Can I put under tank heaters on my snake rack

[alejandrosantana0420]

Can I put under tank heaters on my snake rack instead of heat watt

[Lizardlicks]

Can you? Yeah, probably. Would you want to? I doubt it. Each pad needs to be regulated by a t-stat and plugged into a power source. Depending on how many slots you've got in your rack, that could be a looooot of plugs to find spaces for, and even the best herpstat on the market can only regulate 4 heat sources at a time. Heat tape is basically one long heat pad that you snake through the whole unit. Only need one good t-stat to regulate temps and one outlet with appropriate wattage output to plug it all into.

[Alicia]

Yes. This is what I do, and my bf built my racks to accommodate them -- my studio can get down into the 60s, so we had to tailor-make something. I use older Herpstat 2s, the ones with multiple plug-ins and all Ultratherm squares or strips for consistency. The tubes do not rest directly on the mats. They hang above them, on the shelves themselves, on drawer rollers, or elevated on a sized flat of plywood that isn't nearly as good or nice to look at.

Each adult rack is only six levels, so each of the Herpstat's outlets is controlling three heaters. It did take time to fine tune, which I spent a few days/maybe about a week doing before I added the snakes, and continue to check that everything is working . . . which, of course, I'd be doing no matter what I was using as a heat source.

So, yeah. I wouldn't say that it's less work than using heat tape, just that it skips having to wire anything yourself. They still need to be regulated and avoid being sandwiched, but can be great if the rack is built with them in mind.

[PitOnTheProwl]

Why does everyone overthink the heat???
All heat mats MUST be the same!!
Plug heat mats into power strip, plug power strip into thermostat, and plug thermostat into the wall.
Place probe on one of the mats and then use a temp gun to check if you have any variance at all.

[JoshSloane]

Commercially produced under tank heaters are basically the same as flex watt, just manufactured with the connections already in place and ready to plug in. There is no reason that you couldn't use these heat mats in a rack, you would just be spending a TON more money on the setup. For what you would spend on one mat, you could buy more than enough flexwatt for the entire rack.

When you are wiring a rack you have a couple options for the flex watt. One solid strip snaked through the enclosure, individual portions of flex watt wired in parallel, or individual portions of flex watt each with their own plug.

What pit is saying is that if you have multiple plugs emanating from the rack, they each need to feed into a common source, usually a surge protector, which is then plugged into the thermostat, so that they are all turned on and all turned off at the same time by the stat.

When you wire in parallel, or snake one piece through, you only have one plug coming from the rack. I usually plug this directly into the thermostat, and then the stat into the surge protector, and then into the wall. This way any electrical surge from the house will be dampened by the power strip.

[alejandrosantana0420]

Thanks you guys so much for all you're advice and information