I have a big heat problem here in my small closet and warm outside temps. If I dont do anything, res temps will hit 76-78 in the daytime. So...I literally drop bottles of frozen water in about every 3-5 hours. Temps are kept at about 68-70, sometimes traveling a little lower, sometimes getting back up to 72. Its annoying and not terribly convenient. But I found that if I leave for work at 10am and drop 2 20oz bottles of ice in each res, then it takes about 6 hours for the temp to get above 72 so they only get an hour or 2 of warm temps before I am home and drop in more ice.

I am saving up for an actual res cooler that sits in the res and has a coil with a compressor. They theoretically lower a 50 gallon res by 10 degrees easy. But people have got quite inventive. Obviously the more ventillation you have and more air moved around the res the better. The more space around it the better, setting your air pump in a cooler area (some people have set them in their freezers)...just use your head.

I have been experimenting with pumps inside and outside the room and the res with the outside pump stays about 2 degrees cooler constantly. And yes, I have left my plants for 4 days with res temps of constant 75. Yes, got some algae, but a res scrub and some H2O2 and some coaxing and takes care of it (although the plants still looked great, just a little leaf curl).
Racerx Reviewed by Racerx on . Keeping Res Cool I've only been doing research for when I'm able to get it together. Since it will be a few months till then I thought I'd do some research. And this f'in site rocks man!! :thumbsup: I'm leaning towards an ebb and flow system. I really wanna do everything proper and am learning all the little details here. From what I've read, one of the secrets to success with hydro seems to be keeping the res cool. Now, I realize there are long time growers here (I've read massive amounts of the info here) Rating: 5