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sump
01/24/2007, 01:33 PM
Ok I know I'm going to spend a fortune. On set up costs, that's fine. On stock, i'll get it when I can and want. What I'm wondering is once I've set up my 75 g reef tank how much will i HAVE to spend each month on electricity, salt, kalk...

What's ur experience?

tkeracer619
01/24/2007, 01:41 PM
It all depends on what you want to keep.

I run 3x250w halides and 2 6ft vho's. A sequence dart for CL. Skimmer, and return pump.

It costs me about $120 on power, $15-30 in salt, kalk is negligible.

Thats on a 150.

Paintbug
01/24/2007, 01:42 PM
it will vary greatly on what equipment you have, how often, and how much water you change, how much and what you feed. i would say roughly $50-$100 if you kept everything top notch. keep in mind you have to add things like bulb usage, clean up crew replacement, etc.

Ron Popeil
01/24/2007, 01:45 PM
on my system (a 45 cube, a 60 cube, 75 refugium and about 1000w worth of lighting total) i run a electricity bill around $70 a month for a two bedroom apartment (warmer months). throw in $15 to $25 worth of salt once a month or two. maybe $20 worth of food every four months. $120 in bulbs a year. $10 a year on a new CO2 tank. and you have about what i spend a year on my tanks.

its ugly. but pales in comparison to others on this board.

spmedi
01/24/2007, 02:51 PM
Here are a few tips I've read and did (not phytoplankton - i'm going to try this spring):

#1 - Buy a good RO/DI unit. I don't know what your water supply is but most utilities charge based on about 700 gallons of water, cheaply. Buy your salt in the 160-200 gallons supply. W/ your own RO/DI and say a $50 bucket your looking at about $0.25 per gallon of saltwater. The salt is $0.20-0.24 of that. (doen't count replacing filters though just still a lot cheaper)

#2 - Use this for dosing:

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-02/rhf/index.php

#3 - Make your own food:

http://www.melevsreef.com/food.html

#4 - Grow your own phytoplanton:

http://www.melevsreef.com/phytoplankton.html

#5 - Lighting. Most seem to use MH. I chose T5 myself for a few reasons. They run cooler (i didn't want to have to buy a chiller), they last 12-18 mths, they run at less watts, etc.


#6 - Pumps. Look at the watts used per gph of flow. For example if you have say a mag 9 on a CL you will be pushing about 600 or so gph at about 90watts. A powerhead can do the same flow at less than 1/10 of the watts. I think those little nano streams run at 6w and produce 660 gph. Anyway you get the picture. Look at watts/gallons.

spmedi
01/24/2007, 03:06 PM
also you can calculate your own electrical costs. Just look at your bill and get the cost per Kwh. For example say it is $0.06 per Kwh.

If you use 400w of heaters that come on 4hrs a day, a t5 6x54 which runs all for say 9 hours and blues another 3, pumps totalling 250w, etc. It would be about 12000 watts a day.

That would be like $0.75 a day to run....

I think I did that right. :)
Just for an example any way.

sump
01/24/2007, 03:56 PM
yikes!!!
well it hasn't put me off yet, but at least I have an idea what I'm getting into!

GARFVolunteer
01/24/2007, 05:02 PM
Niffty little calculator here that will calculate the approximate cost of electricity per month: http://www.reefcentral.com/calc/tank_elec_calc.php

Luckily we have hydro-electric power that costs $.05 per kwh so we pay around $51 a month for our 150... The 60 gallon costs about $7.50 a month...

Thanks,

Scott

sump
01/24/2007, 05:14 PM
Thanks I'll find out my electricity rate tomorrow.

What type of light is cheepest to run?

GARFVolunteer
01/24/2007, 07:45 PM
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9064954#post9064954 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by sump
Thanks I'll find out my electricity rate tomorrow.

What type of light is cheepest to run?

Night lights but I would not recommend them...:D

They say a watt is a watt. However when I run VHOs on electronic ballasts, both the bulb and the ballast run cooler than on magnetic ballasts. A buddy of mine has an in line watt meter The 400 watt MH magnetic ballasts and the 400 watt MH electronic ballasts, both measured 400 watts.

Thanks,

Scott

piscivorous
01/24/2007, 09:43 PM
don't know what my bill is going to run electricity wise...but we are fortunate to have our own town plant...NOT NYSEG...so I pay about $.01 a watt.