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Cultivated Reef

DIY Chiller idea?


JCase

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I have a biocube 29g on the first floor. Directly below it in the basement I have a sump hole in the basement floor that has a daylight drain without a pump. There is always water in it up to the lever of the Daylight drain.

 

I was thinking if I coil maybe 25 feet of 0.25" plastic line in the sump and run it up to the tank to a small pump I should have very little head pressure because the inlet and outlet would only be a few inches apart in height. Even though the floor level to the basement is about 10 feet below.

 

The water in the basement sump should run about 50 some degrees year round.

 

Connect the circulating pump to the apex controller to turn on the pump when the tank temp goes up.

 

Anybody have any thoughts as to how viable this diy chiller would work?

 

Thanks

JCase

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AZDesertRat

Plastic tubing is a very poor heat exchanger. I would think the heat energy from the pump would offset any potential cooling provided by the loop so you end up about even if not hotter.

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Thanks for the feedback.

I may give it a try anyway. My Geothermal unit heating/cooling my house is a closed system with direct contact with the ground about 6 feet under which uses PEX pipe.

 

I'm still searching for information. I understand the thermal conductive properties of PEX are not as good as lets say copper. But if I'm going to spend the amount of money on stainless steel pipe, I might as well just buy a chiller for this summer.

 

Thanks,

JCase

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I'd check about using pc water cooling radiators...not sure if they are/have some which could be reef safe but they're inexpensive and have standard fittings

 

Not safe for aquariums!

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LeCharlesMuhDickens

You can pick up stainless steel brake line in decent sized rolls from the auto parts store for pretty cheap. I bought a 20 ft roll of 1/4" ID stainless brake line a few months ago for $30 at car quest.

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Can you put fans on the tank? I've successfully chilled tanks under 40g with fans blowing across the top, it can take a solid 2-3 degrees off depending on your surface area, just increases your evaporation. On a hot summer day, with an air conditioner going in the room anyway, that may be all you need.

 

I've heard of people running lines through old mini-fridges for make-shift chillers as well. I'd be surprised if the system you're thinking of would work effectively, mostly for the reasons Arizona brought up.


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You can pick up stainless steel brake line in decent sized rolls from the auto parts store for pretty cheap. I bought a 20 ft roll of 1/4" ID stainless brake line a few months ago for $30 at car quest.

Is it solid stainless or steel with a stainless outer coating?
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I'd check about using pc water cooling radiators...not sure if they are/have some which could be reef safe but they're inexpensive and have standard fittings

 

Most radiators designed for PC use have a copper core, brass end tanks and G1/4" threads, and then tin solder to hold it all together. Probably not recommended if you want it to stay together reliably, as well as not worry about killing off any animal that's sensitive to copper (invertebrates, etc).

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If he was running an air conditioner, I doubt cooling would be an issue. Not many people that run air conditioning keep ambient temperatures above what a reef tank would ideally run at.

 

I'd give it a shot. The temperature differential between the tank and the basement sump is large enough that the pump shouldn't add enough heat to overcome the cooling.

 

At 50°F and only a couple inches of head pressure, you can run a fairly small pump. I've been running the Hydor Nano pumps and they add very little heat, even in extremely small aquariums. At most, I've seen only a degree or two of temperature increase running one of the the 100GPH pumps in one gallon of water when my apartment temperature got up to about 85°.

You will loose some flow due to the length of the tubing, but I wouldn't imagine that you would need too large of a pump or that you would need to run it continuously to provide the cooling you are looking for.

 

What temperatures do you normally see in the house during peak times in the summer?

 

I think that running a thin wall tubing would be beneficial.

I would have concerns about the oxygen levels in the tubing dropping during long down times, like during the cooler months, and causing issues when the system starts back up. But that can easily be remedied by flushing the system before starting it back up in the spring.

 

You can always check out engineering toolbox.com and find the equations to verify the viability of this. You could also just give it a shot. It is a fairly inexpensive endeavor. If you have a spare pump kicking around, it would be less than $15 in tubing. Much cheaper than just buying a chiller or constantly running an air conditioner to keep the room temperature down.

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We typically don't run much a.c. here, it would only be for a few days during the summer. Unless the light and pump start pushing the temp up.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I actually disagree. The problem with the plastic is that its too short. So why not just coil up a bunch of it in the sump. Instead of one loop, go for 8. Just make sure the pipe and flow is high enough.

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