Anyone use UPS battery backups?

[Scott.h]

@WhiskeyCoffee that was my dads exact words followed by there is no way that backup will run my pump more then 15 minutes. But here's the thing. A battery rated at X is good for X draw for X length. It's actually silly that in the day we live all these companies aren't jumping all over that opportunity.

 

[RudyB]

I have a 1500 on two of my tank circulation pumps. I am more concern with the main tank than the sump. Anything in the sump/refugium will survive much longer without power or movement. I have another smaller one for my DC 15000 return pump. That will continue to run for a couple of hours since I am running the pump at about 75%.

 

[Scott.h]

Your last statement is true for home users. In a corporate environment UPS's are used to carry the load of our equipment until our generator starts up. There is a 5 second delay between the power going out and our generator coming online, the UPS will keep our equipment up and running during this switch over to avoid any data corruption or hardware failure.

Likewise this statement should stand true for home users. Knock on wood I live in a newly developed neighborhood all of our transmissions are ran underground, this does help in the event of a disaster but we still have experienced power outages. In the 5 years I have been in my new neighborhood we've lost power a few times with the longest outage being 10 minutes. The various battery backups I have around the house can easily handle the load for 10 minutes. This means that none of my tank equipment, PC or networking equipment along with my tv's never see the power go down or come back online. Now with that being said next year once my tank is stocked I will be investing in a generator. The UPS will allow me enough time to get the generator online if there is a potential long term outage.

Ecotech does make a battery backup that according to their specs will run a pump for 36 hours with 1 MP40 and 18 hours with 2 MP40's per their documentation. You can also daisy chain their backups to one another to double the run time. This is very well a viable solution if anyone is running vortech pumps.

im in the same boat. About a month ago we lost power, and we never do. It was out for about 7 hours. Luckily I was home. Extention cords everywhere. But Setting up a new system I'm planning ahead before I even have anything living in the tank. I do have the vortech battery backup for the Powerheads. Awesome system. But I didn't go with a vortech pump because it's not apex ready. Silly really. But even at that it requires a booster. My real concern is when the power does go out, I'm at work, I want apex to send me an alarm. I can take my time getting home and dragging the generator out without having it be an immediate crisis. I have over 4K in this build without anything in the tank. Why stop now, right? Lol I want to do what I can with it.

 

[Scott.h]

Here is my write-up from a few years ago. The system is still in place. I have a whole house standby generator now so I only need about 15-20 seconds now. Before the generator, I had at least 45 minutes of continuous run time without an issue.

http://www.thereeftank.com/forums/f183/homemade-battey-backup-197872.html

that is exactly what I was planning for, hoping I didn't have to. Btw my 75 with a 50 fuge Plummed from the basement has only ever ran on a 250 watt heater. Keeps it 78 with no issues

 

[vetteguy53081]

I just bought an 8 outlet unit that says will power for 48 minutes. I only have heater and main pump at sump attached and in hopes that I get an hr of run time from it.

 

[Waterjockey]

I find the ratings on ups systems bizzare. They are difficult to find the information to figure out how long it might power 'x' load. A simple Amp-Hour rating would actually be useful (imho). And when you do find the useful storage capacity...they really suck considering the price for them...like a 6 volt Lantern battery would probably kick their butt.
Looking at the prices of these things, I can't help but wonder if it wouldn't be more cost effective to simply buy a marine/golf cart/solar system battery, a smart charger and an inverter.
A 30 Amp-hour marine battery would power a lot of aquarium equipment for hours.

 

[Wy8tt_Earp]

I have a ups 1500 running my apex, router, 1 mp10, and 1 mp40. I would rather have the flow inside the tank to promote the oxygen exchange for an extended period of time instead of running my circulation pump, while the power is out, for a limited period of time.

 

[Khh27]

I use a 500w power Inverter and a 31 series deep cycle I use for my trolling motor on my boat. 114 amp hours. I power my 200w heater and my jebao dct6000 on power level 4 on the controller (40ish%) on the winter and only the return on the summer when I'm not worried about heat. It'll run 12hours on 1 charge powering heater and return and much longer if it was just return.. And that's only because the Inverter turns off at 11.9v I assume it could run much longer if it would discharge more and still work

 

[Scott.h]

I use a 500w power Inverter and a 31 series deep cycle I use for my trolling motor on my boat. 114 amp hours. I power my 200w heater and my jebao dct6000 on power level 4 on the controller (40ish%) on the winter and only the return on the summer when I'm not worried about heat. It'll run 12hours on 1 charge powering heater and return and much longer if it was just return.. And that's only because the Inverter turns off at 11.9v I assume it could run much longer if it would discharge more and still work

with it being a dc pump shouldn't there be a way to wire it without an inverter? How do you have your setup wired while still having the pump plugged in?

 

[Khh27]

with it being a dc pump shouldn't there be a way to wire it without an inverter? How do you have your setup wired while still having the pump plugged in?

Yea but then I would need to retrofit things. all i do is unplug heater and pump and plug into inverter. I've seen people take apart the ecotech battery back ups and replace with a hefty battery so it'll detect when power goes out also there is a way with relays and such to do what I currently do but leave it plugged in all the time. The tricky part is when power cuts back on I've heard story's of it frying inverters and such the retrofit way. I think the ecotech way or ups way is the best if you want actual when power goes out they cut on function. You can even do the same with a ups. Open it up and hook a bigger battery to it.

 

[Scott.h]

To be honest reef octopus need to step up and be competitive with ecotech. And ecotech needs to get their stuff apex ready. And the aftermarket companies need to step up and meet the demand of a plug and play option. You know if someone came up with a decent plug and play option reefers would pay hundreds for that.
I guess if I run 2 1500 battery backups, one for the return pump, and maybe another for a heater the worst thing that could happen is I'm out 300 bucks for a power source that doesn't last long. What I'll do is after its all set up I'll do a timed outage to see what happens and do an update here with real numbers.

 

[Tdawg]

Hi, I have an 80 gal tank and run tunze for o2 off an RV house battery. I check charge levels once a month and every time a leave for more than 24 hours. Test suggest I should get about 10 ten day before total failure. My tank is in my living room, so I installed a fireplace with a battery backup instead of a whole house generator. IMHO, whole house system are spendy and not reliable. Anecdotal evidence suggest that they seem to fail at end of warranty and repair times are not next day. Just my 2cents.