horrible fishtank tragedy :(

lsboogie

lsboogie

Member
Originally Posted by T316
http:///forum/post/3267743
My chiller would counter act any heat output that my heater could possilbly produce before I could catch it.
I thought the same thing but I came home to a 85 degree tank and a chiller that was damn near on fire. Thought at first that my chiller was overheating and heating my water up but it turned out my heater wouldn't shut off and the chiller just couldn't do any more. Yes it saved me from alot of loss, but not sure how much longer it could have made it.
I bought a $99.00 reefkeeper lite controller...best 100.00 worth of insurance I can think of to protect thousands worth (to me at least) of internal critters. my .02 but I'd never run a reef without a controller now. As a side note, my chiller and heater both come on about 50-60% less then previously with the controller operating them. Seems that even though I had it dialed in pretty good they were still battling SO...I save some money in electricity too...
 
acrylic51

acrylic51

Active Member
Agree with LSBoogie....Something on the line of the Apex or ReefKeeper or something like a Ranco controller would be a fail safe against that....I've had the same thing happen years ago and luckily I was home and caught it, but we honestly shouldn't rely solely on the temp controller on the heater which we all do at some point.
I do know with the Apex that if something would go crazy with your heater, lights, etc....you cell phone or such can be alerted ad if you set it up to have internet access to your controller you could see what is going on and override outlets on the bus bar with the Apex.
The chiller might save the day, but even if it doesn't over heat your being counterproductive if the heater is sticking and the chiller is compensating for it, your wasting how much electricity before the malfunction is caught??? Why not run 2 smaller heaters, that way 1 small heater can't overheat your tank, and if 1 of the 2 did stick it wouldn't be tragic.
 
tannersmith200

tannersmith200

Member
I bought the AquaController 3 Pro with lab grade probes which monitors unfortunate situations like these in more ways than one (such as heater malfuction)
I have my controller monitorsing my 28G nano reef and my 160G reef tanks. It's expensive but a lifesaver and manager of my showcases. I would suggest this controller to everyone who has a large investment in their aquariums!
 
cranberry

cranberry

Active Member
Don't get me started on the Reefkeeper elite........ I've invested over 800 bucks in that piece of trash. I'm starting over and buying the Apex.
 
ibanez

ibanez

Member
Counting the original owner of my 90 gallon tank there have been three heater failures in the last year in my tank. The first one killed everything and that was why he sold it. Since I have had it in two months, I have had one tetra heater stick on which I caught while the temp was only 84 and yesterday, the marineland stealth that was less than a year old was leaking voltage into the tank. It doesn't seem to have killed anything in the tank. I think I may have a tank goblin destroying my heaters.
 
cranberry

cranberry

Active Member
Tiss why I'm switching.
Actually, I don't wanna get called for slander for the piece of trash statement.... lemme rephrase. It's no more useful to me than a piece of my trash. Drink coaster anyone?
 
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