Venting out heat, humidity, and smell

[KenT]

I have quit a few large softies and my house stinks! Also in the cooler months, condensation builds on all the windows. With 3 250w and 3 400w halides, there is a lot of heat in the canopy.

My question is, can a canopy be built "air tight" on top of the tank and then vented outside? Will this reduce all the factors listed above? Would flexible tubing and a decent fan work?

Thanks

[tyler]

i would think this would be perfectly feasable if you had enough fan to pump out the wet air. a high performance face designed for the purpose of pushing air through ducts would be the best choice i could think of. let us know how it goes.

[mhurley]

Another thing to consider is a heat/air exchanger. I installed one to my fish room and it works great. I takes air out of the room and pulls in fresh air from outside, runs the air across a exchanger core to save some of the heat and pushes new air back in. In my case, I just have it hooked to my room. But you can buy these units for a whole house. They're not cheap, but a good long term investment.

Mike

[VegasMike]

An air exchanger is actually part of the system I am installing in my fish room being built as part of my house addition. The other thing I am doing is putting an exhaust fan in the room that will turn on at a set temperature or set humidity level. I can also be turned on manually with a wall switch. The AC unit I am putting in is rated for a room 8-10 times the size of this room so I am not too woried about cooling. I am using the gypsum board for wet environments instead of traditional drywall. If worst comes to worst, I can put a ten inch fan into an access panel I am having installed. The access panel is for chiller lines to a chiller located outside the room, but I am sure I could fit both in the 12"x12" access hole.