Opinion on different brand of Chiller

[clowntrigger]

Hi Guys

Just like skimmer, there bound to be some brands that is a no-no to get while some are a must to get, so can someone enlighten me on chiller as well?

I know in the market there are famous brand, Teco, Hailea and Resun, can someone who own these system give their opinion? I am interested in how they fare. I will be running it on a 4x2.5x2 tank with sump, thus I believe a 1/2 HP will be enough. Here are the stuff I am interested

1. Noise level

2. Price

3. efficiency, given the same HP, which one tends to turn on more often.

4. size

5. Which one need a external pump to circulate water through the chiller

6. Where to get the above brand cheapest

7. Power consumption

8. Price difference betw the 3 brand is not a consideration, as long as it is good. Just like comparing H&S to a sander skimmer, both perform the same function, but one outshine the others.

[Achilles Tang]

I doubt if you can get someone who can give you a review on all the different brands and models unless they are super rich and fickle enough to upgrade and experienced each of them.

Noise levels??? Gee.... line them all up in a row and listen carefully?

[clowntrigger]

ok.....ok maybe I should say, fo those who own the above, what have you got to say to it? Given a choice again, whould you get the same brand chiller or you would switch to another brand and why? mmn... Does that sound more appropriate....

[chanbi]

I'm also on the look out for a chiller and based on what i see/hear on Teco/Hailea.. let me see whethe i can help u a little bit..

1. ??

2. Teco TW6 (1/2 hp, copper coil) ~$1800

Hailea 880 (1h/p, titantium coil) ~$1500

3. From the thread by Yazid, he bought a TW6 to replace a Hailea 380 (also

1/2 hp) and i concluded that the Teco is more efficiency?

4. Teco (black colour) is smaller than Hailea (white colour).

5. All need external pump to circular water to chiller

6. Teco - u can check with AT

Hailea - David from LCK 110 said he may be able to help. But i did not

go in detail on the pricing. so not sure whether it is the

cheapest.

7. Power consumption - this should be directly related to the hp rating and

efficiency.

And personally i trust Teco more although Hailea has a very strong advantage (it is using titantium and cheaper).

[robe]

I'm using a Hailaea 880 for the past 5 months so far so good can cool down my 350 litre tank w/ 800 watts of lighting in around 30 minutes using a Eheim 1060 to pump the water.

My 1/3 Hp chiller used to run for 4 to 5 hours to cool down my tank.

[nannochloropsis]

ok.....ok maybe I should say, fo those who own the above, what have you got to say to it? Given a choice again, whould you get the same brand chiller or you would switch to another brand and why? mmn... Does that sound more appropriate....

I am using Teco - RA680, 1/2 HP for S$1,500 for my 4ft tank. Have been using it for the past 1.5 yrs. So far cools down pretty fast, about 20 min mx. I put this by my side of cabinet. My wife claimed that it was ugly in the hall - so what I did was to buy a wooden box with many small square holes from IKEA and put it inside - cost about S$50. Cover the top with simple table runner cloth and it looked like a side coffee table

A little noisy to my liking bec of the front grill - so need to silicon the the grill to the cover. Noise was more tolerable after that. The heat comes from the front.

So far I am happy with this chiller, except for one occasion where the chiller could not cut off. The dryer in the chiller was chocked, so need to replace this. I was glad that I bought this from Aquatechnic bec I got the temporary replacement for the chiller immediately and most important thing, it was totally free, although the guarantee period was slightly over - Peter was more flexible than his wife. No, I'm not a fan of Aquatechnic bec they sell most things sooooo expensive.

My friend who bought from Patrick had a similar issue but he could not help him, so recommended a freelancer to fix the problem. Unfortunately, he could not get a T loan set, and some of his corals died. Worse thing, my friend had to pay for the repare cost even within the warranty period. Lesson learnt - better to get from authorised distributor than from somewhere else. Lower TCO - oops another IT term!

One other thing - make sure you get a 3 pin plug for the chiller than the Euro plug. Again, my poor friend got a mild electric shock when he put his hand in the sump. Did not burn him but burning with rage with Pat for supplying him with this!

[Sinn]

poor chap....

[mv3i]

nanno , can i ask you what can of lighting you using ????

cos i believe that teco temperature sensing is 2C before it operates the compressor .... so it takes about 10 mins to cool 1C down ..... which is very good considered that your's is a 4 ft tank !!!

are you using MH, PL or FL ...... and for how long ?

[Tanzy]

mv3i,

The hysteresis or tolerance of the chillers can be set by the user, so it need not be 2 deg. Mine's at 0.8 deg.

[nannochloropsis]

nanno , can i ask you what can of lighting you using ????

cos i believe that teco temperature sensing is 2C before it operates the compressor .... so it takes about 10 mins to cool 1C down ..... which is very good considered that your's is a 4 ft tank !!!

are you using MH, PL or FL ...... and for how long ?

I'm using 2 x 150W MH Aqualine plus 2 actinic blue for my 4ft tank.

MH for 10 hours - actinic blue one hour before and and one hour after.

By default, Teco chiller is 2C but you can change this to 1C. I think I saw a thread in this forum on how to change this. Unfortunately Teco never mention this in the manual but I found out from Aquatechnic Malay technical guy who is pretty helpful so long as his bosses are not around.

From my observation, Teco chiller cuts in only when it is about to reach 2C difference even though you put it as 1C variance. I realised this when I set at 26C but the chiller cuts in only somewhere at 27C just before reaching 28C. Happened to both of my chillers.

Why I want to buy 1/2 HP? Well, I know one day, I will be itchy to upgrade to my dream tank of 5ft, so I rather buy slightly bigger chiller for future expansion I'm also itchy to have more light wattage for my tank to keep acros, if I can find a nice one <_<

[rrrobt]

what wrong with my TECO RA680 ?? or isit ok ??

i am using TECO RA680 2nd hand

from first owner till now is 1.5 years

2 MH 150 watts = 300 watts

my tank is 3.5 x 2 x 2.5 = 130 gallon

only 3 pump in the sump total =138 watts

1pump outside the sump =50 watts

no powerhead

im using 1500 L/H pump for the chiller

temperature setting is 25-27

temperature sensing is 2C

light is 8 inch above water

room temperature is 30

and it take 4hour 15min with light on.

and when light off it take 3 hour .

can anyone help me with this ?

nanno what do you think ?

[Tanzy]

rrrobt,

I have more or less the same chiller, 2nd hand and 1.5 years old. It doesn't take that long to cool my 75gal tank down.

I think we need to know,

How big is your tank?

What is the flow rate through the chiller?

[nannochloropsis]

what wrong with my TECO RA680 ?? or isit ok ??

i am using TECO RA680 2nd hand

from first owner till now is 1.5 years

2 MH 150 watts = 300 watts

my tank is 3.5 x 2 x 2.5 = 130 gallon

only 3 pump in the sump total =138 watts

1pump outside the sump =50 watts

no powerhead

im using 1500 L/H pump for the chiller

temperature setting is 25-27

temperature sensing is 2C

light is 8 inch above water

room temperature is 30

and it take 4hour 15min with light on.

and when light off it take 3 hour .

can anyone help me with this ?

nanno what do you think ?

I have the same problem where the chiller cannot cut off. My problem was due to the dryer that get choked. According to Aquatechnic, this happens after certain number of hours used. Known issue to them. They replaced it with a local dryer. This can cost about S$300 but I managed to escape paying bec it was just after warranty.

Another possible reason could be due to your thermostat that is not functioning.

[rrrobt]

tanzy

tank is 3.5 x 2 x 2.5 = 130 gallon

im using 1500 L/H pump for the chiller

[robe]

rrbot,

Check the refrigerant gas may need to top-up and the filter drier as well. Other factors that may contribute are dirty coils reducing the heat transfer rate. they say that the older TECO chillers does not use titanium coil but rather copper encased in some kind of plastic.

Ask Alvy ask he dissected his old TECo before. His chiller's coil has some portion thinned down amost to the copper coils.

[alvy]

yup...and boy after that you get nice green water coming out from it..(i filled it up with water to test for copper when i got it!)..geee...wonder whether my corals will like nice chiller produced "phytoplankton" !!