Flexwatt and Reptichip

So my Reptichip finally came in. Seems the heat is now a few degrees lower (after 1 day) than when I had paper towels. I run flexwatt under my tubs. I'm wondering if I'm doing something wrong, I upped my thermostat a few degrees and seems to help and I didn't put a lot of reptichip down either, just enough so you don't see the plastic bottom. The temp is now in the 85 to 87 range when I use my heatgun on the area above the flexwatt. Ambient is around 78.

The substrate shouldn't have any impact on the surface temperature of the tub. Is it still within the couple of degrees of where it was before? If so, I'd chalk it up to the accuracy of the temp gun - most of them are +/- a degree or two anyway.

Yes that hasn't changed, but I meant to say the surface temp of the substrate.

Well of course that's the case, but it's not something you should be worried about. As long as the surface of the tub is the right temperature and you have the thin layer of chip that you described, you're good. The snake will move substrate around and do it's own thing inside the tub.