Monday, January 24, 2011 Rena SmartHeater Aquarium Heater, 50W Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)I recently got the Rena Smartheater after a couple episodes of burnt fish from my old, conventional glass tube heater.

No, they were literally burnt to a crisp, but certain types of fish like to rest on available perches in any given tank.Even if your tank is well planted with many available hiding places and good sized leaves like mine is, chances are your fish at some point will come to "rest" on or in the space between the heater and the glass side of the tank that the heater is adhered to.

Bettas and loaches in particular like to take a rest from the filter current, especially if they can do so near the top of the tank to grab air now and again.

I could see spots where the fish received these burns and I felt bad as soon as I realized that these burns must be coming from their contact with the heater.

And though the most inexpensive way to heat a small 5-20 gallon tank is to use the cheap, standard glass tube stick-on-side heaters, I don't like them for this reason alone.

I researched on the internet and found that the Rena appears to be just about the only hang-on-side aquarium tank heater that does not have an exposed heat source on which fish can burn themselves.It seems to heat by some sort of internal heat convection in which water is drawn up through the slats on the bottom and expelled gently, imperceptibly through the top.The top hole itself glows red when the heater is on and shuts off when the heater is not actively heating to show you that it is working.

It seems to do the job well, keeping my tank's temperature apparently stable.And it is built quite robustly, with better build quality and more solidness than the glass tube heaters that I have previously tried.

Fish burning themselves on an exposed heating element is not as uncommon as you would think.The Rena heaters aren't inexpensive, but they do the job safely, which is reason enough to recommend it.

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Product Description:
The unbreakable, ul-approved smartheater has an abnormal temperature alert and integrates with all xp and smartfilters.N/A