Warning to Profilux Users

[Aqua-Digital]

It seems something has got badly out of hand from our support forum, the original thread can be found here

http://profiluxsupport.com/showthrea...ic-Alarm-Reset

It is important to clarify few points that have come to light in this since talking with GHL this morning that they were not aware of.

We sent the photo of the faulty sensor to GHL since the post here (GHL was not aware of the original support case on our forum) and we were informed this sensor was last manufactured 4 years ago.

Our advice on the thread remains, float sensors are mechanical, they do wear out and our advice is to replace them after two years, furthermore as a company GHL have no way of determining the quality of the product that has been stored for long periods, some reasons for this are that the actuator can weaken or stick if stored for long periods in the on position, in regards to magnet degeneration, yes this is highly unlikely, but “could” happen, the purpose of mentioning this is to highlight that stored items of this nature can be effected by external forces and it can not be assumed after two years it will work the same way as it did when new whether used or not, this is why warranties start from date of purchase, not date of use.

We have offered the OP a new sensor even though it was out of warranty (by approx 3 years), this was refused sadly (please read the thread), however our offer remains.

I am sorry to see this thread had to come to light when not all facts were presented.

Naturally we hate to see such upset and I hope it is now clear both GHL and ourselves have offered and done all we can to advise and assist even by offering replacement of out of warranty items.

I think Matthias ha kindly covered all other areas such as multiple power outages etc.

Again - we are very sorry to here about the losses and will of course help the OP out in replacing the sensor as a gesture of kindness irrelevant of its age.

[Aqua-Digital]

Originally Posted by sphelps

My intentions here are only to make others ware if these issues. My initial attempt at making profilux aware of the issue didn't go overly well as I attempted to find reasoning for the automatic reset and assurance something would be done to fix it, rather I think they concluded I screwed up by replacing a worn (but working) sensor with what I believed to be new seeing how I purchased it a couple years back but never used it.

I felt it important to clarify this, I apologise for the repeat post but by the time I saw this I could not edit further.

When the thread came to light we also did post on the support thread that feedback would be provided to GHL in regards to an option for power outage non auto alarm reset.

Originally Posted by aqua_digital

In regards to vunerability, although this is not assurance to you, this is the first ever reported case we or GHL have had in 11 years, as typically as system does not need such a long top off period, but as I first stated I have already passed your feedback onto GHL and you are welcome to do the same on the German support forum.

Again we are really sorry to hear about such losses and as a gesture we will do all we can to make the OP feel very much assured and looked after as always

[BigAl07]

I’m sorry to see this happen to you and your tank. It really is sad regardless of the cause and hopefully we can learn from this and go forward as a reefing community and be better for it.


I have to say I was impressed with the input, concern, and support from both Aqua Digital and GHL on this matter. This shows the level of care and support they are willing to give to even an individual customer. On the flip side I think it could have been avoided with a few changes to the set-up.
I’ve been an avid ProfiLux user for many years now and as such (like so many of us) we go on and on about remote access and monitoring via the controller itself. I’ve taken some long vacations and even with my controller working as it should I make sure all my email notifications and alert are working as planned before I leave the house. I go through my own personal “Equipment Checklist” trying to test each “system” before I leave for a trip. Also the house I just moved out of had a terrible problems with the electric company (power outage almost daily sometimes 5-6 times a day… we stopped setting out digital clocks while we lived there) and as such after the first couple of days living there I put my ProfiLux onto a UPS. Not to carry it through a long power outage but to help level out the incoming power blips and keep the system from going through multiple power cuts a day. This was probably the best $75 I ever spent on my system. It was “Life Support” for my tank’s Life Support. The 4 year old sensor didn’t help matters which I see they are willing to replace that and whatever else the OP And GHL work out. The “Auto Reset” issue is being looked at and I’m glad to see they are keeping an open mind about potentially making changes to their firmware to help avoid this in the future.



Even with all the fail-safes in the world there is no substitute for “Human Intervention” which is why remote access is so important. Being able to get a snapshot of your system status is extremely important regardless of which controller you’re running. ProfiLux has allowed for multiple options for remote access/control for the very reason that the posted situation would not arise.



I’m sorry this happened to you and I plan to watch your tank thread(s) to hopefully see your system bounce back and be better than ever before. Hopefully it’s a learning experience for all of us and can teach us a few lessons: a) regardless of the # or type of fail-safe systems involved we must all make sure everything is in top order before leaving b) make sure we can have total remote access of all vital criteria (alerts etc) before leaving c) the importance of electronic devices being “isolated” from repeated on/off cycles due to power fluctuations d) when I get home tonight I’m going to take some time to go through my ProfiLux and make sure my max ATO run-time is minimal to keep this from happening.

I look forward to seeing your system recover from this and flourish like I’m sure it will in time. I live a LONG way from you but if there is anything I can do to help I’d be willing to give it a shot. I’ve had crashes before and it was the reefing community that kept me going when I wanted to just quit it and forget it! If there is anything I can do please don’t hesitate to drop me a PM and I’ll reply right back.

BigAl

[Seriak]

After reading through both posts I have to agree with the OP. He mentioned numerous times that sensors fail and that is a part of life and has no problem with the fact that his sensor failed (Other than the expiry issue or non issue depending on who you are talking to) The real problem is why the alarm gets reset after a power failure. Maybe we should do a poll, but IMO I would want the alarm to remain in memory after a power on/off cycle instead of having it reset. All alarms should have to be reset manually. Now if the majority of other users want it to reset after a power outage, then it should clearly state in the manual that a power failure will reset the alarm. A toggle switch would even be better, so we could choose.

[Aqua-Digital]

100% correct and as above copied parts of the thread these comments were passed onto GHL and most certainly not overlooked.

GHL have also posted here they will look into this.

This is my last post on the subject to save it all getting out of hand. Our support remains personal and direct with the OP from here on.

[sphelps]

I also have no interest GHL support issues further at this point. Regardless what happened I would like to keep focus the two issues I originally outlined.

1 - Float sensor:
Can we confirm what is required here as I'm still unclear resulting from many different opinions being stated.
Is it the recommendation of Profilux to replace these sensors every two years or not?
Is shelf life an actual issue? I originally assumed I had a clearly defective part which happens no doubt but it's very rare. It was previously suggested even a non defective part can or will degrade if not used immediately from factory.

2 - Auto Reset:
I would still like an answer regarding the reasoning for this especially now as it's been stated there is one due to user request. I see no reason why this can't be posted here but if you insist on posted only on the profilux support site then do so under the thread I previously posted already asking this exact question but be aware I will post response here regardless.
IMO this feature of auto reset would be very specialized, I still cannot see a single reason for it hence my curiosity. It would definitely make more sense to me to have such a feature as option through user programming however the default should not to have such feature active.

In regards to some solutions mentioned numerous times I'd like to make a few comments:

• Email alerts: I don't feel this would overly useful in such a circumstance. First my vacation took place in remote location in another country. I had extremely limited access to internet and constantly attempting to check emails through the day would have ruined the vacation completely. I may have been able to use data roaming on my cell but keeping that active the entire time would have cost more than the resulting damages. Also I have a profilux II not III which I understand has better abilities with web interfaces. From my understanding, with my version a computer would have to connected continuously with the software running. First of all I've had communication errors from regular short interval programming so in no way would I consider this reliable and any power outage would cause the PC to shut down. You would need a dedicated PC with UPS at the very least.
  
• Remote monitoring: Not a solution either, even if I could perform such monitoring if I can checked at some point during the day it would have easily been after a power outage in the brief time before an alarm was re-triggered giving the appearance of things operating normally. In addition even if I can see the ATO alarm has been set I have no way of knowing how severe the issue is. Remember I have no clue about automatic resets at this time. The only way this would be useful is with conductivity monitoring which I actually do have but to assume all profilux users have this rather expensive upgrade is not fare and again having to check on your system so frequently would be considered a nuisance at the very least.
  
• Max on time: Again it's based on flow rate, increasing flow rate and decreasing max on time would produce the same results. The max on time must be long enough to effectively top of the tank in worst case evaporation circumstances. As such repeatedly adding this max amount of top off water within a short time period will cause issues on most systems regardless.

[Aqua-Digital]

Hi

Please email us and we will happily reply to all your questions and concerns.

sales@aqua-digital.com

If you wish to continue your thread on by publishing our reply I am happy for you to do so.

[intarsiabox]

Originally Posted by Aqua-Digital

this is why warranties start from date of purchase, not date of use.

We have offered the OP a new sensor even though it was out of warranty (by approx 3 years), this was refused sadly (please read the thread), however our offer remains.

The sensor was only purchased 2 years ago but you're saying the warranty was up over 3 years ago before the item was even purchased. So which is it, warranty starts from mfg date or purchase date? I sure some readers would like to be reassured that they are not buying brand new products with the warranty already expired before the sale has gone through.

[Aqua-Digital]

ONLY to clarify warranites - GHL warranty document is available to you by email sales@aqua-digital.com or visit our forum

As said above by us and the OP we are not posting any further on this thread. We are available by email for any further concerns anyone may have. We have an open disclosure policy with such things so the requester is more than capable and in their rights of posting their gained reply in the public domain for complete transparacy but, we are not going into open debate on public or non official support forums, this is not how proper support is provided by any company.

We appreciate any concern or support case and will be answered 7 days a week, by email at sales@aqua-digital.com or on one of the support fourms.

[Matthias Gross]

This is the official statement from me (GHL):
- The floater or optical sensor don't expire when lying on the shelf! Correct storage assumed.
- pH- or redox electrodes do have an expiry date (no suprise I guess)

and no, there is not a common issue with the opto-levels

Was this clear enough?

I hope all the confusion has been cleared up now.

This is my last comment to this topic here, all further discussions will be between spshelps and us directly.