kyley
Active Member
Anyone know the CFM on the stock 250 and 130 hood fans? With some fans quieter because of lower RPM (and lower CFM) those may not be good for sufficiently cooling the hood if the cubic feet/minute is too low (shorter bulb life).
Hey Terry,
I missed this post earlier, sorry. Yes, the lower CFM fans may indeed provide a bit of risk with shortening the life of our bulbs. I edited the original post with a note to warn about this.
I don't know the original CFM of the RSM fans, but the official JBJ Biocube tank fans run at 18 CFM and are a much louder 31 dBA; 3,800 rpm. If the Red Sea ones are close to that (just a hunch), then dropping to 12-14 CFM may not be a large enough difference to impact the life of our bulbs. I'd err on the side of quiet myself. After all, how peaceful and relaxing is a nice aquarium with annoyingly loud fans!
Anyway, the most important thing here is that you can find fans of similar CFM flow that will be much quieter due to better bearings, more aerodynamic fan blades, better balance, and just better quality construction in general (a lot of the noise comes from vibration as well - so putting some foam around the fan edges may help quiet things down further). More efficient design and slower RPMs can actually deliver more air at lower volumes. Papst and SilenX fans are perfect examples of this. The SilenX fan I listed is also 18 CFM, but only 2,000 rpm and 16 dBA - half the dBA of the JBJ fan!
yycguy, thanks for sharing your mod! Pretty slick! However, wouldn't using two quieter fans at lower CFM (12) provide more air movement than one loud fan at higher CFM (18)? Take care,
--Kyle