Power saving tips and ways to save money!?

[Reef Pilot]

The biggest (or baddest) power draw we have is our hot tub. It runs from Nov to Apr, and the power bill always goes way up for the winter. We only use it on avg about once a week. Have talked to the wife a few times, about whether it is worth it, but she wants it, so... Talked to the spa shop about a timer, but they say it is not good for the motor to shut it off and on. And we keep the heater on all the time, because we use it more as a spur of the moment decision in the evening, and wouldn't want to wait for it to heat up again.

Speaking of money sinks, though, my Shaw cable (incl internet and phone) is costing us more and more, with all the HD and specialty channels (can't give up my Oasis). We're up to 200 bucks a month on that now!! I tried pulling the "we're switching to Telus" ploy on them, but it hasn't worked so far. Seems that until you actually put in a cancellation, they won't budge.

And not to mention my iPad and Smartphone costs.....

My SW tanks don't looks so bad, when I look at the above, but it does all add up....

Hope I don't run out of money before that asteroid comes....

[Baldy]

Originally Posted by Reef Pilot

Hope I don't run out of money before that asteroid comes....

Hey if you ask some of.the crazies in the US, it'll be a zombie apocalypse.

Sorry, the fiance and I are watching the walking dead atm and I couldn't help it

[asylumdown]

When people calculate out how much they're going to save on LEDs (or not, as the case may be), they always seem to use the total wattage of the fixture in their calculations.

My fixtures never hit their max output, so they're never drawing their max wattage, and even the max output that they do hit is only maintained for 4 hours a day. The rest of the time they're using significantly less than their listed power draw capacity. My radions trip my GFI circuits, so they're not plugged in to my apex unfortunately, but it would be interesting to see what that ramp up and down does to their actual power draw over the course of a day.

On another note, does anyone know whether it's better from an electricity point of view to run more watts of heater, knowing that they'll be running for a shorter period of time, or the less wattage possible, knowing that heaters will have to run longer to maintain temp? I've got 2 300 watt heaters on my system, and when the Apex turns them on, they're usually on for 20 minutes or more. I'm wondering if I should add the other 300 watt heater I've got sitting in a drawer as backup to cut down the total length of time the heaters are running.

[lastlight]

I would think the only difference with heater count is how gradual or rapid your recovery to target temp is. More heaters gives you backup in case one fails but fewer heaters would make the tep swing back up more gradual.

I'm saying this using a ranco which kicks on at 77 and off at 78. With fancier controllers this prob isn't a concern with ramp up time since the controller keepers a tighter range i think.

As for power draw... some with halides likely underestimate their draw. My 250W each ran at 330W. Ballasts and bulbs both determine what that number will be.

Another way to save money (unrelated to power though) is to take good care of your ro membrane. flush it before and after use and then bypass the di resin for a minute or so until membrane output is as low as it's reasonably going to get. mine has been outputting 1 TDS after less than a minute of bypass since I got it and after running a while it drops to zero. This practice saves you a ton of DI resin.

[asylumdown]

yah the Apex kicks the heaters on at 26.1 and turns them off at 26.6 or 26.7 I think, which I think is the difference between 78.9 and 80.06, so it's a pretty tight range. I just takes a good long while to swing the temp even that small amount with 600 watts of heater, but on the plus side, it takes hours for the temp to fall enough to trigger the heaters. I thought that maybe added heaters would be more efficient, but I guess it probably all comes out in the wash, your'e still heating X volume X degrees.

[kien]

my suggestion would be to ditch filter socks. Or at a minimum reduce their use. In my opinion they do not fall under the "must have" category of reefing. Using them means you have to wash them which means you are either rising them out by hand or throwing them into the washing machine or both. There is an opportunity to conserve on water and electricity here.

[Reef Pilot]

How efficient are in-sump pumps for heating water? For example, if I have a 100 watt pump running in my sump vs a 100 watt heater in my tank. Will both heat my tank equally? I assume not, but for sure the pump does produce a fair bit of heat as well.

In my specific case, I have 2 sumps, each with 2 pumps. One tank needs to be supplemented with a heater, while the other has bigger pumps and needs to be cooled with a chiller. And yes, I know some of the heating comes from the lights.

But just curious, what is the difference in heating efficiency between pumps and heaters?