Aquatronica Temp Settings

[Gavin Smith]

I've finally gotten round to using my Aquatronica to control the heater.

I've set the heater thermostat to 26 degrees, the reference temperature to 26 degrees with delta min @ 0.0 and delta max at 0.5.

The way I see it if the aquatronica failed then the heater thermostat will act as a crude back up and vice versa.

It seems that I will need to increase the heater temp though as 26 on the heater cuts out with the water at 25.5.

Gavin

[Stevielad]

Yes - a common problem - inbuilt heater stats typically suck.

[simon garratt]

Hi Gavin.

Im probably spouting crap here as im not familiar with the Aquatronica. and im not sure on your indevidual set up ie wether your using the controler to run fans etc as well for cooling. But ive found that setting the heater to a degree 'below' the controler (in my case a hawco unit) cut off point, allows for a cirtain amount of climb generated throught the day by lights etc as well.

ie set your min on the controler to say 26 (heater to 25), and set your max to 26.5, youll usually find the tank settles into the 26-26.5 bracket quite nicely without the controler bouncing on and off from cooling to heating all the time. 'its usually harder to loose heat than it is to generate it'.

If your running halides, assume these will heat your tank just as effectively as the heater (within reason). In essence your tricking the controler into thinking its the heater thats heating the tank when its actually off, and the lights are causing the gradual climb. effectively your heater will only come on once the tank has lost the heat generated by the lights as a backup.

plus it saves your electric.

obviously this all depends on your overal set up but i found this a very effective way of running my old 6x2x2 (3 x250W halides) and keeping temperature very stable without the use of a chiller.

regards

Si.

[~Tony~]

I've finally gotten round to using my Aquatronica to control the heater.

I've set the heater thermostat to 26 degrees, the reference temperature to 26 degrees with delta min @ 0.0 and delta max at 0.5.

The way I see it if the aquatronica failed then the heater thermostat will act as a crude back up and vice versa.

It seems that I will need to increase the heater temp though as 26 on the heater cuts out with the water at 25.5.

Gavin

Hi Gavin
The Aquatronica will turn the heater on at 'Reference Temp - Delta min' and off again at 'Reference temp', so you need to set a 'delta min' value greater than zero.
It can also turn a fan on at 'Reference Temp + Delta max' and off again at 'Reference Temp'

If you want different reference temperatures for the heater and the fan, then just use 2 separate programs on the Aquatronica. You can then take advantage of a 'dead zone' between heating and cooling as Si has suggested. I have my tank is set up like this and then have just 0.2c for delta min and delta max so that the heater phase and cooling phase don't add much extra temperature swing over the 'dead zone' of 0.5c.

As your heater is now controlled by the Aquatronica I would set its internal thermostat to about 27c so that it never normally turns off, but is still there as a backup in case of a fault in the Aquatronica.

Si, why let the heater thermostat operate at all - they are notoriously unreliable when allowed to switch the heater on and off.

Tony

[simon garratt]

Si, why let the heater thermostat operate at all - they are notoriously unreliable when allowed to switch the heater on and off.


agreed, but the same could be said for just about any bit of kit to be honest including the controler. (dont know about the Aquatronica), but the Hawco comes with both high and low level warning siren so you know wether somethings up be it sticking on, or failing.

regards

Si.

[~Tony~]

agreed, but the same could be said for just about any bit of kit to be honest including the controler
Yes, but I trust a controller more than the bi-metal strip with arcing contacts that is in a heater.

The Aquatronica also has alarm levels, and can switch the halide off if the temperature gets too high. All useful, but the heater thermostat is still a fail safe if the controller goes faulty. That is the main reason I don't like it switching normally - it should be reliable enough if it is only rarely operated.

cheers
Tony

[Dave_P]

I agree with Tony and that's how I have set my aquatronica/heater/cooler.

The only thing I will add is that I found that the temperature setting on the devices is not the same i.e. 26C on heaters is different to 26C setting on cooler etc.

So if you allowed the devices to switch themselves on/off they could be fighting each other. I just use the Aquatronica to switch everything on/off and the individual thermostats 1C above/below as backup.

Dave

[simon garratt]

Ahhhh, :D thats why i use digital heaters rather than bi-metal strip ones.

Horses for corses though at the end of the day i recon, Mr Murphy has allways been a good freind.....:rolleyes:

:)

[~Tony~]

ok, so heaters probably have electonic thermostats in them these days - but I still don't trust them.

[simon garratt]

you pesimist you.....;)