$20.00 Controller-how to wiring (easy)

[nc0gnet0]

Thanks rick and limige. Wish I would have known but since I have everything wired already I will leave as is.

How is it working for you? Have you plugged a heater into it yet?

[rickztahone]

How is it working for you? Have you plugged a heater into it yet?

Not yet. I was going to fill up the 40g tank and test them but I have been swamped at work lately. I have a question for you though before I start. I have 2 250 jager heaters and I was wondering if the heaters had to be calibrated to each other? I've never calibrated a heater but it seems pretty straight forward. I have an HM TDS pen and thinking of using that as a heat measurement. Any thoughts?

[nc0gnet0]

Not yet. I was going to fill up the 40g tank and test them but I have been swamped at work lately. I have a question for you though before I start. I have 2 250 jager heaters and I was wondering if the heaters had to be calibrated to each other? I've never calibrated a heater but it seems pretty straight forward. I have an HM TDS pen and thinking of using that as a heat measurement. Any thoughts?

Should not be a real need as the controller will turn the heaters on and off. Just make sure to set the heaters at about 84-85 degrees......

You can test the unit out by just plugging a lamp into the socket and have both a hot and cold glass of water to dip the probe into.


-Rick

[rickztahone]

Should not be a real need as the controller will turn the heaters on and off. Just make sure to set the heaters at about 84-85 degrees......

You can test the unit out by just plugging a lamp into the socket and have both a hot and cold glass of water to dip the probe into.


-Rick

Oh cool. Will do bud. Thanks

[PP_GBR]

Thanks again Rick. I finished mine yesterday . Is there a way to switch to fahrenheit?

DSC02515 by SimplyDiscusPhoto, on Flickr



DSC02516 by SimplyDiscusPhoto, on Flickr

Ricardo,

Please tell me the dimensions of your project box and where you ordered it from. I've been looking at these boxes on Amazon and don't know which size will fit this controller. I've been putting it off for months until I had a heater malfunction this morning which killed my flowerhorn .
Thanks.

[rickztahone]

I'm so sorry to hear about your flowerhorn

Here is the exact one I bought:
Amazon black project box

[nc0gnet0]

They have them at radio shack.

[limige]

heard the shack filed bankrupcy

[rickztahone]

heard the shack filed bankrupcy

you'd better go quick then . I was just there yesterday.

[PP_GBR]

Thanks guys. I just ordered two controllers and will go to RS to buy the boxes. I just had another heater malfunction yesterday. Luckily, I caught it this time. It was a less than 2 yrs old Aqueon Pro. Had it replaced in November 2013.

[rickztahone]

Tried out the controller, works like a charm!

[discussmith]

You see this is why it is difficult to help people here. Someones ego always seems to get bruised because they take offense when the help being offered disagrees with their opinion. I accuse no one of sin only a lack of understanding which I wanted to correct but expected it would possibly not be received as intended. So I will explain. And again I will never revisit this thread as I have no need for the insults or assumptions as to my motives. So do with it whatever you wish.

There have been statements made that are not accurate. I mean nothing personal but will disagree with them. Dropping a glass heater plugged into a properly wired receptacle into your aquarium is not the same as using this device. This device is not classified as double insulated when you add wiring to it that is not part of the original manufacture. The problem lies specifically in not using a polarized plug and then wiring the device switching the neutral and not the hot. This allows current to always be in the heater without the presence of the return neutral. If the heater leaks or ruptures this allows the entire water column to become energized because the electricity has no place to go until you stick your hand in the water and potentially complete the circuit through your body ,or the controller switches making the neutral available. This is not the case when you plug the heater directly into a properly wired receptacle and use the heater internal control. The neutral is always present and will provide a path for the energy should the heater rupture or leak. If you use a polarized connector or better yet a three wire grounded connection and then switch the hot conductor you will always have the neutral present at the heater and only have electrical energy there when the controller sends it. This is why we switch the hot in this country and not the neutral anymore like it was decades ago. In the cause of making things as safe as possible I would recommend a three wire grounded connection with three wire grounded receptacles because then when you get a three wire grounded titanium heater like I have you can plug it in and use it. It will also force the proper polarity when using two wire heaters. Also telling someone to cut off and remove the ground connections even though they may not be currently needed is a deceptive practice and not legal electrically because one assumes when the third terminal exists it is connected, and who knows when someone may actually have a connection that needs it and it's not actually there. I have been on this site since a couple months after its inception and have learned that if you let people make mistakes they will lose some fish but will learn what they need, but electricity does not always give you that second chance. I know electricians who did some simple things , the wrong things, things they should have known better and are dead now because of it. So understand, anyone can get it wrong. If you are going to do this then do it right and do it the safest way you can.

[nc0gnet0]

You see this is why it is difficult to help people here. Someones ego always seems to get bruised because they take offense when the help being offered disagrees with their opinion. I accuse no one of sin only a lack of understanding which I wanted to correct but expected it would possibly not be received as intended. So I will explain. And again I will never revisit this thread as I have no need for the insults or assumptions as to my motives. So do with it whatever you wish.

There have been statements made that are not accurate. I mean nothing personal but will disagree with them. Dropping a glass heater plugged into a properly wired receptacle into your aquarium is not the same as using this device. This device is not classified as double insulated when you add wiring to it that is not part of the original manufacture. The problem lies specifically in not using a polarized plug and then wiring the device switching the neutral and not the hot. This allows current to always be in the heater without the presence of the return neutral. If the heater leaks or ruptures this allows the entire water column to become energized because the electricity has no place to go until you stick your hand in the water and potentially complete the circuit through your body ,or the controller switches making the neutral available. This is not the case when you plug the heater directly into a properly wired receptacle and use the heater internal control. The neutral is always present and will provide a path for the energy should the heater rupture or leak. If you use a polarized connector or better yet a three wire grounded connection and then switch the hot conductor you will always have the neutral present at the heater and only have electrical energy there when the controller sends it. This is why we switch the hot in this country and not the neutral anymore like it was decades ago. In the cause of making things as safe as possible I would recommend a three wire grounded connection with three wire grounded receptacles because then when you get a three wire grounded titanium heater like I have you can plug it in and use it. It will also force the proper polarity when using two wire heaters. Also telling someone to cut off and remove the ground connections even though they may not be currently needed is a deceptive practice and not legal electrically because one assumes when the third terminal exists it is connected, and who knows when someone may actually have a connection that needs it and it's not actually there. I have been on this site since a couple months after its inception and have learned that if you let people make mistakes they will lose some fish but will learn what they need, but electricity does not always give you that second chance. I know electricians who did some simple things , the wrong things, things they should have known better and are dead now because of it. So understand, anyone can get it wrong. If you are going to do this then do it right and do it the safest way you can.

If you feel that strongly about it then by all means feel free to show how to wire the device insuring that the hot wire is being switched, while utilizing a polarized plug. First and foremost, I believe that all fish rooms should utilize GFCI's making this all a rather moot point. Suffice it to say all glass heaters have a hot wire in the tank. As to whether or not the presence of a neutral wire will lessen the degree of electrical shock will be largely dependent on a few factors, mostly being the point of failure of the device.

For those that are following, all you need to do is make sure that the small blade of the power cord to the unit is attached to terminal one, the large blade to terminal two in figure eight. As to why the above mentioned couldn't just point this out rather than over dramatizing the whole bloody thing is beyond me, but I guess he had an axe to grind. One would think he might have pointed that out already?

[jawfish]

Hey guys I've had a couple of these units running for several months. I love them so much that I ordered 4 more but the Centigrade version this time... I'm a bit confuse as 2 of the 4 units have gone crazy on me. After several days all a sudden they temperature reading goes sky high and reads 190C When the actual temperature is 29C. The good thing is that since its reading higher its not cooking the fish... I figure I might have gotten a bad batch. As anyone else experience this issue ? I've written to the seller as they promised a 12 months warranty on these units. will see what happens.

Cheers,
Fred

[nc0gnet0]

Hey guys I've had a couple of these units running for several months. I love them so much that I ordered 4 more but the Centigrade version this time... I'm a bit confuse as 2 of the 4 units have gone crazy on me. After several days all a sudden they temperature reading goes sky high and reads 190C When the actual temperature is 29C. The good thing is that since its reading higher its not cooking the fish... I figure I might have gotten a bad batch. As anyone else experience this issue ? I've written to the seller as they promised a 12 months warranty on these units. will see what happens.

Cheers,
Fred

Make sure you haven't somehow nicked the wire on the thermostat probe. If you have it would cause a short (not dangerous) and give you erroneous readings. You can get replacement probes for a buck or so. What I would do, is to swap a probe from a known working unit to a unit that is flaking out on you and see if that solves the problem. If it does, I can send you a link to where you can get new ones (or return it to the seller).

-Rick