Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hows using the heat cable?

Bob.

It's really worked out well, and the timing was good. I got in a shipment of G. janseni that I was told were "large hatchlings". Turns out they were more like small subadults and just a bit large for the sweater boxes I had setup for them. So my impulse purchase worked out quite well

It's nice to have such a secure rack for a species that is so good at escaping.

Regarding the heat cable, I wasn't asking it to do much since my room is heated. However, the thermostat I use for the room heaters failed while I was out of town and it was pretty cold by the time I got back. I think it was about 55*. Cold enough that some of the snakes in the other racks had regurgitated. Those racks are heated with rope light run full blast.

The animals in the Vision rack were much more active than the specimens in the rest of my racks. I was sort of freaking out setting up a space heater so I did not bother to take separate temperatures. But they were clearly warmer.

So I'm pretty impressed with the heat cable and not so confident in my next out of town trip.

But to get to the heat cable - I like it! I will use it on all of my DIY projects from now on.
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Current snakes:

0.2 Gonyosoma oxycephala - (Silver/Yellow)

3.3 Gonyosoma oxycephala - (Green)

2.1 Gonyosoma janseni - (Black)

3.3 Gonyosoma janseni - (Black & Tan)

Hi Chris,
I got one of the racks too. In regards to the heat cable, are you using the thermostat? I'm ordering another cb70 vision rack and I'm going to make a medium rack on my own. I discovered iris tubs in Bed,Bath and Beyond. Just for the record, I was there with my wife.

Frank

Hi Frank,

No, just a dimmer. When I set it up as my quarantine rack and am relying mostly on the cable for heat I'll buy another thermostat.

I'm going to order two more levels for my Vision CB-80 rack. I have six levels on my current rack and I think four is as high as I want. Two more levels and I'll have two, four-level racks.

Just an FYI about building your own CB-70 rack. The box is of a size that does not allow for the most efficient use of material, at least the typical 4'x8' sheet material. You might closely figure out what you'll need to spend before you start.

Of course having leftover material is not always a bad thing
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Current snakes:

0.2 Gonyosoma oxycephala - (Silver/Yellow)

3.3 Gonyosoma oxycephala - (Green)

2.1 Gonyosoma janseni - (Black)

3.3 Gonyosoma janseni - (Black & Tan)

np

Posted by: chris_harper2 at Sat Apr 9 15:38:23 2005 [ Report Abuse ] [ Email Message ]

It's really worked out well, and the timing was good. I got in a shipment of G. janseni that I was told were "large hatchlings". Turns out they were more like small subadults and just a bit large for the sweater boxes I had setup for them. So my impulse purchase worked out quite well

I thought as a whole they didnt retain heat as well/harder to heat than other plastic type enclosures. You dont find that to be the case?
They are nice looking.

>>I thought as a whole they didnt retain heat as well/harder to heat than other plastic type enclosures.

Heat retention and how efficient a rack or cage is to heat are not necessarily related. In fact cages/racks that don't hold heat as well are more efficient to heat when you consider that ambient room heat is more efficient than individual cage heat, at least for medium to large sized collections.

For example, you could use ten 60 watt bulbs to heat ten cages that retain heat well. That would be total of 600 watts.

But with a 600 watt space heater you could heat several times more of the same sized cages in an average sized room. You would still need some wattage for thermal gradiants but the total energy would be much, much less on a wattage-per-cage-basis.

So in that regard cages that don't hold heat as well are the most efficient and easiest to heat. Why? Because there is less total thermal mass to be heated. This is most pronounced in situations where night time temperature drops are needed for a particular species - like those in my signature. And obviously in a medium to large sized collection.

As herpers we don't realize that there are (at least) two extremes of heating efficiency we need to worry about. For a smaller collection, say 6 specimens or so, we are better off with cages or racks that retain heat well and then heating them indvidually.

But the collection does not need to be much larger for that to no longer work. In fact we would be better off with cages that are not insulated as well (i.e. are poor heat retainers) and using ambient room temperatures to provide the majority of the heat for our animals.

I've oversimplified this a bit, but I hope that anyone reading this can realize that there are multiple factors that determine the most "efficient" way to heat a reptile collection.

>>You dont find that to be the case?

Well in my case I was not comparing my Vision rack to a plastic rack.

I have two racks that hold the CB-80 box. My Vision rack and a rack I made from hollow-core doors show below:

This rack is pretty well insulated. The sides are melamine, the back is pegboard covered with Reflectix insulation. The bottom is also covered with Reflectix insulation.

The top is not insulated but the air-space in the HC door is large enough that the very top of my rack directly over the heat source is the exact same temperature as the surrounding room temp. That suggests a well insulated rack.

The heat source is rope-light run full blast along the back of the boxes. Surface temperatures is about 105*.

So I can only say that during the episode where my room heater failed the hot spot of my Vision rack was warmer than my insulated rack made from HC doors.

It is hardly an apples to apples comparison. Most of the difference is probably due to the thermal mass between each tub on the Vision rack and the differences between back and sub-floor heat. But I'm certainly glad my valuable G. janseni were in the Vision rack and not my DIY rack.
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Current snakes:

0.2 Gonyosoma oxycephala - (Silver/Yellow)

3.3 Gonyosoma oxycephala - (Green)

2.1 Gonyosoma janseni - (Black)

3.3 Gonyosoma janseni - (Black & Tan)

Thank you very much.