Heater Acting Up

[Tsi_User]

It's finally cool enough to get the heater going in our 30g, when I woke up the temp was at 74 so I put the 150 watt heater in, turned it on the lowest setting and over a 2 hour periot is climped up to 78 which is what I was aiming for. So we left, came back a couple hours later and the temp was 82+ degrees . I unplugged it for now and the tank is cooling down, luckily we didn't loose any fish.

Am I missing a key step here in safely heating a tank?

 

[Tolak]

Your heater is forgetting a key step, a functional thermostat. Sometimes they stick, when they do it's time for a new heater.

 

[Tsi_User]

Damn that's exactly what I was worried about.

Another quick question, how come the settings on these heaters/thermostats are't by degrees? Like lets say you want to keep your tank at 78 degrees, why don't they have a setting for 78 degrees?

 

[Tolak]

Your more expensive heater are, and are able to be callibrated. I consider the ones with degree marks to be only close, and check with a thermometer.

 

[Tsi_User]

alright I'll have to pick another one up soon then. Thanks for the help