fish room expanding!

[scott]

i'm in the process of adding more tanks to my fish room. i have everything necessary except heaters. i'm looking for the best deal on 6 75watt heaters for the rack of 10's. does anyone know the best place to purchase heaters. the lfs' in my area are too expensive and i have already asked them about quantity discounts but none of them will agree to that.

 

[aspen]

how cool is your basement? i use ebo 50 watt heaters in my 10's and 15's. they work perfectly fine. if the tanks are side by side, they should be fine. i don't like to use a heater bigger than i need- ie cooked fish.


rick

 

[scott]

it's cool down there, i have 50's in 3 tens in there now and they aren't quite enough. the water temp drops down to amost 70 sometimes. i normally like to use as small a heater as possible but winters in RI get pretty cold sometimes. i've been thinking about heating the room instead but i've heard that creates a whole new set of problems i.e. mold, evaporation.

 

[fishboy20]

Jehmco.com has 75 watt heaters listed at $15.50 for up to 5 and you will get an even larger price break since you are buying 6. Seems like the best deal to me although I have heard of some other places like BigAls being even cheaper.

Can't wait to see pictures of your fishroom once it is finished. Good luck!

~Jeremy

 

[Mike Wise]

If you have a separate fish room, you can do what I did 25 years ago when building my fish room. I put a separate heating zone & thermostat in my fish room. The temperature is set at 80ºF/26½ºC; the tanks temperature stays at 78ºF/25½ºC (bottom row) to 80ºF (top row). Think of it; not heaters sticking & boiling fish. Expensive initially, but cheaper in the long run. I call it peace of mind.

 

[scott]

i looked into using the electric type baseboard heaters and a standard thermostat to heat the room. i think it will be possible and relatively inexpensive compared to running another loop off the boiler for a whole new zone. i'm gonna price it out over the weekend before i buy the 75watt heaters. i hope it doesn't cause a mold problem though.

 

[Mike Wise]

Electric base board heating, in most places, is much more expensive than gas heating. Over the long haul, a separate heating zone added on to your present system will probably cost less. You might also want to look at a separate stand alone gas heating systems. I also added insulation between my room & the rest of the basement. It not only keeps the heat in, but also reduces the noise in the rest of the house from my bubbling tanks & blower.

 

[scott]

thanks mike. i'll check the price of both options before i decide on anything. i just assumed that 2 electric baseboards would be enough to heat the room as it is a very small room in the basement. on the other hand being that it is only about 15 feet from the boiler it probably would be easy to set up another zone. i could possibly even do it myself .