i use 400 watt mh lights to do the heating on my 700 in my basement. if the room is anywhere in the 60s the tank stays around 79. the only trouble is this summer looks like a warm one and I am going to have to start running multiple fans or a chiller.
 
You need to account for lighting as well. High wattage lights put a ton of heat into your tank. And if you can do a semi closed cover that will also trap heat in.

Sent from my SM-G925T using Tapatalk
 
http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1771510

Is my thread on building out my natural gas system 6 years ago. Still running great. What ever you do, do not use hot water off of your hot water heater. If you want to cut corners put in a heat exchanger between it and your tank heating loop. Not worth the scary health risks. My thread no longer has working pictures but I can try to dig those up if anyone is interested.
 
https://www.osha.gov/dts/osta/otm/legionnaires/hotwater.html

The big issue is stagnant water in the heating loop line getting mixed back into your hot water you use for cooking and cleaning. Legionnaires is just one of the potential nasty things that can get. Again while this is all very low risk, is it worth putting your health and your families at risk? It is real easy to fix this by either putting a dedicated heater in place for just the tank, like I do, or to just put a heat exchanger and a 2nd pump to power that heat exchanger off of your heater.

Your standard tank water heater and it seems like half of the tankless hot water heaters are not designed for radiant heating setup like this. Using them will drastically shorten their life as they cannot handle the stress of a radiant setup. Again another reason to just use a dedicated heater. I use a Takagi Jr outdoor unit run on natural gas. So far it has been rock solid. The model has been replaced by the newer Jr 2 but it looks like from the rating to be just as solid of a unit and it is still rated for radiant use. Feel free to ask me any questions on my thread or PM me as I dont want to hijack Sundog's thread. GL with the build dog.....


http://www.supplyhouse.com/Takagi-T...agi-Tankless-Outdoor-Water-Heater-Natural-Gas
 
I consider living in an earthquake zone (such as the location you're in) to be much more hazardous to one's health than an extremely rare occurrence of catching legionnaires' disease from a domestic hot water supply.;)

Cases of legionnaires' disease are as a result of poorly designed and maintained commercial hot water systems, as well as the compromised state of health for an individual.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

L
Equipment help
Replies
9
Views
383
oliver729
O
Itchy Trigger
Heaters for Sump and for Storage Tanks
Replies
2
Views
677
aquaman67
aquaman67
S
Why do oversized protein skimmers not adequately remove protein from a tank?
Replies
12
Views
2K
Paul B
Paul B
D
Structural support for 125 gallon aquarium
Replies
7
Views
660
ddang
D
griss
pH - Thought I'd Share This
Replies
5
Views
2K
BuckeyeFish
BuckeyeFish
Back
Top