I hate aquarium heaters!!!!!!!!!!

[Alunai]

*quickly crosses off the stealth heater that was circled in Dr.'s Foster and Smith catalog literally minutes before reading this thread*

I've been using stealths for a while now with no problem, but am worried after reading this. For replacements I'm looking at Smartheaters and Hydor Theo Heaters. Thoughts?

 

[twinreef]

I throw mine in the garbage were it belongs. It was leaking electricity into my tank.

 

[Johnny C]

For those who are claming that these 'issues' are related to a certain lot of Stealth heaters, that is false information. I have used several over the years, and every single one I own has had one issue or another.

From Left to Right:

#1: Almost caused a house fire, you can see the burned cord on top exposing bare wires.
#2: Started melting/expanding near the bottom.
#3: Stuck on the "on" position.
#4: Cracked down the middle, leaked toxic chemicals into the aquarium (Stealth Pro)
#5: Also stuck in the "on" position
#6: Leaking voltage
#7: Boiling hot white liquid started pouring out of the top, you can see the remnants between heater base and top.

Here's a few close ups of the heaters... rest assured that the folks at Marineland will be hearing from me shortly.

 

[Chrishew09]

just got my 100w Finnex titantium with the controller in the mail today, it's in the tank now hopefully i'll be okay with that one.

thanks everyone for the the kind words.

 

[rengnath]

Johnny, thanks for the pictures!

After seeing that these heaters have some serious issues, regardless if some people have no problems, I just submitted my order for 2 new heaters. Maybe I can put the stealths up on craigslist and get a 12 pack of pabst out of them. That's $60 down the drain ....

Good news is I got a 100w and 250w ViaAqua titanium heaters from bigals along with a temp display/alarm for under 90 bucks shipped. Drs wanted 90 for the heaters alone! They should be nice additions to my 60 fowl and 14 nano reef. They have a seperate control for the temp setting and a seperate probe to place away from the heater for more accurate temps.

 

[Korrine]

Time to go heater shopping. Won't reuse my stealth when I set up my 75g.

 

[Pallobi]

For those who are claming that these 'issues' are related to a certain lot of Stealth heaters, that is false information. I have used several over the years, and every single one I own has had one issue or another.

From Left to Right:

#1: Almost caused a house fire, you can see the burned cord on top exposing bare wires.
#2: Started melting/expanding near the bottom.
#3: Stuck on the "on" position.
#4: Cracked down the middle, leaked toxic chemicals into the aquarium (Stealth Pro)
#5: Also stuck in the "on" position
#6: Leaking voltage
#7: Boiling hot white liquid started pouring out of the top, you can see the remnants between heater base and top.

Here's a few close ups of the heaters... rest assured that the folks at Marineland will be hearing from me shortly.

if at first you dont succeed, try try try try try and try again i guess lol...

im curious, why sould you have kept goin back to the same company's product? i would have given up after the 2nd

 

[JTL]

Marineland claims that these lastest problems were from a particular batch, myself and others were just repeating what they said. Johnny, if you had so many problems why would you keep buying their product? I have a brand new 300W replacement for one of the "bad" lot numbers but I won't be using it.

 

[~ChrisB~]

I had 3, and all ended up with issues leaking voltage into the tank. Never again, back to my Ranco and Titainium.