Heaters and running to hot

I have a 250 W in my 60 w/ 20 gal sump and it is always messing up. I will put it on like 6 and it will drop down to 75 then ill turn it to 6.5 and it will go up to like 84..

I have another 150 W that i just added today.. should i run the 150 W in the sump before or after the 250 w on the way up to the return. And what should i run it at.. has anyone else had problems with heaters not working right.. would this be considered not working right with the 250W?

 

Hi Doorboy - I have had a few dodgy heaters over the years - ones that fail and dont come on and ones that the bi metallic strip gets stuck on and never switch off

2 small heaters are better than 1 large one - as the odds on both not working proper at same time are very high

if it where mine, Id get it swapped out

 

+1 to that. Get a good titanium heater. If you have the aquarium in a place where there is not a lot of difference between the air temp and the temp of the water, then 150W is fine. Otherwise, stick with 250W. The idea of running two is a good idea. I did that for awhile, I had one set at, say, 6 and let that be the one to click on all the time. The second was set at 5. So if #1 failed, #2 picked up....just ran the tank at 75 instead of 78. That sort of thing. Look into controllers to regulate heater's gone wild. That happens more often than you think.....and the tank cooks.

 

i run two in my sump just for space, you will have more space with two short heaters then with a high watt long one i have always used marineland for my heaters, i bought one about four years ago and it still works great

 

Did someone say cooked shrimp :LolLolLol , as stated above i would replace it asap. if its not working right, i just lost a hole tank over thanksgiving because of a bad heater not much fun.

 

I just went through this myself. I had 2 x 150 w heaters that ran fine for a year. Then all of a sudden, my tank is warming up to 83-84 degrees. I thought it was related to my halides.... Then through the process of elimination, I figured out that one of my heaters was malfunctioning. Once I unplugged it - problem solved.

I switched to a 200 w titanium heater with an separate temperature probe and external controller. I can't believe how much better this arrangement works. I may put the remaining functional 150 w heater somewhere (set lower like PharmrJohn said) in case the main unit pooches.

Z

 

They got it right! two little ones is way better. IMO ditch the 250 and run the 150 and get another small on. I have my heater in the sump, because i dont want to look at them in my DT

 

I have had good luck with heaters however with the addition of my reefkeeper 2 it will only turn the plug out on for my heater when the temp is between to set ranges. this will prevent my heater from sticking on and cooking my tank. just some added safety that i rely on.

 

I used to use nothing but Marineland heaters. Just had a 200w Stealth blow-up and take out my Coral Beauty. Going to get a Titanium. The heater was only 6 months old. I will be sending it in.

 

Interesting... The heater that failed on me (mentioned in my post above) was also a Stealth. It didn't 'blow-up' - it just started overheating the tank - well beyond the termperature setting it was set on. I guess I just caught mine earlier than you.

It does cast some doubt on the quality of the Stealth line of heaters though...

Z