lastlight's 34g solana

lastlight · #1 08-06-2010, 06:55 AM

Ah what the heck here's some lame iphone snaps of the ghetto action. Please take special note of my high-tech flow restrictor.

Greenmaster · #2 08-06-2010, 11:53 AM

Can you post a pic of the inside of your fridge? Showing your cooling coils or what ever you got going on inside? Also is that your tank water or is it a closed loop system that is separate from your tank water?

muck · #3 08-06-2010, 02:28 PM

BWAHAHAHAHAH... love the flow restrictor Breet.

lastlight · #4 08-06-2010, 03:33 PM

Those lines are my tank water. It's a closed loop and it enters the fridge and goes into an ice-cream pail of water that sits inside the fridge. I didn't buy enough hose so the actual loop inside the fridge is only maybe 6 feet long. I know it might work a little bit if I went out and got say 30 more feet and added to my loop but after reading it's pretty obvious this hose insulates VERY well.

The compressor on the fridge also gets crazy hot and It was hot the entire time it was running. Most people that make these things report the fridge burning out pretty fast as they aren't meant to run non-stop like they end up doing.

mseepman · #5 08-06-2010, 03:52 PM

Take a look at J&L's site under chillers. They have a blow-out price on the 1/10HP Pacific Coast chiller right now. Would work well for you and you can't beat the pricing.

Lance · #6 08-06-2010, 04:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by muck

BWAHAHAHAHAH... love the flow restrictor Breet.

Hey! I like it. I've got two the same on the frag tank.

Lance · #7 08-06-2010, 04:48 PM

Brett, are your fans blowing across the surface of the water or venting the air from the light? If not, try aiming the fans at the water surface. Evaporation works quite well.

lastlight · #8 08-06-2010, 04:58 PM

Lance the fans blow out across the water...angled about 45 degrees to hit the water.

Not sure of the cfm on the Azoo 4-fan unit I have. It's a nice looking unit and did the trick for my 150w pendant nicely. I'm going to get a fugly clip on from walmart today and try that before I think about a chiller as it's not exactly within my budget right now.

abcha0s · #9 08-06-2010, 06:25 PM

Here's a thought.

The main reason you are having heat issues is that the volume of water is relatively low when compared to the intensity of the light. If you consider the same bulb over a much larger system (say 100 gallons), it is unlikely that you would be having the same problem.

The problem with metal halids is that they are inefficient. Some of the electrical power is converted to light but the the left over energy is converted into heat. This heat is transfered into your tank.

I'm not sure the technical term, but I think it's BTUs. It takes x number of BTUs to heat 35 gallons of water by 1 degree above ambient room temperature. It takes a much bigger X to heat 100 gallons of water by 1 degree above ambient room temperature (within the same period of time).

So, instead of cooling the water, you could also increase the water volume. Instead of a closed loop to a bar fridge (interesting idea

) you could run a closed loop to a sealed 65 gallon barrel. This would effectively increase your water volume to 100 gallons and would solve a number of your problems. You would likely solve your heat transfer problem, but would also increase your stocking capacity and overall system stability.

The best part - much less power consumption than a chiller.

I only suggest this as it appears that you already have the plumbing in place. It should be just as easy as plumbing in a chiller, but much cheaper and with additional benifits.

Might be crazy, but I thought it was worth the suggestion.

Take care

- Brad