Lighting and electricity in fishroom advice…

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Orthopod

Dovii
MFK Member
Feb 22, 2010
553
385
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Seattle
I am the point where i have to decide the lighting and electrical in the fishroom.

any advice or suggestions regarding type/ amount?

thinking canned LED lighting but open to suggestions. Honestly, I know very little about electrical and just know i need it to sustain a lot of pumps and heaters, lol. Current fishroom had some issues taking the load.


thanks for the advice

photos for attention lol

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For a fishroom, especially if you have lighting over all the tanks, I'd just go with a few inexpensive LED battens.
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Looks isn't likely to be a high priority, but they're still decent looking, good lighting and easy to install No punching big holes in the ceiling like LED cans.
 
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A few general recommendations I would make:

As many circuits as possible into the fishroom. Ideally, each circuit would also feed some sort of light or other frequently-used device in the main living area of the house, just to alert you in case the circuit breaker trips. Otherwise, you wouldn't know until your next trip down into the fishroom. Could be as simple as a simple red LED light over your kitchen counter or elsewhere upstairs to indicate the fishroom circuit is live.

Full GFCI (Ground Fault Circuit Interruptor) protection on everything in the fishroom. These will trip if you splash water on a receptacle or drop some device into a tank. They react almost instantaneously, fast enough to prevent a dangerous shock to you. They can either be simple GFCI-protected powerbars (better than nothing), GFCI receptacles (much better option that can be wired in such a way as to provide GFCI protection on other devices like lights), or (best of all) proper GFCI breakers in the panel.

I like to make sure that each tank is filtered/aerated by devices fed from two different circuits. This way, if one circuit trips for whatever reason, the other remains live and every tank still has some water movement and aeration. I have a central air pump that feeds a sponge filter or at least an airstone in every tank, and it doesn't share a circuit with any other pumps or filters.

I would also place all receptacles on the ceiling or high up on the walls rather than the traditional location near the floor. Far fewer splashes or drips introducing water into a plug that way. Seeing receptacles or powerbars mounted inside stands makes my skin crawl. :shocked:
 
A few general recommendations I would make:

As many circuits as possible into the fishroom. Ideally, each circuit would also feed some sort of light or other frequently-used device in the main living area of the house, just to alert you in case the circuit breaker trips. Otherwise, you wouldn't know until your next trip down into the fishroom. Could be as simple as a simple red LED light over your kitchen counter or elsewhere upstairs to indicate the fishroom circuit is live.

Full GFCI (Ground Fault Circuit Interruptor) protection on everything in the fishroom. These will trip if you splash water on a receptacle or drop some device into a tank. They react almost instantaneously, fast enough to prevent a dangerous shock to you. They can either be simple GFCI-protected powerbars (better than nothing), GFCI receptacles (much better option that can be wired in such a way as to provide GFCI protection on other devices like lights), or (best of all) proper GFCI breakers in the panel.

I like to make sure that each tank is filtered/aerated by devices fed from two different circuits. This way, if one circuit trips for whatever reason, the other remains live and every tank still has some water movement and aeration. I have a central air pump that feeds a sponge filter or at least an airstone in every tank, and it doesn't share a circuit with any other pumps or filters.

I would also place all receptacles on the ceiling or high up on the walls rather than the traditional location near the floor. Far fewer splashes or drips introducing water into a plug that way. Seeing receptacles or powerbars mounted inside stands makes my skin crawl. :shocked:
Appreciate the advice thx
 
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i’ve got canned LED’s i use as working lights - more decorative pendant LED as room lighting - tanks have all their own independent blue tooth lights -

if you are going to hardwire your tank lights, hanging pendants can be good as tank lighting -

i have some outlets placed at tank top level to plug in my lights -

GL!
 
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i’ve got canned LED’s i use as working lights - more decorative pendant LED as room lighting - tanks have all their own independent blue tooth lights -

if you are going to hardwire your tank lights, hanging pendants can be good as tank lighting -

i have some outlets placed at tank top level to plug in my lights -

GL!
Thanks for the input!
 
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I like having my electrical outlets above tank height this creates a natural drip loop. Lights controlled by a switch would be nice. I'm not a fan of can lights. I have LED fixtures in my garage that daisy chain off each other and can support 9 in a row. I have one of these over my 120g and like it's color output.
Multiple circuits so that if a circuit trips not all of the tanks go off.
 
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One of the biggest things that has saved my fishroom is the multiple circuits....I also installed a transfer switch to the two circuits that run my central air pump and the water pumps for my sump. The transfer switch has a direct connection to my back up generator. The air pumps and water pumps are the lowest wattages in my room so the generator can handle it easily. Heating circuit is separate but if u have an outage if the room is insulated it will be awhile before Temps get to dangerous levels.
 
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