Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I've recently received my first two Helix DBS1000... I setup my DBS1000 on my rack to control my hotspots... I have a timer cord and a digital programmable timer (3-pin) setup as well for night-time drops.

The folks at Helix (which I will attempt to call on Friday if I can't resolve this before that time.. I doubt I will be able to call them sooner), said that digital timers prefer to have a load on them so I had initially plugged a 4W "night-light". Because things did not work properly, I plugged in a 40W red bulb instead, but this did not rectify the problem.

The problem appears to be that once the timer kicks on at 5pm (to trigger the night-time temperature drop on the hot spots), it seems to be on only for a few hours then it kicks off. If I manually set it back on, it appears to be ok for a little while, but I'm suspecting that doesn't keep the night-time temp drop all night... this is bad because my hotspots are probably too warm at night and all this bouncing around is probably not good for the snakes in the rack

Any input would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks,
Bristen.

Hello,

I run many Helix DBS-1000's in our facility and some of them run off timer cords other off photocells. I always use a cheap and simple analog (dial-type timer) for my night drop cords. They seem to work well. I can understand wanting to be as precise as possible with the times of your drops which can be a little hard with the dial-type timers but it really doesn't matter that much to the snakes. If it is 30 minutes off either way they don't seem to be affected.

I have most of our units hooked up with the photocell that drops the temp when the lights go out. However some of my older Helix units (5-6 years old) don't function with the photocell. Helix was unable to tell me why so I hooked them up with the timer cords and dial-type timers.

I hope you get the problem figured out... no sense confusing all the snakes with off-on-off-on nightime temps!

Good luck...

-----
Sean Bradley
Owner : EbN
www.ExoticsByNature.com
www.BallPythonMorphs.com
www.CornSnakeMorphs.com

Hi Sean,

I was using the digital timer just because I had that one already here... I will try and get a cheap mechanical one. You're the second person to recommend that. What I don't understand is why the digital doesn't work? I think it's not the DBS1000 that's at fault, but probably the timer but I'm not sure what the issue issue. And you are correct, it's no good to the snakes.. so I'll get a mechanical timer within the next few days, hopefully that will correct the issue.

Thanks for the reply!
Bristen.