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To much watt on heater is bad?
- Thread starter Aceswild
- Start date
Unless you have extraordinary conditions, like keeping the tank in an unheated basement or garage, you should size a heater at about 2 to 3 watts per gallon. In other words you want about a 75 or 100 watt heater. That should be all you need. The old "rule" of 5 watts per gallon was way too much if you had a failure.
This is once case where you do not want to go larger than you need. A 250w heater would have an excellent chance of cooking your livestock, if it fails in the on position.
As usual, with any SW equipment, always get top quality. My personal preference,for a good all round heater, is Jager, now owned by Eheim. Although there are others that are just as good. Avoid the cheep ones at all costs, too many of those easily let salt creep in, destroying the heater.
This is once case where you do not want to go larger than you need. A 250w heater would have an excellent chance of cooking your livestock, if it fails in the on position.
As usual, with any SW equipment, always get top quality. My personal preference,for a good all round heater, is Jager, now owned by Eheim. Although there are others that are just as good. Avoid the cheep ones at all costs, too many of those easily let salt creep in, destroying the heater.
Keep in mind that smaller tanks cool much faster than large tanks. With a 90 gallon tank and a 30 gallon sump, I need 600 watts of heaters to keep them at temp, where a 180 could probably have no problem at all with 600 watts. So here is a case of the 3-5 watt rule doesn't help.
I use 3 heaters and have the temp controlled by an Aquacontroller. As a second safetly, the thermostat in each heater is set to be 2 degrees about the Aquacontroller temp.
I use 3 heaters and have the temp controlled by an Aquacontroller. As a second safetly, the thermostat in each heater is set to be 2 degrees about the Aquacontroller temp.
I'm really surprised you need 600w of heaters to keep the tank at the temp you want. For years I ran a similar setup, and a 250w heater did just fine, and the tank was in the basement. Of course, such an arrangement will work, but I think it's a lot more than needed.
I do like the idea of using a controller to operate the heaters. Thermostats is most aquarium grade heaters are terrible, and often prone to fail in the on position.
I do like the idea of using a controller to operate the heaters. Thermostats is most aquarium grade heaters are terrible, and often prone to fail in the on position.
DaveK said:
My sump is in the basement - that is normally like 60 degrees in the Winter. We keep the house temp at 68 during the day and 60 at night, so it has to work hard to keep it at temp. I could remove 1 and get down to 400 watts but then it will just run constantly. At 600 watts, the warm backup time is only slight longer than the cooling time.