Inline heaters

[EA James]

Hi all,

I'm thinking about getting an inline heater so I have one less piece of equipment in the tank, I have an FX4 filter on a 330L tank. Any recommendations? Will I be able to use one on my ribbed hosing?

Cheers

 

[Zeus.]

Nothing a bit of plumbing cant sort out and still keep good output

 

[EA James]

@Zeus. that looks complicated!! Which ones do you have? Guessing you have two because of your tank size? Mines smaller so i should get away with one right?

 

[Zeus.]

Hydor ETH External Thermal Heater x2 plus two as then twin heaters in parallel produce less resistance so better output, one with a bypass should be plenty IMO if your house has central heating

 

[EA James]

So two in parallel doesn't restrict flow? What's the need for a bypass? I haven't had anything inline before so its all new to me
We have 20 month old twins so the central heating is always on, and my mrs hates the cold so the house is always warm! My current heater has a light to show when its on and I rarely see it so it wont have much work to do!

 

[Zeus.]

So two in parallel doesn't restrict flow?

Depends how they are set up

I have the 25mm Fluval hose attached to 25mm PVC piping then reduce it down to 20mm before the Heaters, the bypass might be a little OTT, but it was done on my fist tank. My Heaters dont come on often 'if' at all with the tank at 22 degrees - cant see the lights as the FX6 canister blocks direct view to heaters. Heaters are mainly there for winter holidays when heating is off. So do we need heaters at all in a central heated house- not really IMO unless you keep fish that need a slightly higher temp.

Turn the heater off for a few days and see and keep an eye on the temps is what I would suggest, you could always pop intank heaters in the tank if going on a winter vacation

 

[Kyle3]

It sounds like you really might be ok going sans heater outside of occasional vacations but if you want to explore more options for inline heating search YouTube for the DIY King’s inline heater hack.

He has a very wallet friendly pvc pipe project for making your own. I bought all the materials to do this myself but ended up buying an Oase thermo biomaster before I rolled up my “DIY sleeves” to actually assemble it so I can’t say how well it works from personal experience ... he’s well regarded in the hobby from what I’ve gathered though so I’d expect it is a solid design.

best of luck!

 

[EA James]

My heater is set at 24, mainly due to my rummynose and the recent apisto additions. I'd say the house must keep that temp steady. Good idea about the heater, only trouble is the heater has an inbuilt thermometer so that then leads to another question, a good accurate thermometer??? I've got a small basic one in my QT tank but not sure if that would be sufficient for the big tank.

 

[EA James]

@Kyle3 cheers, I'll have a look into that

 

[Kyle3]

As to thermometers:
I use the basic glass style in my tanks - never had any issues with them.

I did recently get a coralife digital thermometer free with a larger purpose and it seems nice and has a digit After the decimal point so it is arguably more accurate. It runs on a watch battery so I’m not sure how long it will run before replacement is required …

A more expensive option would be incorporating a temperature controller. Or if you want to go truly high end, there are computerized aquarium controllers with temperature probs like INTAQO, felix, hydros, GHL, Neptune- seems like an area that’s really expanding rapidly but well beyond my experience 💰

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,

I use the basic glass style in my tanks - never had any issues with them

Quite a few of us still prefer a <"spirit glass thermometer">. The don't have any moving parts.

Same here. If it's made right, ie accuarate from the start, it will stay accurate unless you actually break it. No wear, no half-dead batteries, no aging components drifting out of tolerance.
When I worked in electronics, I costed making a thermometer which would give the same accuracy. It would have cost well over £100 for the components at wholesale prices. At the time, aquarium thermometers were under £1.
I also knew that if I built it, it would have been military/aerospace quality construction, and I would have had my mate inspect it to be certain it complied

cheers Darrel