Quality heaters?

[n3wt]

I need to buy a new heater and I don't know if their are any brands to stay away from or if they are all generally the same. I have a 55g tank with 3 calvuses, a featherfin catfish, and a pair of Julidochromis Ornatus. I'm in central Florida so I won't be using it all that often but my last heater was a generic Topfin heater and kind of fell apart in my tank and I don't want that again.

Anyone have any recommendations on good brands of heaters?

 

[mfdrookie516]

visi-therm stealth

 

[dkpate]

+1 for the Stealth

 

[Markstanfill]

+1

 

[blue71]

Stealth or ebo-jager, whatever you do do not buy a tetra, they fall apart

 

[dkpate]

Yes, Tetras are horrible. They are not consistant either. I started out with them and quickly changed to the Stealth.

 

[fishmonkey]

Stealth is nice but if you really wanted to go all out, there is this: JBJ True Temp Heating System w/Controller & Titanium Heating Element

 

[supradupafast]

+1 Stealth All the way!
I owned 3 x Eheim Jager (formerly Ebo) and they fell apart on me! Temp was out of whack! I replaced them with marineland Stealth, and WHAT a difference!

 

[glassbird]

I have a Stealth, and am happy so far. But I had an interesting talk with my LFS owner recently. He said that he has noticed that large numbers of people are having problems with heaters now, much more so than the last 30 years that he has been in business. His theory is that the economy is so bad that people are penny-pinching, and the heater manufacturers are responding by lowering the quality of the materials that they use. So even "good" heaters are more likely to have problems today than they did even a few years ago.

Get a really good thermometer and check it every time you look at your fish. If you have house mates, tell them to do the same. And show them how to un-plug the heater if it gets over your limit!