Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I started on a new set of enclosures for my pythons and wanted to ask a few opinions from you guys,what do you think so far?I am at the point where I need to come up with an idea for doors,I was thinking side hung doors, but they will need a lot of space to open so simple drop down style doors would probably suit me best, I'm just not sure how to go about attaching them.I also need to be able to lock them according to FWC regulations, any ideas? I also put heavy duty casters on the bottom so I can move them around,do you guys think I should add one more set in the middle to keep it from sagging? They are 8' long but I did frame in the the bottom and put in cross braces.Any ideas you guys that have done this before would be appreciated.

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0.1.0 Burmese Python 12'- "Baby"
1.0.0 Albino Granite Burmese Python 6.5'-"Capone"
0.1.0 Albino Burmese Python 11'-"Lacy Underall"
1.0.0 Reticulated Python 8.5'-"McLovin"
1.0.0 African Rock Python 9'-"Pauly Walnuts"
1.0.0 BCI 7.5'-"Mr.Pink"
0.2.0 BCI 6'-"Scarlett O'Hara & Sloane Peterson"
1.1.0 Bearded Dragons-"Radar O'Reilly & Carol Anne"

IMO a center pair of casters is a must. With the long span and added weight of the animals etc. I would think it could easily sag.

For doors, again, side mount would be likely to sag and would need a LOT of room in front to even open. Drop down or removable sliders. Look at the cage manufacturer sites to get ideas on how to do locks/latches.
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Thanks,

Dave Colling

www.rainbows-r-us-reptiles.com

0.1 Wife (WC and still very fiesty)
0.2 kids (CBB, a big part of our selective breeding program)

LOL, to many snakes to list, last count:
26.49 BRB
20.21 BCI
And those are only the breeders

lots.lots.lots feeder mice and rats

Hi, will you post some information about how you made them? I really like them and need to make some large cages too. I wonder how hard it would be to put sliding tempered glass doors on them? thanks
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Mark Kennedy

Nice cages. I agree with Dave, a center set of casters would help with sagging. As for doors, we recently built some cages and used drop down doors with cam locks. We used hinges on all the doors except the bottom ones. We used wooden brackets so the doors could be lifted out of the way and we wouldn't have to work around them. The bracket is a piece of 3/4" x 3/4" wood and a piece of 3/4" x 1 1/4" wood screwed together.

Here is a pic of the door, I hope you can see the brackets on the bottom of the door.

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Randy and Michelle
Art In Scales
(719) 439-4199
info@artinscales.com

Nice cages yourself. I like the bottom door idea with the wood catches.
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Mark

What are the door frames made from? Did you cut a groove for the window to fit into, like a picture frame? Is the window replaceable?
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Mark

The doors are made of solid maple. I ran a groove in the door frames before I built the doors, so the glass isn't replaceable. The "glass" is actually 1/8" plexiglas. We've had a 15' burm bounce of the door, so I'm not concerned about the plexi breaking. This is in part because the door is so short, only about 12" high and also because the groove in the frame is 1/2" deep, so the plexi has a lot of support. If the plexi does ever break, I'll replace the door. I've been building cages like this for several years and haven't had to replace a door yet.
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Randy and Michelle
Art In Scales
(719) 439-4199
info@artinscales.com

>>The doors are made of solid maple. I ran a groove in the door frames before I built the doors, so the glass isn't replaceable. The "glass" is actually 1/8" plexiglas. We've had a 15' burm bounce of the door, so I'm not concerned about the plexi breaking. This is in part because the door is so short, only about 12" high and also because the groove in the frame is 1/2" deep, so the plexi has a lot of support. If the plexi does ever break, I'll replace the door. I've been building cages like this for several years and haven't had to replace a door yet.
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>>Randy and Michelle
>>Art In Scales
>>(719) 439-4199
>>info@artinscales.com
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Mark