Temperature

[boxerbill77]

Hi all.. My biocube 32 I have a heater in, set at 77.. My temp is climbing to 80 and im concerned, or should I not be? My house is set at 74 temp year round, except in florida I may reach 80 in the house as the AC cant keep up. Was thinking of adding a micro chiller?

 

[boxerbill77]

No the heater is not kicking on.

 

[Ou8me2]

I would normally say you could add some type of fan blowing across the water surface in the tank but that may be hard with the biocube. Unless you don't run the top on it. You could easily get 2-3 degrees cooling with the fan but the evaporation would increase a little bit but not bad.

 

[scooter31707]

You can take some water bottles (16 oz) and fill them up with RO/DI and freeze them. Once you get to say 78, you can add one to the tank to chill it down. Once it is melted, take it out wipe it down and put it back in the freezer. I have a sump, so I am able to use the 2 liter soda bottles when I do this.

 

[GimpyFin]

For a room temp of 74, ~80 in the tank is fairly normal. (Nothing wrong with that temp either, in case you are worried.) I keep my house around 70 in the winter and my tank stays pretty close to my setpoint of 77, maybe even a hair under. When the house is a few degrees warmer like in the summer, the tank is a tad higher. If you drop your room temp a couple degrees, your temp will likely stay closer to your setpoint of 77.

 

[Ron Reefman]

I'm in Florida as well and we let our house get between 80 and 82 in the summer (not an A/C issue, we like it warm). Hey, it's SW Florida and it's 92 to 94 degrees outside EVERY day for 6+ months, get used to it! I do run chillers on both my systems. They really don't work very hard, maybe a few minutes every half hour at most.

HOWEVER!!! Have a power failure due to a bad thunderstorm or worse yet wide spread power failure due to a hurricane and in the 90+ heat with no A?C the tank is toast! So besides a chiller, you may want a small generator that can run the chiller and a few other things.

 

[Bender19]

80 Degrees in your tank is not a problem. I purposely keep mine at 79. Once you hit above 82, that i would start being concerned.

 

[boxerbill77]

Thanks for the help guys, I appreciate it..

 

[DesertTank]

Make sure you calibrate your heater. I had the same problem.

 

[ryeguyy84]

I second the fan, it did wonders in my biocube but I didn't have the lid.

 

[skiingfast]

You can take some water bottles (16 oz) and fill them up with RO/DI and freeze them.

You don't need to use RODI water because you could do it just the same with frozen Koolaid. It's in the bottle so it doesn't spread into the tank.

Be careful of the volume so as the bottle doesn't make the tank run over.

I second the fan, it did wonders in my biocube but I didn't have the lid.

If a consistent problem you can mod the lid and even add higher flow or extra fans.

Keep in mind that a fan doesn't keep you cooler from blowing air on you, it's mainly from increasing evaporation of your sweat. So mind your tank level if your don't have an ATO and full reservoir.