How high of a temp would you be willing to go before intervening?

[serwobow]

Well, the heat is here in New England. Some of you must be in the same predicament. My house heats up during the day. My 50 gallon mixed reef was up to 85 yesterday. Lots of coral in there. No chiller. No fan. At what temp should I start to get concerned? What do you all think? How do corals show temperature stress? Or do they just die all of a sudden?

 

[Knight]

Same boat - I went to the Christmas Tree Shop and purchased these tubular ice trays... I started making RO/DI ice last month. I unplug my heaters and toss a few in the top of the display any time they go above 83. We did hit 85 last week in the 125 - I ended up making some ice in ziplock bags and that worked pretty good. I have noticed when it is warmer, the serpent stars are a lot more active and it is nice to see them coming out and not just at feeding time

 

[this is me]

It depends on what's your low. If your low is 76, 85 is a problem. If your low is 83, 85 is less of a problem.
It's all about the swing. Not necessary the max number.
My tank, low is 76, I have my MH turned off if it goes above 82. But the tank is in the basement with the dehumidifier running, it rarely goes beyond 80.

 

[Slombardi]

My tank is going through the same thing right now. If I know it is going to be a really hot day I turn the lights off, or if the temp gets up to 82. I also have a couple floor fans pointed at the tank to help keep the temp down. Corals seem fine and it has been in the low 80's for a couple days at a time. 85 seems like it would be at the high end.

In smaller tanks I had a gallon jug of distilled water in the fridge that I would use as top off or floated bags of ice. Fans and no lights should help mitigate it a little.

 

[BiGGiePauls33]

Get a couple of cheap fans to blow across the surface

 

[Aquanaut]

Ya I keep at 76 and at 81 I'd hard intervene

 

[serwobow]

Get a couple of cheap fans to blow across the surface

Fans, yeah. Maybe I will have to try this.

 

[serwobow]

Same boat - I went to the Christmas Tree Shop and purchased these tubular ice trays... I started making RO/DI ice last month. I unplug my heaters and toss a few in the top of the display any time they go above 83. We did hit 85 last week in the 125 - I ended up making some ice in ziplock bags and that worked pretty good. I have noticed when it is warmer, the serpent stars are a lot more active and it is nice to see them coming out and not just at feeding time

That is kind of neat. I haven't really noticed any changes in my tank, yet.

 

[serwobow]

It depends on what's your low. If your low is 76, 85 is a problem. If your low is 83, 85 is less of a problem.
It's all about the swing. Not necessary the max number.
My tank, low is 76, I have my MH turned off if it goes above 82. But the tank is in the basement with the dehumidifier running, it rarely goes beyond 80.

I think my low this time of year probably is 82 or so, so 85 is probably less of a problem. However, I read that the Great Barrrier Reef corals will start bleaching with extended time at 90 degrees, so even with acclimatization, the upper limit is somewhere around 90 in otherwise perfect water. I am just sort of hoping I don'd see RTN all over the place when I get home one of these days.

 

[Reefer508]

I try and keep shades closed in room with tank. I also run an window ac. Set the ac for around 78 just to keep room cooler. If you cant do an ac, pick up a couple of cheap fans, one for across top of tank. Other blowing on open stand, if you are running a sump. Hopefully you don't have glass covers on tank. If you do, remove and replace with screen top. Don't know what you run for lights but if you could ramp them down for the hottest part of the day it may help, or even just a shorter photo period. Unplug all unnecessary equipment.

 

[FishieBusiness]

I try to keep mine below 83 for high and 78 low. Anything above that and I try do something about it. I found that the most effective way to cool the tank with out adding a chiller is through evaporation. Like Paul had said with the tank top exposed put a fan blowing across the water. Icing didnt work for me but i have a 72gal. maybe on a small water volume ice can be more successful. Fan method has an immediate effect where is may take lager quantities to produce the same effect. Good luck

 

[serwobow]

I try and keep shades closed in room with tank. I also run an window ac. Set the ac for around 78 just to keep room cooler. If you cant do an ac, pick up a couple of cheap fans, one for across top of tank. Other blowing on open stand, if you are running a sump. Hopefully you don't have glass covers on tank. If you do, remove and replace with screen top. Don't know what you run for lights but if you could ramp them down for the hottest part of the day it may help, or even just a shorter photo period. Unplug all unnecessary equipment.

I do have plexiglas covers on my tank. I like the idea of removing them, but I need to have something to prevent my jumpy 6-line wrasse from getting out. But now that I think about it, the wrasse is easily replaceable compared to all the corals...

 

[serwobow]

I try to keep mine below 83 for high and 78 low. Anything above that and I try do something about it. I found that the most effective way to cool the tank with out adding a chiller is through evaporation. Like Paul had said with the tank top exposed put a fan blowing across the water. Icing didnt work for me but i have a 72gal. maybe on a small water volume ice can be more successful. Fan method has an immediate effect where is may take lager quantities to produce the same effect. Good luck

Thanks for this advice. First I am going to replace the covers of the tank with a screen, then get a fan for it.

 

[Chris A.]

With my house at 72 my Biocube with a 250w MH heater gets to a whopping 78. I run the tank at 78. All I have on it is a computer fan blowing across the water ( not at it )

 

[this is me]

With my house at 72 my Biocube with a 250w MH heater gets to a whopping 78. I run the tank at 78. All I have on it is a computer fan blowing across the water ( not at it )

This is the way to cool a tank in your living space. Cool the whole space. You're comfortable and your tank and critters as well.

 

[serwobow]

With my house at 72 my Biocube with a 250w MH heater gets to a whopping 78. I run the tank at 78. All I have on it is a computer fan blowing across the water ( not at it )

I think my electric bill would be about $1000/month if I kept my house at 72. Thermostat set to 85 during the day, and 74-76 in evening. But, maybe tank-fan will still work.

 

[this is me]

I think my electric bill would be about $1000/month if I kept my house at 72. Thermostat set to 85 during the day, and 74-76 in evening. But, maybe tank-fan will still work.

You must have a mansion.
I heat and cool my 3000 to 72 around the clock because of my newborn and it’s 388$. This includes a 400gallons running on 1000w of MH and T5.
You also don’t have to cool the whole house. Just the room the tank is in is just fine.

 

[dz6t]

The ocean is not a good example what temperature should we keep coral at.
Coral are hotter than the surrounding water due to metabolism. The wave in the ocean can carry those heat away from coral. We don’t have those big wave in our tanks.

Use a fan blowing over the surface of the tank can drop several degrees and that may be enough to keep the tank cooled.

AC is the way to go, chillers is not effective in terms of electricity usage unless you can vent it outside of the house.

I know a guy who used to keep a 220 gallon tank in his apartment and used a chiller to cool the tank and a window AC to cool the chiller. That cost him $400 a month 15 years ago.

I said why don’t you ditch the chiller. He did just that and the tank was cool and electicity bill dropped a lot.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[mandarin]

I have a inkbird temperature controller that turns my heater and fan on and off works well my fan has been running quite a bit lately but temp doesn’t go much over 80


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

 

[Terry Martin]

I put in 4 new t5 bulbs into my 200 gallon tank and it started to get hot already in the spring. I got a 15 buck fan on Amazon and set it up to blow across 30 gallon frag tank and it worked remarkably well, at least three degrees worth of cooling. I programmed it into my apex so it turns on at 79.5 and off at 79. So far tank hasn't gone above 79.8.