When I started saltwater 8 years ago I made some bad choices with trying to save money and go with the cheapest available. I learned the hard way that eventually it ends up costing more so when I upgraded tanks last year I decided not to cut costs with trying to go as cheap as possible but...
Sergio made a good point about heat! My chiller is in a corner next to the tank, about 8 inches from the wall with the air outlet and this thing is blowing some real hot air! It's almost like having an electric heater turned on in summer blowing hot air. I noticed over summer that the chiller...
Noise is no issue at all.
And electrical bill... I honestly don't want to look at my electric bill in general because it is scary ;D
I really don't know how much it brought up my bill.
The 1/3hp one definitely works really well. The 1/5hp should work as well, will just take a bit longer to bring the temperature down.
I went for the bigger one in case I upgrade or add another tank inline later on. Since the 1/3hp is rated for 200g I figured it would work at max capacity every...
I have a 1/3HP TECO SeaChill Chiller on my system which is about 200g total volume and I have been very happy with it. It is more expensive then the $750 range though but I have no experience with the two models you show.
I beliece you cut away some plastic on the inside of the shroud? Looking at the pictures on the RC link and if you did cut out that inside cylinder completely you could maybe find a plastic ring or maybe a piece of a PVC pipe (I don't know how big that shroud is) and glue that in?
Very nice and clean Jeff!
One question about the picture above: Is that clamp on light somehow secured so it doesn't slide down or is it just clamped? If not be carefull because it could eventually slide down and once it drops into the sump you will have a problem. Everything is very nicely...