Damn Heaters!

[mike31154]

Originally Posted by spreerider

i have had a few failures but one i have had for over 11 years, and its just a cheap walmart brand chinese junk.
Im trying a stealth and so far its had no problems.
I have heard that heater cables have almost no failure, the type people used to use alot in planted tanks, the only part that can fail is the thermostat and since you use a dedicated thermostat to control the heater cables you get high quality on both.

Hmm, heater cable... light bulb shining above head... I just installed some in-floor resistive heating cable in a small area I'm tiling at my living room bay window. Now I'm thinking when I set up my 90 gal with basement sump, why not incorporate something like that under the sump or even under the tank? This type of cable has its own sensor & thermostat and I'm sure with a little ingenuity, could be controlled with an additional sensor/controller for the water as well.

I plan to tear out my L-shaped kitchen counter and set up the tank on a new beefed up counter dividing the Kitchen & DR which is currently an open area. I was going to tile the counter with granite tile except under the tank which would have been just wood/plywood with a foam pad maybe. Now I'm thinking tile the entire surface and add the heating cable under the granite. Wouldn't use a foam pad then since that would act as an insulator blocking heat transfer to the tank. Alternatively,or in addition, a heating cable could be added under the sump in the basement. Voila, redundancy and no more dependence on finicky in tank heaters.... Caveat... just a 'little' more expensive than an aquarium heater, he he... How 'bout it, am I on to something here??

Here's a link to the co. that manufactures the system I have in the Living Room. Available at Home D. There's another system available which is a mat with the heating cable woven into it. The True Comfort system is a separate cable you need to install in a zig zag pattern with clips. Both are covered with a thin layer of mortar prior to applying the covering of choice which can be anything from tile to wood.

http://truecomfortsystems.com/