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Stealth heater crapped out on me.

T

tcarswell

Polypterus
MFK Member
I guess my Stealth heater crapped out on me. I was walking by my tank when I got home from work and I noticed one of my coral life digital thermo's said 91 degrees.... I figured it must be an error and checked the other one and it was exactly the same 91 degrees I opened the glass tops and the water was really hot.

The unit was a 200 watt visi therm stealth on a 90 gallon bichir tank. The bichirs are all actually ok surprisingly. Its unplugged right now thank god I got back ups...

My question to you guys and the reason I am posting this is. Will the high temps have killed my beneficial bacteria ? Are there any precautions I should take for the bichirs health ?
 
Since you caught it, your bichirs will be fine. Since it is cooling down now, and your bichirs look fine, there is no precaution you should take. Good thing you caught it.

I had one stealth heater fail me, but it was the opposite of yours. It stopped working, and I found the water very cold.
 
Angler;3589869; said:
Since you caught it, your bichirs will be fine. Since it is cooling down now, and your bichirs look fine, there is no precaution you should take. Good thing you caught it.

I had one stealth heater fail me, but it was the opposite of yours. It stopped working, and I found the water very cold.
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Thanks for the quick reply. Im shocked because I think its been too hot since yesterday but I did not notice. I always check everyday it must have slipped my mind.

Anyone know whether this will have killed beneficial bacteria ?

Also the senegal has been acting skittish prancing around running into decor....
 
I think a temperature crash would be my biggest worry ( the temp dropping back down to fast), O2 levels my second, Ammonia ( particularly if the tank has infrequent or low volume WC's). Bichir are actually one of the fish I have I'de be worst worried about. tough lil' buggers, and tolerate some pretty crazy temp diffs.

I'de wait until the temp dropped back down 'n prolly do a 25% extra WC in a few days. Just to make sure the hightened temp = higher metabo = more poop. and keep an eye for a mini cycle. I doubt it would damage an older system much if at all. BUt a freshly cycled or "new" tank might take abit more visible hit.

/shrug prepare for the worst, But hope for the best. 91 is high.. but it's not really that high outta range.
 
Oh boy :( The tank is well established and has excellent maintenance on it. I didn't rip the heater out so the climb down will be pretty slow cause the heaters still warm im gonna wait up until it hits 80 probably tomorrow morning and start using the other heater.
 
This is why I switched to controllers and titanium heaters. Although a controller on a stealth heater would have prevented this.
 
Pharaoh;3590174; said:
This is why I switched to controllers and titanium heaters. Although a controller on a stealth heater would have prevented this.
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Yep. Me too. Lost too many fish this way. Just posted this on another thread...
Wet Whiskers;3590205; said:
I'm going to have to go with you on this. We are now have now had 3 run away heaters resulting in at least 6 dead fish including a 10" black ghost knife who was growing awesomely. Then I've had at LEAST 4 other marineland heaters that have started putting out current into the water. All these heaters went within about 8 months of each other and were no more than 15 months old. I think they are too sensitive to any power surges and must be kept on good surge protectors.
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this is the third post I've read in a couple of months (including my own that killed/ cooked my bichir) that a stealth heater went above normal heat temp. parameters. The heaters are crap.
 
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