Aqvarium heater.

[Fredrick]

Hi.
I am wondering if it is possible to use an aqvarium heater for C41/E6 development? Would be 100x cheaper than buying a Jobo processor. My plan is to use a washing basin as a water bath. I'm sorry if this utter and complete stupidity, it just seemed logical to me. Saving money and all that

[Brian C. Miller]

If you get the right control for a heater, it's fine. Unfortunately, as I found out, the heater's thermostat can become wildly inaccurate over time, producing extreme temperature swings. You need to check its performance with a thermometer.

[Fredrick]

Thank you. I was thinking about buying a precise digital thermometer and a quality heater. I hope this doesn't allow for temperature swings.

[Jason Greenberg Motamedi]

One option is to use an aquarium heater with an external controller. PID controllers and thermocouples are now quite cheap and are usually very accurate. Look around for instructions for a DYI sous vide bath and modify to suit you needs. I have one built into a plastic cooler which cost me about $60 to build and keeps temperature at ±.2°C

[Corran]

I did this with a cheap heater from Pet's Mart, but I burned it out in like 2 weeks. I assume by the time you buy a decent heater and whatever else you need, you'd be better off finding the right tool here in the classifieds. They come up on occasion.

[Light Guru]

You can but you cannot use a cheep one.

You will need a digital heater controller like this in addition to a comparable aquarium heater.

http://www.drsfostersmith.com/produc...m?pcatid=21333

[Fredrick]

I did this with a cheap heater from Pet's Mart, but I burned it out in like 2 weeks. I assume by the time you buy a decent heater and whatever else you need, you'd be better off finding the right tool here in the classifieds. They come up on occasion.

Perhaps, but since my income is limited I won't have the money for the right tool in the classifieds. I live in Norway and the shipping would be something like $500. I might be lucky and find something on Ebay in Europe though.

You can but you cannot use a cheep one.

You will need a digital heater controller like this in addition to a comparable aquarium heater.

http://www.drsfostersmith.com/produc...m?pcatid=21333

Thank you. I'll look into what I can find here in Norway.

[wombat2go]

Hi Fredrick
I use this, available on Amazon for about USD$33
"Hydrofarm MTPRTC Digital Thermostat For Heat Mats"

It controls a tabletop electric cooker and its sensor is in the bath. The water temperature cycles by about 0.25 C around the setpoints ( 49 C for mixing and 37.8 C for processing)
I use widemouth jars with screw tops as shown to quickly dump the tank and get the solutions back in the bath.

[joselsgil]

Aquarium heaters can be used to control the temperature in a water jacket tub. It just takes a while longer to reach the set temperature.

I used to run two water heaters when I had a 100 gallon fish aquarium. Depending on how often you use them, I'm sure they can last a long time.
I never bought the cheapest, but they were usually in the $30 to $50 dollar range and would last about a year. Not bad considering that they were on 24/7.

[Fredrick]

Thank you all for your responses. I have now found an Aqvarium heater with a digital controller here in Norway and I will purchase it soon. I'll try and post some examples when I get the chromes scanned.