What is a good timer to buy?

[Aquanaut]

Beware not to exceed the amp and wattage that these units can handle. Best stick with heavy duty grade hardware/appliance timer. Cheap and tuff as nails. I use a high duty grade power strip for multiple Halide lamps (2x250-750w max)to individual timers for lights w/ corresponding parallel fan series and alternating koralla motors.

 

[cobyb]

i got a nice one from home depot for 20 dollars

 

[rainydave]

spend the extra money and get a reef keeper you will like it alot better if you go with the corallife or zoomed brands not much of a price difference and easier to set up.

I agree with this. I bought a Reefkeeper Lite to replace my light timers. I'd never go back. The standby mode for turning off the pumps while feeding or doing water changes is great. Having the heater only powered on when the temp falls below a set temp is good insurance. Plus the light timer mode is very flexible. It was $100 well spent.

Click for info

 

[khaosinc]

Depending on how much wattage you are pushing through them the hope depot ones and the like are fine. They claim to be rated pretty high on watts, but once I started pushing 1000+ watts through them I was burning them out in months. While spendy, I ended up with an RKE, mostly for lighting (I'm controling lights on 4 tanks admittedly), and have really enjoyed a bunch of the features I never thought I would use or need on them. By the time you have gone though 5-6 cheap timers (which work just fine really) you could add temp, salinity and PH monitering plus the ability to shut of return pumps for feeding and stuff like that. If you know someone local to you that has someththing like the reef keeper light or the like, it might be worth checking out what it can do. Granted not many have an extra $100 kicking around but its a thought.

In the scheme of $$$ we tend to put in to these tanks,