Rena Smart Heaters???

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Rob Martin

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Apr 30, 2009
49
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Ontario, Canada
Hey guys,

I've been doing a lot of reading up on rays the last couple days. I've actually owned a single Motoro before and never had any trouble with her, but I figured there's always more to learn and it wouldn't hurt to have a bit of a "refresher" before getting back into rays.

During my "studies" I came across mention of people using Rena Smart Heaters as opposed to heater guards for their rays. So, I looked them up and they sound great but I have a question (a silly one I'm sure...)

I've never used an inline heater before, but the Smart Heaters say they can be installed in the intake tube of my Filstar XP4's... How do you do this? I mean, if the heater is INSIDE my filter tube, then how do you plug the heater in to the electrical outlet? Do you need to somehow cut a hole to allow the power cord access to the tube and then patch around it? I'm sure that's not the case, that would be down right dumb, but I'm failing to visualize how a heater can be inside a filter tube, and yet have a power cord hanging out to plug it in without water spilling everywhere???

I hope I'm making sense with what I'm asking here....
 
Rob Martin;4323343; said:
Hey guys,

I've been doing a lot of reading up on rays the last couple days. I've actually owned a single Motoro before and never had any trouble with her, but I figured there's always more to learn and it wouldn't hurt to have a bit of a "refresher" before getting back into rays.

During my "studies" I came across mention of people using Rena Smart Heaters as opposed to heater guards for their rays. So, I looked them up and they sound great but I have a question (a silly one I'm sure...)

I've never used an inline heater before, but the Smart Heaters say they can be installed in the intake tube of my Filstar XP4's... How do you do this? I mean, if the heater is INSIDE my filter tube, then how do you plug the heater in to the electrical outlet? Do you need to somehow cut a hole to allow the power cord access to the tube and then patch around it? I'm sure that's not the case, that would be down right dumb, but I'm failing to visualize how a heater can be inside a filter tube, and yet have a power cord hanging out to plug it in without water spilling everywhere???

I hope I'm making sense with what I'm asking here....
Click to expand...

The heater will be fitted with intake holes no matter what if you buy a RENA smart heater. The intake pipe of the canister just pops into the heater instead of putting an intake head on the end of it. The heater has a hole in the top where you push the intake pipe down. The top of the heater this way still stays above water and the cord comes out the back as on a normal heater.

It's hard to describe, but also incredibly simple once you see it. The heater doesn't go in anything. The canister and tubes run exactly the same, the only difference is your pipe pushes into the heater instead of having its own intake head.

Hope that helps.
 
Absolutely! Thank-you! I tried finding pics of this thing to get an idea and all I came up with are tiny thumbnails of the box it comes in which was really no help at all. Sounds easy to hook up then....

Thanks again!
 
Oh, another question about these heaters if I may....

So, if the heater is basically right up at the water's surface like that, I take it then that it is NOT bad for the heater to be out of the water when the water level drops during water changes? Or do you always make sure to unplug this kind of heater prior to a water change?

And am I right in assuming that this thing only heats the water passing THROUGH it and therefore its exterior edges don't get hot - making it ideal for rays?
 
I wouldn't recommend running any heater in open air

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See that's where I'm still curious.... If this thing is heating the water passing through it rather than the water surrounding it like a typical heater would, then even when you did a water change it wouldn't matter because water would still be running through it as long as you had your canister running...... right....?

Seems like it would be a pain to crawl under the tank and unplug two or three or these everytime you had to do a waterchange. Might was well just go with regular heaters placed lower down in the tank (with guards of course)....

On that note, I've been scouring online stores for guards and can't find any. I've heard guys will often drill a bunch of holes in PVC piping to make some, but I imagine it might be a pain in the butt to secure the heater within it and yet still be able to mount it with suction cups to a tank wall...
 
I don't usually bother on my afican cichlid tank, but then I've got them positioned down low so that when I swap out water they remain beneath the surface the whole time.
 
I Can't tell you for sure that when the heater was designed that it wasn't meant to be submerged to cool some parts

Chances are you will be fine if water is still flowing through but there is still a chance I could be wrong
 
Thanks, johno. Maybe if I go with a couple I'll plug 'em in and see just how hot they get to the touch. Because they are not made of glass they wouldn't crack or shatter I don't think, and I've read elsewhere that they don't get hot enough on the outside to burn a fish (not sure as to the validity of that statement though...).
 
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