I have a 270 gallon, with a Red Dragon return on a UPS. Today, the power went out for 2 hours do to "Adverse Weather" (aka light snow). This proved my UPS on my return will run at least 2 hours. But it got me thinking about how to handle longer outages.
I have SPS and a lot of head between the display and sump and want more flow than the red dragon. I currently have a few dirt cheap powerheads in the tank I planned on replacing with a closed loop. The one issue I don't like about Red Dragons is there is no good way to run them off DC power. So the best solution is probably a different DC pump for a closed loop with a battery backup. Any suggestions?
Another solution is to buy a Vortech and Vortech backup. I am not thrilled with relying on powerheads for this, as they do not last long, require maintenance, and power outages always seem to happen at the worst possible time. For the cost, the closed loop seems a much better option, even if it is more work initially.
A lot of people have generators, and I've considered that route. If it is another thing that requires high maintenance (I don't trust 4 month old gas in my motorcycle or lawnmower) and it requires manual intervention, this is less attractive, especially since it is the highest priced option. I don't know a lot about this.
I have SPS and a lot of head between the display and sump and want more flow than the red dragon. I currently have a few dirt cheap powerheads in the tank I planned on replacing with a closed loop. The one issue I don't like about Red Dragons is there is no good way to run them off DC power. So the best solution is probably a different DC pump for a closed loop with a battery backup. Any suggestions?
Another solution is to buy a Vortech and Vortech backup. I am not thrilled with relying on powerheads for this, as they do not last long, require maintenance, and power outages always seem to happen at the worst possible time. For the cost, the closed loop seems a much better option, even if it is more work initially.
A lot of people have generators, and I've considered that route. If it is another thing that requires high maintenance (I don't trust 4 month old gas in my motorcycle or lawnmower) and it requires manual intervention, this is less attractive, especially since it is the highest priced option. I don't know a lot about this.