Reptile & Amphibian Forums

After spending most of the early summer with a crowded incubator, I'm now waking up to the fact that I do not have enough housing for all of these babies du to hatch over the next few weeks.

I've always designed and built my own racks out of melamine, and they have served me well. At the present moment, my plan is to make another using shoebox sized rubbermade or sterlite boxes. I need it to take at least 20 boxes, but I would prefer it to hold 25-30. I'm also open to buying, or building a non "solid" melamine rack (in other words, build some kind of frame versus solid melamine sides, back and shelves).

So, I'd love some input on baby rack design. Send me pictures and plans for your favorite baby rack that fits my needs. OR, if you know of a commercially available baby rack in the less than $500 price range, let me know about that. Thanks!
Joe Pociask - My site...

My hubby is working on a 55 space hatchling / juvenile rack for me using hollow core doors. He modified a boa rack design to hold hatchlings / juvies. I think he said it takes like 8 doors and will make 2 55-space racks. He bought all the materials for around $200, not including thermostats and rope lights, so all told the investment for 110 spaces would be around $500 total.

Don't know if that helps, but I hope it does.

I just bought a 10 shoebox rack from boaphile plastics for $199.99

They had a 20 shoebox rack for $349.99. They also have bigger but I don't remember prices since I wasn't in need of anything bigger. Anyway, I really like it and it came with the belly heat and shoeboxes!

I picked up 4 baby shoe box racks from RBI and they hold 16 shoe box for $235 delivered with box and heat.
Rich is an awesome guy and he gave me a better deal because I picked them up at the White Plains show.

Check out RBI
http://www.reptilebasics.com/product.php?productid=16181&cat=251&page=1

I made mine out of melanine and ordered the hatchling tubs from vision. I used heat tape and just foil taped it down but if I had to do it over again I think I would use heat cable and make grooves in the melanine with my circular saw and inset the heat rope. But the tape is working fine for me. I made it 4 bins wide and 11 levels high with 1/8" gap between the shelves and the tubs so I would not have to drill any holes in the bins. It only ended up costing me around $300 for a 44 tub rack inculding every thing but the Herpstat.
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John Vandegrift

np

Not too bad I would guess it is just under half a ton . I put some heavy duty casters on it so it is not too bad to move, but I don't really plan on moving it a whole lot anyway. I really like the vision tubs. I think they are about the pefect size. I like that they are 18 inches deep.
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John Vandegrift

I have a melamine for my adults. I like it so far and was thinking about building a baby one. I would like to see yours to get an idea on how to go about it.

this is the best pic I could get. I can't get far enough away in the room to get a full rack shot.

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John Vandegrift

Thanks. Mine is also like that for my adults,the only thing I had to do is add a brace in the middle,It started to bow. I like that though.

not a fire hazard?

How would cutting grooves in the wood be a fire hazard????
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John Vandegrift

It is no more a fire hazard,as the heat cable taped to the wood. That is what I did it works great.

Hi Joe, I built all these racks and only took a few hours and 1/2 a 6 pack of beer.

Old Melamine racks:

XPVC rack upgrades:

The white racks with the sterilite tubs are made of Melamine, they hold 28 12qt tubs or 14 28qt tubs or a mixture of the two.

The Black sterilite racks were built using 1/4" XPVC and hold 20 12qt or 10 28qt or a mixture of the two tubs each. That tall rack in the picture is actually two smaller racks stacked together. They hold a total of 40 12qt tubs. They took only a few hours to build and were really easy to put together, if you are a DIY person, this is the way to go IMO. XPVC is also much lighter than Melamine. You can either use 1/4" or 1/2" material and either one is lighter than Melamine.

Good Luck!