Warning to Profilux Users

[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.

[sphelps]

I'll add this which is the response I got from Michael Hall

We (Aqua Digital) personally recommend that float sensors are changed every two years when in use due to the harsh nature they are working in. However sensors unused need to be carefully checked for any degradation prior to use,(cable gone hard, actuator stuck in on position, cat chewed the cable) for these reasons the manufacturer can not assure reliability, If they could then warranties would start from time of use not time of purchase. So we advise caution when using such stored parts and would go as far as saying do not store critical parts for later use. One obvious reason would be if it turned out to be faulty your warranty would have expired.

[Slick Fork]

Thank you Matthias and Michael for clearing that up. I don't think any reasonable person would expect a warranty to start from date of use rather than date of purchase (or if a cat ate the cable!). Your recommendation on not storing parts long term for the simple reason of ensuring warranty coverage in case of a rare faulty part is also quite good.

Thank you as well Sphelps for posting the followup and keeping the focus in this thread on real issues/concerns and not letting it degenerate into a flame fest. This thread has been very informative and caused me to double check everything on my profilux ATO!

[DiverDude]

This has been an interesting read. However, I can't help but notice that there is an important concept being ignored and that is that the Profilux device is a life support system; albeit for fish and invertebrates and not humans, it is still largely responsible for the well being of these creatures.

As a life support system, there is a requirement that it accept failures of sensors and respond in a known, predictable manner. There is a limit to what can be done in firmware, but sphelps' tips on max timer settings (or similar) should be in the manual.

The manufacturer should be aware that the product can't do everything in every conceivable situation -but often, how the unit is programmed can mitigate catastrophic situations.

Perhaps the most important 'lesson' to be learned is not to rely entirely on ANY system. As Mathias is no doubt aware, no system is perfect and as users we should always plan based on the premise that it WILL fail (and hope that it doesn't). With that in mind, it makes sense that the USER regularly inspect and replace mission-critical components that wear and are known to be prone to failure (given the environment). Even the highest quality products can fail unexpectedly; simply paying more for an item does not guarantee it will last longer than a lesser item.

Considering how sphelps went to great pains to present an informative and level description of a product shortcoming (with detailed insight on how to work around it to boot !) might cause a serious problem for others with this equipment, I am disappointed that some members took this to mean that the Profilux product is 'no good' -and even more disappointed how the commercial interests have responded. Leveler heads should have prevailed.

[Myka]

In all of this I see two flaws...

1) Tank was left unattended for too long (if you value your tank someone should check it daily).

2) Alarms should have to be manually reset (that's really basic engineering).



In the end though, it's all about redundancy. Redundancy is the only insurance we have. No way on Earth would I have my system set up in a way that would allow that much freshwater (or dosing fluids) to be pumped into the display. I think sometimes we rely on computers and gadgets too much, and put too much faith in them.

My system is designed so that if my freshwater bin gets pumped dry for some reason the sump can even hold all the volume so I wouldn't even have a wet floor. The top off bin needs to be refilled every second or third day, and that's fine by me because it's a safe way to do it. I cringe when people have their top off system hooked up to unlimited supplies of water. It's an accident waiting to happen. My dosing canisters are small; I have large premixed containers that I use to refill the dosing canisters once a week. My dosing pumps have dosed a whole weeks' worth of fluid in about 8 hours which ran the dosing canister dry. This was not enough to cause significant reactions. The redundancy I have implemented means I have to "do stuff" with the tank more often, but I have a lot of time, money, and energy in that glass box so it is worth it to me. When I go on holidays an aquarium maintenance company checks my tanks 1-2 times per day. It's not cheap, but neither are the corals in the tank!

[Myka]

I don't mean to sound insensitive at all, I feel really awful for what sphelps has gone through with this horrible disaster. I thank sphelps for sharing his story, and I hope we can all take something from his experience.

[sphelps]

Myka, I agree with your statements but be aware I did have someone enter my house twice daily although their experience with aquariums is nil and their prime objective was not related to the tank. I also had someone with experience on call and checking on the tank every few days. While I would have loved to have someone with great experience in aquariums checking my tank more frequently my remote location makes this rather difficult. Also note this failure occurred very quickly within 12 hours if you can believe it. By the time the issue was noticed the damage was done.

In regards to top off water supply yes perhaps a smaller amount of available supply would be better but I have issues with this as well. If I leave for an extended period of time then IMO it's better to have enough top off water available for the entire time otherwise I have to rely on others fulling a container with RO water which in the past is something that has gone very badly for myself personally and others I know as well. So for extended trips the amount of evaporation water available IMO will need to exceed that of the amount that cannot cause damage. Using the small bucket approach to me is not redundancy as it basically adds the need for another top off system which in fact increases your chances of failures rather than decreases it. While obviously there are many way to do this I stand by my method but agree more redundancy is needed but more related to what I mentioned earlier and perhaps additional floats or something else along these lines.

Lastly I draw attention to my last request in the first post of this thread.

[jorjef]

What I have taken from this is I'm keeping my "five gallon lift to the tank and pour in top up system" for a long long time. Call it old school, cheap, inept regarding technology but it's flawless. After reading this post and others regarding automated system mishaps be it dosing or top up has pushed me further away from ever exploring them. They're just not for me.