Heater May Be Broken, How Long Can I Safely Leave The Fish In Cooling

[clairebear76]

Evening all
I've just noticed that my heater seems to be on the blink. It's set at 79 degrees on the little dial at the side and I've just popped a thermometer in and thats reading a smidge over 70 degrees which seems a bit cool to me. I've bumped the heater up to 82 to see if there's any noticeable difference in the thermometer but the little thermostat light hasn't come on and I'm just not convinced it's working.
Typical something like this should happen now when most of the shops are shutting. So...if the heaters conked out how long can I leave the fish, will they be ok until the morning when the shops open again?
Should mention that the fish seem fine, the plec's a little pale and patchy but I'm putting that down to me doing a water change this morning

 

[england]

Have you checked the fuse in the plug?
Otherwise you have no choice but to wait until tommorow, Do you have a pets at home near you?
http/www.petsathome.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/StoreLocatorView?storeId=10551&catalogId=10601&langId=-1

Not keen on these shops, however there open til 8pm around here,

Ah ok close at 6pm on a saturday, but you should be ok, could you stick on the house heating? keeping room temp up

 

[clairebear76]

Hiya
Yeah, we've got a Pets at Home but they close at 6 here.
I've not tried the fuse in the plug but it's a sealed plug so I can't get in it to change it...not sure if we've got a spare plug. I'll have a look

 

[england]

What fish do you have other than the pleco? 21c is fine for a while, its in the green zone

 

[clairebear76]

We've got a hoplo, quite a few cory's, a single solitary otto and an assortment of tetra's. Slightly annoying thing is I've been and bought some new fish today and only noticed how cool the water was when I was putting them in the tank...dur!!!
It was just in the green area on the thermometer. Would topping up with a bit of lukewarm water help (with the stuff in to remove the nasties from tap water)? Just thinking to keep it ticking over until the morning

 

[england]

No you should be fine, hoplo's and corys can handle the cold.. its not like its 16c down, if your worried, wack the central heating on, even if you turn other radiators off leaving only the one on in that room

 

[CezzaXV]

I'm guessing it's sorted by now, but you can always float a bottle of hot water in the tank if you need to bring the temperature up in an emergency.