Keeping the temp down

[Bebop]

So, I have my new LEDs (yay!).

Unfortunately, they put a lot of heat into my tank. With the biocube canopy, there isn't much opportunity to put a fan over it. Any ideas how to keep the temp down?

 

[little_fish]

That is really odd, LEDs should put out hardly any heat at all...

 

[Bebop]

Well I think they put out more heat than the stock T5's that were in the tank, but the temp in my tank sows a pretty steady heat increase when the lights are running. I'm adjusting the amount of time they're on to see if that has any effect.

I suppose it could be the ambient temperature in my apartment, but I highly doubt that (considering it's in the 70's and the tank went from 79 - 81 today)

I'm thinking of trying to prop up the hood with egg crate or something to get some airflow but I am open to ideas.

 

[marcah]

a heater will only be able to heat so much above room temp in your apartment. So if Winter is over and temp in your apartment is getting a little warmer the heater wont struggle as much to raise the temp in the tank along with any lighting that may be running.. During the winter my house is set at 68 the tank easily stays at 78, but as the warm days come and the temp in the house gets over 70 ( never gets above 72) the tank temp goes up closer to 80 to 81 during the day and settles back down at night.. I get about a 2 to 3 degree swing during the summer and very little swing during the winter..

 

[Bebop]

My heater's been off for about four days, so the temperature rise has to be from the lights or something else in my tank (maybe the powerheads?)

Here's a graph of the temp in my tank with the lights (lights are the red line, when they're up they're on, down they're off.) I guess my concern is that the temp in the tank doesn't cool off enough at night before the lights come back on (infact the temp continues to rise for a while after thay're off).

I put some ice in my tank to start to cool things off (in plastic bag so no contamination) which is why there's a sharp drop at the top of the last curve.


I think if I get some egg crate and position it so my lid is up a bit that could help, but i'm not sure what else to do.

 

[FishyReef]

What brand of LEDs do you have?

 

[marcah]

if you are only swinging a degree or so I wouldnt be worrying about it at all anyway.. it is very normal for a tank to swing a couple degrees during a 24 hour period.. You wouldn't want to much more then that but if you are only swinging that much a day it is within norm..

 

[Bebop]

What brand of LEDs do you have?

Luxeon LED's in a retrofit kit (Biocube 29 Gallon LED retrofit kit)

if you are only swinging a degree or so I wouldnt be worrying about it at all anyway.. it is very normal for a tank to swing a couple degrees during a 24 hour period.. You wouldn't want to much more then that but if you are only swinging that much a day it is within norm..

I'm not worried about the temp changing a degree or two, I worry because there hasn't been enough of a downswing to balance out what the swing is when the lights are on.

It swings up two degrees, but only swings down half a degree, then swings up two degrees, ect. It could quickly become a problem and i'm trying to figure out how to nip it in the bud. :mrgreen:

 

[FishyReef]

I just scanned the link you gave for the lights and see that the kit comes with 2 fans - I'm wondering if both are operating properly? Perhaps there is a malfunction somewhere in the cooling system?

And a few other things I've noticed about measuring temperature in my own tank - I've used both a glass thermometer and a digitial thermometer probe - at first I was using a glass thermometer, which floats close to the top of the tank, and close to the lights and sometimes the heater, which caused readings to go up when in reality my water isn't actually that hot. When I got my digital probe I mounted it on the opposite side of my tank from my heater and closer to midway down the water column - now my temp readings are steady throughout the day (swinging only from 79.3-79.5) regardless of lights on or off. This is a big difference from the few degree temp readings I was seeing with the floating glass thermometer. If you are using a floating glass thermometer, you might want to switch over to a digital probe instead - mine is a cheap coralife one that they sell at petco for somewhere around $15-20.

 

[Bebop]

FishyReef - You sir are a GENIUS! There is only one fan in the kit, but I was wondering why it was really really quiet... turns out the wire was severed. replaced it and the fan is now running! We'll see how it does!

I actually have a digital thermometer. I'm using the Neptune Apex system and it comes with a temperature probe (that how I could do that pretty graph :D)

It'll be interesting to see if this helps keep the temp down.

It's also good to note that the retrofit kit managed to work for two days with out a fan! haha