Heater problemos

[Anonymous]

Now that the weather has considerably cooled off here in SoCal, I've noticed that my tank has cooled off to 78 in the very early mornings. I've got a new Acura 1000 300watt heater in my sump set at 90. Do I need another heater in the tank itself? I was hoping not because I think their ugly and I worry about the fish touching it. Is that a worry, or am I just an over protective mother? Where do you all keep you heaters and what brand do you use?

 

[Anonymous]

Hi,

I have 75g tank & 300W heater. I keep my heater in my 20g sump in swift moving water.

To obtain maximum benefit from your heater, it is absolutely critical that it be placed in rapidly flowing water. This will ensure the most stable temp since you won't have "pockets" of hot and cold water.

If you do place your heater in fast moving water, make sure you turn down it's temperature since it will increase the heaters efficiency and could overheat your water if you are not careful.

-Nathan

 

[Anonymous]

90! Why so high? I am new to this, but I thought 72 to 76 was about right?

------------------
Joel Tesdall
Begining Reefer
[email protected]

 

[Anonymous]

Gloria,
I have to agree with Joel on this one, 90F what would happen on a warm day?? I don't think 72-76 is right either but thats another topic

I think the big ? here is......does you temp move up and down or does it stay at 78.
I use Ebo-jageur (sp?) heaters and I say heaters because I use 2 of them,I read a thread along time ago about using 2 smaller heaters rather than one big one because if a heater should stick it would heat the tank up slower and hopefully the reefer would catch it before the tank got to hot and if one heater should fail hopefully the reefer would catch that before the tank got to cold.
It made a lot of sense to me but I'm one sick puppy

I use two 200 watt heaters on my 55

Mark

------------------
see my tank at
members.xoom.com/golfish1/reef.htm

 

[Anonymous]

The two heater idea is a good one, but two 200 W sort of defetes the purpose, as each of these is more than sufficient alone to heat an aquarium. I have 1 150 W in a 55 gal aquarium set at 77 F to insure that the temperature doesn't fall below that. But it seldom comes on. Clearly, if you need to heat your aquarium you need more lighting and power heads!!!!

 

[Anonymous]

The temperature is set at 90 because 77-78 in the tank is too low. So maybe that's what the problem is, my pump is not moving the water fast enough. I've got a Little Giant 2-MXQ. Hmmmmm....so should I get 2 heaters? one in the sump and other in the tank? I've noticed during the day/evening temp climbs up to 80-81. Yeah I didn't think of that, duh, my poor fish on a hot day. I gotta change that right now!!

 

[Anonymous]

hi
Your water temp should be 78 degrees and not fluctuate more than 1-2 degrees higher in the daytime when lights are on.
I have a 150 gal with vho,6 maxijet 1200's,2 rio2500 pumps(skimmer and sump) with no heater and my temp is 78 night time and 80 day time with no heater. of course it's cooler up here on the north coast.
but im no expert just my thoughts.
Bill


------------------
surfinbill

 

[Anonymous]

Keep in mind the higher the temp the less disolved oxygen you have in the tank. 78 is a great high temp but, try not to go much higher than that. another thing is fluctuation! Surfin's right not more than one or two degrees fluctuation otherwise you'll see pretty little ich spots on those fish, depending what fish you have in the tank. Two heaters both in the sump. If it were me they would both be big enough to heat the tank by themselves, that gives you room for one to fail with no great loss.

------------------

If it doesn't work quite right...


Throw more money at it!!!

Clark




[This message has been edited by Clark (edited 26 November 1999).]

 

[Anonymous]

Surfinbill and Clark,
It is not imperative that you keep your temperature at 78o F. Actually, I keep my temperature around 82-83o F. I do this because of everything that I have been reading lately about temperature and salinty on various boards. Ron Shimek and Rob Toonen both advocate higher temperatures in the marine aquarium. Temperatures on a reef crest can get into the 90s during the afternoon and then drop into the upper 70s at night. So fluctuations on a natural reef where most of our corals and fish do come from happen quite frequently.
Also, yes dissolved oxygen contents are going to be lower at higher temperatures, but it will be negligable. I am sorry but I don't have the link to the archived discussion, but DougL over at Aqualink has it archived. You might want to check over there or at reef central where Dr. Shimek is. He keeps his tanks at 86o F I believe.

 

[Anonymous]

this is great. i have to realy get caught up on this stuff.you hear so many diferent answers to questions and they all could be right (or wrong).
my thinking is to keep water temp. lower because unwanted parasites and such (nasties) have a harder time surviving and thriving in cooler temps.
at least thats what martin moe said if i remember corectly.
but im sure since then someone else has come along and proved otherwise.
hehe

------------------
surfinbill

 

[Anonymous]

surfinbill,
hey. Yeah, I know what your talking about. Moe says in his Handbook to keep temps at 78. Keeping lower temps however won't necessarily (sp) help eliminate parasites. Now lower salinities yes possibly, because of the osmoregulatory systems in fish tend to be more advanced than in protists. Therefore parasites can be eliminated when in certain stages of their life with hyposalinity. But running an aquarium at lower temps and salinities still stresses out the fish and a stressed out fish will be a sick fish in time. So why not try to emulate the natural environment? Check out http://ozreef.org/press/1997/october.html go to the temperature article by DBW. Great info.

 

[Anonymous]

Folks, stop worrying about dissolved oxygen levels. Talk about a Freshwater throwback. The average yearly temp on the worlds reefs is 84 degrees. Thats the average. It's not uncommon for water temps on the reefs to get over 90 degrees.

All of the books that have been written prior to 1999 will say 75-78 degrees. THERE IS NO SCIENTIFIC BASIS FOR THIS! This is a throwback to when we as hobbyiest had to slow down our animals metabolisms in order to sustain them for any period of time. It also allowed for a certain measure of parasite control because they didn't breed as fast(hyposalinity is more effective but also detrimental). This is no longer an issue. We can more aptly meet our animals requirements and we no longer need to keep them in an artificial environment.

Does raising the temp of the water decrease the dissolved o2 levels. Yes. Does it really matter in marine aquaria? Not really. Are you running a protein skimmer? whats that doing? could it possibly be aerating the water? Stop applying a freshwater issue to marine aquaria, I've yet to see o2 ever be a real problem. but YMMV

Set a target temp ie 84 degrees and try to keep your tank's temp range within it. It's not critical to nail the temp in fact you want some fluctuation, you just don't really want huge temp swings. Personally I try to keep the temp within a 5 degree range. ie 84 degrees +/- 2.5 degrees. OR say low temp at night will be approximately 80-81 degrees and the high temp will be around 85-86 degrees.

You'll find many headaches go away, like summer heat issues, and everyone is happy.

Tom



------------------
Visit Tom's Reef
http://www.bit-net.com/~tjotoole/

proud to be an associate of

Inland Reef Aquaria, Nashua, NH
http://www.inlandreef.com/

 

[Anonymous]

Tom,
I do agree that in most clean reef systems D.O. Is more than likely not a factor. But to say D.O. is a freshwater throwback..come on! If I were to play Devis's advocate here...It is a fact that the higher the temp and salinity, the less oxygen that can be disolved in the water. It doesn't matter how much aeration you have going on, that temp and S.G. dictate how much D.O. you can physically have in the water. For example 90 degrees S.G. 1.025 at this point you have a dangerously low D.O. Level(~3.8ppm), throw in a little decaying debris(uses oxygen), and there is a good possibility your going to be hosed. Another Example (please don't take offense) - Your own tank, power failure, 105 degrees S.G. 1.025 your D.O. Had to be less than 2ppm...Not good. It is a possibility that had you been running a lower temp in the first place (Thus high D.O. to begin with, not to mention a lower starting temp ) It might have bought you some more time giving you less overall loss, Then again, maybe it would have made no difference at all, we'll never really know!
But to say D.O. is not a factor in a reef system, I just can't agree with that...It's Physics. For what it's worth I respect your opinion on everyting else I have read from you, But I can't go here.

That would be the devils advocate speech.
I'll climb down off my soap box now and let you climb on yours.

Clark

 

[Anonymous]

I new I was going to get reamed. I just wasn't sure how bad....No NSW does not have more ability to contain D.O. but were not talking about the ocean we are talking about very small closed systems with respect to the ocean, there will be a certain amount of decay no matter how clean the system. There is no tide washing in Clean fresh (cool) oxygen rich water, while it takes debris (and heat) out to sea to cold depths with lots of oxygen for breaking down contaminants. High temps on a peak in the day I can deal with, High temps consistantly..I cannot.
You say..."There surely isn't massive die-off in the wild at these temps." No, but there is die off and that is a fact.
Whether It's D.O. or the lack of remains to be seen.

I agree completely that I can raise my temp a great deal and still be quite safe and maybe even see some benefit, in fact I might do just that, but there are some nasty, sess pool, tanks out there that D.O. is a problem, so I don't feel that you can just blindly say D.O. is not a problem, it is!

At least you and I are aware of D.O. and I'm sorry, whether we agree that there is any type of contributing factor or not is not the important fact, if your in this hobby D.O., Decay, and the nitrogen cycle, and so much more, are things I think you ought to have a working knowledge of, or at least be well aware of. Besides you know as well as I do those damn fish could swim where the oxygen was. The corals couldn't!!! Poor corals stuck there in that stagnant water while the fish used up all the O2. In all seriousness I am sorry for the loss of your tank and I know the possibility of the lower temps saving your corals is remote.

At the risk of sounding like a corn ball.. these animals have been placed in our care..and the more knowlege a person has the greater chance they have at keeping that animal alive. It is all about education and if one person wonders who in this argument is right and went in search of the answer, then the the whole thing was really worthwhile. Maybe they even found somthing else out that really does make a difference.
and they let us know about it. Hey I'm all for that.


Clark

 

[Anonymous]

"High temps on a peak in the day I can deal with, High temps consistantly..I cannot."

I guess you need to quantify what "high temp" is. To me it's anything well over 90 degrees for a significant(read: 8 hours+) amount of time. If the natural temp swing of your tank is 82-86, thats normal and I doubt you'll see any detrimental effects.

"I agree completely that I can raise my temp a great deal and still be quite safe and maybe even see some benefit, in fact I might do just that, but there are some nasty, sess pool, tanks out there that D.O. is a problem, so I don't feel that you can just blindly say D.O. is not a problem, it is! "

Come on you expect me to qualify every statement? Yeah if someone has a tank with absolutely no circulation, no biological filtration whatsoever, and dead decaying rotting flesh of corals and fish, then yeah DO is a significant problem =)

But if the tank has been set up properly, has a protein skimmer, decent surface agitation, I still maintain that DO levels will not surface as a problem.

"Besides you know as well as I do those damn fish could swim where the oxygen was. The corals couldn't!!! Poor corals stuck there in that stagnant water while the fish used up all the O2."

Come on you're reaching now =) Who has a higher o2 demand? The fish right? If they used up all the o2 so that corals were dying wouldn't they be dying as well? I'll even grant you that when the water was at 105 degrees that the o2 levels did come in to play somewhat since there was so much decomposing and what not occuring in the tank. But thats also at 20 degrees over normal seawater temps! Take that same reef and drop it down to 65 degrees and sustain it there for 8-24 hours and tell me you won't see similar die-offs. But I'd bet that 65 degree water is gonna have one hell of a DO rate =)

I maintain that at NSW levels, dissolved oxygen rarely if ever is an issue, in the average reef tank.

BTW, no offense either taken, or implied, I enjoy a good healthy debate =)

Tom


------------------
Visit Tom's Reef
http://www.bit-net.com/~tjotoole/

proud to be an associate of

Inland Reef Aquaria, Nashua, NH
http://www.inlandreef.com/




[This message has been edited by MickAv8r (edited 29 November 1999).]

 

[Anonymous]

Climbs up on the box....

If the tank turns into a fetid, festering cesspool than yeah I agree with you, but if the tank is looking/operating normal I disagree comepletely.

Just look at natural reefs. 84 degrees is the AVERAGE. It's quite common to see natural reef temps in the upper 80's to lower 90's. Does NSW have a better ability to contain DO than your tank? Of course not. There surely isn't massive die-off in the wild at these temps.

As for my own situation. You don't take into account that this was during a heat wave power outage of a significant length. It wouldn't matter what the starting temp was, it was long enough for the tank to reach room temperature. Did DO play a role? Well who is going to be most affected by DO levels? Fish or corals? Since fish are actively consuming the o2 I would have to say the fish. Only thing is, of the seven fish in the tank at the time, I only lost ONE, a coral beauty. Everyone else was fine upon my return. The severe losses were all corals. This during a time when there is no power whatsoever, thus no circulation, no aeration via protein skimming etc

Does it have a role? of course. Does it ever really become an issue? No. Is it worth worrying about? No.

When Shimek first proposed NSW temps on Aquarium Frontiers, Richard Harker wrote a counterpoint, and of all his arguments on the issue, none concerned with DO levels. Never came up in the conversation. It just doesn't really become a factor.

Tom


------------------
Visit Tom's Reef
http://www.bit-net.com/~tjotoole/

proud to be an associate of

Inland Reef Aquaria, Nashua, NH
http://www.inlandreef.com/




[This message has been edited by MickAv8r (edited 29 November 1999).]