Do you really need a chiller

[pweesng]

Hi All,

I just want to start a simple thread, hopefully it will be helpful for new entrance into this hobby to be decision.

Some of you might remember that i was struggling with the decision whether to have a chiller for my tank or not.

Even after i bought a chiller, i was struggling with the idea.

Now, I am sold! Reason:-

my 75g tank without fan was running at about 30 to 31 degrees on the average each day. Temperature at night doesn't drop by that much. I was topping up about 2 litres to 3 litres of water each night.

Also, i notice that due to the large water body in the living room, couple with the evaporation, the living room has a "musty" smell when i reach home at night.

Anyway, to cut the long story short, after i install the chiller and reduce the temperature to 28.5 degrees, i only had to top up max 1 litre of water. I top up with distill water that comes in 500ml size, so can you imagine the amount of water i had to stock up at home just for topping up? Now i can stock up less.

Not only that, i realised that the "musty" smell is no longer there.

I have to admit that while the signs of my clown fish becoming more active may not be linked to the water temperature at all, but as long as they look happy, it is good enough.

I am using a Arctica 1/10 chiller coupled with a ehiem 1000 compact pump on my 75g (65g main tank and 10g sump). I don't monitor how often the chiller kicks in, but i have only caught it in action once, after i first calibrated the chiller.

But the chiller is not that quiet, i can hear it when it kicks in, so it can't have kicked in that many times each night.

But that aside, the fact that water evaporation is reduced by half and the disappearance of the "musty" smell is good enough reasons for me.

I am keeping a FOWLR tank at the point of time. I might add a couple of anemones later on, so i will probably keep my water temperature to 28.5 degrees lowest...

Hope this helps.

[teebs]

Your chiller and pump seems to be undersized for your tank.

[pweesng]

Your chiller and pump seems to be undersized for your tank.

Chiller's recommended flow rate is 900l/hour to 3000l/hour.

The pump is 150l/hour to 1000l/hour.

As the chiller is set up to "transfer" one portion of my sump tank water to the return portion of the sump tank i cannot afford the flow rate to be too fast. If the insump portion is not filling up fast enough, there won't be the "splashing" effect which i want, to keep the oxygen level in the water higher.

anyway, with this set up, i am cooling 1 degree in about 15 mins... and my guess is that the chiller comes alive every 2 to 3 hours... which is reasonable....no?

hear from you

[teebs]

Chiller's recommended flow rate is 900l/hour to 3000l/hour.

The pump is 150l/hour to 1000l/hour.

As the chiller is set up to "transfer" one portion of my sump tank water to the return portion of the sump tank i cannot afford the flow rate to be too fast. If the insump portion is not filling up fast enough, there won't be the "splashing" effect which i want, to keep the oxygen level in the water higher.

anyway, with this set up, i am cooling 1 degree in about 15 mins... and my guess is that the chiller comes alive every 2 to 3 hours... which is reasonable....no?

hear from you

Is the outlet of the chiller back to your sump or back to your tank? In my case, my chiller output is pumped directly back to my tank. Based on my understanding, the Artica chiller is set at a standard +/- 1 degF not degC.

In your case, 28.5degC is 83.3 degF and the chiller will cut in again at 84.3 degF which is about 29 degC.

[markietan]

a tank w/ coral without chiller can be done. it depends on where your tank is placed, if it is a well ventilated place, using fan to cool the tank n evaporate the water might not be a bad idea. at least that's what i'm doing for the past 2 months.

[pweesng]

Is the outlet of the chiller back to your sump or back to your tank? In my case, my chiller output is pumped directly back to my tank. Based on my understanding, the Artica chiller is set at a standard +/- 1 degF not degC.

In your case, 28.5degC is 83.3 degF and the chiller will cut in again at 84.3 degF which is about 29 degC.

do you mean that the temperature shown on the chiller is actually degreeF?

if so, i better go back and recalibrate!

[pweesng]

a tank w/ coral without chiller can be done. it depends on where your tank is placed, if it is a well ventilated place, using fan to cool the tank n evaporate the water might not be a bad idea. at least that's what i'm doing for the past 2 months.

Yes, i am pretty sure it can be done.

the problem is moe with evaporation as well as the musty smell that evaporated salt water leaves behind.

I top up my tank using distill water that is packed 500 ml each bottle. it is hard to leave office with 10 bottles each day without looking damn suspicious! hahhaha

a chiller cut the number of bottles from 8 to 2, sometimes 4

[teebs]

do you mean that the temperature shown on the chiller is actually degreeF?

if so, i better go back and recalibrate!

Errr...No. What I mean is that the temperature is in degC but the set differential in the chiller which you have no way of changing is set as 1 degF.

[pweesng]

Errr...No. What I mean is that the temperature is in degC but the set differential in the chiller which you have no way of changing is set as 1 degF.

hmmm... no quite it seems...

I can calibrate the current water temperature to say... 29 degrees and set the target temperature to say 28 degrees...

I notice that it will kick in when the current temperature gets to 29 degrees... and it stop when the temperature reaches 28 degrees...

[teebs]

This is from the artica chiller manual.

[pweesng]

This is from the artica chiller manual.

I see...

Thanks Peter, That might be the older version though. Coz the instruction that came with me, says the set has been set to 25 degrees celcius...

Thanks though...