Reptile & Amphibian Forums

What do you use for backup power for when the power goes out? I only have a couple of herps, a generator is out of the question. I've been looking at getting a large universal power supply (UPS) to keep my UTH going when our crappy electiric company goes down. I was wondering if anyone else had done this and how well it worked, or what would be another option?

Thanks, KC

>>What do you use for backup power for when the power goes out? I only have a couple of herps, a generator is out of the question. I've been looking at getting a large universal power supply (UPS) to keep my UTH going when our crappy electiric company goes down. I was wondering if anyone else had done this and how well it worked, or what would be another option?
>>
>>Thanks, KC

I use a kerosene heater and can heat the whole herp room with it easily. It has come in handy during power outages.
-----
Sonya

Failure is not an option. It comes bundled with the software.

A UPS will work nicely. Add up the total wattage of all heaters for your snakes, and get a UPS rated at least 3x that (or buy 2 smaller units and plug some heaters in one and some in the other.)

The really large expensive units allow adding extra batteries. Its the battery size that gives you the extended uptime when power goes out. Unfortunately, the home PC UPSs that are affordable do not have extra batteries available (ask anyway, maybe there are some now) so the only way to extend uptime is to buy a larger capacity UPS.

Example - You have 200 Watts of snake heater total. The UPS rating can be 400VA, but that small of a unit wouldn't give you much uptime when power went out. If they sold extra batteries, you'd be in business. So, you have to buy a larger UPS to get more uptime. That's why I say for 200 Watts, get a UPS rated at least 600-800 VA, and the bigger the better.

Thanks folks, that makes the decision a lot easier. I had been hesitating a little because I didn't know how well it'll work, but now the UPS will be on the list for the next trip to the computer store.

KC