Aquarium ice probe

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denise

Guest
i have a 20 litre tank and was looking for a chiller, but the chillers that i have found are for much larger tanks. i have read somewere that maybe i could use and ice probe for small aquariums. does anyone know if i can get them in australia or if any overseas companies export to australia but also does anyone know how these ice probes work and if they are worth it
 
I don't know about where to get one is australia, but i'm pretty sure most companies will be willing to ship one.

I can however help you on how they work.

Ice probes use a think called a "peltier diode" or commonly call a Thermo electric cooler (TEC).
I believe the ice probes use a 50w peltier which is exactly the same as what you would find in most 12v car fridges.

TEC's are made up of hundreds of thermocouples (two dissimilar metals used to measure temperature) and by applying voltage it will get hot one side and cold the other, reverse polarity and the opposite will happen.

The peltier is mounted between a heatsink and
the cooling probe.

As for effectiveness i found a site a while ago that claimed that one 50w ice probe was capable of chilling a 40 liter aquarium by 6-8 degrees.
So one Ice probe should easily cool your 20L tank.

Mounting however will be where it gets interesting. They are designed for acrylic tanks, where a hole is drilled in the side of the aquarium. I have seen a post on this site of someone who had managed to suspend theirs in the top of the tank with the heat sink above the water line.

I'm currently in the process of building my own peltier powerd cooler with 3 x 75watt peltiers when its finished I'll post some photos for everyone (not long now only have the power supply to finish)

Hope this helps
 
Good answer from Andrew. (Looking forward to photos of your cooler!) I would add that mounting an Ice Probe could be a challenge. I believe that they are usually bulkheaded, meaning that you have to drill a hole in the tank, or in filter, so that the cooler spans the outside/inside of the tank.

Have you considered a fan?
 
If you want to plumb a iceprobe onto the back of a tank, get a used hang-on-the back wetdry filter systems. The chiller should be able to be mounted onto the acrylic which is pretty easily drilled.

Another possible option would be to hook an overflow to a heavy duty rubbermaid tub and mount the chiller to the tub and use a pump to return the water.
Just keep in mind that both of these options the amount of cooling will be limited by the rate of water return.

Ed
 
thanks andrew for you great detailed response not that i understood most of it. i have a wisper filter on the side of my tank so maybe i could drill a hole into it for the ice probe. does anyone know the dimensions of an ice probe. i also started going around the pet shops and asking if anyone can get them from america and to my surprise nobody knows what im talking about so i have to tell them, some pet shops have also said that there is a chiller around that does 60 ltr tanks but i have so limited places to go to. if anyone has a pet shop near them that stock a small chiller could they please let me know cause i want one.
 
How much are you willing to pay for a chiller? Im in sydney, havent come across a pet shop as yet that have them. If i do come accorss one ill let you know, l could maybe buy it and ship to you to help you out. That would be pretty pointless though, seeing as ur best bet right now (unless anyone here from qld can suggest a petshop) is to buy one online which would need to be shipped anyhow. I googled and found a few sites for you.

http://www.equarium.com.au/store/category.asp

http://home.listings.ebay.com.au/Pet-Supplies_W0QQfcclZ1QQfclZ3QQfrppZ50QQfsooZ1QQfsopZ11QQsacatZ1281QQsascsZ2QQsocmdZListingItemList (also seen a few on eBay)

http://www.aquariumsonline.com.au/chillers-c-38.html

They are very expensive, id go with fans for the moment. A couple of small desk fans.
Good Luck and l will keep my eyes peeled.

happy.gif
 
thank you jojo for your time to find those links for me. i spoke to a pet shop in brisbane about these ice probes and they are doing some research into maybe importing them if able. they think they might sell for $200au then you need a thermostat which can cost about $50. they are supposed to be able to cool tanks up to 50 gallon which is a lot of water, but as soon as the pet shop let me know ill let everyone know but the pet shop want to be able to tell if there would be a market in australia so maybe everyone could let me know if they would be interested and i can advise the pet shop. if you google "ice probe"it gives you a good idea what they are.
 
No problem denise
smile.gif

Good luck with the pet shop importing them, keep me posted . . .

jojo
 
OK. a couple of questions on the subject:
1) what do you mean by suggesting desk fans? you mean point them at the water? the outside of the tank? and what sort of result would you expect?
2) I know its a very crude method and time consuming, but would using a Small frozen water bottle in the tank (rotating them as they defrost or as needed) be ok?

Julio (my axie) seems to have his water around 24 most of the time (sydney aust) but I get nervous when it climbs round 25. I know I'm going to have to move him to a cooler room in the house, but I'm interested in what I can do in the meantime?
 
Yeh. Desk fans pointed at the water. The fans should bring the temp down atlest 4 degrees.

I use ice cubes to bring the temp down on days that its sitting alot high then what it should be. I cant comment on the frozen water bottle method though, ive never tried doing that (have heard of the method but havent really wanted to do it).
 
Yeah, I haven't heard of it either, just came to mind the other day when I was thinking about it. The ice cubes in our fridge keep smelling of garlic (NFI why) so I'm not that keep to see how julio likes garlic! That came to mind because I figured it wouldn't introduce any other water to the tank and it wouldn't melt as quickly. I'd just take it out of the freezer, rinse it off and secure it in a corner of the tank.
 
this method is very common. you just have to make sure you rotate them constantly to keep the tank at even levels, even if a tank is way too hot its better than the stress it causes them from the temp fluctuations
 
Denise - In these temperatures a thermostat on an ice probe would be pointless. The outside temperature would most likely be to high for it to cut off anyway.

If you are worried about the tank getting too cool i would invest in a time clock and work out how many hours a day you need to run it for. This would be a much cheaper option. Bunnings sell these for about $10.
 
I have just been on ebay for you and there is a guy in America selling ICE probes for $40 without power supply. You can make a good power supply for one of these from a PC power supply which is quite easy (i can gice you instructions if you would like) and will only set you back about $30

Here is a link to the sellers items (hope this works)

http://search.ebay.com.au/_W0QQsassZrynobroQQhtZ-1

Hope this is of some help to you.
 
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