Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I need to keep the water at about 50-60 degrees farenheit. If you know of a product out there that keeps the water cool or a modification you can make with a fridge please let me know. Any help would be great, I need to keep it cool during the summer. I don't want to constantly use ice and having to replace it. I know this is of topic but I don't know where else to put it, thank you.

I've heard of chillers that people use for salt water aquariums before. You could put your tank inside of a bigger tank and have water in between the two with the chiller keeping the water in between the two cold, thus insulating the inside tank with cold water (lol, not sure if that made any sense). Anyways, I'd just check for chillers used for fish keeping and try to figure out a way to modify it to your own uses.

-Joe Blecha-

Turn it into a dart-frog vivarium.

Seriously, I wonder if instead of ice, the cold packs for shipping and beer coolers would last longer and be more convenient than having to replace ice all the time.
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Patty
Lost River, Idaho

I don't specifically know of any commercial products you can use, but I know they are out there. However, depending on your location, this might be easier than you think.

If you have an RO unit, or if you have a well, or if your utilities are paid for, you can easily create a "chiller" that should keep your tank around the upper 50's-60's. All you have to do is get plenty of 1/4" plastic tubing (the semi-stiff stuff that they use for things like ice-cube makers) and divert the stream of cold water from your RO runoff through that tube. Now, you'll make a large coil of this tubing that you can place inside the aquarium to act as a heat exchange (like a reverse radiator). So, the cool water (water from a well is usually 55 degrees) that runs through the tubing goes through the coil of tubing in the aquarium and out the other end (which should be attached to a drain in some fashion). The coil needs to be big enough to allow adequate surface area for sufficient heat exchange. A slow drip flow would probably suffice to keep the water in the tube cold enough to cool the aquarium.

If this is unclear, let me know. I have used this system of diverting my RO unit waste (which could easily be adapted to simply using diverted water from a cold tap--but would be wasteful) to keep blackworms cold enough to last for over a month in the fish room.

Good luck,
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Homer W. Faucett III, esq.
Purveyor of All Trivialities

Its really not hard, but kind of expensive. First you need to get a good external water pump, the kind that sits out side of the tank and pushes alot of water, you can find them at any good saltwater fish store. then get a few hundred feet of 1" plastic tubing and one of those little "college fridges". drill 2 holes in the door, one for in and one for out and then take all your hose and coil it up so it fits inside the fridge. run tubing through the in and out put holes and seal them up with silicone caulk. hook up the pump and you are good to go. These instructions are really breif and i am assuming you already know how to set up pumping systems and such. I will see if i can find a website that details this process. This will cost you about 200-300 bucks, but it is far cheaper than the commercially available tank chillers you can buy at saltwater stores. Plus, if you ever find that you dont need it anymore, you can take all the tubing out and you will find that you have Keg-er-ator with predrilled holes for the tap .

Good Luck

go to www.nano-reef.com
and ask on the forums how they chill their nanos

ashley