Idea #1:

As far as covering belly-heat Flexwatt, you can put thin felt pads on the bottom of the box, then cover the part on the Flexwatt with tape where those felt pads would come in contact with the Flexwatt.



Idea #2: (works if using the 3 or 4 inch wide Flexwatt):

You lay the Flexwatt on the shelf but way in the back, so the box only sits 1-2 inches of the heater. This is like a combination of back heat plus belly heat. Now you raise the box up with felt pads. On the rear of the box, you place the felt pads 3 or so inches from the back of the box. Now the box is raised over the Flexwatt but the felt never rubs on the heater.



Back heat stuff:

Years ago I had a small back-heated enclosed rack and kept a young Dumerils and carpet python in the rack. When the ambient room temp got into the 60s, the back of the boxes just couldn't maintain a high enough temperature. For colubrids it would have been fine, but for boids, not fine. I put insulation on the back of the rack - it helped a little, not enough for the boids.



Then came the novel idea - put a door on the front of the rack. My "door" was a piece of pegboard leaned up against the rack front. Temps went up a bit rather quickly. What I saw now was slightly higher ambient temps throughout the box, while the back of the box went up only a few degrees at most.



When I placed a solid covering over the rack front, of course the effect was greater, to a point. I was able to get 85-90 at the back of the box.



So, if you want to use back heat for ball pythons, and your room is very cool, you could cover the front. Just make sure you use a temperature controller with feedback, like a proportional controller or an ON/OFF with a probe.
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Mark

[ Hide Replies ]

• Covering Flexwatt instead of routing a . - John Q, Thu Feb 11 11:02:02 2010
• Why the shock - markg, Thu Feb 11 14:02:05 2010
• Rack options - markg, Thu Feb 11 15:09:30 2010