# Heaters



## destructo (Aug 12, 2009)

I am in the market to get a new heater since mine is on the fritz. 

Its not keeping the temperature that I set it to. It will for a couple of days and then drop 10 degrees with out turning back on. 

I am unsure of the make or model of the heater as I bought it from Menagerie a couple years ago and did not keep the box for it. 

Any suggestions?


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## carmenh (Dec 20, 2009)

I always use Eheim Jager. Of the many I've had, I've only ever had one bad one and it was a bad seal, not a catastrophic failure like overheating/not heating, or exploding.


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## Fish_Man (Apr 9, 2010)

carmenh said:


> I always use Eheim Jager. Of the many I've had, I've only ever had one bad one and it was a bad seal, not a catastrophic failure like overheating/not heating, or exploding.


I too use the Eheim Jager and other heaters. I find that the Jager is made pretty well.

The only question I have for people with the Jager is: do you find it turns on very often? I had a 50 watt in a 10gal tank and the light was on very often as compare to my other heaters (Marineland, Fluval)


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## carmenh (Dec 20, 2009)

That's odd, I've never noticed that. But I haven't really paid attention...



Fish_Man said:


> I too use the Eheim Jager and other heaters. I find that the Jager is made pretty well.
> 
> The only question I have for people with the Jager is: do you find it turns on very often? I had a 50 watt in a 10gal tank and the light was on very often as compare to my other heaters (Marineland, Fluval)


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## tebore (Jan 3, 2010)

Fish_Man said:


> I too use the Eheim Jager and other heaters. I find that the Jager is made pretty well.
> 
> The only question I have for people with the Jager is: do you find it turns on very often? I had a 50 watt in a 10gal tank and the light was on very often as compare to my other heaters (Marineland, Fluval)


Keep in mind that less water means less heatsink so the temperature in a 10 gal will fluctuate more than a 90 gallon. It's 9x more water so it should take 9x more energy to warm up and take almost 9x to cool down.


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## Chromey (Sep 25, 2010)

Ive had 6 Eheim Jager in the last 4 months Die on me.

I will never buy another.


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## carmenh (Dec 20, 2009)

OMG, how did they fail? 



Chromey said:


> Ive had 6 Eheim Jager in the last 4 months Die on me.
> 
> I will never buy another.


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## Chromey (Sep 25, 2010)

2 of them The knob failed... Got stuck.

1 filled with water

2 stopped heating

1 Over heated, KNob said 72, Water was 85.


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## carmenh (Dec 20, 2009)

Crap, I hope it's just bad luck. 
I have to buy a heater today to replace the piece of #### visitherm that came with the last set up I bought. I noticed yesterday that the temp was only at 72, so I wanted to bump it a bit. I turned it a LOT clockwise and nothing happened. Then after a bit more, it finally came on but stayed on. When manipulating it, it's impossible to get a feel for where in the rotation the light turns on cuz it's different every time!



Chromey said:


> 2 of them The knob failed... Got stuck.
> 
> 1 filled with water
> 
> ...


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## fish_luva (Nov 24, 2009)

Heh Chromey, Were all these heaters newly purchased by you? or did you get these used from some other good Pn'ers? I got lots of these as well... Some of them are working but really need to adjust the heaters up to get to desired temperature....none have failed "YET"....

tks
Sheldon



Chromey said:


> 2 of them The knob failed... Got stuck.
> 
> 1 filled with water
> 
> ...


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## fish_luva (Nov 24, 2009)

Heh Fish_man, I have been finding that it turns on a lot in the smaller tanks because of water volume like *tebore* mentioned. IN my 10 and 20 gallon tanks the heater is constantly coming on and some all of the time. IN the larger tanks it comes on less, Once the tank does get heated up though in the larger ones it does not come on as much because it takes longer for that body of water to cool.

Also though, i have some new heaters in small tanks, hydor theo's and they don't appear to cut in as much as the older jager's i have.. But then again.. they are brand new.....

Check to make sure you don't have it to close to a source of air bubbles... If the heater is close to air bubblers, it could cause it to cut in more as the air blowing in could be colder... just a thought because it happens to me....

Hope we are not hijacking this guys thread here, but it should help at least in making heater decisions....

So for the *thread owner*.. Check out Hydor theo's,, i find them good aqua via's



Fish_Man said:


> I too use the Eheim Jager and other heaters. I find that the Jager is made pretty well.
> 
> The only question I have for people with the Jager is: do you find it turns on very often? I had a 50 watt in a 10gal tank and the light was on very often as compare to my other heaters (Marineland, Fluval)


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## Chromey (Sep 25, 2010)

3 Were Lightly used (FW) 3 were Brandnew(SW)

I have found that in Saltwater these fail for me alot faster.

I had a brandnew 300W in my cichlid tank that lasted me 3.5 months, I was very happy when i woke up 1 morning to see my temps at 71'C.

I then turn it up to 85 to get it to turn on again, That brought my temp too 74'C.

Too me that is a fail.

I have a 400W visitherm for my Saltwater, And it does a good job... Not great.

So its time for me to take the next step and invest some $$ in a good heater.
My cichlids can handle some flex in the temp... Im not risking my corals and Tangs.


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## destructo (Aug 12, 2009)

Not to worry about "hijacking" the thread. 

I need to get a new heater soon. Woke up this morning and the temp is sitting at 72 when it should be at 80. It does seem as though its a bit of a common problem with other heaters as well.


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## Fish_Man (Apr 9, 2010)

Thanks for the help on my question.

So I would suggest these:

1) Jager (so far it's been keeping the temp stable at the correct knob temp, also you can manually recalibrate the heater)
2) Fluval (sleek and has digital temp reading but $$, stable temp) 
3) Visitherm (fill in the blank)


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## carmenh (Dec 20, 2009)

I rummaged through my stuff at home and found a Fluval heater that had been given to me (new), so I decided to try it instead of buying another Jager. So far, so good. My only complaint is that it's marked in celcius and my brain works in farenheit...had to go online for a conversion 
Will post if anything changes...



Fish_Man said:


> Thanks for the help on my question.
> 
> So I would suggest these:
> 
> ...


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## AquaNekoMobile (Feb 26, 2010)

carmenh said:


> I always use Eheim Jager. Of the many I've had, I've only ever had one bad one and it was a bad seal, not a catastrophic failure like overheating/not heating, or exploding.


O___o;;

Exploding? Can I heard the details on this?  Now I'm starting to worry as my heaters are all glass ones. Not Eheims.


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## carmenh (Dec 20, 2009)

That was in reference to the Marineland Stealth ones that are currently under recall. If yours are glass, to the best of my knowledge, there is little to no risk of explosion. And my stealth never exploded, anyhow, it just tried to electrocute me and my fish 



AquaNekoMobile said:


> O___o;;
> 
> Exploding? Can I heard the details on this?  Now I'm starting to worry as my heaters are all glass ones. Not Eheims.


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## svtcontour (Mar 15, 2009)

I've only used Ebo / Eheim heaters. My oldest is about 10 years now. I've got a total of 5 ranging from 50W to 250W. Never once failed. The only issue I did have is that one of them the knob did become stiff after not turning it for a long time but it wasnt permanently stuck. As far as temp stability, they've been great.


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## Julian (Jun 29, 2008)

I had one of the Stelths that is currently under recall. Mine died but thankfully in the no long turning on way so nothing super bad happened. Got it replaced by the company. So now i'm using a Eheim Jager which had been fine all winter. At the moment the temp in the tank is lower than the knob is set to but my apartment has been pretty warm so that is probably the issue. I'm keeping the replacement stelth as a backup as when it was working I really liked its design.


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## Splash768 (Mar 29, 2011)

The Jager seems to be the most reliable, according to the opinions of people here and on other forums, then why is petsandponds saying Jager have lower reliability than all the other heaters they carry? 

See this link
http://www.petsandponds.com/en/aquarium-supplies/c5810/c195250/index.html


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## destructo (Aug 12, 2009)

Splash768 said:


> The Jager seems to be the most reliable, according to the opinions of people here and on other forums, then why is petsandponds saying Jager have lower reliability than all the other heaters they carry?
> 
> See this link
> http://www.petsandponds.com/en/aquarium-supplies/c5810/c195250/index.html


Crap I just bought a 125 Watt Jager. Seems to be working fine, only time will tell.


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## conix67 (Jul 27, 2008)

I've had all kinds of heaters, and most of them eventually failed on me. 

The biggest problem is the thermostat - it would not stay consistent throughout its lifetime (which is supposed to be permanent).

If the temperature is important, get a dedicated temperature controller along with a good heater. It will not fail like the thermostat on these heaters, and allow you to set "hysterysis" which means it won't be frequently switching on/off.


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## carmenh (Dec 20, 2009)

My guess is that it's NOT a quality issue  
Looks to me like they are trying to steer customers to Hagen products, which have a very, very much higher margin...



Splash768 said:


> The Jager seems to be the most reliable, according to the opinions of people here and on other forums, then why is petsandponds saying Jager have lower reliability than all the other heaters they carry?
> 
> See this link
> http://www.petsandponds.com/en/aquarium-supplies/c5810/c195250/index.html


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## Lee_D (Jun 11, 2010)

I recently bought a Theo by Hydor. 400W. The main reason I chose it was because of the way the actual heating element is made. It allows for a shorter heater for the number of watts. Certainly keeps the tank warm, thats for sure!

I originally tried Tronic and my last round of heaters were the Jagers. Essentially the principals are the same for all three. A knob at the top that may or may not stick with time (The tronics were bad for this), a bimetal strip to measure temp, and a heating element at the bottom.

As for quality, in general, I don't think I have seen anything to complain about. Having used the 400W I think my biggest problem in the past is that I have been buying them far to under powered. Buying to low a wattage doesn't save you anything and you will end up with unnecesarily large temperature swings. Probably shorten the life of the heater as well.

Lee


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## carmenh (Dec 20, 2009)

What size tank do you have??? I would worry about a 400w having the power to boil things quickly if things go wrong!



Lee_D said:


> Buying to low a wattage doesn't save you anything and you will end up with unnecesarily large temperature swings. Probably shorten the life of the heater as well.
> 
> Lee


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## Lee_D (Jun 11, 2010)

Just finished setting up a 120g. I'm going crazy waiting for it to cycle.

The guy at BA suggested the recommended rating is three watts per gallon. At 400W I'm just above that. The light still comes on rather regularly but the tank feels rather warm. Digital thermometer reads 28.5 ish. I was going to adjust it down a bit on the weekend to 26-27.

Lee


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## carmenh (Dec 20, 2009)

Do be careful. I've always heard that 2 undersized heaters is much safer than one oversized, because heaters fail as often in the on position as they do in the off...Like I said, don't want to boil them 

BTW, if you want some filter schmootz to kick start your cycle, I'm in Burlington, and have a couple fw tanks in the mix...



Lee_D said:


> Just finished setting up a 120g. I'm going crazy waiting for it to cycle.
> 
> The guy at BA suggested the recommended rating is three watts per gallon. At 400W I'm just above that. The light still comes on rather regularly but the tank feels rather warm. Digital thermometer reads 28.5 ish. I was going to adjust it down a bit on the weekend to 26-27.
> 
> Lee


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## Lee_D (Jun 11, 2010)

I tried two 100W Jaeger heaters in my long 120g but I found the second heater never turned on. I guess the twiddle knobs on top may look like they are more accurate because they have distinct set points but I suspect no two heaters are alike, even if they are from the same manufacturer.

Thanks for the offer of the schmootz but I have plenty already. I like to wait the month before I add more fish mostly to let the tank equilibrate. It currently has 6 very Rummy nosed Tetras and three Glowlights that are having a grand old time exploring all that space. It's the boatload of common snails I threw in that are doing all the work!

Lee


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## carmenh (Dec 20, 2009)

I guess in a 120 it would take a while to overheat, and you sound like you have the good sense to keep an eye one it...
You're welcome...always glad to spread the schmootz around! 



Lee_D said:


> I tried two 100W Jaeger heaters in my long 120g but I found the second heater never turned on. I guess the twiddle knobs on top may look like they are more accurate because they have distinct set points but I suspect no two heaters are alike, even if they are from the same manufacturer.
> 
> Thanks for the offer of the schmootz but I have plenty already. I like to wait the month before I add more fish mostly to let the tank equilibrate. It currently has 6 very Rummy nosed Tetras and three Glowlights that are having a grand old time exploring all that space. It's the boatload of common snails I threw in that are doing all the work!
> 
> Lee


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## JohnyBGood (May 27, 2011)

Where do you guys like to shop for heaters (for lowest prices)?

Edit: I'm looking for a good 300W, on sale.


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