Inkbird ITC-306T vs BRS AQUARIUM HEATER CONTROLLER

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Phildago

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I had the same issue with the CT alarm and I got with customer service. After some back and forth they actually sent me an updated model that you can disable the CT alarm direct from China. Not sure how you can order it yet, but I will share once I get the info.
That would be great. Thank you

I found a way to stop the alarm from going off. I set the InkBird to turn off every 24 hours and put in a smart scene so that if it turns off it automatically turns back on. This resets the timer but the device is never actually off.
 

bluerider098

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That would be great. Thank you

I found a way to stop the alarm from going off. I set the InkBird to turn off every 24 hours and put in a smart scene so that if it turns off it automatically turns back on. This resets the timer but the device is never actually off.
Lol, nice work around. I went back and forth with the customer service for awhile because I don't think they understood why I wouldn't want the CT alarm, but after explaining that my heater was more precise and that the manufacturer recommended not constantly turning the power on an off they seemed to understand. I wanted to use the inkbird as a backup for my heater, not the other way around.

I have to admit I was skeptical when they said they would send me an updated model direct from China, but sure enough about 3 weeks later one arrived.

You can now set the CT alarm to 0 which disables it.
 

Reef.

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That would be great. Thank you

I found a way to stop the alarm from going off. I set the InkBird to turn off every 24 hours and put in a smart scene so that if it turns off it automatically turns back on. This resets the timer but the device is never actually off.

Do you mean by using a smart plug?
 

lelandmarine

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If the continuous heating alarm goes off on the ink bird can you just use the app to turn inkbird off and then back on to stop the continuous heating alarm and restart the system? I have the ink bird 306A
 

Reef.

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If the continuous heating alarm goes off on the ink bird can you just use the app to turn inkbird off and then back on to stop the continuous heating alarm and restart the system? I have the ink bird 306A

Not sure is powering off holds that settings? What I did was change the continuous heating setting to another figure, save that setting then change back to 72 hours.

Ended up going back to the inkbird controlling the heaters as the heaters themselves were even worse at holding the temp.

I checked last night and the temp of the tank ranges by .7c which I feel is a little too much, so looking for an alternative, the Ranco is not easy to get in the UK and seems the variance on that is a full 1.0c so worse, the Aqua Medic state it’s only 0.1c on theirs but no Wi-fi, very basic but I will probably go for that one.
 

lelandmarine

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Not sure is powering off holds that settings? What I did was change the continuous heating setting to another figure, save that setting then change back to 72 hours.

Ended up going back to the inkbird controlling the heaters as the heaters themselves were even worse at holding the temp.

I checked last night and the temp of the tank ranges by .7c which I feel is a little too much, so looking for an alternative, the Ranco is not easy to get in the UK and seems the variance on that is a full 1.0c so worse, the Aqua Medic state it’s only 0.1c on theirs but no Wi-fi, very basic but I will probably go for that one.
The continuous alarm went off on my ink birds this morning. I thought I would try using the app to turn off the ink bird power and then turn it back on. This did restart the inkbird and the heaters started working again but unfortunately the alarm went from a intermittent beeping to a continual beeping. Not sure if there is any way to turn that off remotely. There were no codes associated with this continual beeping. I had to press a button on the ink bird itself to get the beeping to stop.
 

Reef.

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The continuous alarm went off on my ink birds this morning. I thought I would try using the app to turn off the ink bird power and then turn it back on. This did restart the inkbird and the heaters started working again but unfortunately the alarm went from a intermittent beeping to a continual beeping. Not sure if there is any way to turn that off remotely. There were no codes associated with this continual beeping. I had to press a button on the ink bird itself to get the beeping to stop.

did you try lowing the set temp to match the actual tank temp so the inkbird believed it had reached the max temp?

If that doesn’t work, looks like once the alarm is triggered the app is useless?

I keep going from not likely the inkbird to not wanting to change, was all set in buying something different yesterday but would loose the Wi-fi and remote alarms which are very useful.
I was thinking a swing of nearly a full degree was a lot but some digging seems to suggest that’s nothing they wouldn’t experience in the wild so back to keeping it.
 

lelandmarine

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did you try lowing the set temp to match the actual tank temp so the inkbird believed it had reached the max temp?

If that doesn’t work, looks like once the alarm is triggered the app is useless?

I keep going from not likely the inkbird to not wanting to change, was all set in buying something different yesterday but would loose the Wi-fi and remote alarms which are very useful.
I was thinking a swing of nearly a full degree was a lot but some digging seems to suggest that’s nothing they wouldn’t experience in the wild so back to keeping it.
Ill try that next time. The other thing that I have done today is set the heaters at a slightly higher temperature. I set the heaters to both turn off at 82°. The ink bird is set to turn them off at 78°. I’m wondering if they were set lower and therefore not reaching the 78° and staying on for hours trying to reach that 78° mark.
 

lelandmarine

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I did remotely get the alarm to turn off this morning and the heaters to turn back on. Not exactly sure how I did it but I think it may have been related to your suggestion. will continue to experiment
 

lelandmarine

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I found putting a smart plug into each of the heater plugs on the inkbird allowed me to make sure that both heaters we’re on at the same time. I found one of them was coming on and the other one was not and that’s why the heat was staying on for so long and triggering the alarm for continued
 

Reef.

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I found putting a smart plug into each of the heater plugs on the inkbird allowed me to make sure that both heaters we’re on at the same time. I found one of them was coming on and the other one was not and that’s why the heat was staying on for so long and triggering the alarm for continued

thats strange...I did think mine was doing similar, only one heater coming on but it wasn’t over heating mine, not sure how yours was? I would have thought the inkbird would just turn both off, unless your heaters are too high a wattage for your tank?

Would it not work better if you just had both heaters plugged into the same socket with a 2 plug adapter?
 

lelandmarine

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thats strange...I did think mine was doing similar, only one heater coming on but it wasn’t over heating mine, not sure how yours was? I would have thought the inkbird would just turn both off, unless your heaters are too high a wattage for your tank?

Would it not work better if you just had both heaters plugged into the same socket with a 2 plug adapter?
Yes i think it would be cheaper to have a single smart plug with 2 outlets. Something similar to this. This picture shows two plugs but you would just need 1 with two outlets
F5CE38D8-A2DD-4CAA-BD7B-FEE7BBAA5284.png
 

Reef.

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FYI I just bought another one from Amazon and you can set the continuous heading alarm to 0. So it looks like they've implemented the new feature.

yeah, a few people from here have told Inkbird this was a daft function to have and not be able to turn off, as it means you can only have the inkbird controlling the heaters rather than have the Inkbird only stepping in if the heaters were to fail.
 

dianerivera

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Lol, nice work around. I went back and forth with the customer service for awhile because I don't think they understood why I wouldn't want the CT alarm, but after explaining that my heater was more precise and that the manufacturer recommended not constantly turning the power on an off they seemed to understand. I wanted to use the inkbird as a backup for my heater, not the other way around.

I have to admit I was skeptical when they said they would send me an updated model direct from China, but sure enough about 3 weeks later one arrived.

You can now set the CT alarm to 0 which disables it.
Can you please tell me what to set the inkbird temp to as well as the heater. I want to use the inkbird as a backup and want my water to stay at 78. Not sure if that means setting the inkbird a little higher
 

Reef.

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Can you please tell me what to set the inkbird temp to as well as the heater. I want to use the inkbird as a backup and want my water to stay at 78. Not sure if that means setting the inkbird a little higher

set heaters to your tank temp, then set your Inkbird to a few degrees above and below, if the temp goes above or below your tank temp you get an alarm and the Inkbird turns the heaters off if it goes above your set tank temp.

best to use Celsius as it gives a smaller temp variation

Tank temp of 25c, set heaters to 25c, set Inkbird to 24c and 26c and don’t forget to set the ‘time to reach temp setting’ to zero.

heaters can be hard to set to a consistent temp, so you may have to set your Inkbird with bigger margins to account for the bigger swings, say 23.5-26.6c, all depends on your heater.

I use my Inkbird to keep the temp, I’ve set my heaters to higher than the tank temp, so the Inkbird now controls the tank temp, if the heaters get stuck on, the Inkbird still turns the heaters off.
 

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