I was curious I’d like to give my pumps and things a break sometimes. Can I unplug everything but heaters for a couple hours a day or would that not be safe without surface agitation. Wife would be happy to cut the bill down to lol. Also would the B.B. be ok to not have sponges filters and hobs have running air/water thru the them
How long can tanks be off electricity?
- Thread starter Pond9
- Start date
certainly not ideal, lots of things could go wrong.
A good pump is designed to run 24/7, and as far as “giving it a break” turning it on and off is far worse than just leaving it on. The toughest thing on a motor is the cold start, so you’d be more rapidly aging your equipment.
If you want to save electricity there are other things that can be done with a well designed system. If you detail your system perhaps people can give ideas.
A good pump is designed to run 24/7, and as far as “giving it a break” turning it on and off is far worse than just leaving it on. The toughest thing on a motor is the cold start, so you’d be more rapidly aging your equipment.
If you want to save electricity there are other things that can be done with a well designed system. If you detail your system perhaps people can give ideas.
When in Wisconsin I unplugged 90% of my heaters June thru Sept, but never the pumps, unless doing maintenance.
Flow to keep beneficial bacteria robust, and aeration are too important to mess with.
i only had lights on tanks with plants (maybe 1/4 of the tanks), and those were on timers, and my fish room averaged about 1,000 to 1,500 gallons, depending on what was spawning at the time.
The energy bill for the fish room alone ran about $300 per month in winter, down to half of that in summer. The heaters being the real energy hogs.
Flow to keep beneficial bacteria robust, and aeration are too important to mess with.
i only had lights on tanks with plants (maybe 1/4 of the tanks), and those were on timers, and my fish room averaged about 1,000 to 1,500 gallons, depending on what was spawning at the time.
The energy bill for the fish room alone ran about $300 per month in winter, down to half of that in summer. The heaters being the real energy hogs.
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It’s not ok to turn the pump off for a few hours. That’s depriving your fish and bio filter of oxygen. A better solution is designing your system for more efficiency. Cover the top of your tank or sump to keep heat lost to a minimal. Sometimes I even put a towel on the side of the tank that get wind from the old windows. Other options are getting power efficient pumps. Some of the pumps have adjustable control so it won’t draw as much power. By the way, acrylic tanks does keep heater better than glass tanks.
I agree about conservation, I put styrofoam insulation panels on the bottom and 3 sides of all heated tanks, too help with retaining heat, and also had a panel cut at the ready for the all fronts in case of a power outage.
You should also cut down on bills by turning heating and cooling to a minimum/off .
Keep lights off and replace light bulbs with energy efficient leds.
Turn tv off when not using it etc.
Keep lights off and replace light bulbs with energy efficient leds.
Turn tv off when not using it etc.
It been my experience that unless someone has a lot of aquariums or runs electricity hogs like metal halide lights and such that a lot of people overestimate how expensive their tanks are in relation to their overall power bill. Is turning off pumps for a couple hours a day really going to make that much of a difference? The biggest risk with turning off a pump to a filter is that as soon as you turn off flow through a biological filter you remove the air supply to critical bacteria... kill enough off and when the pumps come back on there could be the potential to essentially poison the tank. Doesn't happen often, but it can and has happened from time to time.
What species are you keeping, and what are ambient room temps? Some fish do great at 65-72 (usual room temp), and some will not.