Battery Backup help / recs? Apartment dweller with no balcony

[cdw79]

After a year and a half I've decided that just having a bubbler that comes on when the power goes off is simply irresponsible at this point, given the amount of time and money I've put into this tank. Trouble is, as someone who lives in a small apartment with no balcony, generators are out of the question. What makes matters worse is the fact my Nero 5's apparently are incompatible with the vortech battery backups that I know a lot of people use.

As I understand, in a power outage, flow is most important, followed by heat, seemingly. I've put out a post in my local forum to try and get a sense of how often / for how long we get power outages to try and get a sense of what is reasonable to expect. I've luckily not experienced any yet but as someone from the Texas coast, I'm very familiar with power being out for days at a time.

I've also gone and attached my Apex's readout for power consumption, though I'm not actually positive on how to read it (whether the usage listed is per day or some other measurement). Technically the pump back to the display isn't on an Apex outlet (should I change that?) but otherwise basically everything else is.

Apologies if this is a dumb question, but how can I tell how long a UPS would power, say, just one of my Neros? Are there other / better options than a UPS that I could get in my current living situation? Any experience w getting the backup to work w the Apex? Thanks in advance!

 

[Shunopoli]

Fowlling as I live in Texas also and need to plan this also

 

[mlivvy]

Check this out- https://www.reef2reef.com/ams/neptune-apex-programming-tutorials-part-4-power-monitoring.698/

UPS info towards the bottom of the thread.

 

[cdw79]

Fowlling as I live in Texas also and need to plan this also

I actually don't live in Texas anymore - out in the DC metro area at the moment - but nonetheless trying to get a sense of the options I should be looking at. Seemingly there are less natural disaster type issues like hurricanes out here, but definitely need to still make a plan

 

[Shunopoli]

I watched the brs investigates and they did one special on a computer ups compared to the echo tech and did last at all

 

[flashsmith]

Check out ecoflo or a similar brand. There's all kinds of these rechargeable battery generators out there now that are way better than a battery backup such as ecotech and others. I have a 2000w sine wave inverter that I can hook to a deep cycle battery as well as a 3500w inverter generator. Neither of which would be practical for you. I had 2 major hurricanes this year and lost power for several days as a result.

 

[cdw79]

Check out ecoflo or a similar brand. There's all kinds of these rechargeable battery generators out there now that are way better than a battery backup such as ecotech and others. I have a 2000w sine wave inverter that I can hook to a deep cycle battery as well as a 3500w inverter generator. Neither of which would be practical for you. I had 2 major hurricanes this year and lost power for several days as a result.

If those would be impractical for me, any thoughts on where to start looking to find options that would be? How did you get a sense of how long those units would power your system's essentials?

 

[flashsmith]

During the 1st Hurricane this year all I had was the 2000w power inverter. The batteries were my trolling motor batteries out of my boat. I chose to run my return pumps over wavemakers on 2 system an 80g and 170g. I got 3 days out of the batteries by running for a few hours and then shutting them off for a couple hours to conserve them because I had no idea when power would be restored. Late on the 3rd day my power was restored and I probably would have made it through another night and that would have been it. I got the generator after that. It was nerve racking to say the least but I made it. If I didn't have a generator I would be looking into those ecoflows or something similar. Those can also be charged back up with a solar panel of needed.

 

[TerraFerma]

Depends on how much you want to spend. The Yeti Power stations (and similar products) can hold a lot of juice and run a dc powerhead for days. I'm not willing to spend that amount of money and rely on an inverter and a deep cycle battery. The inverter/battery take up a lot of storage space which isn't great.

 

[cdw79]

Depends on how much you want to spend. The Yeti Power stations (and similar products) can hold a lot of juice and run a dc powerhead for days. I'm not willing to spend that amount of money and rely on an inverter and a deep cycle battery. The inverter/battery take up a lot of storage space which isn't great.

Is a Nero a DC pump? pardon the ignorance, definitely not my strong suit

 

[Lbrdsoxfan]

Is a Nero a DC pump? pardon the ignorance, definitely not my strong suit

Yep, 24vdc.

 

[cdw79]

Depends on how much you want to spend. The Yeti Power stations (and similar products) can hold a lot of juice and run a dc powerhead for days. I'm not willing to spend that amount of money and rely on an inverter and a deep cycle battery. The inverter/battery take up a lot of storage space which isn't great.

Yep, 24vdc.

Is there any good rule of thumb to determine what size can keep a pump going for how long? I figured there must be some kind of conversation but I'm not familiar with how that works.

Also, I take it this would be something I'd have to hook up myself (IE I couldn't wire it to come on automatically), right?

This also just occurred to me- given the Neros are controlled by the AI app via bluetooth, if internet connection is down presumably as a result of the power outage, would the pump still be able to be turned on with the app? This feels like a potentially dumb question but I appreciate all the help immensely

 

[Lbrdsoxfan]

There are ways to calculate wattage v. Amp hours of battery to determine overall runtime.

There are diy methods to set up auto switching of power from wall to battery.

Read this to understand watt hours and amp hours!

Once you understand the science of it, then we can talk about wiring up some batteries in series or parallel (depends on application) and available auto switching options.

End game is find out your device wattage & voltage then you can calculate the run time off of the size battery you will use. Outside of Ecotech (newer) and some tunze most DC pumps and powerheads are 24vdc.

On the Nero front, the powerhead dosent care about the Bluetooth connection to the ai app backup or not, that's a convience for us. They can be controlled from the button on the cord, and the programmed settings remain in the controller if the power goes out.

 

[OU812Reefing]

After a year and a half I've decided that just having a bubbler that comes on when the power goes off is simply irresponsible at this point, given the amount of time and money I've put into this tank. Trouble is, as someone who lives in a small apartment with no balcony, generators are out of the question. What makes matters worse is the fact my Nero 5's apparently are incompatible with the vortech battery backups that I know a lot of people use.

As I understand, in a power outage, flow is most important, followed by heat, seemingly. I've put out a post in my local forum to try and get a sense of how often / for how long we get power outages to try and get a sense of what is reasonable to expect. I've luckily not experienced any yet but as someone from the Texas coast, I'm very familiar with power being out for days at a time.

I've also gone and attached my Apex's readout for power consumption, though I'm not actually positive on how to read it (whether the usage listed is per day or some other measurement). Technically the pump back to the display isn't on an Apex outlet (should I change that?) but otherwise basically everything else is.

Apologies if this is a dumb question, but how can I tell how long a UPS would power, say, just one of my Neros? Are there other / better options than a UPS that I could get in my current living situation? Any experience w getting the backup to work w the Apex? Thanks in advance!

This may help Jebao MLW wave makers will work with icecap battery backup the MLW 5 is pretty much the same size as Nero 3 works great I have one in my tank just in case the power goes out I have it set on the lowest setting should run about 24 to 30 hours

 

[SteveMM62Reef]

I used a Deep Cycle Battery from Walmart, Battery Box. RIBU1C Relay, Pinfox Plastic Project Box, Barrel Plugs 5.5mm X 2.1mm, Mountain Ark 2 pack DC Pump, Silicone Tubing. I used a Salvage Basement WatchDog Controller, to Maintain a charge on the Battery. You could use a Battery Maintainer/ Charger as a Substitute. Make sure you 30 Amp fuse the output on the Battery. Ran it for a test for Six Days, got bored with checking the battery voltage, so ended the testing. Except for the Battery and WatchDog Control, got everything off of Amazon.

 

[Lbrdsoxfan]

I used a Deep Cycle Battery from Walmart, Battery Box. RIBU1C Relay, Pinfox Plastic Project Box, Barrel Plugs 5.5mm X 2.1mm, Mountain Ark 2 pack DC Pump, Silicone Tubing. I used a Salvage Basement WatchDog Controller, to Maintain a charge on the Battery. You could use a Battery Maintainer/ Charger as a Substitute. Make sure you 30 Amp fuse the output on the Battery. Ran it for a test for Six Days, got bored with checking the battery voltage, so ended the testing. Except for the Battery and WatchDog Control, got everything off of Amazon.

That was the idea, but that's diy level, lol. You never know how diy someone is.

I have much the same but with two 18ah 12vdc batteries in series with a battery auto switch from Amazon. Toggle switch to shut off the battery side if needed, and it's powered through a eb8 socket. Keeps the ol gyre running for a few days.

 

[cdw79]

Yeah not gonna lie I'm looking for as simple and least DIY as possible lol.

I was thinking maybe something I could plug the Nero into when the power dies, ideally that would last at least 24 hours if possible. And separately I thought I could try and find some sort of product that would have an audible alarm go off if I was sleeping, given I figured my Apex would send me a text if it went off midday and I wasn't home. Is this a good / bad idea, or even feasible for that matter?

 

[Lbrdsoxfan]

Yeah not gonna lie I'm looking for as simple and least DIY as possible lol.

I was thinking maybe something I could plug the Nero into when the power dies, ideally that would last at least 24 hours if possible. And separately I thought I could try and find some sort of product that would have an audible alarm go off if I was sleeping, given I figured my Apex would send me a text if it went off midday and I wasn't home. Is this a good / bad idea, or even feasible for that matter?

As said above, the icecap backup is as clean and as simple as it will get. It's 24v. Now whether it will last for 24 hours.... It's about. the wattage of the powerhead and the ah of the batteries that icecap has.

 

[Lbrdsoxfan]

Nm... Ice Cap is out! Not a full 24vdc backup like the older models were.

Screenshot from coralvue.

Ice Cap pumps with ice Cap backup, or Ecotech pumps with Ecotech backup....

Sucks, but those are the plug n play auto switch options. Also that 2.5ah battery is bogus.

 

[cdw79]

Yeah that's what I thought. I saw that option awhile back but saw a thread that said it wouldn't work with Neros

Nm... Ice Cap is out! Not a full 24vdc backup like the older models were.

Screenshot from coralvue.

Ice Cap pumps with ice Cap backup, or Ecotech pumps with Ecotech backup....

Sucks, but those are the plug n play auto switch options. Also that 2.5ah battery is bogus.