The "Reli-On" humidifier in my main snake room went out yesterday. (not very "Reli"able to stay "On", I must say, as this is a common thing for these cheap humidifiers after about 45-60 days of constant use). So as I decided not to buy any more Reli-On humidicrappers I needed to keep the humidity up until I figured out the best brand/make to get. So I wracked my brains for a few minutes thinking of ways to maintain the humidity for a day or two.
I could go in every hour or so and mist a couple of quarts per hour. It works well, but I really didn't want to have to do that. It's excruciating on the forearms and tedious.
So I'm walking around looking for electrical things I can rig into a make-shift, hot vapor (steam) humidifier and I come across my electrical hibachi bar-b-que I bought last summer. It has this elaborate double figure S in it's shape and gets VERY hot. Red hot!
So I had the element,.. now I needed a body of water large enough to accomidate this thing and a way to float it at an angle so as to keep the electrical connections dry. I found an intact 20 gallon fish tank outside in my huge stack of aquariums and decided to try that. I placed the aquarium within a larger metal tub serving as a back-up resevoir should the aquarium break due to too rapid of a molecular expansion during the heat up process.
Next I brainstormed over a floatation device for the electrical plug end so as to keep it out of the water to prevent a short out. I knew it had to be something highly resistant to hot water as I expected the water to reach 210 degrees or so. It wasn't long before I decided on an upside-down, medium sized coffee can. I drilled some tiny holes near it's opening and ran baling wire to the base of the heating coil, securing it tightly. Next I nearly filled the aquarium with very hot tap water and placed the ugly contraption in the tank, centered, and away from the sides. Under the low end of the coil I fashioned a wire mesh "sling" so as to keep the coil from contacting the glass bottom directly. I plugged it in and watched.
The damn thing worked TOO good! Before even 5 minutes the water was roiling and clouds of hot vapor billowed out of the top of the tank. I sat and watched this thing for a few hours just to make sure that the glass wouldn't crack and that it would function without mishap. Everything worked perfectly. The water evaporated at about a gallon every 2 hours. The coffee can floatation device worked flawlessly, allowing the coil to drop as the water level quickly lowered.
The humidity in the room, which had dropped to below 50%, was up to 75% within 3 hours. I then had to hook this contraption to a timer and I am still calibrating it. I turn it off completely when I leave or sleep as it is what I would consider to be a potentially unsafe device. But man,. when I need quick humidity,.. I got it!
[Disclaimer for the sake of my secret admirer/stalker/obsessed internet critic/official forum 'hall monitor', as she would undoubtedly take this post as such that I was suggesting that every herper make one of these immediately and thus have reason to accuse me of giving lousy advice, lol....
Disclaimer: I am in no way, shape or form suggesting that ANY person, herper or otherwise, take this post as actual advice to construct, fashion, erect or build such a device as described above as it is a potential fire hazzard and thus a possible health and safety risk.]
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"If I had 365 enemies it would only take a year out of my life to settle all scores." Mia Miselfani
. Heck, last night at about 4:30 I suddenly got a vision of an ideal, fully contained rabbit facility that can be built for under 1000 dollars and houses approximately 100 adult rabbits. I stayed up until 8am illustrating it. It's perfect in every way. I can't wait to build it. Incidentaly, anyone in the So Cal area,.. I am getting rid ALL of my out door rabbit hutches that are all equiped with auto-water systems and huge feeder bins. There are a number of individual hutches or cage systems each with between 5 and 15 cages per unit totalling over 75 individual rabbit cages. They're great cage systems, but I want something better now. Email me if you want them at BrianSmithReptiles@hotmail.com