Heater Die Off

[Mr. Hollywood]

Are all aquarium heaters junk. I've lost 3 in as many months. They die after power comes on from an outage.  I guess the surge kills them, nothing else is affected, guess my TV is tougher than an aquarium heater   Long ago a heater lasted close to the life of the aquarium.  Heating filaments must be made very thin now, they are made to replace frequently just like light bulbs.   My outdoor mini pond baby bluegill dropped to 63 deg. f a few days ago.  I had new a heater, so I installed it.   Took two days to get water back up to 65 deg. f with the outside temps below freezing. But all are happy.

[Native Keeper]

From what I understand, all aquarium heaters are like this. I would recommend looking into Coldwater fish like goldfish, so you don't even need to have a heater.

[lefty o]

most heaters are not super reliable. i personally dont trust them to not cook fish.

[gardenman]

Yeah, I'm not a big heater fan. If you have to use them, I prefer two smaller heaters to one "properly" sized one. If an undersized heater malfunctions and stays on, it will take longer to cook the fish, buying you more time to notice it. And if one dies, you still have some heat keeping the fish from getting too chilled before you notice it. Two smaller heaters just feels safer to me. (Four or five smaller heaters might be safer if you're dealing with something rare and irreplaceable.)

I'm kind of intrigued about taking the commercial sous vide units and modifying one for aquarium use as a heater. Sous vide is a warm water cooking method that's become quite popular. They combine a very accurate thermostat with heating elements and a pump to circulate the warmed water. Some operate at a range outside of normal fish keeping, and you'd probably want to modify their design a bit to make them less likely to suck in an occasional stray fishy, but the potential is there. 

[Jawjagrrl]

I can see the allure of a fish room and keep the room temp what you want the tank temp to be. I find heaters made now to all be suspect. Still wondering if one of mine malfunctioned during Christmas after ruling out any biological reason for 3 healthy kuhli loaches to commit fishy suicide at the same time. 

Cory mentioned his progress on a heater in his recent video. Even though that's still months away, I am ready to order. I know how particular he is regarding product development so the thought of the Coop selling a better heater is really encouraging to me.

Edited December 30, 2021 by Jawjagrrl
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