• Folks, if you've recently upgraded or renewed your annual club membership but it's still not active, please reach out to the BOD or a moderator. The PayPal system has a slight bug which it doesn't allow it to activate the account on it's own.

Tank temperature

NJ Lunatic

NJ Lunatic

Just curious about what everyone keeps their tank temps at and if you run a chiller.

I keep my tank at 80F and do not run a chiller.
 
lefkonj

lefkonj

78-80 with a chiller. I originally didn't have a chiller, LED lights and i kept the canopy open with bird netting and a ceiling fan, kept it fine for me. We weighed the cost of the chiller vs increasing our AC temp and it was cheaper to buy the chiller. SO now the house is slightly warmer, bird netting is gone, canopy is closed and my chiller goes on for about 45 minutes every 3-4 hours.
 
greybolt03

greybolt03

77 in the winter & 80 with the help of fans in the summer...
I do have a chiller from my old set up but have no room for it now in the new tank so I have to use fans on-top to keep water temps under 85.. But my water evap is crazy high..
 
falconut

falconut

NJRC Member
Since switching to LEDs in January I'm running around 77. It does dip down to just over 76 sometimes. Wonder if I should try bumping my heater a tad to get a little warmer, since everybody seems to like 78.
 
NJ Lunatic

NJ Lunatic

Before I changed to LED's I was running 82 with no chiller or fans and was loosing about a half gallon to a gallon a day. Dropping my temp 2 degrees about halved my evap, but I do notice corals not growing as fast.
 
MatteZ

MatteZ

77 and no chiller. I do have two of those little 4" USB desk fans in my canopy and then two more of them in my sump. $4 bucks a pop at Target. I also run LEDs and all dc pumps. I have my apex set to kick the fans on at 79 degrees and shut them off at 78
 
Cdiggy

Cdiggy

Mine used to run 80-82 with a chiller b/c of t-5's and canopy. Added 4 computer fans and controlled with reef angel and still at 80-82. I now run LEDs and no longer need the fans either but need a heater and temps run 76-77. Corals do seem to grow slower.
 
M

mnat

Officer Emeritus
Staff member
Moderator
There have been studies done on the calcification rates in corals at different temperatures. I can't find the article right now but will try and paraphrase it here. Ideal temp for coral calcification is 78, however the study showed that a swing of two degrees either way still had 90-100% of the same calcification rates so as long as you where in that 76-80 range you were fine. They did show more drop off the farther you got away from that.

Personally we run a bit cooler around 75ish but that has to do with our fish selection, but we have not had any worse coral growth and I rememebr a conversation I had with smcooler who was growing sps very fast at 72 at one point.
 
NJ Lunatic

NJ Lunatic

Not just calcification you need to worry about but metabolic rates as well, no?

Of course a higher temp invites lots of not so fun things like nuisance algae.
 
JRWOHLER

JRWOHLER

NJ Lunatic said:
Not just calcification you need to worry about but metabolic rates as well, no?

Of course a higher temp invites lots of not so fun things like nuisance algae.
Click to expand...

O2 obsorbtion too.....but I don't think the range that most people run their tanks at is too impactful.
Worst thing that happens is fast swings in temp in the case of a problem. I think most peoples tanks go up some in the summer but slowly enough not to present problems. If you move to far from the range or too quickly that is what causes problems.

PS 76.4 ...water changes tend to drop it a degree and in the summer it goes up to maybe 80 ... LED no chiller I have one haha but not hooked up. Have put a fan on when I ran T5.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top