Heaters

[Lampshade]

So this is probably my 4th heater in the past year....

I bought a heater on boxing day because the one in my tank is 20+ years old. I'm using the old one because it's never broken, and every other heater i've had seems to be evil and try to kill all my fish by sticking on. I built a controller awhile ago and put an interlock in to shut off the heater on overtemp, problem solved right? well... apparently SOME heaters fail open, leaving my tank to get chilly overnight. Lucky the email woke me up at 3am to say the tank was cold, so I went and put the 20+ year old heater back in and went to bed. After testing the "new" heater this morning, the lights are on, but there is no heat. This thing was put in the same place of my sump as any other heater, beside my return intake where it can't be bumped.

So... why do they make such crap these days? My 20+ year old heater has been in a freshwater tank or salt it's whole life, and has never been on the shelf for more than a year. I don't know how many cycles that would be, but it sure is a lot more than the 6 weeks this marineland heater lasted.

Anyways, more of a rant than anything. Finally recovering from my crash and if I didn't get an email I probably would have had to start all over again.