Under Tank Heating Setup... How?

Recently my father was given an old display tank a gentleman had converted into a snake tank. The tank is six feet long (give or take a few inches) and roughly two feet wide. It is welded on a metal frame with lags of the same. The floor of the tank had been a sheet of plywood and has rotted. Under the floor of the tank are two drawers that are part of the tanks base.

My dad has removed the rotted wood and cleaned the tank up for the most part but now we are wondering how to do heating for the bottom of the tank. The tank is going to be home to two adult ball pythons. They won't be given access to one another, there will be a divider set in the middle so they will each have their own three foot two enclosure. The problem we are having is figuring how to do the necessary under-tank heating. Before anyone suggests using lamps and bulbs, we had that set up for the one ball python for a while and he was unhappy with this arrangement to say the least. So how would someone propose we heat this tank?

Please let me know your thoughts and have a good new year. Please and thank you.

Is the floor still going to be wood? If so how thick?

This is how I have the flexwatt on my divided PVC cages. As long as the floor of the cage can be heated through it should just be a matter of using foil tape to attach the flexwatt and making sure that the thermostat probe is in between the floor of the cage and the flexwatt.

http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...s/IMG_0439.jpg

If the floor cannot be heated through then you might want to look into Radiant Heat panels. These are mounted to the ceiling of the cage and radiate heat down. They do not effect the humidity in the cage and will probably be the easiest/safest way to heat the cage if flexwatt cannot be attached to the outside bottom of the cage.

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Originally Posted by The Serpent Merchant

Is the floor still going to be wood? If so how thick?

This is how I have the flexwatt on my divided PVC cages. As long as the floor of the cage can be heated through it should just be a matter of using foil tape to attach the flexwatt and making sure that the thermostat probe is in between the floor of the cage and the flexwatt.

http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...s/IMG_0439.jpg

If the floor cannot be heated through then you might want to look into Radiant Heat panels. These are mounted to the ceiling of the cage and radiate heat down. They do not effect the humidity in the cage and will probably be the easiest/safest way to heat the cage if flexwatt cannot be attached to the outside bottom of the cage.

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Just to clarify, with a PVC tank you would use EITHER RHPs or UTHs NOT BOTH??? For my new tanks that should be here in two days, I bought Helix RHP's with a thermostat…..wasn't sure if I should also have UTHs.

Thanks for all of your help in other posts :)

Happy New Year!!

I have the same setup, I use both flexwatt and two rhp's, one on each side of the divider.

http://i1250.photobucket.com/albums/...1/DSCF0732.jpg


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Originally Posted by Ldag32

Just to clarify, with a PVC tank you would use EITHER RHPs or UTHs NOT BOTH??? For my new tanks that should be here in two days, I bought Helix RHP's with a thermostat…..wasn't sure if I should also have UTHs.

Thanks for all of your help in other posts :)

Happy New Year!!

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I use both in my PVC enclosures.

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Originally Posted by Bobbafett

I use both in my PVC enclosures.

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Thermostat for UTH and RHP's I imagine?

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Originally Posted by Bobbafett

I use both in my PVC enclosures.

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Thermostat for UTH and RHP's I imagine?

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Originally Posted by martin82531

I have the same setup, I use both flexwatt and two rhp's, one on each side of the divider.

http://i1250.photobucket.com/albums/...1/DSCF0732.jpg


Sent from my iPhone 5 using Tapatalk

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Beautiful setup! You use thermostats for both RHPs and the Flexwatt??

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Originally Posted by Ldag32

Beautiful setup! You use thermostats for both RHPs and the Flexwatt??

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Yes I use a Herpstat 1 for my flexwatt and since I already had them from a previous setup, I use two hydrofarm thermostats for my RHP's.


Sent from my iPhone 5 using Tapatalk

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Ldag32

Just to clarify, with a PVC tank you would use EITHER RHPs or UTHs NOT BOTH??? For my new tanks that should be here in two days, I bought Helix RHP's with a thermostat…..wasn't sure if I should also have UTHs.

Thanks for all of your help in other posts :)

Happy New Year!!

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You can use either or both. It really depends on the cage itself and the room that the cage is in.

We aren't quite sure what we are going to use as the floor but we were thinking maybe something other then wood for the simple fact it would likely rot again when exposed to water from misting and spills from the water container. Also it has to be basically leak proof so as not to drip water into the drawers below the tank itself.