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Lightning strikes

C

chase33

I don't know about you guys in the south but there was a bad storm here last night in the north. I never saw so much lightning in my life. At one point the weatherman on the 11 o'clock news stated there were over 100 strikes within 15 minutes :eek:. Glad it's over and hope everyone made out ok.
 
S

Subliminal

NJRC Member
Wow! I say lightning in the distance, and it looked like a lot, but I figured it was just heat lightning.

Guess not! :eek:
 
mynd

mynd

I hear ya.. Could not even go to sleep till almost 3am, since it was thundering so loud. Good thing I have a couple of these.

http://www.compusa.com/products/product_info.asp?pfp=BROWSE&N=200082&product_code=305898

I can't believe anyone does not have something of this kind at least on one of the circulation pumps and their heater ( if they have one ). I am lucky to have a AP12. I can run everything including the chiller for 3 hours and 45 minutes if I needed too and even longer if the chiller does not come on.
 
M

mladencovic

mynd said:
I hear ya.. Could not even go to sleep till almost 3am, since it was thundering so loud. Good thing I have a couple of these.

http://www.compusa.com/products/product_info.asp?pfp=BROWSE&N=200082&product_code=305898

I can't believe anyone does not have something of this kind at least on one of the circulation pumps and their heater ( if they have one ). I am lucky to have a AP12. I can run everything including the chiller for 3 hours and 45 minutes if I needed too and even longer if the chiller does not come on.
Click to expand...

Heaters on any system 50 gal and up (lets say 100W heaters) will drain it in 25 min or less.
 
mynd

mynd

Are your heaters on the entire time? :) I have tried it on my system and with that configuration I am able to keep the tank going for over 3 hours with the moonlights on. That includes an 8.5 watt mj900, a 45 watt hd20 blueline and a 200 watt cl-150 ( which comes on once every 4.5 hours for 10 minutes. No matter what you think the math is. It works... and I would rather have the protection then not. If your tank requires more batteries, then buy them. Spending a couple hundred dollars or even a 1000.00 over time to protect your 10,000.00 dollar tank is nothing less then a wise investment.

I started to look at this reply and figured it might be interpreted as a come back.. I just want to specify it was not meant that way. It was meant with respect. I also noticed that I forgot to quote myself from above.

I have a COUPLE of these. Not just one.
 
K

kathainbowen

We were driving to QXTs last night in Newark on the Turnpike NB, and it was absolutely amazing. I almost had to stop the car to watch. In fact, we were so distracted by the pretty, that we fell behind on our rigid "we-must-get-there-so-we-chicks-don't-have-to-pay" schedule (despite the fact that Johnny Bass always has to pay.

Did anyone manage to snag any sweet pics? I'd love to see some of the cooler bolts that I missed but had the rest of the car jumping and squealing in delight!
 
GregW

GregW

I took this photo about 20 years ago. I was on the Spring Lake side of Lake Como and the storm was getting pretty intense to the north. I had two rolls of slide film and just started shooting away. This is the only shot I got out of the bunch.

lightning.jpg
 
K

kathainbowen

ReeferNets said:
QXTS? Where is that..


Go to Adega
Click to expand...

It's on Mulberry. We go for the industrial and the dark wave.... and also to watch Johnny Bass get intoxicated and do weird things like jump on mailboxes.
 
M

mladencovic

mynd said:
Are your heaters on the entire time? :) I have tried it on my system and with that configuration I am able to keep the tank going for over 3 hours with the moonlights on. That includes an 8.5 watt mj900, a 45 watt hd20 blueline and a 200 watt cl-150 ( which comes on once every 4.5 hours for 10 minutes. No matter what you think the math is. It works... and I would rather have the protection then not. If your tank requires more batteries, then buy them. Spending a couple hundred dollars or even a 1000.00 over time to protect your 10,000.00 dollar tank is nothing less then a wise investment.

I started to look at this reply and figured it might be interpreted as a come back.. I just want to specify it was not meant that way. It was meant with respect. I also noticed that I forgot to quote myself from above.

I have a COUPLE of these. Not just one.
Click to expand...

:) no offence taken, whatsoever.

It is true that in summer, my heaters are not on, most of the time, but they do turn on and off at some times, and they will drain the battery fast. Remember, this particular product has only 50Wh in it (will drain in 3.7 min at 800W). And even if we forget the heaters, and take only my Mag 9 pump that uses 90W, that will give me only 30min of its work.

The point that I am trying to make is that these products are not that usefull on systems that are not nano systems. Even if it works for several hours, it is still not a consequential help. Basically, if your power outage is for just a several hours, your system can survive it easily. People often shut their pumps for a longer period of time when target feeding or photographing, and the systems are fine. On the other hand, if the power outage is of a longer nature (every few years there is something like that :mad:), then the several hours here or there won't make much difference :(.

:) I hope my reply will offend you as well ;)
 
J

JasonR

I was out in Mechanicsburg PA at a Sprint car race last night It never rained
I got home at 2Am and say that my power went off and the driveway was wet and said to myself we must of had a storm ;D.
So I guess I missed a good one

Jason
 
GregW

GregW

mladencovic said:
It is true that in summer, my heaters are not on, most of the time, but they do turn on and off at some times, and they will drain the battery fast. Remember, this particular product has only 50Wh in it (will drain in 3.7 min at 800W). And even if we forget the heaters, and take only my Mag 9 pump that uses 90W, that will give me only 30min of its work.

The point that I am trying to make is that these products are not that usefull on systems that are not nano systems. Even if it works for several hours, it is still not a consequential help. Basically, if your power outage is for just a several hours, your system can survive it easily. People often shut their pumps for a longer period of time when target feeding or photographing, and the systems are fine. On the other hand, if the power outage is of a longer nature (every few years there is something like that :mad:), then the several hours here or there won't make much difference :(.

:) I hope my reply will offend you as well ;)
Click to expand...

Would there be any benefit if you ran it for say 5 minute every hour?
 
J

jerseydiablo

Wow, great shot Greg!

While last night we didn't get hit, we've had so many storms and crazy lighting all summer long. A few weeks ago there were a few strikes that hit some houses in the area. A few Million $$$ homes in Shark River Hills got pretty badly damaged from what I heard.
 
C

Carlo

With a UPS you don't want to try and power your whole system. In a nut shell you really only want to concentrate on keeping a couple of powerheads and/or air bubbles running to keep O2 up. Trying to run heaters, lights, return pumps, filters is not a good idea.

Keep some ice packs in the freezer for an emergency cool off and if it happens in winter you can heat up some water if you have a gas stove and float the hot water in soda/milk containers to keep temps up as much as possible.

Also worth having is a DC to AC converter that can be used in an emergency. Plug into car (start it to not drain battery as fast) and use this for some powerheads, etc. Think of this as a poor man's generator. Works as long as you and the car are home. :)

Carlo

Carlo
 
mynd

mynd

What no one has really touched on is the basic fact that having a UPS covers any power blips ( those are when the power goes on off on off every few minutes ) Having those blips can render hardware useless and in some cases pumps won't restart. I love having a UPS and I would not have a tank without one or two or three..
 
C

Carlo

If a power blip takes out a pump or powerjet it was probably on it's way out anyway. Pumps and powerjets aren't sensitive like electronics to outages. Heck most pumps that tell you not to use on a wave maker will do this fine for a while before they die. As an example I've got two Hydor #4s on a wavemaker alternating every 3 minutes. Been doing this for 2 months now and these are pumps you're not suppose to do that with.

So I'm not saying not to put them on a UPS but I don't think it's warranted for blips and whatnot. Overall I think a design where you maximize the amount of watts you have to keep essentials running as long as possible is a better choice but hey that's only my 2 cents. Everyone does things differently.

Carlo
 
M

mladencovic

mynd said:
What no one has really touched on is the basic fact that having a UPS covers any power blips ( those are when the power goes on off on off every few minutes ) Having those blips can render hardware useless and in some cases pumps won't restart. I love having a UPS and I would not have a tank without one or two or three..
Click to expand...

As Carlo has pointed out, wavemakers and top-offs can be as bad as the lighting blips. They ARE strikes of lightning every time when they open and close the circuit :)
 
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