How often does my heater kick on?
 

Any electrician out there that can help me figure a question out...

I just got curious how much my tanks are part of my power bill which I can calculate easily for the lights and filters....BUT how do I know how often my tank's heaters kick on to calculate how many hrs per day they run???

I have a 200W heater of the 55g tank for example and the Temp is set to 78F while the room is at 70F...any way to calculate from there how often the tank heater would kick on to maintain that temp?:-?

Too many variables for a simple equation. Lights add some heat to the system. Dead air under the canopy acts as an insulator. Air circulation around the tank, as well as the water currents within it would effect its capacity to hold heat.

I suppose a person could sit down for an hour, and watch the indicator light on the heater if there is one and count how many minutes in an hour the heater is actually working. If one also knew the heater wattage, this would work for rough numbers:

((minutes on)/60) * (heater wattage) * 24 = watt/hrs per day

(watt/hrs per day) / 1000 = kW/hrs per day

(kW/hrs per day) * 30 = kW/hrs per month

Agree with frog. At night when the house is cooler the heater will heat more than during the day when it's warmer. Does you heater have a light on it when it's heating? Video tape the tanks at night, figure out the on duration and estimate it for 30 days combined LOL hehehehe

Wait wut? You probably would. Wouldn't you Angel?

the truth :notworthy:

Sometimes I miss the obvious. Totally right that there would be two different results depending on if the aquarium light is on or not. So then a person would have to do an hour of each and then average it out as far as how many hrs per day the light is on to get a rough estimate.

Or I guess if money is less of an issue than time, you could invest in one of these:

Kill-A-Watt EZ Plug Power Meter

:roll: never mind, i love watching my tanks as in my fish & shrimps...but God didn't bless my rear end with enough patience to sit there for one whole hour w/out moving and counting lights on/off...I just thought maybe someone had a rough idea....

I really only tried to figure out how much more/less my tanks actually are part of the power bill....I just assumed in the calculation now they're on 12hrs/day which is plenty sufficient i'd think.

Haha! I wouldn't have the patience for that either. I'd get caught up looking at the pretty fishies after about 5 mins and that would be it. Very straight forward question, but oh wow would that be a nasty flux equation. Probly need a friend with a physics degree, a couple free months, and a few kegs of beer to even get started. Wish I could've been more help. :|

Don't worry; like I said I just assumed 12hrs to calculate it...I was just curious how much the fish tanks are on the light bill and amongst all electronics on there the heaters would technically suck the most power. BUT obviously there's a difference between day/ night and summer/ winter time....lol

Unless you've got an odd shaped tank that requires a lot of heating or keep your house very cold 12 hours a day is probably over estimating it. I'd suspect somewhere between 8 and 12.

I have a 48 gallon tank with a 15w light, a 100w heater, and a Penguin 350. I figured up that my tank was costing me about $7-8 dollars a month in electricity. Unless you've got a salt set up your fish tank won't come close to equaling your AC, fridge, or range for the cost to run them.

Oh I know...like I said I was just curious LOL
I have calculated (with the assumption heaters run 12hrs/day)
My 10g's cost me ~$2/months
45g ~ $6
55g ~$7.5

(Just in case anyone else cared to know tank cost lol)