Cheapest way to heat tanks?

[Ben P.]

I see lots of people who have tanks in the mid 70s in their homes without heaters, what I'm wondering is if those people just have their house pretty warm or do they not have ac?  I'm wondering because my fishroom stays at 69/70 year round with heat and ac, and was wondering if there was some tricks to keeping tanks warmer that I didn't know about? And to answer a few questions ahead of time, all my tanks have lights and custom glass tops that I cut and drill myself

[Rory Waliser]

How many tanks are you talking? I guess decent tank heaters are like 30ish bucks average depending on size. You might see a dollar difference per month in your electric bill per 100 watt heater so i would say the cost is mostly upfront. Also depends on the type of fish you want to keep. A lot of species wouldn't mind staying in that 70-72 degree range so you may not even need anything to heat your tank. It might also be possible to run all of your tanks through one sump tank since you have done custom drilling. That way you may be able to by one higher wattage heater and put it in the sump tank to keep the rest of them warm.

[Ben P.]

I think right now I have 17 tanks.  So not really a ton, but for breeding purposes I usually like to keep them at 77-78, as it helps with fry grow out to keep them warmer.   I'm not concerned about the cost of the heater itself, just the electricity cost.  The sump is a good idea to consider, but for electricity cost would it be very beneficial to have one large heater vs many small ones?

[Rory Waliser]

Yeah I guess 200 watts is 200 watts so it would cost he same if you had 4 heaters or a singe heater. And you would be creating more upfront cost to buy an extra sump tank and plumbing anyways. Scrap that idea lol.

[mountaintoppufferkeeper]

I have to have supplemental heaters in the tank rack systems by using a constant overflow sump system and a heater in each sump.

My acrylic tanks and food grade polycarbonate tanks have minimal openings and retain heat much better than the glass tanks but still need help in fall through spring up here on the mountain.

If I had a closed room I would use the house central heating or possibly a multi safety feature type room heater on a thermostat. Id guess those are a bit more regulated for safety and keeps electronics out of your tanks themselves if they have an issue. 

[Wonder Boy]

On 7/22/2021 at 12:47 PM, Ben P. said:

I think right now I have 17 tanks.  So not really a ton, but for breeding purposes I usually like to keep them at 77-78, as it helps with fry grow out to keep them warmer.   I'm not concerned about the cost of the heater itself, just the electricity cost.  The sump is a good idea to consider, but for electricity cost would it be very beneficial to have one large heater vs many small ones?

It's just in one room? It'd be quite the investment, but do you have the option to heating and cooling that room separately from the rest of the house?

If possible, you could try to do a through-the-wall unit or mini-split to heat and cool the whole room at 77-78. Not sure of the electricity costs of that vs individual heaters, but you might have have a little easier time keeping the tanks at temp since it'll be room temp. 

[Odd Duck]

@Ben P. If you have your tanks in one room just closing the vent to that room when the AC is running will keep that room a bit warmer, even if you have the door open.  If you close the door, it will let that room get significantly warmer.

When the heat is running during the winter, open the vent completely and close the door to hold that heat inside.  Partially closing the vents to other rooms will keep them slightly cooler and direct more heat to your fish room.

If fiddling with vents isn’t enough, you get a space heater for the fish room for winter.  Closing off that room to the AC should be enough in the summer for most people’s houses, depending on your climate.

[CT_]

I'm with odd duck here. 

1) try to stop cooling the room whenever possible.

2) heating the tanks is more efficient because you're heating less. 

2a) It may be more efficient to heat the whole room with a minisplit(which has >100% efficacy) .  if money is no object but you're somehow electricity constrained (eg off grid solar + battery) this may be the way to go, depending on how well insulated the room is and how much not-fish-mass is in there.

2b) If you don't have a heatpump/minisplit for the room insulation on the tanks will help a lot and or pushing them right up to each other.  Along with that a lot of energy is lost by evaporation so lids help a lot!

[Streetwise]

@Cory often recommends heating the room. Personally, I have tried to pick fish and shrimp to match my local conditions, including my apartment parameters. I have managed to remove all my heaters.

[Ben_RF]

Heating the room is most common.  Personally, I like during the summer to save energy by keeping the ac around 75'f in thee summer, fall, and spring.  Plus having lids really does help keep heat in.  

 

AND also a lot of fish are ok for gradual temperature swings.  

[Andy's Fish Den]

My fish room is in my basement and I live in northern OH, which gets cold in winter and hot in summer. I do have vents for my HVAC system in the basement, but in summer when AC is on, I close them, and in winter I open them to allow the heat in, I also have a dehumidifier that runs all the time so I get the heat from that. I have not insulated the walls or anything as of now, maybe one day down the road, but the basement is only 8 years old and I had 9" thick walls poured along with 2" of foam insulation and water proofing put on the outside of the walls because I had planned to finish off the basement into a rec room at the time of construction. Anyways, my basement stays around 75-78* year round, tanks will vary from 72 on bottom shelves to 76 in ones on highest shelf. I only have heaters in three tanks out of 21 tanks everything else, is unheated. 

[Fresh]

With my how my apartment is setup the tank stays in the upper 70's without a heater.