00W's AIO Smorgasbord

CoralB · May 3, 2026

Calmwaters said:

That’s my foxface’s secret place .

CoralB · May 3, 2026

tharbin said:
I'm not Kevin but 52 years give or take a few hours.

That explains everything . Kevin must be 72 years old
! lol!!

tharbin · May 3, 2026

CoralB said:
That explains everything . Kevin must be 72 years old
! lol!!

At least

code4 · May 3, 2026

We like being early.

tharbin · May 3, 2026

code4 said:
We like being early.

No sense fighting the crowd. Looks like a nice venue.

tharbin · May 3, 2026

CoralB said:
That explains everything . Kevin must be 72 years old
! lol!!

Oops forgot what year it is, make that 54 years give or take a bit.

kingranch2003 · May 3, 2026

tharbin said:
It just occurred to me the other issue you may be running into. Inkbirds also have max heating times. I don't remember if it shuts off or if it errors or if it alarms, I think the default is six hours, but if you want the heater to control the tank and the Inkbird to act as a failsafe, you want the Inkbird on 'heating' 24/7. If the Inkbird shuts off the heater won't be able to turn on until the tank's temp drops below the Inkbird's low temp setting and it turns the power back on to the heater.

I always ran controlled heaters as Inkbird controls tank, heater acts as failsafe. First because the Inkbird should have more robust contacts and because I want the heater always powered.

Ill absolutely check into that. I didn't see anything in the app immediately but there are a lot of settings to check. Here's a timeliness of the temp according to the inkbird app

CoralB · May 3, 2026

tharbin said:
No sense fighting the crowd. Looks like a nice venue.

There’s a crowd ?

CoralB · May 3, 2026

code4 said:
We like being early.

Are you guys a day early ? Lol!!

kingranch2003 · May 3, 2026

tharbin said:
Tank thermometer = useful. If you have a handheld digital TDS or S.G. or even pH meter, it may have a temp reading as well. I always keep a couple of cheap glass aquarium thermometers around to check probes, heaters, etc. Always handing to have some kinda/sorta reference point.

Im getting one or maybe two tomorrow after work. My Hannah has temp reading, but im not sure how accurate it is. Good reminder though, ill check it too. I definitely want one of the old school type on hand from now on though.

kingranch2003 · May 3, 2026

code4 said:
Bye, leaving for my concert

Have a blast! 3 Dog has some great music

kingranch2003 · May 3, 2026

tharbin said:
Here is the approach I would take to sort this all out:

1. Find something that either measures temperature or has a temperature you trust. A digital meter, a cheap glass thermometer or even another heater.

Adjust your heater until it matches that temperature and either adjust the calibration knob or just jot it down.

Put the probes (or probe depending on model) of your Inkbird in and read the temperature. Use the calibrate function to offset the reading to match the true temp.

Set the high and low settings of the Inkbird to where you want the heating range and alarms.

Set the temp on the heater to two degrees higher than the Inkbird high setting but at least a degree below the Inkbird's high temp alarm.

Result: Your probes and heater should agree roughly on what the temperature is and they should be near the true temperature. The Inkbird will turn on and off as needed to heat the tank and alarm if the heater or Inkbird fail in the off condition. The heater will turn off if the Inkbird fails in the on condition. The high temp alarm will sound if the heater also fails in the on condition.

(sure hope I wrote that right).

Man thanks a lot Tom. I see exactly what you're saying and I agree with this. That was kind of my intended approach with the parameters before I realized I had an issue and started over correcting. I'll get my true temp with a thermometer tomorrow since the tank is at an ok temp right now.