Results 1 to 3 of 3

Thread: Help. Aquarium overheated and Apex did not respond.

  1. #1
    Regular Vistor
    Join Date
    Feb 2016
    Location
    Minneapolis, MN
    Posts
    31

    Help. Aquarium overheated and Apex did not respond.

    I have owned my Apex for one year now and never had this problem. Yesterday, while performing maintenance on my aquarium, I had the Apex prolonged feeding mode (1 hour for maintenance) since it was one of my bigger maintenance days. I have done this plenty of times in the past with no issues but yesterday, while performing maintenance to the sump, I noticed that the water in the last compartment of my sump, the section that houses the return pump and my titanium heater, had steam rising from it. I checked the temperature in that section and it was a whopping 113 degrees. I confirmed the temp with another thermometer. I chalked it up to the water being stagnant in that section too long without me turning off the heater although I was not completely satisfied with that answer since, again, I have performed hour long maintenance sessions in the past without any issues. The water in the main tank area stayed within my desired parameters. Once I turned off the heater and back on the return pump intermittently, the problem seem tom have been solved.

    Just a few moments ago, I decided to just check up on my system before bedtime as I always do and found my apex temperature probe reading 83.4. I was very surprised since my apex is programmed to turn off the heater when the temperature is >78 and to turn on when it is <77. The Fallback is programmed for Off. Despite this programming, the heater outlet was on. My heater is plugged into the 4th outlet on my E8 energy bar.

    Again, I have never had this problem before. I am not sure what to do now besides unplug the heater...


    After more consideration of the issue, I just recalled something. About 2 months ago, I recall making some adjustments to my apex programming and noticed an issue at that time. I was trying to adjust parameters for my temperature program when I noticed that although my temperature probe is plugged into the PM2 module (Tmpx4), every time I tried entering Tmpx4 during my programming, for some reason, Apex fusion and my Apex iphone app would automatically switch it to tmp as if I had the probe plugged into the main module. It was repeatedly doing that and I thought I had fixed it and was not thinking about it whenever I would work in Fusion but after trying to get to the bottom of this fiasco just now, I recalled that it was doing that and sure enough, the programming language was automatically switched back to tmp in Fusion. Also, last night when I discovered my water in the sump was boiling, every time I was trying to switch the heater outlet to "off" in Fusion, Apex was automatically turn the heater back into the "on" position.

    I have no idea what is going on. I think the last time I updated the main module was about 3 months ago maybe. Does anyone have any suggestions or insight into this problem. This really concerns me especially since I just added new coral into my aquarium today. I am sure they are not pleased with the 7 degree temperature swing within the past 5 hours.

  2. #2
    Frequent Contributor
    Join Date
    Apr 2013
    Location
    Santa Cruz, CA
    Posts
    1,842
    Sorry to hear about this, what firmware are you on, if not on the latest I would recommend doing so. 5.01_2E17 is the latest firmware. If you are not on that firmware, update the Apex and see if that fixed the Temp probe issue.

    I would never run a Titanium heater just off any brand of controller with out a inline thermometer set a degree higher the Apex allows the heater to be controlled as a redundancy. The biggest causes of tank crashes is heaters and so many people do not run redundancy like a secondary thermostat on such a device that crash our tanks.

    Was it only the Sump that got to the 113 degrees?

    The other mistake that can happen is if you have the heater and the temp probe in two different locations like heater in the sump and Temp probe in the tank when you do maintenance and do not have flow between the Sump and tank you can cause the heater to come on when not necessary.
    Jon

  3. #3
    Frequent Visitor
    Join Date
    Nov 2013
    Location
    Ottawa, Canada
    Posts
    73
    I have the same question that Jonmos75 already asked. Is the thermometer and the heater in the same sump compartment? Did the water level drop below the thermometer during maintenance?

Similar Threads

  1. Apex for the Planted Aquarium
    By Agiacosa in forum Misc Aquarium Automation Discussions
    Replies: 15
    Last Post: 10-26-2022, 08:36
  2. Help! EB8 outlets do not respond to Apex lite
    By Jeff P in forum EnergyBars 832 / 632 / 8 / 6 / 4
    Replies: 5
    Last Post: 07-05-2022, 14:31
  3. New York Aquarium video tour oldest operating aquarium in the USA
    By OurCoralReef in forum The Neptune Café
    Replies: 0
    Last Post: 12-02-2019, 17:18
  4. Help! Apex wont respond to limits
    By AndyN&M in forum Misc Apex Usage & Programming
    Replies: 5
    Last Post: 07-19-2019, 04:35
  5. APEX For Non- Aquarium Use?
    By Long Island Camper in forum Misc Apex Usage & Programming
    Replies: 2
    Last Post: 11-12-2014, 23:33

Bookmarks

Bookmarks

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •