Any electricians in the house?

[RCS]

Okay, wall #3 went up last night, so I'm on the verge of getting ready to think about what kind of electrical setup I'll be needing to run this little gizmo I'm calling the fish room...

The ceiling lights I should be able to run off of the current wiring in the room, I'm not worried about them. What I am concerned about is the potential 12-15 250w halide setups that will be going on in the room. I'll have to look at what kind of current the ballasts pull, and I'm sure I can figure it out...but I was hoping for some 'professional' input as well.

In addition to the lighting, the only other pieces of equipment that will be running will be a dehumidifier and a large water pump or two, depending on how many separate systems I end up running. Likely there will be two: one for the corals and one for the display and fish.

Potential wattage I'm guessing will be in the 3500-4000w range...

[scooters reef]

Wow, thats a lot of lights !!! If nobody is an electrician with exact answers, I did the same as you and figured it up myself for a general idea and plan, then had my electrician review it for accuracy when they came to actually install it all. I did all my basement wiring myself except for the three areas with water or unique needs (Fish room, bath, bar).

If you look up the max current draw for your ballasts you can figure out how many circuits you'll need to not exceed 80% (I think was the rule of thmb my electrician used) of what they are rated at. The max current for MH is at start-up, so as long as none are turned up at the same time I figured I could fit more on a circuit, but that was the one thing the electrician said I should change, so it resulted in one circuit beyond what I planned. With the walls open and pulling wire anyway, it didn't add much to the cost to know it was covered.

At 120 vots, 4000w converts to 33.33 Amps, but when you look up the max current for your ballasts I think you'll find you are going to need well beyond 33 Amps total. My 250w HQI's list max current at 5.5amps on PFO's website.

[jandlms]

Fred,
I have no expertise in electricity beyond calling the electrician and pulling out my check book. However, I have a small fish "area" that has had one minor problem to relay to you. In spite of a large dehumiidfier some of my light fixytures near the fish "area have experienced corrosion. I wopuld guess the MH will be hot enough to dry out their immediate vicinity, but watch the lights near but away from the fish room as they may get corroded too. With light bulbs lasting so long these days, I didn't notice a problem until I had to change bulbs a year (plus) later.
By the way did you get my Paypal for the skimmer?
Jon

[scooters reef]

Wow, I never thought of that. I better check mine too. Don't they make some kind of socket grease for reqular bulbs?

[RCS]

Keep the thoughts coming, these all help!

I'm debating installing an outlet fan as well just to be able to vent some of this outside if needed...can't be that hard to install, right?

I got the paypal Jon, thanks much!

[scooters reef]

Oh, for a bit of advertising, my electrician (he's a plumber and general contractor too) lives in Menasha or Neenah and is great to work with. He has no problem at all if you want to do as much as possible yourself to keep costs down, and will even answer questions on how to do it. He may have an employee actually do the work, ut seems to always come out personally to decide WHAT needs to be done. Send me a PM if you want his contact info.

I already have an exhaust fan of some type on my gunna list too. I had planned to set it up on both a humidistat and thermometer to turn on any time either exceeded a certain threshold, dehumidifier not keeping up, etc. With what Jon posted though now I'm not sure again. Maybe I could have it run on a schedule besides, or make it the primary means of removing humidity with the humidifier coming on if the fan isn't keeping it down.

[yaitisme]

Fred, check out Scooters post for fish room humidity.

[scooters reef]

OH!! I left it out. To get the current (amps) just divide the wattage by 120 (volts).

For the other humidity thread, I'm still looking at many of the things mentioned and trying to figure out what will work with the way my house is built and layed out. That unit Prugs got looks interesting, but not sure what I'd do with it yet.

[scooters reef]

Fred, will you be using an Aquacontroller or anything X-10 at all? If so, you can also minimize issues by watching what phase the circuits are on without needing to possibly add a bridge.

[RCS]

I think i've got this whole thing figured out by now. And thankfull Lowe's is open, so I'm also saving about 33% over other local prices...

Any idea on sizing circuit breakers? Here's what I'm looking at:

12 gauge wiring, should handle 20 amps. I'm figuring max draw from any setup is going to be 10 amps. I was going to use 20amp breakers...is that too big? 15 amp?

[scooters reef]

Yep, 12 gauge (yellow cable) would have a 20 Amp breaker. If you're sure you wont exceed 10 Amps, you could use 14 gauge (white cable) and a 15 Amp breaker.

If pulling it all yourself, I doubt the small additional cost would beat just going 20.

Also, can save some effort running two circuits with a 12-3 instead of having to pull two individual 12-2 cables. Assuming you can find what you need in close lengths and not have much waste either way anyway.

[RCS]

Each circuit will be running ~1000 watts and roughly 10 amps during constant use, so I'll be running individual circuits for each set of lights. I'm thinking any more than 4x250w lights on one circuit may start to get a bit much.

I've got one run right now (for the display tank and possibly the filtration system) and will see if this works before going much further.

[yaitisme]

I'd stick with the two separate 20 amp circuits using 20 amp GFCI breakers. More flexibly to deal with power-up current surge and 10 amps generates alot of extra heat in the smaller gauge wire over long runs. The 20 amp rated outlets are also much better quality for a little extra $$$. The GFCI breakers are a bit expensive, but very convenient if your outlets are going to be above ceiling tiles. I would also run a 15 amp floor level and overhead lighting circuit if your pulling wire.

[yaitisme]

O and make sure your accurate with your per lamp current draw. If they are closer to the 5.5 amp per ballast/lamp as Scooter stated 3 per 20 amp is pushing it.