Summer Heat - Cheap Cooling Solution

[PsymonStark]

Dear Reefing Community,

Germany - Heat Wave - in excess of 30C / 85 F - which for Northern Germany is pretty HOT - and like 60% humidity.

This is what i faced over the weekend. My tank soared right up to 28C / 82,4F last week Saturday, and honestly didnt look like it was going to stop.

I currently have an Aqua Medic T Controller Twin. The 12V DC fan i have over the Aquarium was blowing at full force for hours but, there wasn't much it could do except slow down the inevitable. I threw ice blocks in bags into the tank to cool down and worked ok.

Sunday we had the second heat wave - similar temps - similar story, except that I came up with a plan to cool the tank down.
I had received a coral order a few days before, and the corals get delivered in these polystyrene boxes - which have huge insulations walls. I cut out two holes, an eHeim 1000l/h pump into my tank and had the pipe go through the one side of the polystyrene box, and the other end back into the tank. I filled the Polystyrene box with ice cubes/blocks and water.

The results were fantastic, the iceblocks melt at a much slower pace, and kept the temps down very nicely, and was easier then throwing iceblocks in bags into the tank the whole time.

Hope this helps someone who is looking for a cheap alternative to a chiller in areas that only experience excessive heat for short bursts at a time and need a quick effective solution.

Here are the pics:

Aiptasia - I know - Trying to get Peppermint shrimps...

 

[narms72]

Cheap indeed.

 

[smedlin]

Hmp, not a bad ideal.

 

[booth2010]

Neat idea. I wish 85 was a heat wave here... It beens around 100f every day here in FL :angryfire:

 

[Shawn O]

Here in the states we call that "redneck ingenuity". Good idea. I saw an experiment on tv once, think it was Myth Busters. Showed ice&water cool down beer cans faster than only ice or only water. I imagine it works almost as well for fish tanks as it does for keeping my beer cold, which is also a high priority. I'll have to bookmark this page for future reference.

 

[AirForceAquariu]

You might also try using a layer of dry ice at the bottom. It will make the conventional ice last much much longer and is also relatively cheap.

 

[Dans85]

I have also heard of people running a tube through a mini fridge as a makeshift chiller

 

[sleepydoc]

I have also heard of people running a tube through a mini fridge as a makeshift chiller

http://www.beananimal.com/articles/dorm-fridge-aquarium-chiller.aspx

 

[sleepydoc]

PsymonStark - good improvised short term solution. Realistically, adding the ice blocks directly to the tank should do a better job; all of the heat needed to melt the ice would come from the tank and you wouldn't need to have the additional pump and tubing.

I don't know if you have them in Germany but here in the states, drinks frequently come in 500 ml plastic bottles. You can fill them with water and throw them in the freezer, then just toss the entire thing in the tank. when it melts, take it out and repeat. To be safe I'd use DI water, just in case it leaks. You could use salt water, but you'd want it to actually freeze for maximum effect, since a lot of the cooling effect comes from the heat of condensation needed to melt the water. Most freezers aren't set cold enough to freeze salt water (~ -15ºC/0º F)

 

[kinnadian]

I've made something similar in the past, except I used an old dehumidifier instead of ice.

You need to get one with a rack of copper tubes inside. You carefully unbend the copper tubes and re-coil them to fit inside of an ice chest, with your PVC hose coiled up inside as well. The dehumidifier cools the copper tubes which cools the water and the PVC hose.

No ice required.

 

[Shawn O]

You might also try using a layer of dry ice at the bottom. It will make the conventional ice last much much longer and is also relatively cheap.

Doesn't fry ice release carbon dioxide? I think that would cause water oxygenation and ph issues, wouldn't it?

I've made something similar in the past, except I used an old dehumidifier instead of ice.

You need to get one with a rack of copper tubes inside. You carefully unbend the copper tubes and re-coil them to fit inside of an ice chest, with your PVC hose coiled up inside as well. The dehumidifier cools the copper tubes which cools the water and the PVC hose.

No ice required.

Wasn't this supposed to be a "cheap cooling solution"?

I think the frozen RODI bottles in the sump would work best and still keep the tank looking uncluttered.

 

[Webmanny]

Doesn't fry ice release carbon dioxide? I think that would cause water oxygenation and ph issues, wouldn't it?

No. I think he was talking about the bottom of the cooler. Not inside the tank.

 

[akmzero]

I picked up a mini fridge for $25 from a local garage sale so I did a similar thing only with more tube

 

[jr2l]

Neat idea. I wish 85 was a heat wave here... It beens around 100f every day here in FL :angryfire:

Yup, central florida is not good heat wise, keeping tank temp around 81 here without a chiller but I do have spikes from time to time

 

[SFish]

Here in the states we call that "redneck ingenuity". Good idea. I saw an experiment on tv once, think it was Myth Busters. Showed ice&water cool down beer cans faster than only ice or only water. I imagine it works almost as well for fish tanks as it does for keeping my beer cold, which is also a high priority. I'll have to bookmark this page for future reference.

Yes an ice bath is colder then just ice by it self.

 

[sleepydoc]

Yes an ice bath is colder then just ice by it self.

no - not really. The reason an ice bath is more effective at cooling a can is because water is very effective at absorbing the heat from the can and is in contact with the entire surface of the can.

When a material changes from solid to liquid, it absorbs heat because of something called the heat of fusion. If you heat a bucket of ice water, the temperature will stay at just at/above freezing until the ice melts and then start to rise. Another result of the heat of fusion is that it takes more energy to raise the temperature of a block of ice from -1º to +1º C than it takes to raise it from -3º to -1º or from 1º to 3º C.

Things are a bit different if you have fresh water ice and a salt water bath (like when you make home made ice cream.) The salt water has a lower freezing point than the fresh water, so the ice absorbs heat from the salt water and drops the temperature as it melts, so the temp drops below 0º C. That doesn't apply to a bottle of ice melting in your sump, however, because the fluids never mix.

 

[BFG]

Another ice mixture to tinkle about is Pykrete. Freeze this mixture in a bottle, last longer than regular frozen water.