North Dakota Mini-Ocean - Page 2

Reefaquariumnut · #26 12/02/2007, 12:14 PM

I do not have any barrier between the slate and the concrete. I will definately be putting a foam layer on the pumps and the flexible PVC will be a must. The tank is in the basement and is very isolated from the rest of the house.

As for pictures, I am not sure what else you want to see...let me know...

jnarowe · #27 12/02/2007, 01:54 PM

Well, no earhquakes in Fargo, so I suspect that it is not SOP to put in an isolation barrier. We use them here to isolate tile from the sub-floor so that cracks do not broadcast to the surface. Its a thin material with a rubbery side and a woven side.

Being in the basement is a huge plus, except for the trek down to see the tank!

I use AquaNotes on my home office PC on the second floor to keep me informed of what is happening downstairs. There are some great wireless cams too.

I really like the simple, elegant manner in which you finished around the tank. It's peaceful yet solid.

Reefaquariumnut · #28 12/11/2007, 05:14 PM

Scott (Spazz) is coming to town Saturday and Sunday to discuss layout/design plans. I am hoping to get this tank project rolling soon afterword.

From the preliminary discussions we will have a couple surge tanks, a quarintine tank, a hospital tank, a sump (maybe 3 seperate sumps acting as one) under the tank, a couple closed loop systems, and most importantly a volcano skimmer!

One question i do have is should I be putting a bathroom type fan in the room? The room has its own temperature control and fans in the room, but I am wondering if i need some kind of moisture remover or can i just open the door to the room and let the rest of the house do the job of removing it (as i have humidifer/dehumidifer/geothermal/air exchanger). Just looking for some thoughts.

jnarowe · #29 12/11/2007, 06:19 PM

no. you don't want the humid air in your house. IMO, your tank room should be totally self contained. I even have an exterior steel door as my tank room entrance, with all the weatherstripping that goes with it.

Reefaquariumnut · #30 12/11/2007, 06:58 PM

So basically I could mount a bathroom fan on one of the walls and exit the air into a common area of the basement? I think that would work best other than the fact it might get a bit noisy outside of the tank...

matt & pam · #31 12/11/2007, 07:44 PM

I would suggest if you exhaust the humidity outside that you have a way to make up for this air. You don't want to have the makeup air come through a gas vent line or other CO2 producing system..

I have a panasonic whisperline in the wall behind my tank and it is very quiet.

matt

jnarowe · #32 12/11/2007, 07:49 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Reefaquariumnut
So basically I could mount a bathroom fan on one of the walls and exit the air into a common area of the basement? I think that would work best other than the fact it might get a bit noisy outside of the tank...

I really think this is a mistake. As I said before, you don't want tank room air in any part of your house.

spazz · #33 12/11/2007, 08:05 PM

the best thing to do is add an air exchange to the room. it exausts old air out and brings in fresh air to the room. this will also keep the tempature of the room stable. the outgoing air heats up the incomming air with an air heat exchanger to keep the 2 types of air sepreate from each other. then if you conmtrol that on a hemostat (humidity controler) to keep the room at a low humidity level it will also aid in keeping the tempature of the tank lower.
you dont want to vent the fish room into the rest of the house for 2 reasons. 1st is the humidity will ruin your house. 2nd is the smells that come from the fish tank will be contained in the room and be blown outside. there is ways of installing air exchangers in rooms that are already built like yours is. the other nice thing about using an air exchanger is the rooms tempature in the summer will be cooler than it is outside becasue the exchanger cools down the incomming air to what ever the inside tempature of the room is. if you use some fans for the first stage of your cooling system this will everaproate water from the tank which will cool it down. that air will be sucked outside and replaced with fresh air. increasing the oxygen to the room and removing co2 from the room which can lower the ph levels in your system.

i hope that all makes sence. im tired and cant think straight today.

Elliott · #34 12/11/2007, 08:52 PM

spazz, would you happen to have a link for the heat exchanger you describe? are you recommending a heat exchanger in addition to an ac unit?

spazz · #35 12/11/2007, 09:03 PM

i would recomend a unit somethig like this one because it has a plastic exchanger in it so it wont rust from everaporated salt water.

http://www.getcozy.com/airtoairex.html

for aome one in the northern climate i would say the ac unit would be optional. but in your souther cliamte i think an ac unit would be needed to control room tempature. it get over 100 degs down ther for weeks at a time. it may get 100 deg in fargo for a day or so but not for weeks at a time.

it really depends on how big your system is and how much cooling you need.

Elliott · #36 12/11/2007, 09:08 PM

thank you

Lunchbucket · #37 12/11/2007, 09:32 PM

I never thought about and air exchanger but what a great idea! Will help the CO2 levels (pH) and would help get humid air out

Lunchbucket

hahnmeister · #38 12/11/2007, 10:08 PM

I just keep it simple and vent the hot & humid air outside. The new air is drawn in from the house, which is a good thing, since lower humidity air will allow for better evaporative cooling. Also, I run my skimmer air intake from outside as well... the O2 boost from fresh air keeps the pH higher in the tank.

jnarowe · #39 12/11/2007, 10:17 PM

I vent outside and allow passive replacement with fresh outside air as well. I don't have any problem with pH and in fact can set it at whatever I want using my top-off and Ca reactor, but I do think fresh air is good for the reef. The only problem I run into is that sometimes the outside air is very humid.

Lunchbucket · #40 12/11/2007, 10:21 PM

I think I'm going to do a passive return like hahnmeister and jnarowe do. I just need to find a fantech fan for cheap.

Lunchbucket

Reefaquariumnut · #41 12/11/2007, 10:53 PM

I do have an air exchanger in my house already...I would just need to get it hooked into the fish room. I will call my HVAC sub tomorrow and see what they say.

Reefaquariumnut · #42 12/12/2007, 04:09 PM

I got the air exchanger questions taken care of with my HVAC guy...He will install a unit in that room ducted to the outside (only about a 12 foot run), Whew!! That will be perfect since i will have an entertainment center/bar being built there in the next month.

Any other electrical or HVAC i should be thinking about before i get too far?

matt & pam · #43 12/12/2007, 05:44 PM

Are the outlets in your ceiling one dedicated circuit, or does that circuit go to other areas in the room. Is one circuit above the tank enough for all your lighting needs?

Reefaquariumnut · #44 12/12/2007, 06:15 PM

The ceiling is one 20A circuit for the 3 outlets. I have 120A in that room alone spread over 15 outlets.

matt & pam · #45 12/12/2007, 06:32 PM

Do you plan to run all your ballasts through the ceiling outlets? I would guess you MH ballasts alone would run about 14-15 amps and then if you tack on T5s or VHO you very well could overload the circuit. I guess you could also divide the ballasts up where plugged in but just seems ideal if you have everything on a track that you would plug everything in the ceiling.

matt

jnarowe · #46 12/12/2007, 07:28 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Reefaquariumnut
The ceiling is one 20A circuit for the 3 outlets. I have 120A in that room alone spread over 15 outlets.

That's what I have in my tank room and I am running out.

Reefaquariumnut · #47 12/12/2007, 09:51 PM

I should have plenty of power in the room. I can plug most of the MH ballasts above and if i run out of power I can always run a longer cord to the floor where more power is. I plan on keeping the ballasts and lighting on a rack/track and if i need i can get longer cords (i've seen 30ft) to find power.

Maybe I wasn't clear before...I have 15 outlet boxes with 46 plug-ins. I have 6 dedicated 20A circuits in that room alone. When my electrical contractor and I were planning the room we added up what I thought I might need and added a couple more. I saw Steve Weast was running 5800W on 4 dedicated 20A circuits. I will be running about half of those Watts on a tank half of his size. I re-checked again and I think I have 40A on the ceiling with 4 outlet boxes and 8 plug-ins.

Reefaquariumnut · #48 12/12/2007, 10:25 PM

I think i can run somewhere around 2000-2400W/20A circuit. So I would be very close for one circuit handling the lighting requirements...The rest of the pumps, skimmers, controllers, etc would probably fit on two more 20A circuits.

jnarowe · #49 12/12/2007, 10:39 PM

Actually, Steve's final config on that tank was 5600W just for lights. He ran his 400W UV opposite the the light cycle, but I am not sure if that was because of electrical draw or heat.

It sounds like you are going to be fine. For me, I have 130A in my tank room, but because I am using 1000W MH lamps, I had to split them up onto their own circuits. This was more of an issue with the Neptune DC4HD's which carry a max of 15A. And I wanted to make damn sure the house lights didn't dim when my tank lights turned on!

jnarowe · #50 12/12/2007, 10:44 PM

jinx!

well, the issue I see is that you need to consider margins. Any time a device starts up, it draws more than the rated amps IIRC. obviously staggering the lights is one way to manage this, but just say you have a power outage and everything comes back on at the same time...then you might trip a breaker and not know it.

I realize this kind of stuff is built into most controllers, like I have a time delay on my lamp re-starts in the event of a power outage, but I still planned for the possible failure.

Don't get me wrong, I think based on what you have written, you will be fine, but keep in mind that rated amp draws are for continuous duty.