I just turned off the house lights tonight, and the light on my heater is flickering. I turned on the house lights again and it appears normal.

The heater is in a small tank with only 3 fish in it. Should I be worried? If need-be I can put those fish into my main tank and turn off the heater.

Thanks for your help

Lisa

Making the assumptions that your heater has a neon indicator bulb (Orange glow to it). And that you can't Hear the thermostat clicking on and off with this flicker. No I don't think you have to worry. It is normal for these lamps to have a irregular flicker to them, as they are effected by visible light, radio active sources, cosmic rays......bah bah bah.

As for the lights effecting them, a couple of things I can think of at the moment are. The voltage change for the lights is effecting the indicator, normally this would have the opposite effect to the one you describe tho. Or your eyes are playing tricks on you , so when the lights are on the illusion that it is not flickering is created.

If it's flickering then it's likely you wont here the heater switch on and off because the bit that makes the noise wont actually be moving it will be the contacts arcing. A heater is one thing you don't want to muck round with cause they can kill your fish pretty quickly, I'd replace it as soon as you can. Also it's a great idea to use 2 heaters that are 1/2 the size you need that way if one fails things don't go pear shaped so fast.

If it's flickering then it's likely you wont here the heater switch on and off because the bit that makes the noise wont actually be moving it will be the contacts arcing. A heater is one thing you don't want to muck round with cause they can kill your fish pretty quickly, I'd replace it as soon as you can. Also it's a great idea to use 2 heaters that are 1/2 the size you need that way if one fails things don't go pear shaped so fast.

I doubt that the contacts in the heater are arcing they normally fall open.

Quick question, other then the flicker does the heater operation seem normal?

Thanks for that. It seems all normal this morning, no flickering and keeping good temperature.

A bit strange. Will keep an eye on it.

Thanks heaps

Lisa

I doubt that the contacts in the heater are arcing they normally fall open.

Quick question, other then the flicker does the heater operation seem normal?

The contacts have to be closed for the heater to operate, the light only comes on when the heater is operating, therefore the contacts would have to be closed and could be arcing.

Heaters usually fail because of the contacts, they either fuse closed because of the arcing, or the arcing makes the contacts dirty so they don't conduct, I've pulled two apart in the last couple of weeks that were fused on, both had over heated tanks.