Well first good news for me, I got accepted to go to University of Maryland for my masters degree PoM Now the bad news… I have to start paying for stuff because my possible new apartment does not include rent. What I wanna know is how much do you think a 150W metal halide tank with 2 powerheads would put on my electric bill? I’m thinking of downgrading to a 10 gallon and just one of the power heads but I doubt it will do much to curb the bill.
If it ends up blowing my budget, I’ll probably have to dismantle the whole tank and just start over post graduate school and such because currently its a pain to move 15 min away much less 2 hours. So I guess good news for you is i may be offering all my live stock (fish, coral, rock and sand) soon to you guys for a good price
[quote=“bugbabe623, post:1, topic:2843”]
Well first good news for me, I got accepted to go to University of Maryland for my masters degree PoM Now the bad news… I have to start paying for stuff because my possible new apartment does not include rent. What I wanna know is how much do you think a 150W metal halide tank with 2 powerheads would put on my electric bill? I’m thinking of downgrading to a 10 gallon and just one of the power heads but I doubt it will do much to curb the bill.
If it ends up blowing my budget, I’ll probably have to dismantle the whole tank and just start over post graduate school and such because currently its a pain to move 15 min away much less 2 hours. So I guess good news for you is i may be offering all my live stock (fish, coral, rock and sand) soon to you guys for a good price :-P[/quote]
If you give me the watts off the power heads, the time you run your lights, watts of the heater and I can give you a rough estimate
When I get to work I will post a template for all kinds of equations
How much more of a pain is it to move 15 minutes then it is 2 hours. Still have to get the animals to the car and into the new apartment either way. And you have to make the trip with or without the animals. Even if you have to make an extra trip I think it would be worth it.
Here is a copy of a basic excel sheet which can help you figure out how much power you are using. Remember to add in everything you plug. It is rough to figure out how often your heaters are on so I usually over estimate. On a smaller sized tank with a MH on I doubt your heater comes on at all while that light is warming up your water. An over estimation for heater usage on your tank may be more like 10 hours unless you keep your apartment at 60*F or below.
W = how many watts your equipment is using. You can find this out for sure using a device called a Kill-A-Watt or roughly by looking online at a company that sells them or sometimes the manufacturers site.
H= how many hours you will use them
KWHRS = (W*H)/1000
Rate = the rate your electrical company charges which you can find on your bill. You may also find a section of your bill that will describe that different rates are charged for non peak hours. Running your MH during that time of the day only may save some $
Cost = (KWHRS*Rate)
Per month = Cost * 30 (30 days in a month)
You may find that going to the movies a couple times a month will cost more than your tank will on an electric bill.
Well moving the tank for 4 hours (with only 2 corals and about half the live rock) was bad. My problem is I have small animals in large cages that can’t be collapsed (and it also looks like I am on my own as far as the move, so i will only have a small truck) so I already am going to have to make a trip for them so taking 3 trips for the fish tank? I don’t particularly want to waste the gas if it can be solved. Right now because of my lack of help moving the aquapod is really awkward and heavy and moving it requires a 5 gallon bucket filled with rock that doesn’t have any live stock on it and water, and a bin that has fish and corals in it as well as rock, as well as the tank, all of that takes up my entire car with space here and there for like my mice. Not to mention it takes me about 2 hours to prepare it for move and then getting it filled again is a whole other issue, considering my RO unit does the tank’s water in about half of a day. Its just a mighty mite. Because of my space, time, and gas restraints I just can’t see the aquapod making it without me smashing it :-P.
Wow Jon thanks for that table. It definitely makes me feel a little better, and I don’t have a heater on that tank (mainly cause the light does the job fine as well as ambient temperature here.) I’m sure though the two power heads i have and the auto top off equal a heater though so yeah. But thanks for the tables andsuch guys! I’m going to try to contact what the rate is in my area and see about peak rates or whatever and try to calculate my animals and see what I can come up with. But as it looks right now I expect I may just downgrade and figure out what to do with the liverock. And just keep the koralia 1 powerhead since it is only 4 w and the auto top off which is 3w and maybe going all day since it is just a aqualifter. Thanks for the help guys
I am moving to Greenbelt I think. I got in contact with the electric company at the place I want to live at and reguardless of time its a rate of 0.12. So it won’t be too bad I think that is less than the current rate I am at and we have a monthly limit of $60 per apartment here as far as what is included in my rent, so I think i’ll be good as far as electricity because we have never gone over the limit here. So yay! haha
