Jager heater help

[KLKelly]

I have to be doing something wrong - can you guys help me?

I bought a 50W jager heater for a quarantine tank today.  I let it sit in the tank for 1/2 hour before doing anything with it.  The temp in the tank is room temperature in the basement - 73 degrees (temp on the strip and my digital thermometer 73.5).  The light only turns on when I turn the dial to 77 degrees.  So I pulled the round button out, turned the dial to 73 and pushed it back in.  I then turned the temp to 75 and the light won't turn. I just turned the dial and the light came on at 78.  I turned it back down to 75 and the light stayed on and is still on.

What am I doing wrong?  I want to heat the tank to 77 but I would like to do it slowly.

Thanks guys.

Karrie

[KLKelly]

The light just went out since the above post.  I doubt the temp is up to 75 in two minutes. 

[BigDaddy]

Are you sure that's the right temp of your tank?  Tested with more than one thermometer?

[KLKelly]

There is no way it can be 77/78 degrees - my upstairs would be a sauna.

[KLKelly]

I dropped the house temp last night to 70.  When I woke up the tank temp was 71 so I know the tank can't be 77 which is still where the light is turning on still!.  So I've turned the heat up to 79 to see if it will heat the tank a couple degrees.  I'm just worried one day it will decide that it wants to heat according to the numbers and will toast my tank and hurt my fish.

I thought that button was for calibrating.  It did nothing 

[Jeff1192]

I had a similar problem a couple months ago with my new Jager heater and had to return it. The new one worked fine.

Jeff

[darkdep]

Yep, sounds like a bad heater.

Jager heaters at one time were considered the best you could buy.  They have dropped the prices of them significantly over the last bit and although they are still considered great heaters, I've seen plenty of them fail in one way or another.