Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hey Mexicana-holics,

I've been thinking about buying some new racks for my collection. For those of you who purchased your racks from one of the vendors advertising in the classifieds can you tell me you level of satisfaction with the vendor and the racks you purchased.

My biggest concerns are:
-Bowing of PVC (plastic) racks
-Belly heat (personal preference) but I'm not sure of the manufacturer's quality when using flexwatt to achieve this (maybe a photo would help)...I'm used to routered heat cable.
-Tolerance on hatchling racks (no escapees)

I greatly appreciate your input. I've been looking at the follwoing vendors:
*Vision racks
*RBI racks
*API racks
*Herpenclosure racks

Thanks,
Russ

RBI plastics STC-410 racks a lot. I will be buying more in the future. Mine have back heat. They seem well built and are quite sturdy (3/8" thick).

I also like the size of the containers, which is nice "step-up" when the babies outgrow shoeboxes (and nice for baby indigos). Oh, and they shipped them right out!

For smaller racks I like my Nature's Spirit shoebox rack. Nothing fancy, back heat, reasonable price, good service. I don't know if they do bottom heat.

No affiliation with either seller, just a satisfied customer.

After building and rebuilding wooden racks I switched to plastic. The first ones I had were a disappointment. Back heat which escaped and the shelves sagged, etc. I resolved the issues but I was not happy with the product. Not happy enough to continue using them and certainly not happy enough to buy more.
Then I switched to Animal Plastics. I now own 4 AP racks and love them. I will be adding more in the future. Even with Ball pythons the shelf sag is minimal and the boxes slide in and out easy, no rubbing, no spilled water bowls, etc. They use heat cable that is in an inverted T groove routered into each shelf.
A feature that I really like and is unique with plastic racks is that they disassemble and reassemble in just minutes. Very convenient if you need to move them a long distance, easier to ship, etc. They are made really well with lots of attention to detail.
Check em out.
John Q

I got my racks from Jason at Rosys, Racks and More (link under breeder’s listings on the front page of KS). They are melamine with routered heat cable in the shelves. The cable is run through aluminum channels. What I like most is the boxes, they are the clear “lexan” food storage boxes, very clear, and virtually impossible to break (believe me, I have dropped a few). The tolerances are excellent and even the smallest thayeri hatchling hasn’t gotten out. The down side is they are heavy. The plastics were just coming out when I bought these and after a great deal of searching, I settled on these as the best for my needs.

I’m getting ready to buy a plastic rack though to see if I will like it, either AP or ??? I need more room, or less snakes ... okay, more room.
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Rick
Never Enough
Reptiles

One of the 4 AP racks that I own is the 1752 hatchling rack. It uses the sterilite 1752 box, 6qt shoe box. The rack holds 27 boxes, 3 per shelf, 9 shelves, and every single box is a perfect fit. No gap, no escapees, even the smallest hatchlings do not get out. Besides working with balls I still breed western hognose, corns, and next year I'll be starting over again with red milks. The box fit is so perfect than even these hatchlings cannot get out. I drill holes in the front of the box for ventilation. Less holes for the balls, more for hogs, etc. and I keep a full extra set of boxes. I think it's the best hatchling rack available.
John Q