lmluckenbach Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 Well, title says it all. It's hard to fit everything in the stand of my 72 gallon bowfront, and since I'm buying a house now and can officially do whatever I want, I'm considering putting the sump in the garage. Seems like I've seen this done a lot on forums, but it's been a while since I've paid attention, so I'm not sure how practical this is in Texas. I guess you just HAVE to run a chiller if you do this? And the refugium would need to stay indoors? Thoughts? Thanks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
reefreak Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 Just really depends what your dt temp is at. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lmluckenbach Posted August 23, 2012 Author Share Posted August 23, 2012 Well, I currently run it at 78, but it wouldn't be a problem to go to 80 or 82 I suppose. I'm really more worried about consistency and, you know, having the dt run at 87 if it gets 100+ outside. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scutterborn Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 I think your best bet is evaporative cooling. If the sump is in the garage, you can run a big fan right over it. Patrick (subsea) has had great success with his outdoor lagoons doing just this. Just make sure you have a workhorse of an ATO! -Ben- Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scutterborn Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 I think many fish and corals will have substantially less stress if not subjected to 87 degree temps. I'm not saying they wouldn't survive but at what cost? It may considerably shorten it's lifespan. -Ben- Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lmluckenbach Posted August 23, 2012 Author Share Posted August 23, 2012 Oh, yeah, I definitely don't want it getting up that high. That's what I'm trying to avoid, but I may not have worded it well earlier. I was hoping someone would tell me to just run a big fan, but I wasn't sure that alone could handle the high heat. If it's worked for others, though, I'm definitely willing to try. Thanks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jaggedfire Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 I have been looking at this as well. Interested to hear what kind of temp drops you can get for certain power level of chiller. I was looking at a setup like Hydros in the garage with chiller and large evap. Haven't had the cycles to pursue. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AquaJohn Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 well I have a 200 is gal system with the sump in the garage in an older house. The garage is not insulated. I would not even consider trying to use evaporation as cooling on it. Its a small enclosed room that I bet hits 110-120 when the temps get up there. I currently use a 1/2 hp cooler and it cycles alot to keep the tank at 80 deg. Another thing to consider is with the lights on in the sump at night to run a reverse lighting schedual will draw billions of bugs so a cover or bug netting is your friend unless you want to add alot of proten for your critters lol. I also leave the window,door open 24/7 and the garage door up 2-3" when I am awan and 12" when I am home. But I will say that moving my 1/4 hp chiller from my living room to the 1/2 hp outside my living room stays ALOT cooler so its a win win my house is cooler I dont have to hear the chiller and pumps or the water draining into the sump. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
subsea Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 If you can move enough air and replace moisture saturated air with dryer hotter air you can easily maintain 80 degrees in the outdoors. I am maintaining 1000G in direct sunlight under a greenhouse with a 60% shade cloth. At 4 PM and 100 degrees ambiant, I am maintaining 81 degrees water temperature. In the case of your garage enclosed,you may want to consider a blower with a duct bringing outside dryer air to blow down on your sump. This will evaporate water and put it in your garage. You may then need to circulate this moist air out of your garage. Thermodynamic definitions: One BTU of heat energy is defined as the amount of heat required to raise one pound of water one degree fairenhait. One pound of water evaporates with a net cooling of 1000 BTU's. One gallon of water evaporates with a net cooling of 8400 BTU's. I evaporate 40 gallons per day, approximately 350KBTU's. Patrick Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lmluckenbach Posted August 23, 2012 Author Share Posted August 23, 2012 Hmm. Well that all makes a lot of sense. Installing a duct in my garage seems a little daunting because of the brink veneer though. I guess I'm going to have to get moved in before I start planning this out. I was hoping to only have to set it up once, but there are just too many variables. Not to mention planning the rest of my move and starting law school Monday. Thanks a lot for all the input. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
subsea Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 Good luck on law school. I noticed your location listed as SW Austin. Come visit me, I can help with knowledge and advice. I am located in Hays County 4 miles north of the Salt Lick in Bear Creek Village. La bonne temps roulee, Patrick Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
victoly Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 The flipside of this equation is that if you're talking about adding blowers and many fans, your cost may be similar to a chiller. I haven't done the cost/benefit, but you should sit down with a pencil and paper and see which makes the most economic sense. Chiller is more bulletproof (i.e removing more variables such as humidity and ambient temp), while evaporative cooling is certainly the less expensive option, albeit with a higher potential temperature ceiling. When I get to my dream tank in 30 years or so, I would imagine that the best route in terms of redundancy and cost is a combination of a chiller as a last resort and evaporative cooling for 90% of the duty. /devilsadvocate Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Timfish Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 I'm was going to toss in my two cents but since it's mostly repeating points already made I guess it's depreciated somewhat. Attached is a photo of one of my systems. It's set up with 7 250 watt HQI MH as well as pumps and power heads totalling 20,000 gallons an hour. As you can see it's completely closed in by the cabinetry. Because of the location of the home office and noise requirements there was no way to set up a chiller to cool the system down, either in the cabinetry, in the attic or outside ("looks ugly from the back porch and we can hear it running in the bedroom"). Similar to your situation there was a stone exterior the owner did not want to punch a hole through for a vent largely because of the aesthetics. What I ended up doing was installing a duct in the attic with fans that pulled air from one of the soffet vents into one end of the space above the aquarium. Another set of fans pulls air from the space above the opposite end of the aquarium and exhausts it out through duct work to another soffet vent. The duct work isn't actually attached to the vents just laying very close to it (partly because I couldn't squeeze into the space). Again because of noise issues (standard vent fans from Home Depot and Lowes made to much noise) I ended up using 12 vdc 150 CFM 4 1/2" muffin fans and running them at 8 vdc so they would not make any noise (I'm guessing I'm moving about 600 CFM through the space above the aquarium). They were set up in two sets of 6, one set sucking air in the other set blowing air out. Cost of the fans plus power supplies was roughly $120 (but there was a lot of hours experimenting trying to figure out what was quiet enough but would still keep the tank cool enough ). There are also a couple of fans set up blowing directly on the aquarium to assist with evaporative cooling and it sometimes losses 70 or 80 gallons a week (12%) but usually is 40 to 50 gallons, rarely 30. Last year with all the 100+ temps we had the tank ran at around 83 degrees when the lights were on. I am a firm believer in using evaporative cooling but like Victoly points out the combination of evap and chiller probably will give better overall consistancy and performance. One possibility, and you will have to get up in your acttic to evaluate whether this is feasable, is to install a fan in the garage ceiling and duct it to a soffet vent or maybe tie into a roof vent. If you use low voltage fans another possibility is to install the fans in the garage door, I would not do this with any fan that uses more than 12 or 24 vdc because of the risk of shock if or when the wires break from being flexed repeatedly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
subsea Posted August 24, 2012 Share Posted August 24, 2012 20K GPH. that is impressive circulation. Patrick Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+cyrus Posted August 29, 2012 Share Posted August 29, 2012 I'm El Paso. It gets to 100° nearly every day here. With no installation in my garage my 55g grow tank regularly is 85°. Not to say that's acceptable for a DT by any means but just to give you another idea of your temperature boundaries. I keep breeding mollies, Peps, macro, live rock, and one vicious coral beauty has been on lock down for the last week for attempted murder. I normally wouldn't put any true saltwater fish out there. I say insulate and do a fan vent. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bimmerzs Posted August 29, 2012 Share Posted August 29, 2012 Just buy the top rated led's that provide as close to full spectrum as possible. The cost will be miniscule compared to the time and effort you willl put in otherwise. Build a tank that fit's within your spec's is alway's the best way imo. Cheers, Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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