EXO-ATO Fales Alarms

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lancesmith1

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Hi folks - looking to see if I can get some help. I bought a RB EXO about 6 weeks ago. I read a lot of reviews/opinions here and other places. Most were very positive. It is a nice little package for the money. I saw one comment that someone was getting false alarms and the unit was beeping a warning signal when nothing was wrong. That was the only negative issue I saw. So, I got mine installed and every few days I am getting the flase alarm when there is nothing wrong. When it does the FA I power it off and on and its ok for a few days then does it again. I beleive the comment on the FA was here on R2R but now I cant seem to find it. I tried emailing RB for support thru their website but did not get a response. Is there anyone else having a similar issue that got it resolved? I am ussually home and not traveling much now due to covid but I wouldnt trust this thing to leave it alone for more than a day or two.
 

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Hi,

Can you provide some details about your tank and these alarms?

1) Which color LED is flashing
2) How big is your tank/return chamber where the ATO is placed?
 

Oldreefer44

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FYI, I have had the exact same issue. All three lights flash. Powering off and back on fixes it. Sensor on 30 gal. sump. Pump in a 10 gal. reservoir.
 
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lancesmith1

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The sensor is in chamber 3 of a biocube 32. im not sure on the light color. i have never checked it. Im sure it will happen again soon and i will check. Evidently im npt the only person with hte issue. I read about it happening on here (I believe) @OLDREEFER44 and @Ron Reefman also said they had the issue.
 

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The sensor is in chamber 3 of a biocube 32. im not sure on the light color. i have never checked it. Im sure it will happen again soon and i will check. Evidently im npt the only person with hte issue. I read about it happening on here (I believe) @OLDREEFER44 and @Ron Reefman also said they had the issue.
The biocube has a very small return chamnber, so it's possible that you are getting what's called the "Frequency Alarm". That happens with the ATO fills up higher than your sensor, and it takes a couple days to activate again. That alarm occurs after 2 days without the pump coming on.

For smaller tanks like yours, I recommend our Prism ATO. It's better suited for small AIO tank reservoirs.
 

Oldreefer44

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The biocube has a very small return chamnber, so it's possible that you are getting what's called the "Frequency Alarm". That happens with the ATO fills up higher than your sensor, and it takes a couple days to activate again. That alarm occurs after 2 days without the pump coming on.

For smaller tanks like yours, I recommend our Prism ATO. It's better suited for small AIO tank reservoirs.
Neither of the above scenarios apply in my case. Happened yet again last night.
 
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lancesmith1

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The biocube has a very small return chamnber, so it's possible that you are getting what's called the "Frequency Alarm". That happens with the ATO fills up higher than your sensor, and it takes a couple days to activate again. That alarm occurs after 2 days without the pump coming on.


So when this happens does that make the system inoperable until it is reset?
 
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lancesmith1

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Also - i probably do go more than 2 days sometimes without it needing to top off so that could be this issue in my case. Is the anyway i can just switch out the prism sensor with the EXO sensor and use the same pump and power supply? In other words just buy the prism sensor only?
 

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lancesmith1

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UPDATE - It turns out that the ATO was working correctly. I was getting an alarm because the ATO was not running more than once every 2 days or so in my biocube. Logan at RB sent me the Prism sensor to excahnge with the EXO sensor which should work since it does not have the low usage alarm feature. Thanks to Loagan at RB for the outstanding customer service.
 

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I am having the same issue. Did not realize the ato has that low usage alarm. Im running it on an Evo 13.5 and the alarm goes off every few days. I woke up to beeping this morning. No clue how long it was beeping. Wish I would have seen this article before buying, would have saved me 30 bucks and alot of beeping in my head. I found this article after looking for a replacement sensor thinking mine was bad and its not even 3 months old
 

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I am having the same issue. Did not realize the ato has that low usage alarm. Im running it on an Evo 13.5 and the alarm goes off every few days. I woke up to beeping this morning. No clue how long it was beeping. Wish I would have seen this article before buying, would have saved me 30 bucks and alot of beeping in my head. I found this article after looking for a replacement sensor thinking mine was bad and its not even 3 months old
Just reach out to us and we can exchange it for you. We typically recommend the Prism for AIO tanks as well as in-sump, they have several advantages for use in an AIO setup. If you ordered direct from us we can issue credit on the order.
 

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Another note- I put my Exo ATO on a timer, so it's off from 11PM-8AM. That way it resets daily, and I don't get any alarms at night (my reservoir exclusively runs dry at 3AM haha). There are some advantages to night time alarms- for example if it's topping off too much due a tank leak, it will alarm. But a cheap leak detector will also do that- and those things make tons of noise when they get water on them :)
 

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Just reach out to us and we can exchange it for you. We typically recommend the Prism for AIO tanks as well as in-sump, they have several advantages for use in an AIO setup. If you ordered direct from us we can issue credit on the order.
I ordered from saltwateraquarium.com. It has been running on my tank since June18th. I reached out to them and was told if it was a defect I needed to reach out to you folks. Wasn't sure how to go about that since the unit isn't defective it's just not right for my tank setup.
 

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I ordered from saltwateraquarium.com. It has been running on my tank since June18th. I reached out to them and was told if it was a defect I needed to reach out to you folks. Wasn't sure how to go about that since the unit isn't defective it's just not right for my tank setup.
Gotcha. I can still exchange the sensor and pump for you (power supply is the same between the 2 models).
 

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