Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hi!

I have a question about the pictures you posted a few days ago about the heating of your cage. I was wondering if the plastic sides of your cage bent a little from the heat? I had that problem with my cage last winter when I used a lot of heat.

Thanks a lot!!

Marie

thats why im not a fanatic of plastic cages .. they are light and look "semi" nice but when you think of it they bend plastic with heat .... and when you heat a cage & esp more then one source IMO you are sooner or later going to get two things depended on the type plastic it built with
1- warpage
2- hard & brittle
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i didnt know plastic warps at 88-90 degrees? if so...anything plastic in my house would be bent during the 100 degree summer season. wouldnt you think it also depends on the type of plastic used?

.

Plastics when subjected to prolonged exposure to heat / weight will/can & have warped. I could be wrong but ithink Jeff Ronne has even stated that even his cages have been known to "sag" when stacked over to many high.With that said with even prolonged heat weight will cause them to "distort" to a certain degree . While i dont think i have condemed plastic cages i am stating my personel opinion .

Other noteable things with them are
Lighweight
easy to move
cheap

so as in anything in life people will have different opinions of things asked even when it wasnt directly asked of them Sorry i didnt mean to step on any toes in my initial response *shrug*
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Not much. The plastic used in my cages is HDPS, and it has a high melting temp. It takes a higher temperature than that any snake should be exposed to. If there is a slight bend, it is hardly noticeable and does not compromise the strength of the cage. How do I know this? An older HDPS cage I have is perfect after years of use and abuse. No cracks, no problems. It is about 4 years old. I have a Neodesha (ABS plastic) that is 8 years old and perfect. I'd like to see an 8 year old wood cage after all those cleanings.

PVC has a much lower melting point, but still, any bending is not permanent and is no more a threat to the well-being of the cage than the slight flex of a melamine cage when another is stacked on top. Of course, if you expose the cage to say 150 deg, you deserve whatever happens, because no snake should see those temps in a cage.

Acrylic is different. It bends and warps like crazy if there is much of a temp differential from one side to another. In a heated room, acrylic is fine because all points see the same temp.

When I said HDPS has a high melting point, I should have said, a higher bending temp point than say acrylic or PVC or HDPE. In any case, bending is not bad if the temp of the wall is 90 or less. Why heat over that amount?

Well i can say that i have a cage here that is 6 yrs old and other then "standard" wear & tear of being moved many times put in storage (150 lb tv set on it for 3 yrs) and and various other things of substanial weight there is nothing wrong with the cage .It still looks 99% as the day it did the .1% is due to things being banged into it dropped in transit ( banged corner) it survived a 200 mile trip in a 14x7 trailer in a recent move with everything under and over the sun exposed to it banged into it etc . i would gladly still trust any snake inside of it and setting 500 lbs on top of it w/o fear of it failing and crushing my snakes ... can you say that a plastic cage would fair well after 6 yrs , having a tv set on it for 3 (w/o sagging at all ?) dropped in a move and come out totally unscathed and then set 500lbs on it with aprized snake in it and not sweat ? the fate of that snake ?

i wasnt downing your cage or any ofthem i was just staing my thoughts... i will from now own just keep them to myself sincere apologies to thos who got ruffled
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how do you know it didnt sag? did you measure or just eyeball it??

well thats easily answered ... a 4 foot cage & a 2 foot framing square placed in all four corners = Square.( meaning that the framing Sq. fits into each corner w/out any variance on either side of the Sq.)

now could you say the same with a plastic cage undergoing that abuse ?
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I wasn't ruffled at all. If I was really good with wood, I guarantee I'd have a slew of nice wood cages as well.

Wood is an amazing material. So is plastic. Wood is stronger. Plastic can hold water with no worries. Each has their good points. For me, the plastic cages have been great. Please don't discontinue giving advice on wood cages just because of me. Besides, I'm going to need new wood cages for a python that is growing out of any affordable plastic cage. I'll need help.