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Old 10-08-2018, 04:12 AM
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Default Can't trust only one Thermometer

I have been using floating glass thermometers to manage my reef tank temperature for as long as I have been keeping fish. I thought I was keeping my tank in and around 80 degrees F. Some times the tanks temperature gets as high as 82 and as low as 79. Two weeks ago I checked the temperature with my digital TDS metre and it read 86 degrees. At the same time my glass thermometer had crept up to 82 degrees. They are inherently difficult to read.

That got me really worried. I checked on the internet and the most precise reasonably priced thermometer is the 12" Vee Gee digital thermometer.
I purchased one off of Amazon.

The temperature in my tank was over 84 degrees when my glass thermometer was reading 80. This means that the temperature in my tank was closer to 86 when I thought it was 82.

Now that I know I have been boiling my inhabitants some of my problems I have had in the recent past have become clearer. High temperature equals lack of O2 especially at night when there is no photosynthesis taking place and everything alive is respiring (even most bacteria).

This is a similar problem I had with a bad batch of salinity calibration solution. You really can't trust any one source of information. If you are trusting your Neptune, your thermometer or any other one device if that device is out of wack you will have problems.

I have now lowered the temperature in my tank to 78 degrees and have a temperature controller managing the temperature. I will regularly check the temperature with my Vee Gee to make sure nothing gets out of line

Last edited by Frogger; 10-08-2018 at 04:15 AM.
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Old 10-18-2018, 11:37 PM
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I fully agree. I was skeptical of a glass thermo I was using because it would always read much higher then what I was setting my heater to. I could not for the life of me get the heater calibrated while using the thermo. So I went out and purchased a similar, slighlty better, thermo. Sure enough, it read 2 degrees cooler. And much more accurate to what I was setting my heater to. I still run both and make sure the deviation between the two is the same at all times to help ensure both are still functioning normally.

With temp being so important, redundancy for this "parameter" is a must.
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Old 10-19-2018, 12:15 AM
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I have always had 2 smaller heaters to protect my tank from one heater being locked in the on position from over heating my tank. This is exactly what happened, about 4 months ago the temperature in my tank started to rise and I did not notice it. One of my older hagen heaters (150watt) must of locked in the on position. It could have been earlier but I only started to notice it. I check my temperature in the tanks once a week. I noticed that the reading was 82 degrees. I keep a detailed log of my fish tank and all its parameters dating back to the day I set it up. I thought summer temperature a little higher no big deal.

It was around 4 to 5 months ago I started having problems I lost a couple fish one of them was a large yellow tang I had had for several years. (I hadn't added a fish for several years). It was eating, doing well and then one day I couldn't find it. i looked everywhere. I lost another smaller fish (pipe fish about the same time). Loosing those fish caused my nitrates and phosphates to spike for about 3 weeks. This caused my tank to crash. Followed by uncontrollable cynos everywhere. I lost about quarter of my acros and everything else looked like crap.

At the time I couldn't figure it out. It appears now that the spike in my temperature (north of 86 degrees) likely caused the problems. Higher temperature less O2 at night the largest fish by far was the first to go.

Now that I have brought my temperature down to 78 degrees everything is looking way better, my corals are colouring up and growing like nuts.

Just a side note I bought two Finnex temperature controllers (supposed to be accurate) to heat my tank and have replaced the other two older heaters. One of the Finnex's is set at 84 degrees and shuts off at 77.7 degrees and the smaller one is set at 80 degrees and shuts off at 78.1. You can't trust a single thermometer or even a heat controller. You need to have an accurate way of double/ triple checking the temperature.

I now test the temperature at least twice a day.
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Old 10-19-2018, 01:02 AM
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If you're using a heater with those suction cup temp probes...
Please be sure the probe is SECURE.

Last thing you want is the probe to come out, giving a low temp reading and the heater to stay on and on because it thinks the water is cool.

You can end up losing alot of clams and zoas that way.
Yes I'm still bitter after a decade.
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Old 10-19-2018, 01:15 AM
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I have 5 of the Hagen floating glass therms which I use to check things. 2 read 1 degree higher than the other 3 so just split the difference. I also have a couple Big Alert Digital units and all match each time I check. I use them to calibrate my controller probes.

On a side note, I run my tank @ 78.5ish. I'd be hesitant to run a controller at your 84F. Hard on some fish and many corals. Plus depleted O2.
This will also give you more algae and cyano issues.
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Old 10-19-2018, 05:33 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by gregzz4 View Post
I have 5 of the Hagen floating glass therms which I use to check things. 2 read 1 degree higher than the other 3 so just split the difference. I also have a couple Big Alert Digital units and all match each time I check. I use them to calibrate my controller probes.

On a side note, I run my tank @ 78.5ish. I'd be hesitant to run a controller at your 84F. Hard on some fish and many corals. Plus depleted O2.
This will also give you more algae and cyano issues.
I originally set the finnex controller at 78 degrees but my water temperature was less than 74 degrees and the heater wasn't on.. I raised it to 80 and the temperature came up to about 75 to 76 before the heater turned off. I had to raise the temperature on the finnex controller so that it reads 84 before it would shut off at 78 degrees. I have been running it at this setting for the past couple of weeks and I check the temperature 2 to 3 times a day with the Vee Gee digital thermometer. It only fluctuates less than half a degree.

This means the controller is calibrated way off. So don't trust the reading on controllers.
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Old 12-31-2018, 04:41 AM
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I refuse to run a heater without a controller to monitor the temp, and as an added redundancy my chiller is running on its own settings. That way it requires 2 system failures. As well as replacing heaters every year to make sure they are in as good condition as possible.
I also use 2 glass thermometers, one in display, one I. Sump, and I have a digital temp gauge so that I can check tank temp on controller plus 3 separate thermometers.
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