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I've just started up my vivarium. It's 40 gallons. My house temp is around 62 degrees. I have 3 100-watt lightbulbs pointed at the basking site, and the temp at the site doesn't get above 85%!! I have one 100-watt regular lightbulb and one 100 watt Reptisun UV lightbulb. Both are in 10" clamp lamp fixtures that are resting on the wire mesh top of the glass enclosure. When those weren't enough I turned on the 100 watt red night bulb too, which is in a much smaller clamp light. The basking site is fake rock and about 6" below the light bulbs. There's also a wood place about 2" below the lights. All 3 light fixtures are clustered together at one end of the cage, over the basking sites, which are right next to each other. I'm measuring the heat with a digital thermometer with wired probe. I even got a second similar thermometer in case it wasn't reading properly, but they're both saying the same thing. I can't figure it out. Help!!!

>>I've just started up my vivarium. It's 40 gallons. My house temp is around 62 degrees. I have 3 100-watt lightbulbs pointed at the basking site, and the temp at the site doesn't get above 85%!! I have one 100-watt regular lightbulb and one 100 watt Reptisun UV lightbulb. Both are in 10" clamp lamp fixtures that are resting on the wire mesh top of the glass enclosure. When those weren't enough I turned on the 100 watt red night bulb too, which is in a much smaller clamp light. The basking site is fake rock and about 6" below the light bulbs. There's also a wood place about 2" below the lights. All 3 light fixtures are clustered together at one end of the cage, over the basking sites, which are right next to each other. I'm measuring the heat with a digital thermometer with wired probe. I even got a second similar thermometer in case it wasn't reading properly, but they're both saying the same thing. I can't figure it out. Help!!!

Also, hot air rises and having all the heat at one end of the vivarium would create an air flow where the cool air is being sucked in from one side going towards the hot side. I would try placing a lamp on the cool end to heat that incoming air which I would think would help raise the basking site temps.
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Rob

There's no draft, and I'll try moving one lamp to the cooler side as you suggest. Any other ideas out there?

heat the room more, bring it up to about 69 - 72 F

>>I've just started up my vivarium. It's 40 gallons. My house temp is around 62 degrees. I have 3 100-watt lightbulbs pointed at the basking site, and the temp at the site doesn't get above 85%!! I have one 100-watt regular lightbulb and one 100 watt Reptisun UV lightbulb. Both are in 10" clamp lamp fixtures that are resting on the wire mesh top of the glass enclosure. When those weren't enough I turned on the 100 watt red night bulb too, which is in a much smaller clamp light. The basking site is fake rock and about 6" below the light bulbs. There's also a wood place about 2" below the lights. All 3 light fixtures are clustered together at one end of the cage, over the basking sites, which are right next to each other. I'm measuring the heat with a digital thermometer with wired probe. I even got a second similar thermometer in case it wasn't reading properly, but they're both saying the same thing. I can't figure it out. Help!!!

cause two updrafts, one on each end where the middle may be the coolest so you may just want to place it towards the middle of the enclosure instead of all the way on the cool side. I think the key is to make sure you have the strongest heat on one end with some supplement heat in the middle to get the air to flow the coolest on one side to the warmest on the other side.

At 62 degrees you will probably even have to have a heat source on the cool end as well. I think you should just make sure the heat sources go from strongest to weakest.

You may be surprised how much raising the temp at the cool end and middle may affect the hot side so be careful.

These are just guesses as I haven't had that problem so you may get a better answers from some more experienced keepers!

Good luck!
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Rob

>>I've just started up my vivarium. It's 40 gallons. My house temp is around 62 degrees. I have 3 100-watt lightbulbs pointed at the basking site, and the temp at the site doesn't get above 85%!! I have one 100-watt regular lightbulb and one 100 watt Reptisun UV lightbulb. Both are in 10" clamp lamp fixtures that are resting on the wire mesh top of the glass enclosure. When those weren't enough I turned on the 100 watt red night bulb too, which is in a much smaller clamp light. The basking site is fake rock and about 6" below the light bulbs. There's also a wood place about 2" below the lights. All 3 light fixtures are clustered together at one end of the cage, over the basking sites, which are right next to each other. I'm measuring the heat with a digital thermometer with wired probe. I even got a second similar thermometer in case it wasn't reading properly, but they're both saying the same thing. I can't figure it out. Help!!!

source on the cool end so as to block an updraft on each end.

Sorry, ideas keep popping up. Maybe I'll have another one as soon as I'm done with this post ! I think I'll just end it here, though.
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Rob

don't take this wrong but:

HOW CAN YOU LIVE IN A 62 Deg HOUSE??? thats cold mann!!!

but then I live in Fla and 73 feels coold as heck now...

Seriously: there are some math and physiscs that apply here

if the room is 60-65 degrees and you need to warm a 40 gallon tank to an average of 75-85 degrees and the tank is glass you are going to lose a lot of heat all over the tank.

see if you can get some insulation pannels on the back bottom and ends of the tank to hold the heat in....

the other thing is trap the heat... whats in the tank now?
any sand? if you have a mass of soil or sand that absorbes heat it will hold it and radiate it back over several hours.
flat rocks could help, if you can let them warm up....

also can you build a light weight "Hood" around the lights to trap the heat from them and add to the tank heat?
a small "Muffin fan" from radio shak could be added to that hood to push warm air from the hood into the tank adding heat and some airflow.

insulate.
trap the heat.
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Thanks everyone for your helpful suggestions. I've spread the heatlamps across the top of the cage, and taken a beach towel to cover the back wall and over the lamps on top and it's worked wonders! Today we built a fire in the fireplace and the darned thing actually got too hot! We seem to be on the road to recovery, and Dragon is perking up nicely.

Thanks again

>>Thanks everyone for your helpful suggestions. I've spread the heatlamps across the top of the cage, and taken a beach towel to cover the back wall and over the lamps on top and it's worked wonders! Today we built a fire in the fireplace and the darned thing actually got too hot! We seem to be on the road to recovery, and Dragon is perking up nicely.
>>
>>Thanks again

also make sure there's a gradiant in the heat so your beardies have a place to cool down if they need to. You probably already knew that but I wanted to make sure.
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Rob