It’s that time of year where I start pre-spending the money I get from family that is either too far away or too lazy to go Christmas shopping. One thing about this hobby I’ve never been very good about is regular testing. Recently I have been a little more religious as I have started keeping slightly more difficult corals and quite honestly, I think this tank looks better then anything I have ever owned and I’d like to keep making it nicer.
So with that being said I am looking in to permanent monitors and controllers. Everything I can find for a reasonable price includes PH and Temp probes and the ability to control multiple channels and dosers/reactors. Which is great because it then becomes upgradeable as I don’t currently have any dosers or reactors.
So I am looking for opinions from those that own / use these types of items (Reefkeeprs, Neptune, etc), as well as opinions from those that do not use them if the choice is do to anything other then cost.
Well I have the RK2 on both of my tanks and I like it alot. It montiors and controls my heatrs and fans and if the tank gets to hot it will turn off my lights. It has the ability to control ph, but i just montior it with mine. It can be used to dose things, but only as far as a set time on and off. I have mine dosing kalk for 4 mintues every hour. There are controllers out there that can do more, and I may upgrade in the future, but for basic simple moitoring and control the RK2 works well.
I am leaning towards not putting all of my eggs in one basket. I may just keep the RK2 and add some seperate controllers as I feel the need to add them. This way if the RK2 goes haywire everything in my tank isn’t also put out of whack. I run my powerheads seperate and have a backup heater plugged sperate also.
Ento makes a great point about not relying on one single controller for your entire tank. It was this very reason, along with cost that has kept me away from the all-in-one controllers.
I use three seperate controllers(ph, temp, wavemaker) that cost me less than the entry point price for an all-in-one. Purchasing the main control unit isnt that bad, but if you want to utilize the full potential and flexibility of these all-in-one controllers it gets real pricey real fast. By using seperate controllers You can add to your system piecemeal, as you needs grow, without a huge upfront investment. If one controller goes down, it only effects one part of your system and your only out the cost of that one controller as opposed to the pricey all-in-one or worse yet, having your all-in-one with a feature that doesnt work properly.
There are advantages to the all-in-ones. The biggest that comes to mind is the ability to interface your reeftank with your computer. Also, the SMS modules which can send alerts to your cellphone via text messages is a great feature. It also makes for a much cleaner setup having only one controller and no need for timers.
I guess it comes down to personal choice. If money was no option, and i was planning a system from scratch, i would probably go with an all-in-controller.
What are you specifically looking for in a controller craig? what do you want controlled?
I’m more concerned with just the “monitor” functions at the moment as the only items I could really have controlled would be the lights,m heaters, and powerheads. But I would like the ability to expand as I go. If I set up a calcium reactor I’d like to be able to control it.
I am debating between the ReefKeepr2 and the Aqua-controller Jr. But relatively inexpensive (compared to the more robust units) and seem like solid versatile units. I like the ReefKeeper and it’s “soft start” option for the powerheads as it is supposed to keep the “clicking” to a minimum. I don’t really NEED the wavemaker function as I still have the Wave2K, but I’d like to unload the wave2K as it blows a ton of sand around (found a drawback to using Southdown).
I like the AquaController Jr. as it provides the ability to control the lighting a little more then the standard on/off and moon lights can be programmed to follow the lunar cycle.
I’d like to be able to constantly measure PH, Temp., Salinity, and if possible calcium and alk (but I am not sure these can be monitored with a controller yet).
When the time comes I’d like to be able to hook up reactors to run off the controller.
Sounds like you know what you want, i would just be sure to do your homework and make sure the unit you decide on will be able to do everything that you will eventually want from it.
Im not 100% sure, but i think when these controllers say they “simulate” sunrise/sunset it only means that it can turn on bulbs seperately if they are powered separately, same as a timer. I dont believe the are capable of dimming the bulbs in anyway. Also, keep in mind that “soft start” doesnt mean jack for a powerhead that is not controllable. IMO, you should really make sure that you get one that will upgrade with an MMS module or at least one that is capable of email. To me that is the biggest value of these units.
I think the RK2 can actually dim the bulbs - I think that’s what I read anyway - not sure if it applies to the T5s or just the moonlights, but either way, anything I can do to get closer to natural I’m all for.
Like I said before I have never been very good at remembering to test regularly, but I am good at looking at my tank, so I figure if I have something that continuously monitors and displays results at a push of a button then I am making progress. I’ve started keeping more difficult corals and would like to move to some SPS. Soon I’d like to look in to some DIY reactors so an upgradeable controller would make life much easier.
Of course you bring up the point of not having everything in one, so if it craps out you don’t have to replace everything.
You would an ALC Module to dim your lights. The module is an extra $90. It is only compatible with the reefkeeper elite, and only works on dimmable T5 ballasts. This is a good example of what i meant earlier when i said it can get real pricey trying to fully exploit all of the benefits of one of these controllers.
Well I decided to go with the RK2. I must say it is a very nice unit. It monitors temp and PH constantly, the “soft start” for the wave maker function really does keep the clicking from the koralias down to a minimum, barely noticeable.
I’m kinda having fun playing with all the different settings. I have my Koralia 3 on a wave maker timer so it kicks on/off about every 10 minutes. The Koralia4 running constantly and the Wave2K cycling on/off every 30 minutes on the oscillate function. I definitely think they’re is enough random flow to keep everything happy now.
The “Standby” function shuts everything off for 10 minutes for feeding.
Now I just have to get around to actually mounting the control box to the stand and I’ll be all set.
The PH functionality comes included with the 8 outlet strip, but I had to supply my own probe (I bought the RK2 used afterall). Each PH is plugged in to it’s own outlet, the outlets are then assigned as wavemaker, the soft start appears to supply a lower voltage power supply when it’s turning the PH on. I assume this because when I set up my Wave2K as a wavemaker so it would run on it’s own cycle independent of the PH the soft start wouldn’t supply enough power to start the motor.
I reaaaaaaaaly want a RKE but theyre so expensive…
You can controll over 260 outlets, and it comes with a ph and temp probe. All sorts of cool features like the soft start, wavemaker, MH bulb protection timer among about 50 more. Just cant seem to cough up almost 500$.
I think for most of what we do the RK2 is sufficient. It includes the MH bulb protector as well. I just don’t have any that need protecting.
I really like the fact I can adjust all power heads and W2K independently. It could be my imagination, but I really think the tank looks better today then it did 3 days ago before I hooked it up.