Heating the Fish Room, Advice

Hey gang,

My fish room is unheated; the heat from the rest of the house doesn't really reach it. Obviously, this is not going to work out particularly well for the winter, and I'm already starting to have some problems with it (namely, that I've had to put heaters in a few tanks, and I had another $1000 electric bill this month).

The fishroom is laid out kind of like this:

I-----I
I&&&I Area A = 10' wide by 16' long
I&&A&I
X......I-------I
I&&&&&&&I Area B = 25' wide by 30' long
I&&&B&&&I
I-------------I (Not to scale; & denotes open space; needed something to take up space in ASCII art)

My options for heating this are basically two fold. One, I can invest in 4 1500 watt heaters at a cost of about $60 each. Two, I can invest in an industrial heater that runs about 4000 watts and plugs into the 240-watt outlet, that is located roughly where the X is above. It could be directed into area B, which is where the bulk of the fish are anyhow.

The advantages of doing the industrial heater are that it'll take only one outlet out, and it's the 240 line, which only sees use when I'm using the drier. Not a big deal. This seems to be a much lower risk of tripping circuit breakers for me, as well as having fewer hazardous heaters around. However, it is 4-holy-thousand-watts of electricity, and that's concerning. Basically, if it ran 24/7, it'd cost me about $350 PER MONTH to run. Eeep.

With space heaters, even though running 4 of them would be 6000 watts of electricity ($500 per month at 24/7), I'm hoping that their built-in controls would mean they'd run much less frequently.

I'm obviously concerned about the cost of electricity going forward -- I can't afford huge heating bills. I'm also concerned about overwhelming the circuit breakers. What is the most efficient route to go? Will using smaller space heaters vs. a single big heater result in higher or lower bills, or ...

Any thoughts?

Do you have gas in the house?

Hey Josh,

Besides adding the heaters, I'd look into insulating where you can as well. Maybe even build off partitions between the fish side of the basement and the rest of it. Frame with 2x4s and use rigid insulation. It'll help.

The house is actually heated by oil; I have a boiler and forced steam radiators. It's fairly expensive and frustrating as is. When / if I buy the house, that'll be changing -- BGE can run natural gas out, and updating the heating system will pay for itself in a couple of years (not to mention the convenience; most people have never had a chilly couple of days because they ran out of electricity unexpectedly .

I'm actually not sure how much insulation would really help -- the only reason its warm right now is because it is fairly well insulated by virtue of being underground (mostly). That's also a bit more expensive to do than I can manage at the moment, though probably a worthwhile long term investment.

I was going to recommend running a couple of (permanent or temporary) HVAC ducts to the basement...but I don't think an option with a boiler / forced steam radiators.

I guess the good news is that heating the basement should cut down on needing to heat the rest of the house.

Looking forward to thoughts from other folks.

Matt

I have no insight on heating your basement, but the good news for you is that heating oil costs are projected by the Department of Energy to be 15% lower this year, due to lower crude oil prices.

Supposedly, heating oil is actually fairly efficient and cost effective; but it's darned annoying to sometimes run out. (Unlike, say, electric or natural gas, you're not connected to as source; you buy 100-gallons or 250 gallons at a time, and get the tank filled up as needed.... and if you're not paying attention, it's easy to run out, particularly since the gauge on my tank doesn't work).

Of course, the bigger problem is that there is no heat built into the basement fish room. :-/ Which is why I'm wondering which method, one big 240v 4000watt heater, or a bunch of smaller space heaters, would work better. . . ..

The more I think about insulating, the better an idea that sounds, too.... If I could decrease some of the air leaks down there, in theory, I could have no heating needed... while the initial cost is a bit much, it'd definitely pay for itself quickly. But, right now, I need a band-aid solution until I have time / money to fully insulate it.

I can't remember the layout of the basement exactly but do you have room to put in a pellet stove or the like down there?

Get an oil monitor heater and tap into the line. It'll heat the entire space and has it's own thermostat.

Insulation is probably the best way to go. You could start by covering and insulating any windows or doors to the basement. That is where most of your heat loss is. Getting heat from upstairs to the basement sounds good but if there is a lot of air flow you will be putting a lot of moisture upstairs and that could result in condensation of that moisture on windows and even ceilings if they are not insulated well. I run a couple bathroom type exhaust fans in my fish room to keep the moisture down. As long as you keep it at or below 70% you should have no problem with molds and mildews, except of course on poorly insulated surfaces where you get condensation.

BTW if you have a couple of exhaust fans in the basement they could suck warm air from upstairs down into the basement provided you do not have a lot of leaks in the basement walls.

And not all space heaters are equivalent. There are space heaters without fans that rely on convection and do a very good job of heating large spaces. I had wall mounted ones of this kind in a previous 20X20 foot fish room and it did a good job of keeping the fish room warm. And without a fan you are not helping the evaporation from your tanks as much as you would if there were a fan.

I wonder if there is a way to insulate with styrofoam shipping boxes?????

James, what is an "Oil monitor heater?" I googled it, and the best I could find are monitors or oil filled space heaters (some of the monitors being quite useful in and of themselves!).

At the first shop, where I was over the car bay, I actually built a wall out of styro boxes to insulate it. It worked pretty well. The air space inside of the box adds extra insulation.

Of course, that means reducing the entire size of the space by the width of a styro..... I'll probably wind up biting the bullet and spending some money on insulating the whole space. I think it is the best bet, just the most expensive up front.

In the country where I live, people heat their whole house with them. I've never owned one, but my wife's grandmother has one that will run you outdoors. You can get one used for hardly nothing and they burn oil, which you already have. She spends about $300 for the entire Winter.

For insulation, one thing I'm thinking about ... what if I bought a bunch of styrofoam sheets, and just basically stood them up against the wall, tight against one another? I could, theoretically, slide them behind the racks and such, and push them tight up against the concrete walls. With a piece of duct tape along the seams to hold them in place, they won't go anywhere.

I could buy 50 of these:
http://www.homedepot.com/p/Polyshield-3-4-in-x-4-ft-x-8-ft-Foam-Insulation-389697/202090376
or similar for $12 each (and probably I don't need to insulate ALL of the walls), completely cover the walls, run duct tape over the seams, and call it a day. That'd be $500 or so, which ... when you consider that vs 4000watts really isn't that bad (4000 watts = $350 per month, roughly).

The nice thing is, if I leave the pieces over the windows untaped, I can just move them in the summer when I want the windows.

I almost responded, "What country do you live in?"

I'm checking with the fuel oil company, to see if they have an option to heat, too.

Josh - my fishroom in California was in my (unheated) garage.

In a nutshell, I created a temporary "room" enclosing the tanks with 4' x 8' sheets of 2" thick styro (taped together).

I used an electric space heater (the oil-filled radiator kind) to keep the space ~72 and used heaters in tanks (where necessary, which was maybe 1/3 of tanks) to make up the difference...and some small fans to circulate and keep condensation down.

Electrical still got pricey - sometimes $300-400 extra per month (on top of house electrical bill). I used a lot of large pumps and power filters back then, too.

For point of reference, our TOTAL household electrical bill was $157 last month, 50+ tank fishroom included.

Matt

Could you install a pellet or corn stove?


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For point of reference, my bill this month was about a grand. The big thing that is making the difference is that I've had to install heaters in a number of the tanks, and they're on all the time ... The Discus tank alone is running 1000 watts of heat. :-/

bah! Who needs discus anyway?

JLW said:

For point of reference, my bill this month was about a grand. The big thing that is making the difference is that I've had to install heaters in a number of the tanks, and they're on all the time ... The Discus tank alone is running 1000 watts of heat. :-/

Click to expand...

put a sterno under the tank? ;P

Wow lots of replies on a very involved subject. I would absolutely recommend insulation around the entire fish room with a r value of 20 or higher. 30 or higher on the ceiling. Steam is a wonderful way to keep the room heated but without insulation it will be a loosing battle to keep the room tempered. I would like stop by and give my professional opinion. I have 12 years experience in the HVAC industry. More than likely a mini split is you best option for effective and efficient heating of your space without compromising the electrical bills in the future. But if I read correctly you don't own the place directly? If that is the case steam would be the more effective option. It's pretty easy to run a line over to the area you need heat and condensate back. Let me know if your interested in having me swing by.