Submersible heater - where is the sensor ?

[Volker]

Hi,
I bought a 50 watt heater (Aquatic Gardens) at Petco. For my 10 Gallon.
Because of it length I would have to mount it either diagonal or horizontal.
Now I thought I'm very bright and let the head look out of the water, so I would not have to reach into the water to adjust the heat setting.
But even on high the temperatur declined. Now it seems that the heater seems to have stopped working alltogether.
I know the diagram showed that you should not mount it only partially submersed but I thought that would only matter for the heat element, not the controlhead.
Could it be that
a) the heat sensor is in the top of the heater ?
b) because the head was not submersed it kind of burned through ?

Please advise,
Volker

 

[fishfreek]

The themostat is usually in the upper 1/3ed of the heater. I belive most of the submersible heaters that say they should not be submersed have that warning for some legal reasons more than it not being fully water tight.

If the heater is fairly new its possible it was just a bad unit and you can try to return it to Petco.

 

[Volker]

Thanks.
I'm gonna try and return it, even I threw out the box already.
My wife just got another heater, a 50 watt from All-Glass.
It works great now, has a dial that allows you to select the temp directly and is smaller than the Aquatic Gardens (and was $ 10 more).
Thanks again.

 

[TomK2]

My old non submersible heaters have a line on them that shows you the depth not to exceed, called a maximun submersion line. My new submersibles have the reverse, a line on them that tells you how far in it must be at the least, or the minimum submersion line.

The minumum submersion line is just under the plastic that the control knob sticks out of at the top. So yes, submersibles have to be in the tank at least so far, and that line should be on the heater. That line is likely to be just a bit below the control knob.

 

[fishfreek]

Sounds like you also had a cheap heater. Heaters are very much you get what you pay for and low cost heaters are low cost for a reason. Cheap parts.