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experience or advice for electricity- dedicated circuits?

Discussion in 'Aquarium Equipment & Decor' started by lostanime, Dec 15, 2008.

  1. lostanime

    lostanime Thread Starter New Member

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    Electricity...

    Does anyone have any warnings/experience with setting up dedicated circuits for aquariums? I'm pulling too much power for a single existing circuit, and cant afford to have all gear go down because of one malfunction. I dont want to hook up the new pumps until I know that it's not going to take down all of my existing gear.

    My idea is to have three dedicated circuits:
    1 - short term "unnecessary" gear: all the lighting, skimmer pump, UV sterilizer, supplimental circulation pumps, any additional "non critical" gear (ie if i add an ozonizer, calcium reactor, electronic top-off, etc)
    2 - redundant line A: one return pump to main tank, one heater, return pump to refugium
    3 - redundant line B: one return pump to main tank, one heater, tank ground

    My thoughts are that I want 1 non-short term critical circuit so if anything not critical breaks, it doesn't take down critical gear, and 2 separate redundant lines so if one critical piece of gear breaks, it doesn't take down all of critical gear and the tank can limp on until the problem's addressed.

    Does this sound appropriate and acheivable? I will use all new GFCIs when installing (I have a feeling one of my current GFCIs isn't up to snuff anymore)
     
  2. Anthony

    Anthony Active Member

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    I'm just curious. Why would the circuit flip off if one piece of equipment broke ?
     
  3. lostanime

    lostanime Thread Starter New Member

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    Great question - I've actually never had a circuit flip from equipment breaking... the GFCI's flip (which in essence accomplish the same thing... power is cut)

    I've had GFCI's flip a few times in the last year... the last time was when a cheap (coralife supplied) pump burnt-out, the time before was from a zooMed rotating powerhead shorting.

    I did pop the circuit breaker when I added the metal halides... apparently 1050W of metal halides, 200w of hot5s, a handful of pumps, and 600w of heaters was just too much for one circuit :eek:

    I dont expect constant failures but I dont want one small equipment failure to turn into a systemic failure!
     
  4. Anthony

    Anthony Active Member

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    Are you dead set on having separate circuits for everything ? I'm no electrician and have very limited electrical knowledge. If it were me, I'd just increase the circuit in the breaker box. I assume it's a 10 or 15 amp, so if you made it a 25 amp it should be fine. Again, this is assuming you aren't set on separate circuits for everything.
     
  5. lostanime

    lostanime Thread Starter New Member

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    Very dangerous to do this, because the wiring in the walls/through the house are rated for the breaker in the circuit box... can start a fire when the draw increases past the original rating...
     
  6. Anthony

    Anthony Active Member

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    Eh true. Clearly I'm not qualified to give electrical advice. :) I'll leave it to the others.
     
  7. lostanime

    lostanime Thread Starter New Member

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    It's a good point, and it's actually got me thinking about adding just one dedicated (25 amp) circuit but having having 3 separate (but not interdependantly wired) GFCIs on that circuit... that'll definitely simplify this - one max current for all aquarium stuff (that will never be reached) and the individual GFCIs should make sure that failures are not escalated to the circuit breaker to address! My original thoughts on having individual circuits is probably extreme overkill regarding redundancy
     
  8. LemonDiscus

    LemonDiscus Active Member

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    I too blow fuses, usually when the wife plugs in the Steam Cleaner.... sometimes the Vacuum, others my guitar amp..... TOO MUCH ELECTRICITY!!! :)

    Couldnt help you though.... I would look up online how to install a new circuit! It cannot be that hard (3 wires, a white, a black and a green) the White and the Black dont really have and particular location to go... just one of the mail "slit" style areas and the green is the ground. AC Current has not positive or negative.... The part I dont know is attaching it to the main circuit... but again cannot be that hard...

    The most labor intensive is probably ripping out drywall to install the wires and then repairing it afterwords.
     
  9. lostanime

    lostanime Thread Starter New Member

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    :) Oh yeah... I forgot to mention - I've strictly forbidden my wife from plugging anything further in either of the two circuits that the aquarium stuff is currently on (and I put those baby outlet plugs in every free outlet on those circuits as a friendly "reminder")...
     
  10. lostanime

    lostanime Thread Starter New Member

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    Ok... I've got new pumps just laying around waiting for me to get off my butt and get power to them now.

    I'm leaning towards killing power to the breaker by flipping the master, adding new circuit & wire... cutting new dropping wires through floor (crawlspace side of house with breaker box & aquarium)... turning power back on but leaving new circuit breaker cut off, running wires under floor boards to aquarium (running through tubing normally used to bury wire so there's no chance bugs/small animal can chew the wiring up), and bringing up through floor behind aquarium.

    I'll pick electrician books up to make sure i'm using "best practices" when doing all of this...

    And yes, my friends are starting to poke and laugh with all the plumbing, and apparently now electrical work I'm doing to the house for the fishies.
     
  11. Blueiz

    Blueiz New Member

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    Was just fixing to suggest adding another breaker to your box if you had an extra space in it just for your tanks. One thing to note on this too. My husband and I removed and in wall oven that was broke and decided it was cheaper to replace the in counter stove with a stand alone. Prob was that wiring that was there for the stove was not rated for a stand alone oven/range. He went out and purchsed the wire to run from the break box that was rated for the range, when he got up under the house he found that there was wire that was already hooked to the breaker box that was the rating we needed for the range/oven that used to go to an old heating and ac unit. We ended up being able to use that wire. Just a thought for you to look at, just in case, it would save you a lot of work if you could luck out like that.
     
  12. lostanime

    lostanime Thread Starter New Member

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    That would be awesome... our "mud room" (with circuit breaker) is off of the kitchen, and the kitchen opens into the den (with tanks)... might luck out. If not, it should be a quick run under the floor..

    I just chatted with a guy @ home depot last night, and he proceeded to try to tell me that metal halides are too dangerous to run on home aquariums because they are a fire hazard, use too much electricity to be efficiently light a tank, and heat the water up too hot requiring a chiller. He insisted that I need to "upgrade" to power compacts like he has on his tank :roll: I was just asking his advice on books/resources to do this wiring project...

    When I mentioned I originally had power compacts (just not enough penetrating light), tank never goes over 80F or fluctuates more then 1.5 degree in a day despite no chiller with metal halides, etc... he kept insisting they'll burn my house down ... dude's on crack if he thinks PCs will be enough in a tank this big for acropora, and there's no way i'm buying 16 bulbs (8 rows) of HOT5s yearly !

    I had no idea employees were becoming so worthless at that home depot (hull)
     
  13. LemonDiscus

    LemonDiscus Active Member

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    Thats why I go to Lowes..... I have yet to find an employee with a fish tank! I love not having employees putting their worthless 2 cents worth!

    Sounds like because that person knows it all about fish tanks they should own a pet store and quit Home Depot!
     
  14. lostanime

    lostanime Thread Starter New Member

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    :)

    It was actually pretty strange, when I told him I needed to have a dedicated circuit he pushed to find out why (for my tank)... insisted that my tank wouldn't use enough current to need that (which i told him the lighting)...which he then insisted i shouldn't have those lights. Hopefully at Lowes I can just tell them my power needs, ask if they have good books and the supplies I'll need, and just let me do it.
     
  15. LemonDiscus

    LemonDiscus Active Member

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    Again, I have issues blowing fuses.... I DO NOT run Metal Hallide, I only run T8 Fluorescents. My issue is a cross of the large amount of lighting, doubled by all of my heaters (about 1000 watts (4 heaters) on my 2 tanks downstairs) plus my filtration (Emperor 400, Penguin 350, Magnum 350, Tetra for 30gallon). Didnt he understand there is more than lighting on a fish tank that drains power???
     
  16. Anonymous

    Anonymous Guest

    Top Poster Of Month

    dude play it safe call an electrician. im an electrician and i cant even tell you how many times i have been sent to peoples homes to fix the mess they started. if you dead set on doing it yourself, then pm me any questions you have. gl