Habitat - Indoor :: Need to bring tank temp DOWN

[TurtleLou]

Hello, folks,

Some of you may have seen a recent thread of mine in the general care forum about the new 75 gal tank that just became my lil' buddy's new home and how he had me concerned due to his behavior in it.

Well, after my initial concern over his behavior... was probably just adjusting to his tank... he's his old self again thankfully.

However, his tank is at about 80/82 degrees and there is no water heater in it. Nor is it directly in front of a window. The window in the room always has the curtains closed... not that it's dark... but it darn sure ain't all that hot in there from sunlight.

He's only got the one basking lamp over his basking dock.

We keep our home at about 78'ish degrees... is that it? I hate the thought of having to crank up our AC more to bring the tank temp down... our electric bills are already about $200/month, (live in Florida).

When I fill it I make sure the water is turned all the way to cold... so it's not like I put warm water into the tank.

He sheds a lot... likely due to his tank being too warm... and at a year old he's about 4.5" ... again probably in part due to his tank being too warm... and... uh... my overfeeding him before I knew better.

Any suggestions on cooling the tank down?

Thanks all.

Take care,
Lou

[jenaero]

I'm having the same prob. The temp in my 125gal sits between 80 and 85F. I've heard of some people who put a couple bottles of frozen water in the tank. I'm going to try it.

[marisa]

I've been able to lower the temp a degree or two with the frozen bottles of water. Lately, though, I've been adding some chilled water to the tank when doing a partial water change and have also been adding ice cubes when the temp is really high.

[kneecole]

What kind of filter do you have?

I had this problem last year and I found the best thing to do if you have a canister filter like the XP3 is to just put the canister in a styrafom cooler and fill the cooler w/ ice or ice packs. So that way you don't have things floating in your tank and it cools the water as it enters the filter. It works great!!

[TurtleLou]

Thanks for the suggestions all.

Very interesting, Kneecole... I'll look into rigging something like that up.

I have a Cascade 600, (60 gallon), and the Cascade 300, (10 gallon), from his old tank working together. Both are completely submersible filters.

I did turn down our AC 2 degrees, (from 80 to 78), much to my wife's delight, LOL. Now his water temp seems to be about 79/80 degrees... down from 82.

Still another 5'ish degrees to go though.

Thanks again for the advice... I'll let you all know how it works out.

Take care,
Lou

P.S. Now why does it keep turning the eight, in seventy eight above into a 7 with a smile next to it? It didn't turn the 8 in eighty above into a smile...

[steve]

Sadly, with this heat wave, I've been doing partial water changes every day. Frozen water bottles were not as effective as I hoped it would be when I tried them last summer.

[jenaero]

I'm doing the water bottle thing this week. The high temp alarm on the digital thermometer finally went off. The water at room temp is 88F. I'm able to get it back down around 80 with the water bottles but I'm not sure what else to do. I know this heat wave is supposed to continue for a while. The humidity in my apartment is 80%

[sesame]

i'm having a similar problem with my baby RES's tank. i know his water's supposed to be around 78, but it's consistently around 84-85 degrees (despite dropping my AC to 74 since it has been crazy hot out these past couple days, which could be contributing to the warmth of the water), and i have a nice basking light on his dock which is probably several degrees warmer than the water, but my baby still doesn't seem to be basking enough, just cozying up in the water by the light, so i'd like to drop the water temp.

is it dangerous to put frozen containers in the tank? that's an interesting idea. do you insulate them with anything? or could i even put a baggie or icepack full of ice in there?

[jenaero]

I just use water bottles. They melt in a matter of minutes tho so it's not proving very useful. I'm tempted to do a full water change, fill it with cold water and then from there, go to 7-11 and just get bags of ice and chuck them in as needed. I'm hoping when my AC goes in today it may help.

Not sure if I'd use one of those blue plastic ice packs. You're talking about the ones you put in lunchboxes right? I think they've got chemicals in them and you wouldn't want to risk a leak.

[marisa]

I'm dumping ice cubes in tanks that have Aquaclears. The cubes are melting awfully quickly in this heat.

[CountryGirl68]

I've had to make daily water changes in my fish tank because of this heat. The water's been going up to 82F, which is not good. I have central A/C which I have running all day long and it still feels as if I don't have A/C. I tried the ice cube thing that you've been doing and, just like you Marisa, they melt immediately and don't seem to be having any effect in the water.

I'm glad I've decided to wait on getting the turtle. This heat is just too much right now.