bad heater

[Ramirezi]

i bought a heater from wal-mart. i believe it's made by tetra. it doesnt have a temp gauge on the heater. i have a thermometer on the tank so i figured it would be ok. not so. this heater is supposed to be ok for a 5 gal. it's a 25 watt.
the heater wont shut off on its own! even if i turn it all the way down it will continue to turn on and heat up the tank. this weekend, i got up and went to feed my betta. i noticed my betta didnt come out of his cave like he usually does every morning to eat. i reached into the water to pick up his cave and the water was very hot. it was like a hot bath. i looked at the thermometer and it wouldnt even register the temp, it goes all the way up to 90 degrees! my betta was on his back gasping.
i quickly put some ice cubes in the tank and started to change out the hot water for lukewarm water to bring down the temp slowly so as not too shock him.
my betta didnt make it. it was too late, i dont know how long he was in the too hot water.
i'm going to buy a heater with a gauge on it from now on.

 

[JSchmidt]

Cheap heaters are bad news. A good heater, esp. if you do mailorder, doesn't cost much more than a cheapie. Tronics have good reputations, but I don't know if they make a 25w heater.

Jim

 

[norm3000]

After breaking 2 glass heaters I will only buy Visi-Therm Stealth Heaters for now on. They are plastic coated, completely submersible and dial your temp. I like to place mine horizontally about 1" about the gravel so that they don't get exposed to air durring water changes (even tho pulling these out of the water shouldn't damage them since there is no glass to shatter). $14.50 at Big Al's for a 25 watt.

http://www.bigalsonline.com/catalog/product.xml?product_id=31734;category_id=1733;pcid1=3231;pcid2=

 

[Ramirezi]

Cool thanks.
yeah i was at wal-mart and saw the fully submersible heater for pretty cheap so i figured i'd try it out. never again...i wont ever buy a heater without a temp gauge again.
and i'm glad they have some fully submersible ones out there for cheap. thats only a couple dollars more than what i paid for crappy wal mart one.
and i've broken a couple glass ones because i've dropped them or forgot to unplug them while doing a water change.