12 G Eclipse with 96w Lighting

[bfoleyiii]

I have an Eclipse 12g bow front I am in the process of setting up as a Nano Reef. The oem lighting just wasnt going to cut it for any corals so I hit the LFS and picked up an Aqualight Retrofit 18" 96w PC unit. A little *southern* engineering and we now have some decent lighting. Now, any ideas on what I could use to lift the hood up a few inches as the lights are raising the tempature of the water to about 88 degrees. Or what other options can you think of to help keep the temp down in the lower 80s?
Current setup is this:
12g bowfront
18" 96w PC lighting
Small power head
Elcipse bulit in filter
Proquatics 1600 canister filter (or somesuch)
15lbs live rock
Perc Clown
2 emerald crabs
Fire Shrim (less the crabs ate him, cause his has been mia for 3-4 days now)
I was thinking I could raise the hood and lift the lights off the water some and that might help, I was also thinking (smack me if this is really stupid) that I could put my canister filter in one of them foam coolers with a vaired amound of dry ice to try and keep the water temp down some. Just not sure how long the water runs through that canister and if:
1) it doesnt sit in there long enough for the dry ice to cool the water or
2) that the dry ice is going to be working too well and gonna drop the temp or freeze the water in the canster.
Thanks
Bob

 

[robchuck]

Is there any way that you could retrofit some 3-4" electronics fans into the canopy? Those would probably help a lot by venting the hot and stale air out of the canopy.
I would stay away from the dry ice concept. It would probably help lower the temperature quite a bit, but I would be worried that the dry ice would damage the canister filter and cause even bigger headaches.

 

[bfoleyiii]

I was thinking about the fans. The eclipse hood just doesnt provide enough room to add anything else. So the hood has to be lifted, and in doing so adding some fans *shouldnt* be an issue. Guess I just need to find some plastic that I can shape and cut properly.
And with the dry ice and canister filter, I wasnt planning on allowing the dry ice to come in contact with the filter, more so just creating an enclosed cold space, just never left dry ice in a cooler and checked the internal temp....I have placed dry ice in a bottle with some water.....err....that wasnt me that was someone else.
Any other ideas out there.
Bob

 

[avbryce1]

I have a 10 gal mini reef with 80 w/ PC and I had the same problem. just not quite as bad.
you need to raise the lights a couple of inghes and add a fan and you should be fine
My lights have a built in fan (that I wasent running at first ) It helped but it was still raising the temp a little more than I liked
at this time the tank was full to the top. so I dropped my water level about an inch and that was enough to do the trick.

 

[bigbobsull]

I am in the process of trying to retro fit my 12 gallon Eclispe. The best idea I have is to raise the top by 3 to 4 inches. I was thinking about going down to Home Depot or somewhere and getting thin pieces of plastic and fitting it so it raises the canopy. Whatever you do you clearly will need to get a mirco pc fan in there somehow. GL and ask if you need anymore specific help.

 

[kentuckian]

do you have any pics of your tank if sooo please post i's like to see some ideas i'm in the same boat with a 15 gal eclipse show eclips 1 hood lookin at about the same ligh setup and don't quite understand how it will all work especially the fan part

 

[bfoleyiii]

Light lifting before...with a little southern engineering with the geek twist:
hmm...no picture...guess I need to do some reading into message boards as well as Salt Water tanks.

 

[bfoleyiii]

Drop and email and I'll send you the picks I have. Or you can wait till I get around to setting up a webserver to serve the images off of.
bob

 

[dvs]

As far as the fans go, Radio Shack has em pretty cheap. Good Luck! Love to see some pics once its up and running.
Jen

 

[bfoleyiii]

before pic #1

 

[bfoleyiii]

before pic #2

 

[bfoleyiii]

After:

 

[bfoleyiii]

and After #2

 

[bfoleyiii]

Now I just need to find a way to paint the top/mod portion. Any ideas on painting acrylic?
Bob

 

[dcbball]

black krylon spray paint... and local hardware store will have it...HTH