Which Controller Should I look into?

[LSBBA]

As I am getting more and more in depth with my saltwater tanks (and money) I am seeing that people are using controllers for there tanks to control salanity,ato,temperature,fans, etc. I am curious which ones you guys would recommend me to look into. To be honest I dont have 300-400 to invest into one. I could see spending a 100-200. Is that realistic? What should I look for in one? Which ones are good? I am using this on a 28g led jbj nano. possible a 4g pico dont know yet. Just need to pick your brains a little bit I need to get some more experience on this subject.

 

[mukymuk]

What do you want it to do for you?

 

[FiberglassMonkey]

I have a reef keeper lite. New there a little over 110$. I control my lights, heater, and fan. It has modules you can add, ph orp salinity top off. This is the only controller I've played with and I'm very happy. I hear good things with apex also.

 

[LSBBA]

That is the thing I have no idea what these CAN do honestly. Lights,temp,ato would be sweet. What else should I be looking for it to do?

 

[melev]

When it comes to a controller, here's what I look for. Decide if you feel the same way:

Timers to turn anything on and off as desired. Lights are a primary need, and I have a lot of them. 3 different Metal Halides come on in Staggered Times, VHO lighting, Frag Tank lighting, Refugium LIghting, Moonlighting. That's 7 timers right there.

Temperature control. It turns heaters on and off as needed, rather than relying on the heaters themselves to turn off as expected. It kills the power to the heater(s) so they are powerless to do damage. The controller turns on a cooling fan on my tank if it runs too hot. And if it gets even hotter, it turns off the lights to remove additional heat sources.

Web Access. I want to be able to check on my tank when I'm in another room or another state. I have an app on my iPhone that allows me to check on the tank, and turn things on and off as desired. If I'm running late getting home and want to feed my fish still, I can make sure some of the lights run longer than usual.

Emergency notification. If the tank's parameters are out of the desired range, I'll receive a text message loaded with data.

Statistical Records. It's nice to be able to see how the tank's temperature has varied over the past day, the past week, or even over the past month. Same for pH and ORP. I can also see how much power is being consumed to dial in equipment for better precision of when equipment cycles on and off.

Better control of special timers. I can set a small motor to run one minute every three hours daily. This motor cleans the neck of the protein skimmer. I could do this with a precise digital timer, but that would mean an 8th timer to add to my collection.

These are the main features I use for my tank. There are many more options, such as feed timers, automated water changes, control of pumps, etc.

I'm using the Apex controller with three power bars.

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[mukymuk]

Here's my low-tech on-a-budget opinion...

Lights can be put on a timer and most heaters/chillers are self controlling. ATO is the single biggest thing to automate in my opinion--especially for smaller tanks. You can get a dedicated ATO cheaper than a general purpose controller.

If you just want to have a controller, the reefkeepers are fine as long as you stay away from their ph/orp/sal monitoring modules. Basically just a smart timer with float switch inputs. I think the other controllers on the market are better overall though.

Also, salinity is best controlled by ATO via water level measurement--not salinity measurement directly. sal probes are very touchy and generally unreliable for ATO purposes, IME.

All that said, as your investment grows, it only makes sense to protect with redundancy, automated alerts, internet/phone, etc. But if your just starting out, you don't really need any of it.

 

[niteowl03]

On a budget look into the apex jr. Come built in with network capabilities. The alerts are one of the biggest advantages to me and the net module for the reefkeepers is like another $75. The only problem you run into is you are limited to 5 modules and 1 of those is the display so technically 4. That leaves little room for expansion later on. I have been looking at controller options for months now trying to decide the best bang for my buck. I finally went with the full apex because of expansion and the ease to control multiple tanks. As Marc stated once you start running a display, a sump, a QT, and a frag tank that ends up being blot of lights, heaters etc. Add the pico in and it just more. On average each tank needs minimum 4 plugs that will eat up your power bars quick. Only having 4 modules on the lite controllers could mean you only have power bars and nothing to control ph etc. My best advice would be keep saving and buy the unit you really want because upgrading down the line will be more expensive otherwise.

Sent from my MyTouch4g

 

[dfwminis]

Reefkeeper lite is a good option. I like it. More user friendly than apex. Both have their pros and cons. I recently got a apex jr since the tank was near my router.
Marine depot has a rkl with sl1 for $189 I believe. Def not a bad choice.

 

[M@]

I've been contemplating a controller for a while. I want an ATO, light timers and heater/fan control. I wish RKL or apex jr. included the ATO, another $50 right off the bat for that.

I might just get a Reef Angel, It comes with everything I need in one package and is easily expandable.

 

[Guest]

@M@! wrote:

if you want to do ato you need to choose full apex or lite as jr does not have an I/O which connects to the float switch.

I am not sure on reefkeeper which versions have ato ability


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[dfwminis]

@kuyatwo wrote:

if you want to do ato you need to choose full apex or lite as jr does not have an I/O which connects to the float switch.

I am not sure on reefkeeper which versions have ato ability


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk"]



All reefkeepers as long as it has the sl1 module.