Ambient Temps ?

[mattchibi]

hey guys
Im having a little trouble keeping up the ambient temps in my BP's tank.

right now the temps have been pretty consistent at:
92-93 F on the undertank heater
80 F on warm side temp at ground level
78 F on cooler side at ground level

Winter is coming where I live, so temps are dropping rapidly. I used to get 92 F on hot spot, 85 F on warm side and 80 F on cooler side no problem (a week ago).

Right now, I have a UTH setup under a hide (hot spot), and an infrared heat lamp above sort of in the middle to control ambient temps. I have this lamp on a dimmer, and Ive only been putting it to about 1/2 of its full brightness. I am afraid that if I crank it all the way up, it will cause the hot spot (where my snake chills all day) to be too hot.

Any suggestions as to how I can achieve warmer temperatures on both the cooler and warmer sides ? Currently I have a space heater in my room, but it doesnt work too efficiently and it only boosts the warm side to 80..

[kitedemon]

The temps you have are fine. Maintaing the same temps as the room ambient temp falls is a balancing act.

There are a number of issues to grapple with. Shape and how it is vented, (is it tall open top or low and side vented for example) How variable the ambient temp is does it drop and stay or bounce all over the place?

Some ideas are to insulate the enclosure so there is lower heat loss. and a bit of a buffer against the cool room temps, you still need to move fresh air in and out too. The other ideas in conjunction is to alter the configuration of the enclosure to something that is side vented if it is not already that will help hold heat in. I have a number of styles of enclosure side turned tanks regular tanks custom made and reptile designed as well as a rack each is unique in the methods used to over come the same base problem you are experiencing. There is no one answer and because something works for me does not mean it will for you.

What kind of enclosure is it? Maybe we can come up with some ideas that might work for you.

[mattchibi]

So as per the instructions from someone I know, I cranked the infrared bulb all the way on the dimmer (it is a 50W) and turned the UTH down on the herpstat to about 91. The new temps I am getting are:

91.9 F above the UTH under the substrate
89.6 F on the warmer side ground level outside the hide
78.7 F on the cooler side ground level

Are these better temps now ? At night, my temps seem to drop too, I will have to do an update later on tonight..

As for the type of enclosure.. I am using a regular 20 gal glass tank with coco husk plantation soil substrate, two identical hides on each side, water bowl in the middle, screen top with a big book cover half of it, infrared heat lamp w/ dimmer on the warm side.

Humidity has been around 60% all week, only today is it floating around 50%.

[kitedemon]

No your cool end temp is way to high you should be seeing what you had before.

78-82 cool end surface temps and 88-92 warm end surface temps and an ambient air temp between 79-85ºF. I understood from your post that you were concerned about falling room temps over the winter moths and that effecting the correct temps you started with. They typically do.