This heat is ridiculous!

[Martin Thoene]

My unheated Sewellia tank was sitting at 87.9F at 06:30 this morning.

I threw a 2L Pop bottle semi-filled with water in the freezer before I left. See if I can bring the temp down tonight. At least they say this weather is due to break soon.

Martin.

[Gary Herring]

That IS hot. My Sewellia tank peaked at around 82/83F last week and I was a little bit concerned, did'nt seem to bother them in the slightest though to be honest. Its been much cooler here in the last couple of days anyway.

Any signs of distress?

[LES..]

I can sympathise all too well Martin. It was noticeable that our fish were bothered once the temperature got that high in the tank.

Thankfully we have had a break in the heat here in the UK, the outside temperature is down to a much cooler 22 centigrade today. Yesterday has been the first day in a long while where we did not need the frozen bottle to bring the water temperature down. The aquarium was 24C last night, still high but we erred on the side of keeping the temp stable.

I have a long term project for a chiller but things have stalled with it, not enough time and it has been too hot to be out playing with power tools. *sigh* what is a man to do without a shed for his tinkering...

[Martin Thoene]

I've been thinking DIY too. I look down from my balcony and see old fridges dumped near the bins in the apartment block opposite. Too big, but if someone throws out a bar-fridge that works.....

Power tools, whir whir, wizz, wizz......a long length of hose, hooked up to a powerhead.....could work.

Martin.

[LES..]

Power tools, whir whir, wizz, wizz......a long length of hose, hooked up to a powerhead.....could work.

It could indeed, i have always had too much back pressure on the powerhead to get any of my previous contraptions to work. Now that I have a good length of kink resistant 3/4" heavy duty hose it may be a different matter.

The other problem is the "You're not bringing that horrible rusty thing in the house!" factor... Justified in this case but it means a lot more work with a wire brush to clean it up followed by a paint job... Not such an easy job.

Pictures will follow i'm sure ;)

[The Kapenta Kid]

I have found that frozen pop bottles are not very efficient coolers. It might drop a 40 gal 1 degree C before the contents melt and you have to begin again.
Directing a fan onto the water surface is much more efficient. It can drop the temp from 30 to 25C in eight hours or so.

[Martin Thoene]

Hey TKK! Nice to see you here my friend

I dropped the bottle in as soon as I got home and it dropped a degree within minuites. I'll see how it goes.

My fans are all blowing on me right now!

EDIT: A few hours later. Oh right on the money TKK! About a 2 degree drop in a 40 gallon system

Martin.

[angelfish83]

I had my dog lying down on an ice pack with an ice pack wrapped around her back and an icepack under her paws and she was still too hot...

[Martin Thoene]

Cool news!

I purchased two Honeywell Super Tech fans today for only $16.99 each.

These can be wall mounted which is a really neat feature. I put one on the wall adjacent to the Sewellia tank at around 5pm today, the water temp was 82.6F, now 2 and a quarter hours later it's 76.7F.

I think I can call that a success!



The fans are pretty quiet, even on the highest setting. Check out the water movement I'm getting.......



All those ripples are from the fan, the little Topfin HOB in the background hardly does anything. I just know with this anmount of cooling I'm bound to get horrendous evapouration. I swear the level went down already

I put the other on the end wall near the 65 gallon River-Tank, but that temp hasn't changed. Probably because the fan is about 24" from the tank and can't blow directly onto the water surface. The tank has two double shoplights sitting on top of it. there is a gap front and back, but it doesn't get much of the fan's blast. I'll probably reposition the fan and experiment a bit. That tank is around 81 and change at present.

Martin.

[kimby]

good find on the fans Martin. I've been searching in vain for some kind of clip on fan. They make clamp lamps, why not clamp fans?
They gotta be out there somewhere....

[Martin Thoene]

Been experimenting with the River-Tank.

Found the fan would sit here:



There's a lot of air coming out as indicated by the arrows.



The tank went from 81.9F to 79F in 45 minuites! Woohoo! I'm wondering if I mount it up the wall a bit so that air flows around the Aquaclear 300 (just beside the fan) it might help further. More experimenting......

Here's one for Mark.....



Martin.

[shari2]

With all the discussions about changing temperatures gradually to reduce stress are you finding any negative effects from the fast change in temp?

[Mark in Vancouver]

Rather good, Martin. I have been keeping a desk fan - 18"? - going full time in the brook tank room, and the water stays just below 80 on a hot day. Ventilation is everything.

[Jim Powers]

Cool, Martin!!
I have a small 4" metal fan I got from Target ( I think WalMart sells them now too) several months ago that I hung over one of my river tanks to reduce the temp a few degrees of the water coming out of the UV sterilizer. It doesn't put out too much air compared to the ones you have but it has dropped the temp down to the level I wanted. I have it on a timer to go on about 5 am and off at midnight. Due to the typical summer heat and humidity here I have been running the AC nonstop so fortunately I haven't had to deal with overheated tanks. But, when that electric bill comes...

And kimby, they DO make a clip on fan.I saw them at some of the discount stores...probably Walmart, Kmart, Target or Meijer. I was going to use one, but I found that the small metal ones seemed sturdier.

[Martin Thoene]

Good question Shari.

Little too soon to say yet.....by the way 5.25 hours in, the Sewellias are at 74.9F and the R/T is at 77.7F after 2.25 hours of fan cooling.

It is my personal belief that this will not present any problem to these fish. I'm convinced that in the wild they would experience big changes in all parameters with tropical storm inundation.

Cross-section wize they inhabit relatively small bodies of water, so a heavy rain storm must alter the makeup of it drastically. I believe that they're pretty adaptable as long as they have good oxygenation.

Martin.