Heat Problem

[57reefer]

Hi everyone. This is my first post. I’ve been reading and learning from the posts here for two months. I have a 65 gal glass tank with custom stand. My canopy is a foot tall with 4 compact lights, 2 are moon. I also have glass tops. The filter is the Life Reef with skimmer. Both are driven by Mag 9’s. Started tank with live rock and sand two weeks ago. Everything is going well except I have a heat problem. The outside temp is 76. The tank is 86 with out the lights. The lights on does not affect temp. The heater is not plugged in. Turned off skimmer pump and temp went to 83. The light ballast is located below but no heat is coming from it. Cool to the touch.
I have very limited space in the cabinet and the tank is in our living room so no external chiller. What can I do??? The outside temp can get to 90 at times so I need to plan for that. Any suggestions would be a big help.

 

[Scooterman]

My first suggestion is remove the glass tops, water to air surface will help keep your tank cooler. The second thing that would help is having fans to blow across the water surface, this will also help.

BTW, glad you decided to become a member of RF & a big welcome!

 

[Herefishyfishy]

Add fans and a water top off system to make up for evaporation, or get an external pump that runs cooler.

 

[ronj]

Welcome to Reeffrontiers........i would say your problem is coming from the mag pumps...they produce alot of heat!!! are you running them externally or underwater??????? i also agree on keeping the glass tops open or gone com pletely!!!

 

[57reefer]

Thanks for responding. The pumps are underwater. The problem is we just got the noise level down by adding the tops. The tank is close to our bedroom, plus there is very nice paneling in this room. Don’t want to ruin it with salt marks. Is there a compact chiller that may work?

 

[ronj]

i'm not sure about the chiller, but is there any way you can run the pumps externally?????if not, you may want to look into 2 diffferent pumps that run cooler...the fans are also a good idea!!

 

[DonW]

Thanks for responding. The pumps are underwater. The problem is we just got the noise level down by adding the tops. The tank is close to our bedroom, plus there is very nice paneling in this room. Don’t want to ruin it with salt marks. Is there a compact chiller that may work?

Those tops are really going to cause problems chiller or not. I guess I'm wondering why the tops would effect noise level? As far a protecting the wall there are plenty of option like plastic film that can be applied.

Don

 

[ronj]

Those tops are really going to cause problems chiller or not. I guess I'm wondering why the tops would effect noise level? As far a protecting the wall there are plenty of option like plastic film that can be applied.

Don

i agree..the tops will cause problems...they can cause the tank to have low a low ph....i have the glass tops on my 72g, but i leave the fronts of both of them open...the back part of the glass protects my lights!!

 

[Brenden]

I used mag pumps at one time to heat and stir my fresh SW. That is def a source of heat. As others suggested the glass tops also need to go. I have 2000w of MH over my tank. No chiller open top with 1- 12" fan running 24/7 and a second that comes on with the lights. The hottest my tank ever gets is 81.

 

[ronj]

he has 2 mag pumps...that's a good bit of heat!!

 

[Brenden]

he has 2 mag pumps...that's a good bit of heat!!

Yes
I used a mag 12 to make SW in a 35 gallon tub. Water was 55 degrees when it was put in the tub. Room temp was 72. The water would be 84 degrees in around 10-12 hours

 

[Krish]

Welcome to RF! I agree with the glass tops. I had to remove mine, remove the back off of my stand, add 2 fans blowing in cool air across my water and 3 sucking hot air out of the top of my canopy, a 5 inch fan to blow on my sump, got rid of a closed loop that was driven by a mag950 and eventuially still bought a chiller. In any event, as I did each thing, the temp dropped slightly. I actually got my temp down to where I wanted it, but wanted the peace of mind knowing a chiller would keep it there. Some people keep frozen gallon bottles of water in the freezer at all times and they just drop one in the sump for a few hours and rotate them throughout the day as the begin to defrost. If you could incorporate a chiller, it would be great, but always ways around it and yes...Magdrives do produce quite a bit of heat sometimes. I've had 1 or 2 that got kinda warm

 

[57reefer]

I'll try opening up the front part of the tops and see where it takes me. Are there pumps that run cooler with the same flow?

 

[Brenden]

Are there pumps that run cooler with the same flow?

Any of the external pumps will. I like the amp master/dolphin pumps. All my pumps on the main tank are external.

 

[Krish]

I use Quiet One pumps. The have them from under 100gph and over 2500 gph and they run really cool. They can also be used internally or externally. I run 2 of the 1508 gph models on my cube externally and with my first plumbing setup, the pump got extrememly hot with all the friction in the plumbing, but after re-plumbing it, it ran as cool as anything. There are also tons of other pumps people swear by, but just giving info on what I have personally used

 

[ronj]

i am going to be using a mag 12 in my n ew sump along with the skimmer pump..i am worried about just the one mag drive pump..i think it will do better in my 125g though...i will probably put a fan or two over my sump