So, here's how my evening/morning went:
I was sitting outside last night, enjoying the amazing Arizona weather while smoking a cigar. Suddenly I get an alert from my Apex on my phone. It said that my tank temperature had dropped below 77 degrees. I open the Apex app and yup, my tank has slowly been losing temperature. Please see exhibit "A":
My 120g tank, with 40g sump was being heated by a single 600w BRS Titanium heater and an Inkbird controller. I immediately go to to the tank and notice that the controller is "ON" and attempting to heat the tank. Luckily, I had just taken down my 40g tank, as we are moving it to another room. I happened to have a 200w heater from that tank. After verifying that both outlets on the Inkbird were working, I dropped the 200w heater into the sump and within 10 minutes, the temperature started to rise. Whew! Yeah, it took all night, but the temperature stayed in the 78 degree zone, and there weren't any indications of any stress to the tank (I mean, it only got to 76.9, so I wasn't expecting any issues).
So, today I went out and decided to be smarter about my heaters. Instead of a single heater, I'm using two heaters now. Instead of just the Inkbird being a failsafe, I got heaters with internal thermostats that I can set just outside of my high range in case they get stuck on. And, if one of them fails, the 300w one remaining should be able to keep the temp stable for some time.
In regards to the BRS heater, they have a 3 year warranty. I'm extremely disappointed that this $90 heater lasted less than a year. I contacted BRS, and since the 600w heaters are out of stock, they credited my account with reward points. I'm satisfied with how BRS handled this. I just wish the equipment lasted longer.
I know this has been a long post, but I think it's a great reminder to have redundancies set up, as well as having spare gear available for emergencies.
I was sitting outside last night, enjoying the amazing Arizona weather while smoking a cigar. Suddenly I get an alert from my Apex on my phone. It said that my tank temperature had dropped below 77 degrees. I open the Apex app and yup, my tank has slowly been losing temperature. Please see exhibit "A":
My 120g tank, with 40g sump was being heated by a single 600w BRS Titanium heater and an Inkbird controller. I immediately go to to the tank and notice that the controller is "ON" and attempting to heat the tank. Luckily, I had just taken down my 40g tank, as we are moving it to another room. I happened to have a 200w heater from that tank. After verifying that both outlets on the Inkbird were working, I dropped the 200w heater into the sump and within 10 minutes, the temperature started to rise. Whew! Yeah, it took all night, but the temperature stayed in the 78 degree zone, and there weren't any indications of any stress to the tank (I mean, it only got to 76.9, so I wasn't expecting any issues).
So, today I went out and decided to be smarter about my heaters. Instead of a single heater, I'm using two heaters now. Instead of just the Inkbird being a failsafe, I got heaters with internal thermostats that I can set just outside of my high range in case they get stuck on. And, if one of them fails, the 300w one remaining should be able to keep the temp stable for some time.
In regards to the BRS heater, they have a 3 year warranty. I'm extremely disappointed that this $90 heater lasted less than a year. I contacted BRS, and since the 600w heaters are out of stock, they credited my account with reward points. I'm satisfied with how BRS handled this. I just wish the equipment lasted longer.
I know this has been a long post, but I think it's a great reminder to have redundancies set up, as well as having spare gear available for emergencies.
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