85 Degrees!

Pete:

In this case the hood is well vented with big gaps on the top and fully open on the back. I normally leave it open anyway. It is also pretty short, so I'd need a small rectangular fan or some box fans. I have an extra 1/2 dozen box fans so I may grab a power supply and add a couple to the hood at some point just for kicks.

More importantly, putting it in the sump allows me to directly cool the water. With the hood I'm just circulating air between the lights and the glass. I don't have open water under the hood. I have seen a BIG difference in evaporation. Pre fan I lost about 2.5 gallons a week. I'm now up around 5. In this case, it seems to be much more effective to place it in the sump.

I believe the key is to try and directly cool the water if possible and have a well ventilated hood. My 300 is sort of rigged like that. I have 4 3" fans in the hood and my up it to 8 the next time I have the hood off. The sump is in a cool unfinished basement with a lot of surface area (It is 96"x30"). I don't have a chiller. Even with 2x250, 1x400 MH and a 1.5hp pump the tank doesn't get hotter than 79. Frankly, I think the twin Beckett skimmer injecting lots of cool basement air into the water really does much of the work in lowering the temp.

 

Well, I'm running a pendant. My top is completely open, so I dont have an enclosed area. But I got 4 inch hi-powered fans I wanna put to use. Any advice?

Putting one in the filter will be better? These things operate on 45v, so they are very powerful.

 

OK, just IMO off the top of my head.

The Pendant is not adding much direct heat if there is no top or hood so more air movement up there isn't any more of a big deal than in the sump. I may be wrong, but a high powered fan on top of the tank may be a little noisy. Personally, I'd bury it in the cabinet as long as the sump has sufficient surface area to cool off.

 

In my own experience, by adding a fan to blow across the top of your tank(evaporative cooling) you will be able to cool of your water quite nicely and without the need for a chiller.
Fans do an awesome job! Try it! The only thing is that you will find yourself having to add RO water to replace the water lost due to evaporation!

 

more fans

my top is open and my 4 in fan is clipped onto my light fixture, so it does blow across the top of my tank. I've put it on the same timer as my lights so it comes on when my lights come on. It seems to be doing the trick. My system is placed in a wall with access through a closet door so the sound isn't an issue.

 

Here is something I just purchased.
http://cgi.ebay.com/Salt-water-aqua...2QQihZ018QQcategoryZ20758QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

I actually purchased 3 of them and will post a review for everyone in 2 weeks after I get back from St Lucia. I plan on putt one on the fuge to work with my reversed lighting and 2 above the 75 gal to go on and off with the tank. I currently cool my tank with a large window fan ever night. So by day i hit 86 and by am back down to 78. So far o losses. Hopefully this will help solve my problem as well.

If you do a search of ebay for aquarium fan all kinds of great fans show up for either your clip on set up or to be mounted in a canopy. All plastic so no worries of salt creep hitting the medal and then dropping back into the tank.