Tonight I came home to find my tank at around 72-3 degrees, down quite a bit. Look at my 250 watt Jager, the red light is on so I assume it is trying to work. Stick my hand in, tank feels freezing and heater is cold. Heater is only around 9 months old, sucks a little more right now because I apparently have ick. I have not been able to pay close attention to the tanks the last few days due to work and this is what happens. Good thing my tank room is kept around 75 degrees. I was hoping this heater would last me a while, but it again all appears to be the luck of the draw. Heater has never been dropped or plugged in while out of water, or hit by any large fish. Just sayin'..kind of agitated
Another heater to go
- Thread starter irishfan
- Start date
IMO, the only real way to ensure your heater won't kill your fish is redundancy - 2 heaters, each underpowered for the tank.
That way:
heater fails ON: incapable of overheating tank. Other heater only runs if it is needed to keep the temperature at setting.
heater fails OFF: other heater attempts to keep temperature at set, likely running 100% of the time and falling slightly short of maintaining the "correct" temperature, but at least the fish won't freeze to death.
Just make sure they have indicators so that you know if one has failed.
It's even better than having a controller - with a controller, you have redundancy if the heater fails on, but if it fails off your tank will drop in temperature fast until it is below room temperature (this means your tank might go from 82 to 65 if your heater fails!)
IMO, any heater can fail.
What needs to happen is someone needs to do a well-made solid-state heater. The fluval tronic and fluval e-series are a step in the right direction, but IME they don't maintain the temperature very accurately.
I don't know what's so hard about soldering together a thermistor, comparator, silicon-controlled rectifier and heating element, but from what I've seen no one has done it right.
Although, to be fair, I guess you'd need a transformer and voltage regulator to run the thermostat parts, which might make it slightly less reliable.
That way:
heater fails ON: incapable of overheating tank. Other heater only runs if it is needed to keep the temperature at setting.
heater fails OFF: other heater attempts to keep temperature at set, likely running 100% of the time and falling slightly short of maintaining the "correct" temperature, but at least the fish won't freeze to death.
Just make sure they have indicators so that you know if one has failed.
It's even better than having a controller - with a controller, you have redundancy if the heater fails on, but if it fails off your tank will drop in temperature fast until it is below room temperature (this means your tank might go from 82 to 65 if your heater fails!)
IMO, any heater can fail.
What needs to happen is someone needs to do a well-made solid-state heater. The fluval tronic and fluval e-series are a step in the right direction, but IME they don't maintain the temperature very accurately.
I don't know what's so hard about soldering together a thermistor, comparator, silicon-controlled rectifier and heating element, but from what I've seen no one has done it right.
Although, to be fair, I guess you'd need a transformer and voltage regulator to run the thermostat parts, which might make it slightly less reliable.
Thinking about it, I guess that's what titanium heaters + controllers are for. The titanium element won't ever fail, and it is extremely unlikely that the controller will. That just leaves the temperature probe to fall out of the tank or be torn off by an exceptionally strong fish. Either way, it will read a very low temperature and the heating element will stay on.
The funny thing is I usually keep 2 heaters in this tank. I recently had to set up a cpl of my empty tanks to hold some trouble makers and those who needed a little tlc. I went down to one heater and then this happened maybe 5 days later.
great comment nes, added a lot. Thats great for you, often heaters may be off by a little, but this one had the "on" light, and was freezing, it will not even turn on. Little different, but thanks
When the temp is set at 82 and tank reads 72 mm
When the temp is set at 82 and tank reads 72 mm
I run a controller on my 150. It is great because it gives me a digital temp readout and I can set it easily. It brings both heaters on together, which use to drive me nuts you can never get them to sync. One always did all the work, the other just sat there.