One heater or two, and why?

[Scott Tuttle]

I have a 56 gallon (30W x 18D x 22T), week 2 of cycling and have 1 heater. What is everyones opion about heaters, do you have 1 or 2 and what is your reasoning?

 

[Doclight]

I always run 2.

Reason 1. If one burns out, and it will happen, you don't lose any temp in tank.
Reason 2. It takes less energy too maintain temp with 2 as opposed to 1.
Reason 3. See other 2 reasons.. a

(even if you don't run 2, always have a spare on hand)

 

[Ebone]

2 and a temp controller... ranco/apex/whatever.... redundancy is always best... hard to fry tank with 2 smaller tanks if a failure takes place... even more so if both heaters have built in temp control and have a temp controller controlling them

 

[Ebone]

and I add a third in the winter for emergency heat

 

[Caliguy1983]

2 because one big one doesn't fit in my sump. Also for a back up.

 

[Forsaken77]

Multiple heaters. You want enough heat that if one fails your tank won't freeze and if one gets stuck on, it's not enough to boil the tank.

Whatever you add, make sure you put it (them) on a Temperature Controller. Marine Depot sells a good, reasonable priced, single stage controller that can handle up to 1,000 watts by Aqua Logic. I don't use a whole system controller, but I sure as heck think a Temp Controller is necessary. I use the American Marine Pinpoint Temp Controller because it's made in the USA and is spot on and works in tenths of a degree, where most work by single degrees. Whatever you do, stay away from Inkbird controllers.

Heaters always fail at one point. A good controller prevents them from sticking on and keeps them in a 1 degree range. I would steer clear of heaters with a built-in controller as well. Usually the controller built-in is junk and if one part fails, you lose the whole package. The Aqua Logic is really the cheapest quality controller at around $120-$130ish.

 

[Radman73]

Multiple heaters. You want enough heat that if one fails your tank won't freeze and if one gets stuck on, it's not enough to boil the tank.

Agree with everything else, but especially this as the reason to have multiple heaters.

 

[ca1ore]

As noted, redundancy is your friend. For as long as I can remember, I have been using two heaters on all my displays. I simply size each to be around 75% of the total required wattage for the tank. I also stagger the set points slightly so that heater #1 comes on earlier but heater #2 stay on longer. Also I keep a spare on hand. I do run both through a single controller. Ideally one would have them completely independent.