DIY Heater for larger reef systems

ravi197699

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Hello R2R, I am planning on building my DIY water heater that will heat up my tank with Natural Gas tankless water heater via heat exchanger. This has been done in the past and this is my version of how I am going to do it. Items that I will be needing for this is Natural Gas tank less heater, heat exchanger, pvc pipe, unions, one way valves, Taco low flow pump for closed loop, Small aquarium pump. Please let me know if you have any suggestions...
 

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Am I missing something or are you missing a temperature sensor to tell the unit at what temperature to turn on and of at?
 
Althouht cpvc could be used for piping the hot water from the heater, I'd prefer pex. I definitely would not use regular PVC.
 
Am I missing something or are you missing a temperature sensor to tell the unit at what temperature to turn on and of at?

Thanks, but there is temp probe that is coming from apex and apex is going to control the pumps based on the temp of the water in sump..
 
Althouht cpvc could be used for piping the hot water from the heater, I'd prefer pex. I definitely would not use regular PVC.

Thanks for this suggestion and yes it makes big difference. I might go with CPVC or Pex depends on availablility....
 
What could possibly go wrong? How much heat loss are you expecting from your system? Do you really need that massive of a heat input? Why invest this much in a non redundant system, when a few cheap heaters will do the job?
 
I Think you are going to need to manage the taco pump separate from the sump circulation pump. If you do things the way you have it pictured the water coming out of the exchanger is going to get way too hot, and likely to cause some serious temp fluctuations throughout your tank volume.

You want to be able to first engage the sump circulation pump, and if the temp does not climb or continue to climb to the desired temp, then cycle the taco pump for a short amount of time. Alternately you could have a 2nd temp probe monitoring the temp of the heat exchanger and if there was a call for heat and the temp was below a certain set temp cycle the taco pump.

The goal when heating the tank is a tiny, slow, even heat increases over a large volume of water.

I think you would be better off getting a small titanium heat exchange coil, that can go in to the sump and just have the taco pump to manage, you would want it to be super low flow, and even then I would put something on the line going to the coil to restrict the flow even more if things get too hot too fast. Even then you are going to have to carefully program the control of the taco pump and cycle it on and off for a short amount of time and then allow the water flowing through the coil in the sump to absorb the heat before cycling it again (if needed).
 
What could possibly go wrong? How much heat loss are you expecting from your system? Do you really need that massive of a heat input? Why invest this much in a non redundant system, when a few cheap heaters will do the job?
I believe this is for LARGE systems, think 800, 1000+ gallons where it is likely 5+ "standard" heaters might not be enough. Never mind the potential given the number of heaters for some kind of serious failure or electrocution.
Given what this would cost it sucks that there is no redundancy, it could be added for additional cost.
 
What could possibly go wrong? How much heat loss are you expecting from your system? Do you really need that massive of a heat input? Why invest this much in a non redundant system, when a few cheap heaters will do the job?

I have big system and will beed 800w heater to keep it going and with this system even when power goes out I can use small generator to to turn on this unit and heat up the tank. Low cost as well....
 
I Think you are going to need to manage the taco pump separate from the sump circulation pump. If you do things the way you have it pictured the water coming out of the exchanger is going to get way too hot, and likely to cause some serious temp fluctuations throughout your tank volume.

You want to be able to first engage the sump circulation pump, and if the temp does not climb or continue to climb to the desired temp, then cycle the taco pump for a short amount of time. Alternately you could have a 2nd temp probe monitoring the temp of the heat exchanger and if there was a call for heat and the temp was below a certain set temp cycle the taco pump.

The goal when heating the tank is a tiny, slow, even heat increases over a large volume of water.

I think you would be better off getting a small titanium heat exchange coil, that can go in to the sump and just have the taco pump to manage, you would want it to be super low flow, and even then I would put something on the line going to the coil to restrict the flow even more if things get too hot too fast. Even then you are going to have to carefully program the control of the taco pump and cycle it on and off for a short amount of time and then allow the water flowing through the coil in the sump to absorb the heat before cycling it again (if needed).

Thanks you for your suggestion... I like this idea as well. I can controll the temp of the tankless heater and controlling the taco pump saparatly is good idea as well. I dont want to use pex coil in the sump. I can't seem to find good titanium coil tube anywhere at good price but i will keep looking..

Thanks

Rav
 
I have a big system with an unheated remote tank room and unheated laundry room where the display tank is. 1000 watts of heater keeps my 360 gallon system plenty warm along with both rooms when the temperatures are in the teens.
 
PEX? perhaps just for the heater to exchanger and back.. obviously you would not want to use pex for the part from your sump to exchanger and back to sump (brass fittings)
 
Not sure why you wouldn't want to simplify it by just running pex coils in sump? Wouldn't need low flow pump or $$$ heat exchanger then. Just add a check valve and selonoid valve.
 
tank

ravi, did you make a thread on R2R about your Wooden Tank, Sump andFrag tank build????? people need to see it!

Hey Rob, Yes I have the thread on this for my plywood tank and tank is filled with RO water, sand and rock and this weekend cycle process will begin..
 
PEX? perhaps just for the heater to exchanger and back.. obviously you would not want to use pex for the part from your sump to exchanger and back to sump (brass fittings)

Thanks for advice and its good idea to use pex from to heater to exchanger....
 

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