Replace heater every 2 years?
- Thread starter b4tn
- Start date
- Tagged users None
Dennco2000
Active Member
- Joined
- May 31, 2017
- Messages
- 134
- Reaction score
- 99
I think the difference in opinion here is that if I had a 55 gallon freshwater with tetras, danios, a redtail shark or even say cichlids and oscar's not exactly high $$$ fish so a heater failure wouldn't be nearly as devastating. On the other hand just my saltwater fish and shrimp at the purchase date would be around $400 not to mention if I had to replace them size for size now. And that's just inhabitants not counting corals, tank tear down & rebuild and so on.
So replacing heaters is like buying a little extra insurance.
So replacing heaters is like buying a little extra insurance.
ca1ore
10K Club member
Excellence Award
Reef Tank 365
CTARS Member
Article Contributor
R2R TV Featured
Replacing all of the fish and corals in my tank would be well north of $10K; so I’ll proactively replace a $35 heater (or two) per year to avoid even the small chance of catastrophe.
Tastee
Valuable Member
I run a main and an backup for my 65g RSR250 and don’t plan to change them until one fails.
The main is an Aquael Gold 300W (possibly a different brand name in the USA - I am from ‘down under’) controlled by the Apex, on < 25C, off > 25.2C. The thermostat on this is set to ~25.5 so if the Apex goes nuts and doesn’t turn it off, it will turn off by itself. If it were to fail I’d probably replace it with an Eheim.
The backup is a cheaper Aqua One 250W not controlled by the Apex, set to ~24.5C. So if the main fails or the Apex goes nuts and doesn’t turn it on, it will keep the tank at least 24.5C. I test to check this heater is still working every month during my WCs.
This gives me pretty good redundancy for heater failure. It would take both an Apex and heater issue at the same time to cause a problem. Even if the main fails and the backup had already failed and I hadn’t noticed, the Apex will alert me to this.
The only other issue in this area I can think of encountering is a heater cracking and electrifying my tank. I have a ground probe in the tank to cover this, and in ~2 months will be upgrading my old circuit box to a new one with a dedicated circuit for the tank and better GFCI protection as I don’t fully trust the current box.
The main is an Aquael Gold 300W (possibly a different brand name in the USA - I am from ‘down under’) controlled by the Apex, on < 25C, off > 25.2C. The thermostat on this is set to ~25.5 so if the Apex goes nuts and doesn’t turn it off, it will turn off by itself. If it were to fail I’d probably replace it with an Eheim.
The backup is a cheaper Aqua One 250W not controlled by the Apex, set to ~24.5C. So if the main fails or the Apex goes nuts and doesn’t turn it on, it will keep the tank at least 24.5C. I test to check this heater is still working every month during my WCs.
This gives me pretty good redundancy for heater failure. It would take both an Apex and heater issue at the same time to cause a problem. Even if the main fails and the backup had already failed and I hadn’t noticed, the Apex will alert me to this.
The only other issue in this area I can think of encountering is a heater cracking and electrifying my tank. I have a ground probe in the tank to cover this, and in ~2 months will be upgrading my old circuit box to a new one with a dedicated circuit for the tank and better GFCI protection as I don’t fully trust the current box.
